Post #103!

I started this blog in August and did not really expect to cross into triple digits so soon! I am really enjoying getting the voices in my head "out there" in the blogosphere.

The "Real" World

I was discussing homeschoooling with a member of my barbershop chorus, and he said something about the real world. His daughter was homeschooled for a while, incidentally. He agreed with me that real learning that takes place in the real world is the most valuable. I said (& now I am expanding), "I do not want to take my kids out of the real world in the first place. That's what schools do. Nowhere else in the real world will you ever see a bunch of humans of the same age in one place - not to mention against their will. Schools are just not real. They are a relic of the early industrial age pre-occupied with mass-production. You could get any color car as long as it was black, and everybody went through the same "bottling process" called education - 2 parts science, 3 parts math, 5 parts of history and so on. My kids are in the real world, where geography and geometry and history and music and philosophy are all interconnected. It is ironic when people in the school system worry about how homeschoolers will fare in the real world!"

Billy Joel's Greatest Hits has been on a continuous loop in the minivan for a couple of weeks now. Here's a gem from "You're Only Human (Second Wind)":

"So take it from me, you'll learn more from your accidents than anything you could ever learn at school"!

That's the way the real world works.

Supriya's Hovercraft/Spaceship

Supriya got the wonderfully-packaged Lego Designer Set #4348 in her goody-bag at Noah's birthday yesterday. She made a plane and a helicopter from the instruction-booklet yesterday evening. Today she made this cool combination hovercraft/spaceship without any instructions! 

Virtual Math Manipulatives

Utah State University maintains this collection of "virtual math manipulatives". I had fun playing the Fifteen Puzzle. I think Supriya is going to like some of these.

What Is N?

"If 10 - N = 5, what is N?" I asked Supriya. She thought for a couple of seconds, got her mind around the question, a light came on in her eyes and she answered, "5!" We worked with this for a while, I used M instead of N and it looks like she gets the idea of using a place-holder for the unknown entity (I avoided using X because it doubles as the multiplication sign as well.)

Then she gave me a problem, "6 - M = 5". I drew 6 dots and said, "If I take away 1 dot, I get 5 dots, which is what you want - so M is 1." This satisfied her.

Doin' What Comes Naturally

I was at the piano singing "Doin' what comes from Naturally" from Annie get your gun. Aseem and Supriya would chime in on the repeat of the chorus. Then it struck me (and Manisha too, quite independently). That's what we have for our educational philosophy!

Now we call ourselves unschoolers. It's a rather unfortunate name that has stuck. It's trying to describe a process or a philosophy in terms of what it is not. So here's a better term for it: we "do what comes naturally". Thanks to Irving Berlin for that!

I am working on expanding this into a whole article using insights from Prof. Martin Seligman ("Authentic Happiness") and John Buckingham ("Now Discover Your Strengths").

We're in the Ring...

We are officially a part of the Unschooling Web-Ring. Click on the links under the blue rectangle to the right.

Supriya's Musical Progress

Supriya has known the notes to several songs on the keyboard for quite a while - "Twinkle, twinkle, little star," "Mary had a little lamb" and even "Luck be a lady tonight". She could sing the songs perfectly in tune and rhythm, but when it came to playing them on the piano or the keyboard, that rhythm went out the window! I guess she was so focused on getting the notes right (which she did) that rhythm fell by the wayside. Her dexterity has also grown with age. Yesterday and again today she played Twinkle and Mary at a good and steady tempo.

Lately she has taken to drumming with a stick in the car. So we are in the car listening to Billy Joel's Greatest Hits, and she is drumming along. The beginner's tendency is to bang on every syllable. Supriya has gone past that and is drumming a steady beat now.

Her singing has also improved a lot. Now I can sing harmony with her and she does not budge from her melody a bit. Her sense of pitch is excellent, and it's a pleasure to sing with her. Now if I can only get her to sing more!

Annie and Frank!

 
That's Annie Oakley and Frank Butler, in case you missed it. Supriya has recently watched 2 video documentaries about Annie, who is of course a great role-model for a girl. We also have "Annie Get Your Gun," that fabulous musical loaded with Irving Berlin's hits. Yesterday when Supriya was pretending to be Annie, Aseem became Frank. Today we are playing at home on this cold and grey day before Thanksgiving and the kids decided to dress up. I just love the ringside seats!
 

Math Fact Triangles

Supriya likes to do math, both oral and on paper. I tried the addition triangle a while ago, but it did not stick. Now she is really getting it. Today I tried division with her as the inverse of multiplication, and she understood the concept. She worked with her abacus and that helped also. She could easily see that (4 times 3) is the same as (3 times 4). She could do (12 divided by 3) to get 4, but then had to again spend time figuring out that (12 divided by 4) is 3. These two operations also lead to their own type of triangle and that intrigued her as well.

What's the Difference between a Turtle and a Tortoise?

I wondered out aloud and Supriya said, "I know, I know. Turtles don't race!"

Movie-star Aseem

"I am a movie-star!", declared Aseem as he put on the shades and got on Supriya's back for a piggyback ride. No idea where that came from!

Tessellations

Here's my first-ever tessellation (a collection of plane figures that fill the plane with no overlaps and no gaps). We were at the library and I happened across this video called "Tessellations: How to create them" by Jim McNeill (produced by Crystal Video). Both Manisha and I are fans of M.C. Escher, who created many great tessellations. I thought Supriya might also be intrigued by the concept since she is into cutting-and-pasting, so I borrowed the video (it's only 23 minutes anyway). I was right, and Supriya was hooked. Today I decided to make my own tessellation. Supriya was interested in the beginning, but lost interest soon. We might make another one later, hopefully with her help...

Supriya's Latest Creation

Manisha came back from India yesterday. As we were driving back from the airport, Supriya said she had a surprise gift for each one of us. This is what had made. She took four pieces of corrugated cardboard, "washed" them with water using a paintbrush and drew the pictures & our names with crayons - entirely her own idea. It has a unique look and texture. Perhaps she should patent the process...
 

$118 Donuts

Our friend Suzanne stopped by in the morning to say hi. It turned out that her brother Daniel was going to "come by" in his 4-seater plane to pick up donuts that he forgot to pick up. Suzanne invited us to go with her to Lawrence to meet Daniel and see the plane and maybe even get a ride! We jumped at the opportunity and went to the Lawrence Municipal Airport in the afternoon. Daniel was waiting for us. Suzanne had several things for him in addition to the donuts and he took them with him to put into the "trunk" of the plane, which was behind the passengers' seats.

Then, like we had hoped he would, he asked us if we would like to go for a ride. Aseem and Supriya were thrilled. Daniel had some concerns about the fuel (he had too much) and Aseem panicking and not enough room and the balance of the plane not being right etc. The upshot was that Supriya went up by herself with him. They taxied to the runway and we watched them take off & circle the airport. A few minutes later they landed. Supriya had this look of wonderment on her face. She really loved the ride. They saw the twists & turns of the Merrimack River underneath and also Boston on the horizon. Then it was Aseem's and my turn. I sat in the back & Aseem sat in the front. He was thrilled & not at all afraid. Again Daniel took us up in the sky and around the airport. The ride was so good, Aseem fell asleep in the plane!

Later we went over the Suzanne's for dinner. She had made some excellent bai char (Cambodian fried rice).

Oh and about the $118? Daniel mentioned that that's how much Avgas he filled into the plane, just to fly out and pick up the donuts!

"Charlott's Web" Done

We just got done with "Charlotte's Web." We've been reading one chapter every night at Supriya's bedtime, and it took forever to finish the book. Very enjoyable though. Supriya has seen the movie and knew the story. "Stuart Little" is next in line...

Details of the Turkey Tail Mushroom

Isn't that beautiful! I Googled "Turkey Tail mushroom," and learnt several things: this mushroom has some medicinal properties ("U of M Receives Funding to Investigate Turkey Tail Mushroom Effect on Immune Response") and you can spend a boatload of money to buy the extract of this mushroom in pill-form.

Another Robot by Supriya

Supriya's latest "Advanced" construction from her Lego robot kit. It's a pleasure to watch her zip through the instructions. Her sense of 3-D objects is better than mine and she plows her way through the process very confidently now.

Tophet Chasm Hike

We came across this gorgeous mushroom on the Tophet Chasm hike in Littleton yesterday. It was another wonderful and sunny day for a hike, like so many we've had this Fall. We came across a whole colony of mushrooms of 4 different types. Christina Anderson-Hoke was prepared with her handy-dandy mushroom guide. This one was easily identifiable as "Turkey Tail." Aseem started coughing & wheezing about halfway through the hike and I had to carry him the rest of the way, which is unusual for him. I feared an asthma attack was imminent and we rushed through the rest of the hike, getting lost & then cutting our way through the chasm. We came back home & I gave him his neb-treatment. He needed one more at night, but it did not lead to a full-blown attack.

Another highlight of the hike was the view of Boston. It was a clear day and we could see the two tallest buildings in Boston with the naked eye. Christina's binoculars helped identify them as the Huntington Towers and the Prudential building. 

At Hadley Park

We have had a couple of very nice, sunny and unseasonably warm past two days. We were at the Hadley Park playground both afternoons. We bumped into our neighbors Benjamin and his dad Steve. Aseem had a great time playing with Ben. Somebody (the City of Lowell perhaps?) had left a bunch of trucks there and they played with them for a while. Then they had a lot of fun carrying the trucks up the playstructure and sending them down the slides to watch them crash.

As usual, Supriya was busy making new friends and running around & playing tag with them. Here are two of her "old" friends (by old she means she has played with them before; she does not even know their names!), 2 brothers ages 6 and 7. For some reason the three of them have always hit it off...

Candle See-Saw Science Experiment

We were at the Lucas's for our Tuesday playdate when the candles on the table reminded me of this experiment from many years ago. It's very simple, easy to setup and fun to watch. Here are a couple of pictures of the see-sawing candle. The see-sawing is not very intuitive and you have to think the process through to understand it.

Unschooling Blogs Web Ring

I am a part of this Web Ring now. You can use the navigation under the blue Unschooling Blogs rectangle (on the side-bar to the right) to check out other blogs in the Ring. This whole blog revolution has unleashed a tremendous amount of creativity on the Web - as is evident on this particular Ring. I love it!

The Elephant's Child

We borrowed this little gem of an audio-cassette from the library and have listened to it twice in the van. It's Rudyard Kipling's story of how the elephant got its trunk, narrated just perfectly by Jack Nicholson. Bobby McFerrin provides a wonderful musical backdrop. Highly recommended...

More Math with Supriya

Supriya got up in the morning, had her cup of milk, sat down on the couch with a paper-pad and a pen and was writing down stuff for a while. A little while later she showed me what she wrote. It was a page full of equations as follows:
"51 - 51 = 0
41 - 41 = 0
31 - 31 = 0
21 - 21 = 0
11 - 11 = 0
10 - 10 = 0
9 - 9 = 0
8 - 8 = 0
7 - 7 = 0
6 - 6 = 0
5 - 5 = 0
4 - 4 = 0
3 - 3 = 0
2 - 2 = 0
1 - 1 = 0"

Her triumphant expression showed me the sense of mastery she felt writing down all these equations that result in 0, as if to say, "I am so powerful, I can cut any number down to size!"

I wanted to build on that sense of mastery and gave her an oral problem, "Instead of 5 minus 5 equals 0, if we want 5 minus Something equals 1, what is that Something?" "4," came the answer right back. (Pretty soon I will start saying X instead of Something and see if she can handle it.)

"7?" "6."
"15" "14."
"45?" "44!"
"95?" "94!"

Supriya has built a strong intuitive foundation for her math with very little input from us, in true unschooling fashion.

Another Fall Hike

We went for a wonderful hike at the Thanksgiving Forest yesterday with Noah, Diane and Karl. It was a cold Fall day and most of the trees had shed most of their leaves. It was also our first day of season of wearing our parkas. It was quite nice and warm as long we kept moving.


We found several clusters of mushrooms like these, which surprised me. I thought it would be a little too cold. I guess life goes on in many different ways even through winter...

Reading Rainbow

This series of videotapes has caught Supriya's fancy. They pick a topic of interest to kids, find a few related books and build a show by actually going to the sites. LeVar Burton (of Star Trek fame) narrates the shows. They are fun to watch and get into the details of a lot of things. We got "Simon's Book" yesterday from the library and she has already watched it twice. It is about how a book is physically manufactured, the actual printing & binding etc. We borrowed a couple of them recently (one about fireworks and another about making pizza called "Little Nino's Pizzeria") and the kids watched them over and over again. Even Aseem could relate to those, which is a good sign.

Rogers and Astaire

We love watching old musicals and recently bought the newly released 5 DVD pack of Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire musicals. They are such a treat! Fabulous dancing and great chemistry between Fred and Ginger. I am really enjoying watching Ginger. She has such style and sass. Supriya is into it too. It is also fun to cross-reference all the actors - the secretary in this movie is that lady in the other movie, and the valet in this movie is the dance school owner in that one etc. Supriya has been building a huge database of these musicals in her head. I won't be surprised to see her major in film history some day...

Elvis

I borrowed Elvis, The Great Performances from the library as a part of our musical and cultural education. It's a 90-minute video hosted by Priscilla Presley. Lots of great songs, including the music video (apparently the first one ever) of "Jailhouse Rock" which indeed rocks! Supriya watched it a couple of times, which surprised me - I did not think the songs would hold her interest. I aked her what she thought of Elvis and she said, "He sings much better than you do!"

Manisha Leaves for India

Manisha left for India yesterday to visit family and to attend the opening of her sister's & brother-in-law's hospital in Nagpur. The longest (& the only time actually!) she has been away from the kids is 2 nights, so this trip at 12 days is a record. The whole day yesterday Aseem was in a panic about her trip and kept asking questions. "So is Mommy coming back in the van with us?" "Are we going to walk back from the airport?" "Are Daddy, Supriya and I going to go back together?" I thought he was going to fall to pieces when Manisha passes the checkpoint. But he did not. All those questions he had been asking were building up the story in his mind, and the upcoming calamity was contained & put in a safe, manageable box. It was not going to be the end of the world after all.

Supriya had one bout of crying the previous night. "I am bored and I want to go somewhere fun. We never go anywhere! I want to go to India with mommy!" She was fine once she got that out of her system. She is going to be a great help to me managing Aseem.

Aseem got up in the morning today and asked, "Where is mommy?" I said, "Remember we dropped her off at the airport last night? She is on her way to India now." And he accepted that and came back to bed. He is getting to be a big boy!

Pogo Stick

We bought this pogo stick for Supriya a number of years ago. It came with "training wheels", which form a frame of sorts to help beginners balance. Unfortunately the training frame did not really work for her and the pogo stick stayed unused. Supriya tried it recently and she got it to work as this photo shows! She has managed 10 bounces once so far...

Walden Pond Hike

We went for a wonderful hike yesterday around Walden Pond. I joked to Karl (the organizer of the hike) that we could count the outing as a field-trip, a history unit, a physical education unit and a science unit if we were into such things. We had 6 families in total and it was a perfect Fall day for a hike. The kids walked the whole 1.7 miles and had enough energy to play in the sand on the beach afterwards. Supriya built a wonderful structure in the sand with several walls, a big hole in the middle and three tunnels. There was a complicated story to go with it too, something about trapping bad guys and making them fall down.

Aseem's "Fishy" Puzzle

Duncan, Jan and Peter gave Aseem this puzzle for his birthday two weeks ago. At 60 pieces and no frame, it was intimidating for him in the beginning. Today I suggested the fishy puzzle and he was ready. He asked for help in a few places, but it was more for moral support, in retrospect. In less than an hour he had completed it!

I continue to be amazed by how long the kids' attention span is when they are engrossed in something that engages them fully. Ordinarily I would not expect either of the kids to spend an hour in one place, but they have shown me that they can indeed do it when the activity has an achievable end-point, yet is sufficiently challenging - in other words, when they are in Flow.