My ds is going to be a Best Buy employee :lol: We already have the perfect color blue polo shirt and khaki shorts (we live in a hot climate, too). I'm going to print out a best buy tag to tape to his shirt. You could do Target employee if you only have red. The easiest costume ever!

Please add me, thanks! This is just what I need because DS is going to be in 7th next year.

If you had access to a few gallons of blackberries but had to transport them 4 +/- hours... you'd probably arrive at your destination with only one gallon of blackberries and a bad case of diarrhea.

Hi, Kristi! I'm going to put another plug in for RightStart, though it does look intimidating at first :) I've used it from the start with the 4th, soon to be 5th grader. Next year will be my third round with RS B. I did not understand math until I started using RS. I mean, I got high grades in math in school, but it's only because I could find the formula needed and plug in the numbers. But math is a way of seeing things, a way of thinking. It's not 2-dimensional: just chicken-scratch-like numbers written on a page, but it's 3-dimensional: numbers represent something and can be manipulated to solve problems. I think math is important because it develops problem-solving skills using logical, step-by-step thinking. To add double digits, a child needs to see that each digit has a different value based on place value. So the digit 4 in the number 42 does not represent 4 objects, but 40 objects. The 2 in 42 represents 2 objects. If you're adding 42 and 31, then it makes sense to group the ones together (2+1=3), then the tens (40+30=70). The final step is to put the two groups together: 70+3=73. You can apply that process to any life problem, like paperwork (which slays me!) First you identify similar papers and group them together: bills over here, account statements over here, personal letters over there. Then you need to figure out how to keep them all in order: a file cabinet, maybe, with all banking documents in this drawer and all personal documents in the second drawer. It doesn't sound like math, but it is using the same skills learned in math! If nothing else, consider getting the abacus from Right Start! I think you can order a book to use with it? It's great for teaching multiple strategies for adding 8 and 9 to other single digit numbers (the higher math facts). That's another real-life application: learning to see a problem and choosing from among several strategies a way of attack. You know that feeling you get when your child learns something under your tutelage? It feels doubly awesome when you learn the same thing at the same time! After our math lessons, sometimes I wish I had a tattoo on my forehead or a bright orange neon shirt that says "I know how to add numbers in my head" or "We love abaci" or "I'm just as smart as my elementary student." :lol:

Misuse of quotation marks! UGH!!! I know, right? I "hate" it when that happens!!!

Lol, I almost came out of lurkdom to post this in this thread! Living books - where do you keep them? In the hamster cage with water, food pellets, and shredded newspaper. But it was these three thread titles in a row that caused me to log in: I learned something today If you take a B12 supplement... Effects of head injuries are not instant

Don't want a debate - I want to vaccinate but not sure how... ...I feel about cow. Cells.

Thanks for the laughs!

Have you ever done a Beth Moore study solo? Yes. It was the one on the importance of fellowship. I haven't been on the boards in ages (I'm a lurker, though, so probably no one noticed, lol) but I couldn't sleep tonight and hopped on here. When I read that title, I was totally all, sure hope they have that forum game still goin'!