Wednesday, February 24, 2010

The Bees Knees

Today's Mosaic of Trivia--

Knees

I'm hoping that spring comes soon just because the knees of Toa of Boy's pants are all starting to give out. Every week I do laundry I have to pitch at least one more pair of pants because the knee has been completely shredded. When kind-hearted friends first started giving me clothes for the boy, I thought I had way too many clothes for him. Little did I know that I needed all those clothes and more because boys *destroy* clothes. It's maybe part of the y-chromosome, need to be continuously prepping for battle or something. At any rate, I stuff his drawers with clothes, and then keep at least one more bag of clothes in the closet to replace pants as they wear out....and I'm still running out of clothes by the end of one season.

Tape Measure

I think I've lost the Jedi's tape measure. Don't tell the Jedi ;) I briefly considered blaming the boy just so I would avoid getting in trouble. But then the boy woke up, came into the living room in a pair of pants with a huge hole in the knee, and snuggled up next to me on the couch. Even I type this, there he is, looking up at me with those big, dark eyes that just melt my heart. So plan B is let's replace the tape measure with a new one from Walmart and hope the Jedi doesn't notice.

Portrait of Insanity

Why is it that when I lose something, my search eventually deteroriates into looking in impossible, ridiculuous locations? I had the tape measure in the master bedroom. I was measuring the bed, so I could price fabric and sheets to determine if it would be cheaper to buy sheets or to buy fabric over the internet to make my own sheets. Therefore I naturally started my search in the bedroom. No tape measure. I started opening clothing drawers. Still no tape measure. I went into the closet room/server room. No tape measure. I sifted through the clutter on my desk. No tape measure. I came up stairs and looking in the cabinet that houses my sewing machine. No. I sat there, staring at the sewing machine cabinet and wondering where else I could look. My next logical thought? The freezer. That's right. The freezer. I didn't look in the freezer. I came and blogged instead.

Love/Hate

We couldn't log on to school yesterday. I don't know why. Sweetling wasn't disappointed. That makes for an easy day for both kids, since it halves the lessons we have access too. I'm proud to say that I didn't give up to play Zelda. I did phonics and math with a reluctant boy, threatening with the loss of all he holds dear if he didn't co-operate (beautiful portrait of home-schooling in action). And I did laundry. And worked on the Rez script for Easter. And made pancakes. And watched Olympics. See, I told you I didn't have a problem ;)

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Signs that you MIGHT be playing too much Wii

1. You're six year old can't read the word "turtle", but instantly recognizes the word "koopa".

2. The same six year old could spell the word Wii before he could spell his own name.

3. You find yourself explaining scripture verses to your children by making analogies to various video games.

4. The word "boss" means a big creature that you have to fight at the end of a level.

5. At church, Awana jewels aren't "earned", they are "unlocked".

6. Wii music is your primary music curriculum for your homeschool.

7. Other families with multiple children spend their Saturday's working out transportation to soccer games and other activities while your major scheduling headaches come from trying to regulate equal turns on the Wii.

8. As an adult, your biggest achievement for the week is completing the Temple of Time without dying even once.

9. A dream of walking through a beautiful redwood forest comes complete with floating heart icons.

10. You really hoping Nintendo comes out with a line of Edu-Wii-cation products so you can use the Wii for school work.

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Winter Indoors

I am not the only mother with a small boy cooped up in the house. In fact, I've enjoyed reading other mother's blogs and telling myself, it could be worse. Yeah, I'm that snide.

We have two feet of snow on the ground outside. I'm not exaggerating. While Toa of Boy loves to go out and play in the snow, there's also a lot of time when he is stuck indoors. For sanity's sake, here's a list of activities I've been trying over the last few weeks to keep Toa of Boy "constructively" active. (In other words, Toa needs an outlet for his activity, and ONE of the two of us is going to find creative ways to release that energy. Far better for it to be the Mommy who is the creative activities director.)

Here's our list so far:

Trampoline in the living room. This is still our most effective energy outlet. We don't have a coffee table, we have an exercise trampoline. Toa of Boy stands and just jumps continually on it while watching PBS or while playing Wii. Don't ask me how he bounces up and down while playing a video game which is run on a motion detector, but he does....and he still kicks my butt. According to the internet, which is never ever wrong, 5 to 8 minutes of jumping on the trampoline is equal to running a mile. Toa of Boy completes a mini-marathon every day.

Active Life Outdoor Challenge Yeah, we're totally dependent on electronics in our house. If you have a Wii and young boys, I strongly recommend this game. Toa of Boy and I play this nearly every morning between 7:30 and 8. I work up a sweat. So does Toa of Boy. Plus, he takes great pleasure in beating me at the log leaper. The game requires a floor mat, and its a good cardio workout. For Toa, its fun and competitive.

Bouncy Ball Keep Away A Mommy invention. This is good for 15 minutes of activity in the middle of the day. I set the kitchen timer for 15 minutes and grab a bouncy ball. I hold the bouncy ball up high above the boy's reach, and bounce it. If I can catch it without him intercepting it, I get a point. If he grabs it first, he gets a point. Whoever catches it gets to bounce it next. We play this in the kitchen and the ball goes under the table, out the door, down the stairs, etc. A great deal of energy is expended chasing the ball. And of course, whoever has the most points at the end of 15 minutes wins. Winning is a big thing for the boy. I don't know who he gets that from ;)

Paper Airplane Race This one isn't as popular with the boy, probably because there's no chance to beat Mommy in this activity. It was good for the first time I had him engage in this. I told him, make two of the very best paper airplanes he could. Then I sent him to the top of the stairs to conduct 10 races with the paper airplanes. This had him running up and down the stairs for a little while.

Ball, no chain We homeschool. But, Toa of Boy doesn't sit in a chair at a desk well. (As in, at all. We tried a chair in kindergarten and he used it like a jungle gym.) So, we have replaced the traditional school chair at his little school desk with a large ball (think exercise ball sized). He sits and bounces merrily away while doing his seat work. Score one for the perpetual motion machine. No, it doesn't effect his handwriting and it increases his ability to concentrate on his seat work. So, win-win for the ball at the desk.

Tickle Fights Yeah, yeah, not very creative, but Toa loves them. He especially loves tickle fights with Daddy.

Wrestling with Sweetling Sweetling is a very, very calm quiet child, but every now and then, Toa can manage to get her "wound up". If he initiates something physical, Sweetling has permission to practice the wrestling holds she's been learning in Tae Kwon Do on her brother. They both squeal and giggle a lot during these wrestling matches, so it still counts as good fun. Toa tries to declare a "tie" even after Sweetling has clearly pinned him, and that's the only time these matches are in danger of actually turning into an arguement. That's usually when Mommy has to step in and call them over.

I'm still looking for some other things to do at home with him. Any suggestions would be very welcome.

Monday, February 01, 2010

Charlie Brown

Sometimes I feel like the teacher on Charlie Brown. "Mwah mwa mwa mwah mwa mwah..."

This is from a worksheet Toa was working on on double letters in past tense verbs. The box of word choices at the top of the page held the following verbs: nap, wag, beg, pat, hop. Toa is to read the sentences, select the appropriate verb to complete the sentence, and then write the new word in the sentence.

He had already successfully completed two sentences without any trouble whatsoever.
1. The dog begged for a treat.
2. The dog wagged its tail.

The third sentence is, "Rich _______ the dog's head." Toa reads the sentence, selects the word "pat", and then reads, "Rich pat the dog's head."

"Almost," say I. "The verb IS pat. But we don't say, 'Rich pat the dog's head.' Can you change the verb to show that it already happened?"

"Nap," guesses Toa. "Rich nap the dog's head."

??? say I. "That doesn't make any sense. Pat IS the right word. You just need to change it to make it something that already happened."

"Nap," guesses Toa.

"Are you listening to me? Look at me. You found the right word. It IS pat. You need to change pat."

"Hop," guesses Toa.

"Toa, what did I just say?"

"Wait?" guesses Toa.

Algebra Conundrums

Yes, it's that time again. I have four algebra problems to present. Two of them are word problems. I hate algebra word problems....unless I can draw a diagram. If I can draw a diagram, I'm usually able to figure out the problem. If I can't diagram it, I'm at a loss. Thus, the famous following famous household quote was born....
Me: "What do you have?"
Smurf: "A drawing of a helicopter and a boat. What do you have?"
Me: "A helicopter and a boat."

The two word problems I'm presenting don't even have helicopters, boats, cars, or trains that can be drawn. (Ok, one of them does involve distance and driving times, but really, even I'm not desperate enough to draw a little car by the problem.)

The other two problems I'm presenting I can work when I do them one way, but get the wrong answer if I take a different approach. My question is, why is the "incorrect" approach incorrect? This is needed because Sweetling took the latter approach. I can show her the way I did the problem, which led to the text book answer, but I feel that's rather valueless without also being able to help her understand why the approach she took didn't work. Otherwise, math becomes a rote memorization of steps, and not a critical thinking exercise.

All four problems I'm presenting are from the same lesson on "mixed expressions". We have been learning how to multiply and divide polynomial fractions. We've learned how to find the LCD of polynomial fractions, to rewrite them as equivalent fractions using the LCD and then to add and subtract polynomial fractions. The textbook given objective for this lesson is "to write mixed expressions as fractions in simplest form.

So, c +5c = c2 +5c

(On an unrelated side note, its amazing what the absence of the first backslash in a short series of html tags does. I'm still not quite happy with how my fractions look, but its better than staight typing I suppose.)

And, (x) + (5x + 2x - 1) - (7x - 1)
Eventually equals x +5.

No, I'm not showing my work. I'm having enough headaches with just the html tags for the problems, and I still don't like how they look.

To give myself a break from my sorry html, here are the two word problems:

It took Jan y hours to drive 200km. If she had increased her speed by 10 km/h and driven for 2 h less, how far would she have gone? (Hint: make a chart. Answer in terms of y.)

OH MY GOSH! As I was typing that in, I realized what I missed. Ok, I can do that. You're welcome to do it for fun if you'd like. (If you're wondering, I totally missed the "answer in terms of y." I think that should have been part of the problem, not part of the hint underneath the problem that I didn't pay close enough attention to. Here's the second one, though if they just want an answer in terms of a variable, I can totally do that. I was thinking that they actually wanted me to solve the problems. My attempts to come up with a numerical solution were extrodinarly circular and frustrating. Now I know why. Duh.

Ted bought n rolls of film for a total of $40. He then sold all but 2 of them for $1 more per roll than he paid. How much did he receive for the rolls of film that he sold?

Now that I've embarrassed myself with the word problems, I'll move on to the second set of algebra conundrums.

Here's the problem:

( a+ba - 1)(ab +1)

If we add the fractions in parenthesis first and then multiply, we get the textbook answer. If we FOIL first and then add fractions, we do not. Is this just a matter of order of operations?

Here's the next problem:

(9- 1x2) / (3x-1)

When the problem is rewritten as:

(9x2-1x2) (13x-1)

The correct answer can be reached after some factoring and simplifying.

But, when the problem is rewritten as:
(9x2-1x2)(13x - 3x3x)

--in other words, when the individual terms of the second part of the expression are inverted rather than the whole term being inverted-- The correct answer is not reached. So, the question is, why should the whole term be inverted rather than inverting the terms and then combining them. "Don't do it that way; do it this way," isn't a very satisfactory answer.

To recap, I know longer need help on the word problems, but you are free to work them for yourselves for fun if you'd like. But, I really do need some clearly worded explanations for the last two problesms. I know how to do them, and did them correctly, but I don't know how to explain why the second approach for each problem didn't work. That's where I need help.

Finally, here are the answers for all four problems.

Don't read this far if you want to work the problems first ;)

The answer to the first word problem is:

distance = 10y2 + 180y - 400

The answer to the second word problem is:

$ (n2+38n-80n)


The answer to the third problem is:

a+ba

The answer to the fourth problem is:

3x+1x2

Thanks for your help!