Jump to content

Menu
Giving You and Your Child a Road Map to the Best Possible Education
The Well-Trained Mind Community

Piper

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    288

  • Joined

  • Last visited

 Content Type 

Posts posted by Piper

    Am I the only one who names cars?

    in The Chat Board

    Posted

    Years ago my friends had a beat-up, old, green Datsun sedan, and called it "Agnes".  I've never come across a better-suited name for a car since then - it was just perfect for that car.

     

    I dubbed our current vehicle "Pearl".  It's white - and it cost a lot! (As in, the "pearl of great price").

    • Like 1

    Hiding in my room with the window open

    in The Chat Board

    Posted

    When I was pregnant with dd, I ate a lot of granola bars in the mornings to help stave off the nausea.  It took me about 6 years after she was born to even be able to *think* about eating a granola bar again.  The associations were just way too strong!

     

    When I was pregnant with ds, we bought dd (18 months old at the time) a baby doll for Christmas.  It was one of those ones that is really strongly scented, with a baby powder smell or something like that.  With my "morning" sickness, the smell just made me want to toss my cookies, and it was so strong, that I ended up confiscating my poor dd's doll until after ds was born!  (Thankfully she wasn't super attached to it at the time!)

    How to challenge 3yo physically

    in The Chat Board

    Posted

    TBH, I wouldn't even worry about it.  Kids are all different.  There's no harm in his being cautious.  My two are very different - my dd is cautious and totally not daring, while my ds does everything with a full body commitment.  (Even now that she's 9, there are things that my ds has been doing for years that she's not entirely comfortable with.)  It's just their personalities, and there's nothing wrong with either way of approaching life.  Let him explore his own boundaries in his own time.  He'll be fine!

     

    (And on a side note, being cautious is not necessarily a guarantee of safety!  Contrary to all expectations, it's my dd who broke her arm, not my ds!  :tongue_smilie: )

    Ancient Roman cooking

    in General Education Discussion Board

    Posted

    For those in the midst of studying the Ancients, here are a couple of fun links!  

     

    This one is a fascinating blog where various Ancient Roman recipes are replicated for your viewing - and tasting! - pleasure.

     

    And on a side note, here is a really interesting news article about a 1,000 year old recipe that kills MRSA.  (I know, neither "Ancient" nor "Roman", but intriguing all the same!)

    • Like 1

    Teach Myself Latin, Diagramming, etc.

    in K-8 Curriculum Board

    Posted

     

    60 percent of English words have Latin or Greek Roots. A deeper understanding of English is an immediate benefit of Latin and Greek study. Though you can achieve this by studying Latin and Greek roots instead of the languages.

    The study of Latin is considered one path to logical thinking.

     

    If you want a gentler introduction to the study of Latin for your littlies, and you want to explore what Kalmia said, check out "English from the Roots Up".

    "When two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking"

    in General Education Discussion Board

    Posted

    I have run the numbers, I have not only The ABCs but the original Hanna study with all 17,000 words.

     

    http://www.thephonicspage.org/Phonics%20Lsns/Resources/letter%20sound%20read%20new%202011.pdf

     

    For spelling:

     

    http://www.thephonicspage.org/Phonics%20Lsns/Resources/sound%20letter%20spell1.pdf

     

    I also have color coded charts.

     

    http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Reading/Resources/PL26VowelChart.pdf

     

     

    I also have language of origin charts, within each language of origin, English is actually very phonetic.

     

    http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Reading/Resources/OriginSlides.pdf

     

    Thanks for posting these links; they are fascinating, especially the last one.  

     

    On a personal note, the phonics program I use doesn't teach the "two vowels go walking" rule either.  :-)  I'm very impressed by your analysis,OP!  Thanks!

    • Like 1

    5 year old dd won't stop sucking her fingers

    in The Chat Board

    Posted

    I sucked my finger until I was five...I remember having a callus on the back of my pinkie.  I stopped when I went to kindergarten and noticed that no-one else was doing it.  Positive peer pressure!

     

    Both my kiddos were thumb/finger suckers, and it was starting to affect their teeth.  For both of them, at around age 4, the use of the "Thumbbuster" glove (it's on Amazon) along with an appropriate reward strategy, worked miracles.  They both quit within about six weeks of starting this.  Your idea of using medical tape is the same principle; I'd tie it to a sticker chart and some favorite toy(s) as a reward, or whatever motivates your dd.

    What curriculum does it seem "everyone" loves...but didn't work for you?

    in K-8 Curriculum Board

    Posted

    Wow, there are some long lists here!  Off the top of my head:

     

    AAS - it's a good program, and I wish it had worked for us, but it turned out to just have too many bits and pieces to it - not a good fit for me, and once dd started moaning about it, I stopped getting it out at all.

     

    GWG - complete waste of time.  Zero retention.

     

    WWE3 for 3rd (or even 4th) grade - not here!  Way too big of a jump between WWE2 and WWE3 for us.  Since I found some other stuff to help bridge the gap, I've come to like the others a lot and I'm not sure I'll even be going back to WWE3 and 4 (although I own both...gotta stop buying ahead!)

    Recipes for lentil and quinoa salads

    in The Chat Board

    Posted

    My variation of the Trader Joe's Red Quinoa salad (sorry I don't have a link).  Totally yummy and a hit with everyone.

     

    Red Quinoa Salad

    1 cup red quinoa

    2 cups chicken or vegetable broth

    1 can (15 oz.) black beans, drained & rinsed

    2 cups roasted corn kernels (or one can corn kernels, drained)

    1 avocado, chopped

    1 pint grape tomatoes, halved

    ½ cup red onion, finely diced

    ¼ bunch cilantro, chopped

    zest of 1 lime

    juice of 1 lime

    salt & pepper to taste

    extra ¼ bunch cilantro, chopped

     

    Sauté quinoa in pan with a dash of olive oil until lightly toasted, about 5 minutes.

    Cook quinoa in broth according to packet directions.  Set aside to cool.

    Combine beans, corn, tomatoes, avocado, onion, lime zest, lime juice and ¼ bunch cilantro. Season with salt & pepper.  Toss.

    Put the quinoa on a large serving platter, top with the corn/bean mixture, then garnish with the extra ¼ bunch chopped cilantro.

     

    Serves 6.

     

     

    Pork Chops recipe?

    in The Chat Board

    Posted

    I'd suggest that you brine the chops for an hour or so before you cook them.  Every time I cooked it, no matter what method (broil, roast, crock pot, etc. etc.) it always came out really dry - because most pork is so lean now - so I just gave up buying it at all, although we all like it.  Then I came across the brining idea, and now pork is back on our menu! :)

    Grammar help - Treasured Conversations

    in General Education Discussion Board

    Posted

    You're definitely asking the right questions! If you're inclined toward self-education, and if you have the resources, you might like to work through Analytical Grammar. I thoroughly enjoyed it and finally understand all the grammar I vaguely remember being introduced to (but never given enough practice to master) as a student.

     

    Thanks for the tip!  And thanks again everyone for helping enlighten my ignorance! :)

    Grammar help - Treasured Conversations

    in General Education Discussion Board

    Posted

    Thank you for answering this! I really appreciate the responses. I can't say I fully understand everything (unfortunately, I wouldn't know a gerund if I fell over it in the street), but the light is beginning to glimmer a bit more.  As I said, profound grammatical ignorance here!

     

    I think I will tell my dd that she's sort of on the right track ("verby" words that are acting in a different way), but it's a bit more complicated and she'll have to wait until we learn some more about parts of speech.  Then we'll be able to come back to these sentences and say "Ah!  That's why!"   :)

    Grammar help - Treasured Conversations

    in General Education Discussion Board

    Posted

    We are working through TC at the moment and loving it.  However, I am coming from the disadvantage of profound grammatical ignorance, so I hope that someone can help me out here!  Today we did Lesson 9, Day 2, and the problems came with the grammar review/paragraph copywork.

     

    The first sentence is: "Sherry leaned over the dock trying to find the mermaid."  My dd wanted to label "trying" and "find" as verbs, in addition to the correct answer of "leaned".  Why are the other two not verbs?  What are they instead?  Also, she (and I too!) thought that "over" must be an adverb, as it modifies the verb "leaned".  Is this correct?  If not, why not?

     

    In the second sentence, the part that reads "so she leaned even farther over the edge" has both "even" and "farther" labeled as adverbs, which we both understand, but why isn't "over" labeled an adverb?  (I think this is probably the same thing as in the previous sentence.)

     

    The last sentence, "The movement caused her to fall into the water" also had dd asking questions I couldn't answer.  She wanted to label "fall" as a verb, and "into" as an adverb modifying that, and I couldn't tell her why that's wrong.  

     

    I'm sorry it's such a long question.  As I said, I come from profound grammatical ignorance.  I know when things sound right or wrong, but all I learned in school about parts of speech was the very basic idea of verb, noun and adjective, and maybe a bit about subjects, but that was about it.  So I'm floundering a bit today!  Thanks for any help!

    How do you read poetry to your kids...

    in The Chat Board

    Posted

    ...when you're such a sap that the poems make you blubber like a baby??  :blushing:  I really want to read them all my favorites, but it's hard to make myself understood, and my poor kids are confused about why I'm "sad"!  :blushing:  :blushing:

     

    Please tell me I'm not the only one like this!!  :laugh:

    Phonics to Spelling transition?

    in K-8 Curriculum Board

    Posted

    Been there...still trying to figure it out. :)  I would recommend that you do level 2 of Saxon Phonics.  Although there is a lot of review, they do add a lot of new concepts.  The review is great, anyway, as it helps make the rules really stick.

     

    I moved to AAS for 3rd grade after my dd completed Saxon 1 and 2 (we didn't use K).  It's a good program, and the rules are presented fairly similarly.  I didn't stick with it, because for me, I found all the bits and pieces just stressed me out and I dreaded pulling it out, but that's about me, not the program, so don't let that put you off investigating it.  Then I moved to  R&S Spelling, partly for the fact that it could be done more independently.  It's not something I'm raving about, though, for my dd.  It's pretty simple for her, to be honest, and I should have probably started her at a higher level with it. 

     

    And that was all in 3rd grade!

     

    So for this year, 4th, I'm simplifying even more (schole and all that, you know :)) and I'm just going to draw dd's spelling lists from the writing she does in the rest of her schooling.  The words she misspells will be put on a weekly list, and we will discuss why they were wrong, referring to the rules from the Saxon program.  Then she'll practice and test on them until she can get them right a certain number of times.  I'm hoping this will give us a more "targeted" spelling approach, addressing the rules that she's weakest in, without wasting a bunch of time practicing and testing words that she can spell in her sleep.

     

    Good luck, and if you find the magic formula, let me know! :)  My ds will be completing Saxon 2 this year so I have to figure out where he'll end up with all this...

    Do you know what drives me cray-cray?

    in The Chat Board

    Posted

    I don't know if this is just a CA thing?  Maybe others can enlighten me...but I abhor the so-called word "Lookit".  As in, "Lookit! My new toy!"  I'm sorry, people, that is NOT A WORD!  (Which I have drilled into my kids since they could talk.)  What you really mean to say is "Look at my new toy!" or even, "Look!  My new toy!"  Repeat after me: "Lookit" is not a word!!!

     

    Another one that gets my goat is "momentarily."  As in, "We'll be with you momentarily."  Well, I sure hope not, because it's going to take more than a moment to attend to my problem here!  You may be with me in a moment, but you'd better not be with me momentarily!

     

    [/Rant off] 

     

    :)

×
×
  • Create New...