On the TI-30XIIS, the negative sign is on the bottom row. The keys are 0 . (-) The (-) is your negative sign. Keep it distinct from the subtraction sign (under the x and above +). This model should work just fine through algebra 1 (and probably beyond). If you have questions on how to enter something or what they're telling you to do post & ask! (Or send me a PM if you want & I can probably help - I've got the TI-30XIIS and the 83 & 84 graphing calcs too.) You wouldn't push a key to change a number to a negative... you'd just enter the number as it is. For instance, if you're adding 3 + (-6), you'd enter 3 + (-) 6 = On older scientific calculators, you sometimes would have to enter 3 + 6 (then hit negative key to get -6). You don't need to do this on the 30XIIS - you get to enter it just like it looks :) Much much nicer!

And that's a really good thing to remember! Goodness knows I need it when I'm trying to figure out if my son is really not understanding and needs a different approach or if he's just not trying. If you want to make another attempt... You're correct with |3| = |-3| = 3. The idea is that with variables, we don't know what our number is. We may be trying to solve an equation like |x| = 3. In that case, we can't get rid of the absolute value bars because we don't know if x is positive or negative or zero (without sign). That's where we need the piecewise definition. When I teach this, I use the "distance from 0" as an illustration and a way to remember... so here we're looking for all numbers that are a distance of 3 from 0. That happens at x=3 and at x=-3. The piecewise definition (formal algebraic one) lets us rewrite for ANY input (let's say "blob"), the absolute value of that blob without absolute value bars. If "blob" is positive or 0, |blob| = blob. (There's no change to the number.) If "blob" is negative, |blob| = - (blob) (It's the opposite of the "blob". This is where if we had |-3|, since our input is a negative number, |-3| = the opposite of (-3) = -(-3) = 3. We're still getting the same answer you were: |-3| = 3, but the algebraic approach lets us generalize. Thus |x-5| = x-5, if x>=5, but |x-5| = -(x-5) if x<5. [Here the x-5 is our "blob".] Clear as mud? ;) Purplemath has pretty good explanations as well - and happy to discuss if you want to continue or drop completely otherwise! :D

I think using the base 10 blocks really helped ds with seeing place value. Just play with the blocks for a while, then you can use them with the math. The Miquon books do a good job of making this transition, but it's very do-able with just the play with blocks and then going to numbers.

Absolute value as distance from 0 is one of the easiest ways to understand the concept. It also can really help with picturing inequalities. It can be defined algebraically though (generally written as a piecewise function... which I can't do easily here)... abs(x) = x (if x>=0) abs(x) = -x (if x<0) So if x is positive or 0, abs(x) = x. (Thus abs(3) = 3.) If x is negative, abs(x) = -x. (So abs(-3) = -(-3) = 3.)

I had started thinking about it when ds was in half-day Kindergarten. Then he had an allergic reaction that convinced me we had to homeschool. My husband was uncertain. Recently, ds and I have been clashing quite a bit. I think we both wanted to quit. Dh was very clear that he really wanted homeschool to continue if we could find a way to do it. He's a very strong supporter of it for us. And ds and I are doing better, so that's good too! :D

Number lines are very useful. Decimals are evil.

There's also the "oysters and snails" scene with Olivier and Curtis.

I'm looking forward to House starting up again. Don't know if we'll watch Survivor this season - but we probably will.

My husband just has asthma. It's under control now that we don't have a cat anymore (he's highly allergic to cats). With ds most recently, we gave the Xopanex with the cough a couple of nights but we weren't seeing the warning signs we saw when he was really young ("cuts" in ribcage with breathing, more rapid breathing). There were no signs of respiratory distress, but we did finally reach the point where we took him in to our pediatrician's Saturday hours just to get another point of view. The pediatrician didn't hear a wheeze (despite the coughing for about a half hour before ds falling asleep the night before), pulse ox was fine, and we were prescribed a different antihistamine (thinking he'd built up a tolerance to the Zyrtec). We did get in to see his allergist that Monday. The breath test (lung capacity?) showed a bit lower than his regular check up about 3-4 weeks earlier (when he looked fine). There were signs of a sinus infection as well, so we got loaded up with an antibiotic, Pulmacort, Xopanex, and Flovent (and stayed with the antihistamine). We're down to the Flovent and back on the Zyrtec (while watching to see if we'll need to switch antihistamines). So far, so good. Ds did humor me when I'd keep asking him how his breathing was doing and how he was feeling (generally I managed not to ask more than once an hour). Listen to your gut too. You may want to go back home early. I know we had to stay in a hotel when we visited dh's folks and dh would still end up on steroids from the visit. I'd think getting out of the house during the day might help (field trip tomorrow?), breathing in steam, and watch for things to get worse. Give your husband a call and get his opinion - he knows how he feels with his asthma and may be able to put your mind at rest or suggest you head out tomorrow. And it may not be asthma... you've got a lot of other ideas here... Don't know that it'd help too much... but we'll sometimes do a spoon of honey for a cough. Good luck. It's so tough when they're sick & you're questioning what to do. :grouphug:

As Time Goes By is my absolute favorite. Judi Dench &Geoffrey Palmer are great.I always end with a smile after any of the episodes. IT Crowd is fun. Season four just was on BBC. It's got some good parts. Black Adder was good enough that we got the DVDs, but I like season 1 least. Coupling was fun too, but pretty risqué.

Totally pathetic. And greatly appreciated by those of us who don't have the items in the cart to watch shipping changes (dratted Oxford Ancient Times series isn't budging). :D Or cursed for having to figure out where to put another book in this house... Clearly we must move. I need another room for a library. Thanks again!

YES, it could be "silent asthma". Dh has asthma (finally controlled, thankfully). We've watched ds but haven't seen what we considered asthma. Ds has food allergies and has been on Flovent in the past and is on Zyrtec daily. In May he started coughing when he went to bed and couldn't stop easily. His allergist said that he probably has environmentally triggered silent asthma - so although he's not really wheezing, the cough is the asthmatic reaction. Ds was on Xopanex through a nebulizer for a couple of weeks and Pulmacort as well. He's now back on Flovent but we've been able to drop the nebulizer. If you have an inhaler, I'd be using it. If not, I'd be monitoring her carefully. If breathing becomes an issue - get to the ER. And do follow up with the allergist when you get back to town. :grouphug: It's tough.

It's open to homeschoolers, so I thought I'd pass on the info. More specifics found at Lego KisdsFest info (Chicago Oct. 29-31, 2010), here. "The LEGO Education Landmark School Competition is open to teachers and home educators of students in grades K-4 and is designed to provide students an opportunity to explore and learn about local, regional, or state history while discovering the value and importance of teamwork, imagination, and creative building!:

Spoilers (just in case) .... The earlier deaths can be tough - especially Sirius and then Dumbledore in Bk 6, but the death of Fred or George (can't remember which twin) has made rereading earlier books a bit rougher for me. I think Colin Creevey also dies (boy who followed Harry around in Bk 2 taking pictures). It may be cruel to prevent your child from finishing the series at this point. I know I'd have found it very unfair... and waiting after Bk 6 would probably be tougher than finishing, but I do think it's pretty dark.

But it can be cathartic too. For instance, lately if I've been in a cranky mood for a while, listening to Sweeney Todd does a pretty good job of cheering me up. (Especially when cooking! :D)

Looks nifty. Thanks! I ordered this one :)

One reason would be that then you can ask a question that goes deeper in depth for analysis instead of just basic knowledge. For instance, with English, you could allow the book and then you'd expect supporting quotes. Again, it's only going to be an effective test if it's testing higher-level skills and not just regurgitation of facts (although in a larger class, that can be done just to see if you learned the facts and can find them quickly).

We have a 99 Accord (thanks to a good deal from my folks in 02 when they sold it to us; they seemed to think a 2-door Tercel was too small for their grandchild). It's got over 160,000 miles and is still doing great. Be sure to get timing belts replaced! We had typical repairs as it's up there in age (new radiator last year). We just bought our first EVER new car this year. (We've never had a car with under 70k miles.) Couldn't afford the Accord new and since Hondas hold their value so much, it made more sense to buy new rather than used. We looked at the Civic but ended up going with the Fit. Ds gets better AC in the back in the Fit than he does in the Accord due to seat configurations. We were set on Honda and so looked at the different models. Hope you get a car you'll be happy with! :auto:

:iagree: Yup... Base 10 blocks. Work problems with the manipulatives first (for at least a day doing every problem with the blocks). Write down answers. Next day, do one or two with the blocks (same problems as before) but also show the traditional algorithm (borrowing). Hope the connection is made. If not, keep using the blocks until the concept gets set. Miquon was helpful for us and it did take over a week to get the concept with me pushing ds back to the blocks for any problem he got wrong.

I have caught errors so I'm glad I don't just download. It's never been more than a couple of dollars, but it happens at least a couple times a year. Often at restaurants where a tip isn't entered correctly on their end. I once had a check that I wrote for $100 only be deducted from my account for $10. The fees there for missing the minimum would have been really rough, so I'm really cautious about just electronic work without double checking.

I think the gripe is that parents don't parent but want to be their children's friends. Helicopter parents then swoop down to rescue little Johnny or Susie from any repercussions of their actions. You do hear of parents calling to check why their child didn't get a job or an interview; I don't know that you'd ever have heard of that 20 years ago.

We pay for almost everything by credit card (and pay off the card without fail every month so no finance charges). We hang on to the receipts (in each wallet) and then every weekend (or every other weekend) we each record our receipts. We use Quicken to track everything. Have records going back to 1994... I just looked up when we bought all our appliances and it's so nice having that data handy. You could get a folder and stick things there until entry - just be careful to actually enter everything. Getting a system that works for you is so good. I know if I wait longer than about 2 weeks, things get unmanageable for me, so I aim for every weekend and am very careful about not going longer than 2 weeks.

Just view the time here as "research".

Hope you got a lot of good prep done today and your classes go great tomorrow. I took the summer off and really have enjoyed having the evenings at home and not grading (I hate grading with a passion but am always grateful I don't have to do papers - I teach math - but the department has a common syllabus with five tests during the semester. Blech.)

38 students in each class or total? In each class, you've got my sympathies. Total... I've got two classes & they upped the size since we've got so many students coming to school with the economy the way it is... Each class has 30 students. Last year this classroom only had 29 desks. :glare: I spent yesterday getting online stuff taken care of, so at least that's ready. Couldn't fall asleep night before last because I was mentally giving my first night's announcements & lecture. <sigh> I'm pretty much burnt out, but I'm trying to remember that each semester I do have some really good students. I'm going to focus on them and not on the troublesome ones. And I do enjoy teaching once I get into it - it's just the dragging myself there that I hate. Hope you manage to accomplish what you need to today and find your groove this semester. Getting back to it is tough & I know I'll be whining today that I don't wanna go tomorrow! :D