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Gil

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  1. In designing knowledge-based courses, I found myself asking: What do I need my student to know at the end of this? For how long will they need to know that information-- 5years? 10 years? 15 years? 20 years? their entire life? Then it occurred to me that after a while that more than any particular body of knowledge mastered (though I definitely have a desire for a certain body of knowledge to be mastered and internalized) that my true decades-long goal is to develop strong memorization skills in and of itself within the kids. In theory, I'd like my children, when they're 45+ years old, to be able to 1) take in new information (multi-steps or pieces of info in general) with greater accuracy, speed and ease 2) retain and recall that information as needed 3) in a manner that's not just a parlor trick (i.e., memorizing a deck of randomly ordered cards) In the effort of training a strong memory and really trying to develop the brains ability to take in, retain and recall things, I've been rethinking a lot of what I'd assumed/calculated for Round 2s elementary education. This of course doesn't mean that I'm not interested in a Knowledge-Centric education--I absolutely am, but I'm also starting to think about instilling the skill of learning differently.
  2. Thanks for the link! I had gone ahead and wrote a simple Chess Scope and Sequence that I'm going to use. >_< I just don't like leaving things to chance, lol.
  3. Ok, I've decided against No Stress Chess. The reason being it delays having students just learn how the pieces move. The cards, I think, will be a crutch and they don't actually lead to anything. I'm not sold on whether I'll use Story Time Chess--as I don't like the idea of spending a small fortune on Chess.
  4. I'm actually debating what to do about building a Memory Palace with Round 2. Amiga has been volunteered as Guinea Pig for memory training. We've began by developing her attention to detail with casual games of "Did You Notice...?" and "Do You Remember...?" but are open to considering any and every technique as the goal is to really develop the attention and memory-skills of the child. So far, Chants already work on getting her to memorize something in sequence (spellings, information, etc) Rhymes and mnemonics don't particularly work just yet and I'm not sure that she understands rhymes just yet. Visualization skills--how does one develop them in someone else?
  5. I couldn't write a book--maybe a pamphlet. Step 1: Commit to Using Loads of Parental Elbow Grease and Common Sense Step 2: Purchase A Few Quality Materials in the Core Skills Step 3: Do Some Skill Work Every Day Step 4: Squeeze every drop of use from your chosen purchases. Ok, so maybe less of a pamphlet and more of a paragraph.
  6. So...phonics? Boy, one day I oughta write a book on education! It's amazing what these educrats can make a living off of!
  7. What does he say are the most effective things for children to memorize for literacy?
  8. So, I'm interested in research and anecdotes re: introducing and using various memorization techniques to young children (2yo-4yo) Currently, everything that Amiga has memorized or is memorizing, she's internalizing via "brute-force" (aka loads of repetition. Daily, ritualized repetition). We just recite things each day and throughout the day as an attempt to establish the skill of memorizing. It works, Amiga has several things that are important for her to know memorized and thinks that it;s grand to sing/say/recite her information. As she's still young, I'm fine with it for another year or so, but I'm interested in building more durable memorization skills into her education. While, I'm not ready to start introducing mnemonics yet, as I feel that her language and abstract-thinking skills aren't strong enough for her to "get it". I am thinking about starting her with a Memory Palace...
  9. What are the advantages and disadvantages of a person being able to (phonetically/orally) read and pronounce a language that they don't speak conversationally? How often is this done? How do you develop the skill of being able to read a language into a tool for being able to speak that language? I know that this is done in other education systems, and that it can be done successfully. I'm just trying to wrap my head around why this works and in what conditions this is most beneficial.
  10. Does anyone have any experience or opinion on No Stress Chess vs Story Time Chess for the 2-5 year old crowd? I could teach Chess with just my normal chess set, but I'm considering one of these as a jumping off point. I dislike that Story Time Chess is more expensive at each level, but you can buy the expansions and it includes more advanced instruction. If I purchase the full kit, then Story Time Chess is essentially a full Chess curriculum. I like that it's 100% offline and pre-planned for me. I was thinking of No Stress Chess then using Level 2 and Level 3 of Story Time Chess, but I'm not sure that I can use the Story Time Chess expansions without the first level though.
  11. I would do 4-8 points for each section because when groups of facts are related, they are easier to recall/remember.
  12. Thanks, I've already harvested what I want from this program.
  13. Spanish Pal is finally reading longer works in Spanish without fanfare. For NaNoWriMo, both of The Boys are writing in Spanish. Pal's writing a lot of short (3-5 page) stories in. He's translating a book that he liked into Spanish which is surprisingly difficult for him. He might've bitten off more than he can comfortably chew, but I'm not going to say anything to discourage him. Buddy wants to write a short film in Spanish, so we'll see how that goes. The Boys have loved the Computer Courses and have expressed a desire to take more varied classes in Spanish (yeah, I'll get right on that :🙄) to round out their vocabularies and language abilities. A friend of mine has hired them as Seasonal Workers in his Mexican restaurant for a couple of months so they're learning to 1-speak/understand a lot of kitchen/restaurant vocabulary, 2-also getting a glimpse of how to make authentic Mexican food and 3-earning a bit of pocket money. Japanese They've been reading every day. They've been reading some short novels with their literacy tutor and are also writing better. Their early papers were full of redmarkings and corrections, now they get a few red marks on each paper. They want to take some technology and culinary courses in Japanese, but we can't afford it on top of their literacy tutor. I want them to truly master their Japanese fundamentals and it's important to me that they're actually literate and fluent at the conversational level. They are at the point where they can read/write in Japanese probably at a middle school level--depending on the subject/familiarity with the topic. Video Games: They've begun religiously playing a couple of games in Japanese and are having to look up less and less each week, I'm not a huge fan of this though because it sets a bad example for Round 2 and I requested that they not play Video Games for long stretches of time around Amiga because she wants to do everything that they do. So, being clever Buddy and Pal actually took the initiative of setting a timer to go off in 3-5 minutes whenever Amiga is around and they modeled putting the game away when the timer goes off. So after a week or two Amiga will willingly turn off a screen when the timer goes off without a fuss or fight. Nice. German HAHAHAHA! The most neglected language in the family. I still want to learn it, but I don't have the energy for long term dabbling, but Round 2 will learn German when they're old enough to. Round 2's language plan is SPN/ENG from birth - 3.5 Seriously start bilingual academics at 3.5 At 1st grade ( 6yo) , introduce German as "foreign language" as a school subject. At 5th grade (10yo), introduce the second "foreign language" as a school subject. There are competing ideas about what that language should be. Really? Any idea why? Did you ever get over this? Anyone else know what this is? Is it because Cousin didn't speak English or because you and Cousins relationship was very verbal already? Do you think you could have made the switch if Cousin could speak English fluently? The families priority for Round 2 is advanced, bilingual, language skills by the age of 3.5 years old. The language priorities for Round 2 are understanding and use of prepositions, correct use of verb-tenses clear articulation/pronunciation 1500 Books by age 3.5 Amiga is on her way to achieve her language goals on time. (Fingers crossed).
  14. So, Amiga (2yo) has sorted out who, according to her, has which language. Interestingly enough, she had a pretty strong opinion about who in the family has which languages. She was quiet miffed to hear her mom trying to speak Spanish and insisted that its not hers. Which was interesting. Amiga has not yet revealed that she has a problem with me or The Boys speaking English and Spanish, but she shut Mrs. Gil down quick when Mrs. Gil was speaking Spanish. I don't know if because her mom speaks poorly, or what.
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