Thanks, all! As performance opportunities have been drastically cut due to COVID, she's been focusing more on composition and arranging. She got word a few months back that a piece she composed for orchestra took 2nd place nationally in the Canada Music Week Student Composer competition (19+ age category) so she was pretty excited about that. 🙂 I'm glad it brightened a few folks' day!

My DD likes to play around with harmonies and make new arrangements for things, particularly hymns as they lend themselves so well to variations on arrangement. She was playing around with her new keyboard and some arranging over the holidays and came up with this. It's just recorded at home so the levels aren't optimized and there's no fancy producing 🙂 but I thought it might brighten someone's day. Hope you enjoy it!

There's also this one: https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210119-covid-19-variants-how-the-virus-will-mutate-in-the-future

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210127-covid-19-variants-how-mutations-are-changing-the-pandemic I found this article to be quite good.

Thanks for the update, Kathy! So glad that things went well and that you're home!

Beautiful, Robin!! I've been watching a few YouTube videos on colouring techniques and I had no idea all the different things one can do with just markers and coloured pencils! The science behind the pigments and the solvent bases and the fillers is SO fascinating!!!

Different surgery but the best thing I did after my total hysterectomy 3 1/2 years ago (vertical incision that went above my belly button - there was a lot of very big... stuff in there to remove) was to get up and walk as soon as I possibly could in the hospital. I held a folded up towel over my tummy incision so that walking wouldn't jiggle the staples (ouch!) and I walked up and down the hallway pulling my IV stand. The nurses always smiled at me so they must have thought it was a good idea. 🙂 It definitely helped the scar tissue to not heal shortened up and I've never had any issues at all with the scar. Other than the fact that my "bikini days" are probably over. Frankly, I never really had any bikini days as a young person so I'm not terribly worried over the scar. 😉 🙂 Calming pre-surgery thoughts headed your way, @Lady Florida.!

I'll be thinking of you tomorrow, @Lady Florida., and sending positive, healing thoughts! Back pain is horrid - I injured my back when I was 17 and it's never been right since - so I absolutely understand and hope you get relief!! ♥

The deer were probably running FROM the geese. Those things are mean, man. Canadian cobra chickens. It's why we're so nice - we channel all our rage into Canada geese. 😉 😄

That's so kind, Kareni! Right now, though, the post from the US to Canada is HORRIBLY slow and everything that comes through seems to get quite banged up during the journey. I have no idea what's going on. I would hate for the lovely postcard to suffer such treatment so I encourage you to send one on to @VickiMNE in my stead. 🙂 Thank you again for the offer and happy colouring, everyone!

Thank you! I use mostly Copic or Winsor & Newton brush markers. They are pricey but the ink goes on incredibly smoothly with absolutely no streaking (i.e. you can't see the "colouring marks" you can usually see with markers). Staedtler markers are also good and not as pricey but you'll still see some streaking. When you're colouring really tiny areas, that won't matter much but you'll see it on larger areas. The Winsor & Newton markers are made in the UK and either their brush markers or their Promarker line are amazing. They're both alcohol-based, permanent markers (as are the Copic ones) so be aware that getting marker on your table or on clothes is going to be harder to clean up than other markers. I find rubbing alcohol is helpful. 🙂 You can buy ink refills for the Copic markers which is nice as it's less expensive than buying a new marker every time one runs out. Both Winsor & Newton and Copic sell their markers individually and in sets which is nice, too. Prismacolor also has good alcohol-based brush markers that don't streak. I buy most of my markers or coloured pencils from Dick Blick - best price around. 🙂 https://www.dickblick.com/categories/drawing/markers/brush/

I mostly colour mandalas and florals. I cannot draw AT ALL 🙂 so I buy books to colour out of. Because I prefer markers, I need books with thick, smooth paper so there isn't any bleeding. I've found that the Mandals to Color books by ColorIt are great for marker colouring: https://www.amazon.ca/ColorIt-Mandalas-Original-Drawings-Anti-Stress/dp/0996511210/ref=sr_1_34?dchild=1&keywords=mandala+color+it&qid=1611608389&sr=8-34 I have zero artist/colour training so I'm basically trying to learn about colours and colour matching right now. 🙂 I've attached a few recent ones I've done (one is still unfinished). I like the intricate ones with tiny spaces to colour. I use mostly Copic or Winsor & Newton brush markers. I love the Johanna Basford books! I find that I can't use markers in them or it bleeds so I need to get out the coloured pencils for those. 🙂 I'm also reading Killers of the Flower Moon (not listening so I can't colour during ;)). An astounding episode in recent history that I knew nothing about.

I finished two books this past week - honestly, since I deactivated my FB account, I'm reading SO much more. And getting other projects started, too. Gah - I never realized how much time I spent on the endless scroll! There were two books in the Miss Read Fairacre series that weren't available for Kindle so I listened to them through Audible. I talked last week about listening to Miss Clare Remembers and this week I listened to Emily Davis. Having finished the latter, I'm now finished with all the Fairacre books. 🙂 I enjoyed them. They were comforting, mild, a bit sarcastic in places, somewhat dated, and they seemed to hit a comfort spot for me. The school in Fairacre reminded me of my own elementary school (not that I went to a one room schoolhouse but I did attend a very small school in a small town and we were probably one of the last to get any new tech or innovations). I'm sad to say goodbye to Fairacre but I'm looking forward to starting on the Thrush Green series. I also finished I Remember You by Yrsa Sigurðardóttir. Very slow burn but I liked it. Everything came to a head at the end. If you get frustrated by books that hold back until the very end, this probably isn't for you but if you like just being fed tiny bits until the very end - go for it! 🙂 I've started listening to Mythos by Stephen Fry through Audible. The audiobook is just over 13 hours long and I've listened to just a bit over 2 hours. His dry commentary is amusing - if you stop to think about it, the story lines in the Greek myths really are borderline absurd. 😉 I don't know how many of the names I'm managing to keep straight in my head (that's where reading vs. listening is far better for me - I would remember the spellings which would better help me to place the different character names) but it's great fun to listen to. I've gotten back into colouring while listening to audiobooks. I feel guilty about it - like maybe there's a more productive hobby I could be doing while listening that would produce useful garments to wear or something - but I've enjoyed colouring since I was a tiny child so to heck with it - a-colouring I shall go. 🙂 Books read in 2021 6. I Remember You by Yrsa Sigurðardóttir *Horror 5. Emily Davis (Fairacre #8) by Miss Read *Fiction (audiobook) With this book, I’ve finished the entire Fairacre series. 🙂 4. A Peaceful Retirement (Fairacre #20) by Miss Read *Fiction 3. Farewell to Fairacre (Fairacre #19) by Miss Read *Fiction 2. Miss Clare Remembers (Fairacre #4) by Miss Read *Fiction (audiobook) 1. Changes at Fairacre (Fairacre #18) by Miss Read *Fiction

I'm curious. 🙂 At what point (what subject) did this quit working for you? I was the same - tested as highly gifted in school, skipped some grades, excellent memory, didn't need to work much. It was upper level chem courses at uni where I hit the wall and figured out that I NEEDED to study. Then I had to learn how. 😉

For comparison (in case anyone wasn't sure what I meant by "intuiting" and "not intuiting" problems :)), here are examples of two problems – one from physics that can probably be figured out through intuition and one from chemistry that cannot. Physics: An engineer is designing the runway for an airport. Of the planes that will use the airport, the lowest acceleration rate is likely to be 3 m/s2. The takeoff speed for this plane will be 65 m/s. Assuming this minimum acceleration, what is the minimum allowed length for the runway? If a student is a very bright math student and even if physics hasn’t been taken yet, the student can probably use the units to figure out what to do and how to solve this question. The rest is just algebra. Chemistry: If 50.0g of hydrogen reacts with 40.0g of oxygen, what mass of water can be produced? Without knowledge of moles, stoichiometry, limiting reactants, common diatomic elements, and combination reactions, there is no way this problem can be solved. I can often tell an “intuition” type of student because they will tell me 90.0g of water can be produced – seems logical. 😉 There is no way that this problem can be "intuited" without knowledge of the chemistry concepts involved.

Interesting side bar... (Yes, I'm derailing my own thread. ;)) I also occasionally teach intro psych and developmental psych at the local community college in addition to pre-health chem. A few years ago, I had a student in one of my intro psych sections who didn't complete the first assignment. She hadn't attended any lectures up to this point but since my lectures were hybrid (online and in person) and were recorded, I just assumed she had been watching them after class at some point. I emailed her to find out what had happened - did she forget, was there a problem, did I not receive it, etc. She said, "I couldn't do it because I didn't know that stuff." So I said, "I noticed you haven't been at any of the lectures. Were you watching them afterwards?" She said, "No - I didn't get a chance." So I asked if she had at least been doing the readings. Nope to that, too. At this point, I'm kind of confused. So I say to her, "But without going to lectures or reading, how could you learn the stuff the assignment was about?" And she said, "Well - I didn't know it from before." And the light went on. She thought that she should be able to do the course from "stuff" she happened to pick up at some point in life - maybe just life experience, previous courses, etc. That had never occurred to me before - that a student might think they could pick up whatever was needed to make it through a course just from life, previous courses... It was an eye-opening moment for me. We then talked about how new stuff was going to be taught in any course she took and she would need to do something to learn that new stuff (go to lectures, readings) in order to be able to do the assignments and tests. She went on to do alright in the course. It really helped me to appreciate the different backgrounds that students have when coming into a course.

These are some documents that I give to the students in my courses to help them out with studying, study skills, and what I'm looking for in short answer question answers. Folks are welcome to download them and use them even if you don't have students in my courses. 🙂 I think the study skills issue is related to what we were discussing above, too. Very bright students often don't have extensive study skills as part of their learning repertoire because they haven't needed them. 🙂 HC Policies for Short Answer Questions.pdf HC Study tips.pdf How to study for an exam.pdf

Interesting thought. I kind of assumed that high school students would have the basics of study skills in place (note taking, reviewing, time management, making sure to watch the video lectures, etc.) no matter whether they were taking a regular course or an honours level course. But maybe that was a false assumption on my part. 🙂 Of course a student can know all of those study skills and still choose not to use them. That's a whole other ball of wax... 😉 🙂

Good to know about the elderberry plant smell! 😄 Yeah - that kind of sound like dialing it in. 😉 We watched Holy Grail with our dd20 on New Years Eve - that's why it was fresh in my mind. We'd watched it before as a family but it seemed like a good way to send off 2020. 😉 🙂

I had a student from Germany come into my pre-health chemistry course at the local college last year. He was a bit older (mid-20s, I think) and he was shocked at the kind of output required of students here in Canada (and, by extension, the States, too, I suppose). He kept telling the other students that they had no idea how easy they had it compared to the exams that he had to write. I'm not sure they believed him.

Well - there are definitely Canadians who struggle to admit when they're wrong. I was one of them for the longest time. 🙂 When I first started teaching in the public schools here, I was always so afraid that if I admitted I had messed up the students would "smell the fear" and turn on me like a pack of wolves. I may have been over-dramatizing things a wee bit in those first few years... 😉 Learning to admit wrongness is a hard, hard thing! They are 36 week courses.

I'm not sure if they meant PS honors chem or other honors chem online courses or both. But all of it taken together gave me food for thought. 🙂

I typically have a number of students who move from Honors to reg Chem. There have been a few parents who have mentioned to me that they felt my Honors course was beyond any other high school honors chem course they had looked at. And Farrar mentioned families in her sphere who regretted signing up for Honors. I took all of those things together in my considerations. 🙂

Constructive criticism is always welcome. 🙂 It can sometimes be hard to hear but over many years of teaching (and life!), I've learned that one of the most important teaching/life abilities is the ability to say "You know what? I was wrong. I'll figure out how to fix things/do better." 🙂 I think (and I could be wrong ;)) that students have more respect for a teacher that can admit when she's wrong and needs to change things than they do for a teacher who is "always right". Now if people started taunting me with statements like, "Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries" (little Monty Python reference there ;)), I might take umbrage with that. I'm positive my mother wasn't a hamster. Although... Since I admit that I'm not entirely sure what elderberries smell like, the second taunt may require more research before I can fully dismiss it. 😉 😄 But constructive criticism about my courses will only help to make them better. 🙂

As a heads-up regarding approximate time commitment for my courses, I did change the Honors Chem numbers last year based on feedback from the 1st year I offered the course. It now says 10-12 hours per week for Honors Chem on my website. Reg Chem is 5-7 hours per week and IOCBC is 8-10 hours per week. As always, though, those numbers are very rough estimates and the actual time needed by any particular student will vary widely based on a student's abilities and working speed. Just wanted to clarify. 🙂