Susan S on Facebook

One problem I had was with my special ed son. He is very "young" even though he's grown. He mostly likes coupons and anime, and kid stuff, so I never worried about him and rarely checked.

Well, I noticed one day that he had a couple of men that he barely knew that were his new "friends". They were friends of friends of friends, or so the story goes. He really didn't know them. Well, they were engaging him (trying to set up a meet) that was disturbing to me. He was uncomfortable, too, so he did unfriend them and refused to answer. But I was surprised that he had allowed them in.

If a photo gets tagged, you can get it untagged, but if it has gone out to a bunch of people, I don't think you can get it back. So, someone can have a picture of you that you have no control over, and then tag it and send it to many.

Another time, and I think this was Yahoo and not FB, I was alerted that a friend of mine had commented at some blog. It even showed me her comment. I asked her if she knew about it and she said no. We both had to change our privacy settings (and the rest of our family's) to stop it. Again, I think that was Yahoo.

Someone out there probably knows more than me, but those were just a few of my experiences.

summer reading assignments

SusanS:

My son's list for incoming freshman (honors and regular) was a choice of three little books. He picked one and we ordered it. When it arrived, he read it in one day, then went back to the other more interesting books he was readiing.

Pathetic.

SusanS

anonymous:

Our high school insists on using the same reading list for honors and regular and there are only 2 tracks. The Honors class simply assigns 1 or 2 more from the same weak list.

They must not teach different material in the Honors classes so they require science fair participation or a research paper (not corrected for grammar) to justify the Honors points.

How unsurprising that the school's stated purpose is to close the achievement gap.

The saddest part is that this focus simply reenforces that what kids can be is coming from the home, not the school. The well educated, attentive parents can buy better math and science textbooks, pick out better books for summer reading, and hire tutors to teach grammar.

In the school's emphasis to obtain "equity" by just assigning work within the grasp of most kids, they perpetuate inequities and take away education as the avenue to move beyond the circumstances you were born into.

Susan S:

Seriously, even the regular English track can handle more than one naval-gazing coming of age mini-book.

The natives are restless.

bad day

glumbert - Bad Day at the Office

Susan S sent this --

Mathcounts Help Needed

Okay, my math kid has been working on his practice sheets for the upcoming Mathcounts competition next year. He seems to be doing great with the practice problems, but the warm-ups sometimes seem harder.

I'd love to help, but as many of you know, I am the resident Math Phobe of KTM. With the husband out of town, you are my only hope to helping him with this one particular problem. I have a feeling it is something really obvious.

Here it is:

"The sum of two numbers is 32, and the product of these two numbers is 48. What is the sum of the reciprocals of the two numbers? Express your answer as a common fraction."

I have the answer sheet, but no explanation on the best way to approach this.

Any and all help would be appreciated. Speak slowly, though....although the kid will probably understand what you're saying.

SusanS

ditto that

from Susan S:

My favorite grade school assignments are when they have to write something and are told to use the Internet for "research." They can't scan, they can't extrapolate a main idea, they can't summarize, but they are told to use the vast world of the Internet before they put together their assignment.

I'm beginning to appreciate our little World Book and Britannica encyclopedias.

As it happens, Lynn G gave me this recommendation just a couple of days ago:

I like the Volume Library from Southwestern. It's almost better than an encyclopedia, as it is arranged by topic, not alphabetically. It is designed to give you all of the background knowledge for a k-12 curriculum in 3 volumes. The reproducible maps are almost worth the price all by themselves.

That one's going on the credit cards pronto.

Susan's test post

test!

Susan S on her summer writing program

Well, I'll just tell you what I'm using for my 6th grader this summer. Some stuff may be appropriate for your child, but you would have to make the call.

The first thing I ordered this summer that I really like a lot is The Paragraph Book by Dianne Tucker-LaPlount. I got Book 1. It targets structure, but in a clear way (compared to the writing program he has been subjected to over the last couple of years.)

Another book I have been using is Writing Skills by Diana Hanbury King, book 2. It also does a good, quick job of targeting structural problems, but in a creative way.

Both books lend themselves to the after-schooler better than others. I am thrilled that I've found them.

2 big comprehensive ones that I have are the Shurley Method English Made Easy series (I have level 7.) This is a popular homeschooler text. I like it a lot, but my son is actually quite good at grammar so those sections are too redundant for us right now. What I do like at this point (we're only at the beginning) is the number of little paragraphs that he has to edit. It has that "sheet a day" format that is easier for me to assign as a parent.

Another big comprehensive curriculum is the Hake Grammar and Writing Series. I think it starts at grade 6, but a bright 4th or 5th grader would probably do okay.

These are the Saxon people, so if you're familiar with Saxon you know how to skip things that are mastered. The curriculum (homeschool version) also covers journal writing (in a way that makes sense) paragraph/essay structure, and the preparation a kid needs to write bigger assignments like, gulp, research papers. Typical of Saxon, it makes it all so easy. I love those people. They have saved my life.

I love the Grammar and Writing 7 that I'm using right now. It's clearing up a lot of confusion with my one son.

For stict grammar teaching, you can't beat Steps to Good Grammar by Genevieve Walberg Schaefer. Coherent and to-the-point, this book covers diagramming (as does the Hake) and has the answers on the opposite page. Even though the book is pointed towards middle school or older, I've used it with my grade schooler from the beginning. This book is why he is so good with grammar.

For spelling, I highly recommend Megawords. Catherine uses this series also. Megawords teaches kids the rules that your school won't teach. It's also a great after-school book.

Anyway, that's my 2 cents. Hope some of it helps.


Catherine here --

I mentioned in a Comment that I'm concerned Educators Publishing Service may be phasing out Megawords, but I was wrong, thank heavens. Megawords is featured on the phonics page, not the spelling page, which tells you something about the series.

I think it's been a lifesaver for us, though I have no way of knowing this. What I do know is that C's spelling before he started the series (he's finishing Book 4 this summer) was psychotic, and has now progressed to not great. To my knowledge he's had no instruction in spelling in 6th or 7th grades. In fact, one of his ELA teachers said she told the kids, "Being able to spell won't do you any good if you can't write," or something like that. (Why? Why? Why would you tell my kid who can't spell that spelling won't do him any good if he can't write? aaauuggghhh!)

This teacher, btw, did a great job; she taught the kids a lot and even managed to go over and beyond the curriculum. I've reported the spelling lapse because it's funny, not because it's a fatal flaw in her teaching. The school doesn't teach spelling past 5th grade & that's that. (I'm noodging the new assistant super, but so far she's not sounding interested.)

This is one of my beefs with public schools, or perhaps just another variant on the beef: the indifference to results.

We don't teach spelling after 5th grade.

So if your child hasn't managed to learn to spell by the end of 5th grade, we'll just assume he doesn't need to learn to spell because what he "really" needs to learn is how to write.


update: wrong again (scroll down)

I'm thinking the middle school would be in better standing with parents if it started talking to us about academics and stopped talking to us about character ed and bomb threats.

Or if somebody put up something in the enormous, soaring, two-story foyer taxpayers just built that wasn't a S.A.D.D. poster or a FOCUS word.

Still and all, it's good to know C. spent last year taking spelling tests.