Xander
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Posts posted by Xander
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aside from books, i would love to find scales that we can practice. i'm sure they are out there, but where??
Try the ABRSM exam requirements - they include scales for each grade. You can find the requirements on their website and they also publish a book with all the scales written out in full in staff notation.
http://gb.abrsm.org/...scant-recorder/
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Beautiful! I need to do a corner in my dining room. Does Billy not have a corner shelf?
The current offering for corners is a pair of special brackets, designed so that you can fix a 40cm Billy on the diagonal such that it lines up correctly with the Billies either side of the corner.
That's probably OK for the tall ones but no use for the low ones as you'd see the gaps and the fixing brackets. Even for the tall ones it wastes space.
They used to sell a proper corner unit. That takes up 60cm of each of the two walls and has an opening across the diagonal just a little wider than you'd get with a 40cm Billy. The space in the corners is a bit awkward, but useable (depending on how you arrange things on the shelves). The corner unit also accommodates deeper books than the standard Billies.
They are available secondhand - we've seen plenty listed on eBay.
Start with a corner unit and work outwards from there, combining Billies and Bennos as needed to fit the space. That will let you work in multiples of 20cm. If you need something else, you can cut down a Billy or Benno to fill the gap.
Hope that helps.
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Thought you might be interested to know that the ABRSM curriculum includes:
Practical exam in front of an examiner from the UK,
1. scales
2. sight reading
3. aural skill
4. performance with a piano accompanist
These exams take 6 months to prep for.
The written theory exam is a separate 2 hour exam
ABRSM is challenging and great!
Anyone interested in the details can download the current syllabuses here:
http://www.abrsm.org/en/exams/gradedMusicExams/latestSyllabuses.html
AB offers graded music exams in theory and various practical subjects. It's not a curriculum as such, though some music teachers may design their curricula around the relevant exam requirements.
There is no fixed preparation time for the exams. Some kids might spend a year or more learning their exam pieces and technical work, but others will need only a few weeks to do it all.
Similar exams are offered by Trinity Guildhall and LCM:
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I would not list theory as theory unless it's truly equivalent to a full-semester university course, because when we see "Music Theory" on the transcript, that's what we expect in a student, since so few schools offer theory as a high school course except to give students advanced placement (usually not a formal AP course-most music schools don't accept it, and almost all give their own exams for placement purposes). Now, since he's doing private lessons and sitting for a National exam-it may be. But I'd check with the instructor as to whether his skills are at a level that a year of theory would typically place him out of a semester of college theory before giving credit AS theory on the transcript.
The UCAS tariff for AP music theory is:
5 - 50 points
4 - 35 points
3 - 20 points
The only ABRSM theory exams which attract 20 or more UCAS points are:
Grade 7 distinction - 20 points
Grade 8 pass - 20 points
Grade 8 merit - 25 points
Grade 8 distinction - 30 points
ABRSM exams below grade 6 carry no UCAS points.
(UCAS isn't relevant for US/NZ college admissions, but it's a useful reference when trying compare exams from different systems.)
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There's a fancy school here that uses LNM for high school.
I just talked to someone from England and he told me that the elite schools still teach Latin and maybe Greek, but not the public schools.
It's not quite that straightforward. Many, but not all, private schools still offer Latin and some offer Greek. Some state schools offer Latin.
In general, Latin starts anywhere from about 3rd to 7th grade, depending on the school. Where a language is taught from first grade, it's usually French or another modern foreign language.Most have dropped the classical languages in favor of what's modern and hi-tech. I was under the assumption that every child in England could decline and conjugate starting from first grade. :tongue_smilie:The year/grade numbering system is different here. The outline from the original post covers years 5 to 8 - that's equivalent to 4th-7th grade.
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"....the Science and Math group has no discussion going on..."
...because there's science to do.
And cake.
(Sorry!)
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Sorry for my ignorance, but what are Basher books?
These (and others like them):
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Basher-Science-Physics-Dan-Green/dp/0753432900/
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Periodic-Table-Duplicate-Elements/dp/0753415119/
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Biology-Life-We-Know-It/dp/0753417316/
(clean links - no affiliate kickbacks)
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Well, I know I have said this before on other threads, but DH and I feel that one of the best things to do for children is give them lots of broken electronics (and whatever other broken items you can find) and let them tear them apart.
One caveat for anyone thinking about doing this with their kids - teach them about capacitors before they start taking things apart.
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You can download A-level specimen/past papers from the exam boards' websites.
OCR:
http://www.ocr.org.uk/qualifications/type/gce/index.aspx
Edexcel:
http://www.edexcel.com/quals/gce/gce08/Pages/default.aspx
AQA:
http://www.aqa.org.uk/qualifications/a-level.php
WJEC:
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Here's a link from a BBC article on the same issue (along with a math quiz :tongue_smilie:) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-17224600. I think the conclusion is that a lot of adults don't even have the math skills expected of an 11 year old.
There's also a little quiz available:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9701000/9701303.stm
I can actually believe this. One of the reasons we started homeschooling was because of a primary teacher, supposedly with a math degree, who regularly sent home math homework with very basic mistakes in it. The same teacher also sent home an English assignment which made it very clear that she didn't know the difference between an adjective and an adverb. Scary.
Would be teachers are required to have maths and English GCSEs at grade C or above. That's not setting the bar very high.
Channel 4 made a 2-part documentary about maths teaching in primary schools.
http://www.channel4.com/programmes/dispatches/episode-guide/series-53/episode-1
Here's a shortened version of the test they gave to the teachers:
http://www.channel4.com/programmes/dispatches/articles/maths-quiz
I'd need to watch it again to check, but I think they tested about 150 teachers, of whom only one scored full marks. If I recall correctly, the average score was 45%.
On the other hand, our standards for maths are high in some respects. Calculus is part of the regular maths curriculum for 11th and 12th grades here. But, because maths is optional after 10th grade, there's a sharper division between the maths people and the non-maths people. Those who take maths for A-level get a pretty decent grounding in the subject.
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Would it be possible to use Khan Academy as a complete math course? I'm asking primarily for my dd (15) who will be in 11th grade next year.The lessons themselves are straightforward, no nonsense, and (usually) clear. You can follow them from number lines all the way up to calculus. Note that the videos are only half the story: if you're just using the KA videos, you're doing it wrong. Rather, you need to be using them along with the 'knowledge map' of the site and the exercise modules to give your kids practice.
I agree with Peter about the exercises.
They might not help much in your case though. The problem being that the available exercises don't cover much 11th grade material. There are a few for differentiation and a couple for standard deviation, but that's about it so far.
They do keep adding new exercises though, so they might add more at that level over the coming months. The videos already go much further, so the exercises for integration, diff eqs, statistics, etc. are likely to appear at some point.
You might want to have an alternative planned in case they're not there when your daughter need them.
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You might be interested in the book "The Physics of Hockey" by Alain Haché.
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We're a Mac family whenever we have a choice. We've had very few problems and the ones that do crop up tend to be the sort that can happen on any system.
If money were not an issue, I'd choose Mac. OS X is NOT the same Mac you were using 20 years ago - it's a much more capable operating system.It's basically BSD UNIX underneath the graphical interface, so you can pull up a terminal window (command line interface) and use UNIX commands, vi and shell scripts.
I went kicking and screaming to Mac. Once I found out how much better it was, I won't go back. (And I was a Comp. Sci. Major in college so i don't buy that "Macs are only easier for people who don't understand computers.)
Macs are great for people who understand computers! When people spend all day fixing computer problems, they don't want to spend their evenings and weekends doing the same - they want something that just works.
Of course, Macs are great for people who don't know much about computers too - there's no need to interact with the underlying OS if you don't want to and there are relatively few ways for a novice user to stumble into something out of their depth. I've come across cases of Windows users messing with the registry without having the slightest idea what it was.
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If you add up all the bookshelf space in your house, how many linear feet (or yards or metres) are there?
How much of it is used for books?
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I think we're going to do dogs for the rest of the month. Any ideas classic (or ought to be classic) dog-themed literature? Lassie comes to mind, but is that even a book?
Eric Knight - Lassie Come-Home
Jim Herriot, need to check about that.James Herriot's Favourite Dog Stories
Any more ideas? Throw 'em at me! As far as level, anything from junior high to adult is fine. Humor is good.Dodie Smith - The Hundred and One Dalmatians
Dodie Smith - The Starlight Barking
Sheila Burnford - The Incredible Journey
Richard Adams - The Plague Dogs
Henrietta Branford - Fire, Bed and Bone
Daniel Pennac - Dog
Phyllis Reynolds Naylor - Shiloh
Wilson Rawls - Where the Red Fern Grows
Jack London - The Call of the Wild
J.R.R. Tolkien - Roverandom
any one of several authors - Greyfriars Bobby
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I don't know what size serving would be considered normal over there (my better half informs me that the catering industry standard is 1" by 2" for double layer, so my best guess is that you'd double that to 2" by 2" for single layer), but here's the maths...
9" by 13" gives 117 square inches.
117 divided by 14 gives over 8 1/3 square inches per person (a little more than 2" by 4" each).
A 9x13 will serve 14, but the pieces will be on the small side - 1.5x3"-ish each.1.5" x 3" would be only 4.5 square inches per slice, so that would yield 26 slices. 12 of the 14 people could have a second helping.
I think 9x13 is plenty for 14 people. I usually cut a cake this size into 18 pieces.6.5 square inches per person, a little more than 2" by 3" each.
In my family a 9X13 cake will serve about 6! :DIn dh's family, a 9X13 cake would serve 20 with leftovers, but his mom cuts things into "bites", imho.
19.5 square inches (almost 4" by 5") and 5.85 square inches (just shy of 2" by 3") per person, respectively (not allowing for leftovers).
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"Any fellow feeling? Would be so nice to know that someone understands.."
Yes!
One of my brothers believes that any sort of structured or systematic education is objectionable and is unschooling his kids, so we can't even avoid the issue within our extended family. :-(
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I know some people IRL (not necessarily on this board) that would just make a copy of that post & give it to their kid without even looking at the titles just because someone recommended them.
That's quite scary!
The problem with anyone else's list is that you can't be sure that they would make exactly the same judgement calls that you would yourself. And even if they would, their list will still be tailored towards the interests, gender and reading-level of their kids, not yours.
I enjoy reading other lists and sometimes I'll see something on one and think "How did I forget to include that?!". Or I'll spot something I've never even heard of that seems to merit further investigation. But wholesale copying, especially if you're not familiar with the books, seems like a bad idea to me.
It's not just lists compiled by individuals that should be approached with caution. Even the Carnegie Medal lists can throw up some surprises (e.g. the 1996 winner).
I was throwing out my big red flag & suggesting pre-reading if you hadn't read them before or re-reading/skimming if you'd read them previously but couldn't remember much about them.
That's always a sensible course of action.
I was amazed at the reading level of some of the books because my oldest is a pretty good reader, but I'm not sure she could get through some of the books listed at the age(s) suggested. I've read the other LOR/Hobbit-type books, but never seen the Silmarillion. (I didn't read LOR/Hobbit until I was an adult.)
I read The Hobbit at 11 and The Lord of the Rings when I was 11 and a half, but didn't get hold of The Silmarillion until almost a year later and found it very heavy going. I think it was another year or so before I read it properly and it wasn't exactly fun even then. It's the sort of book that's bearable if you're reading it by choice (and are free to set aside if you find it too difficult), but that most kids would probably balk at as assigned reading.
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These are the two I'm most against being on the list without having the parents pre-read them.
I don't think the fact that they're on one person's list in any way suggests that other people should use them without pre-reading. Everyone has different standards and concerns and everyone's kids are different in terms of reading level, maturity, sensitivity, interests and so on, so people should always use their own judgement about what to use with their own kids.
I was a tad surprised to see them on a list of "classics" myself, but everyone has their own ideas about literature and it's the OP's list of what she wants her kids to read. If she wants to include them, that's up to her.
Same goes for The Silmarillion - not something I'd generally expect to see required of 10-11 year olds, but clearly the OP's kids are way more advanced than most. Doesn't mean that anyone else should expect their kids to read it at that age (or at all). It's not on any required lists here, but there's a copy available if anyone wants to use it for free reading.
It never hurts if you haven't read something to at least skim it before putting it on your kid's summer reading list.Definitely.
There are a few on the OP's other list (for rising 7th/8th/9th graders) that she's clearly fine with but that we wouldn't choose to use at that level (including Stranger, BNW, HoD, Passage, Remarque, Gatsby and C22). The only way it would be a problem would be if I just copied her list and didn't use my own judgement about which books to use at middle school level and which to save for high school or beyond. Apart from anything else, I think people get more out of those books if they come to them with more maturity.
I found it interesting to read someone else's lists and see where they overlap with mine and where they differ, but I don't see them as a prescriptive list of what anyone's kids (other than the OP's) should read.
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Do you have any thoughts on the apparent advantage Latin gives one on the SATs, over the study of other foreign languages? If you don't believe that would be cognitive, would you say it's cultural, or related to vocabulary, or both?
I suspect that part of it is because bright kids (who will score highly anyway) are more likely to be given the opportunity to take Latin than slower kids (who are likely to have lower scores). In other words, Latin is offered to kids who are already on track to do very well on the SAT, rather than Latin causing a significant increase in scores.
Over here, Latin is offered in very few state schools. The ones which do offer it tend to be among the relatively few which select their pupils by academic ability.
Many public schools offer Latin (and a few still offer Greek), but they're mostly even more selective than the state grammars. The "slow" kids in a typical public school would be above average in a state school. Even in these schools, not all kids take Latin - many schools divide the kids by ability and the very brightest can take Latin (and Greek if available), the middle kids take just Latin and the slowest kids take a non-language class in classics, studying the civilisations and literature in English translation.
The end result is that the national exam results for Latin and Greek typically have far higher average grades than other subjects, because the only kids to take them are the kids who are likely to be achieving high grades in everything they take. The less academic kids are either at schools where Latin isn't taught at all, or they're not given the opportunity to study it. (I don't agree that that this is how things ought to be, but it is the way they are.)
I suspect that similar forces may be at work over there.
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Very addictive.
I just wish it went past algebra.
Do you mean basic algebra? The lessons takes one past calculus, ending linear algebra.
This website is pretty wicked!
The videos do, but the interactive exercises don't go beyond 10th grade work (and there are a lot of gaps before that too).
They have been adding more exercises though and the most recent additions included some at the end and some that filled gaps in the middle. Also there are currently 126 exercises (including challenges), but if you inspect the source code you can see that one of the Black Hole badges is for gaining proficiency in 150 exercises, so there's clearly more to come.
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What sort of Greek?
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Actually, I'm very interested in this. Personally, I have neither the time nor the inclination to read Homer in Greek, but learning a little "easier" Greek appeals to me. Thanks for the clarification.
There are plenty of resources for that, including ones aimed specifically at home schoolers and people wanting to study it by themselves. Just make sure you choose something that says "New Testament" or "Koine".
The exam that Joan's daughter wants to prepare for is in ancient Greek and the difficulty there is that there are far fewer home school and teach-yourself resources available for that.
DIY.org update
in General Education Discussion Board
Posted
Earlier this year, I saw posts in various threads which recommended DIY.org and I got the impression that several forum members had their kids sign up around that time. I'm interested in hearing what people think about it after having their kids use the site for a while.
Are they still enjoying it?
How much do they use it?
If you're willing to share, roughly how many projects have they done and/or how many skills have they earned?
Do you need to push your kids to spend time on it, do they maintain a good balance by themselves or do you have to limit their time spent on the website or on activities related to it?
Do you think they're learning much from using it?
Would you still recommend it to new users?
Do you have any concerns about the impact it has on your kids' attitudes?
For those who enrolled their kids on the basis of the comparisons made to Scouts in some of the earlier posts, how do you think it compares to Scouting and similar programs?
Many thanks,
Alex.