Facebook nonsense

[Danae]

5 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

 

I try not to discourage those kinds of approaches, especially when it's clear they've found the ONLY answer. I just give questions where it's harder to see the answer immediately so that they see the point of what we're doing 😉 . 

 

Yes.  But I don’t want to have to make up my own problems.  That’s why I buy books. Also he is frighteningly good at “just seeing” the answer to problems I never would have imagined it possible for.  
 

And he can’t explain how he knows the answers so he makes up “rules” that lead to the right answer (sometimes completely by coincidence) for that particular problem and I have to make up problems where his rules don’t work in order to prove to him that they aren’t valid because he will argue that they should be.

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, Danae said:

Yes.  But I don’t want to have to make up my own problems.  That’s why I buy books. Also he is frighteningly good at “just seeing” the answer to problems I never would have imagined it possible for.  

And he can’t explain how he knows the answers so he makes up “rules” that lead to the right answer (sometimes completely by coincidence) for that particular problem and I have to make up problems where his rules don’t work in order to prove to him that they aren’t valid because he will argue that they should be.

Well, let me know if you need some problems, lol. I like making up problems. 

[Danae]

Just now, Not_a_Number said:

Well, let me know if you need some problems, lol. I like making up problems. 

I will almost certainly take you up on that.  

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, Danae said:

I will almost certainly take you up on that.  

Please do! I love experimenting. I've learned so much this way. 

I don't teach in the same order as any textbook I've ever seen, by the way. 

[Danae]

6 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

 

I don't teach in the same order as any textbook I've ever seen, by the way. 

This information is not new to me.  😛

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, Danae said:

This information is not new to me.  😛

Hah, sorry. Just as a heads up 😛 . But yes, perhaps I say that about 10 times in every 11 posts 😉 . 

[Danae]

1 hour ago, Not_a_Number said:

Hah, sorry. Just as a heads up 😛 . But yes, perhaps I say that about 10 times in every 11 posts 😉 . 

Yeah well.  If you ever find yourself in need of a middle school American Studies/English year focusing on African American and Native American history and combining AA and NA young adult lit with sci-fi and some intentional connections to the study of biology, hit me up.  That's where I'm putting my "making it up from scratch" focus this year and I'm pretty happy with how it's turning out.  For math, we're using AOPS.  :)

[Not_a_Number]

10 minutes ago, Danae said:

Yeah well.  If you ever find yourself in need of a middle school American Studies/English year focusing on African American and Native American history and combining AA and NA young adult lit with sci-fi and some intentional connections to the study of biology, hit me up.  That's where I'm putting my "making it up from scratch" focus this year and I'm pretty happy with how it's turning out.  For math, we're using AOPS.  🙂

Sounds cool! I’ll try to remember you’re the one to ask. Those are NOT areas of expertise for me...

Seriously, though — let me know if you need math problems!!

[Danae]

5 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Sounds cool! I’ll try to remember you’re the one to ask. Those are NOT areas of expertise for me...

Seriously, though — let me know if you need math problems!!

I will.  We're starting school back up today, and I'll pay attention to areas where something extra might help.  

 

[Clemsondana]

3 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

I don't mean equations exactly... more like "explaining it out." You can certainly talk this kind of thing through without setting up equations, although it's of course more onerous. 

Explaining it was how I knew that the approach was mathematically sound and not just guess-and-check. They were perfectly capable of saying that, since the difference was 6, they added 3 to one and subtracted 3 from the other (although they might not have been able to say what 'the other' was since I think they just saw a balance, but I could be wrong), and then they'd say that since one was twice the other that you were actually adding 6, and then on the other side you were dividing by 2, so you had 1.5 and 6 and then...  I could understand the reasoning, each step made sense, but it would have been a lot harder to write it out that way. 

That's actually how I check their current work - first they read answers, and if they are right then we're good - there's no way that they are routinely randomly guessing asymptotes and factors with radicals.  But, if they miss a problem then I have them read it to me.  If there's a simple mistake they usually catch it, and if not then I look to see if any of it matches the provided solution.  Sometimes it does with a little rearranging and sometimes they've gone about it in a different way and I have to sort out whether it makes sense or not.  

[katilac]

17 hours ago, lewelma said:

 My point is, to ask a student to show *her* work, is the wrong approach in my opinion.  You need to train a student to write the workings in a certain way, and that certain way when repeated day after day, year after year, will train a student to see math differently. 

You couldn't have told me this 10 years ago? 😁

I really, really like this. 

[Not_a_Number]

31 minutes ago, katilac said:

You couldn't have told me this 10 years ago? 😁

I really, really like this. 

I’m sort of... half way between what lewelma said and simply “show your work.” I think a kid needs to learn how to organize their thinking, absolutely. You don’t want nonlinear nonsense, which is definitely what kids will sometimes spew into the page themselves. 

On the other hand, I like to be as flexible as possible within the constraint of it making sense and being linear. So I tend to have a few big ideas I’m working on at a time, and as long as the ideas are demonstrated, I tend to not worry about the methods not being “standard.”

I also think it’s crucial to work with kids interactively to organize their thinking. It’s not NATURAL to think that way, but conversations with people who can model how to do it really help.

[drjuliadc]

On 1/1/2021 at 10:36 PM, Not_a_Number said:

Last I checked, when they measured, teething also only bothers kids for just a few days as the tooth is erupting, and not for the months of crankiness that parents seem to blame teething for 😂.

Said the mom who didn’t have kids with teething problems. My 3 bio kids started with teething symptoms at 2 months old. First tooth didn’t show up until 5 months.

When it first started with my first child at two months, I thought, “I swear it looks like this baby is teething.” I never said a word about it to my mother in law (had 3 children and worked in day care) who came over that day and declared, “That baby is teething.”

400 IUs of Vitamin D cured all teething symptoms except teething related fever, which was cured by calcium lactate. At about 10 months, my not very fussy kids started to get fussy again.  I increased to 1000IUs D and all fussiness stopped again.

Lots of kids have no or very little teething symptoms.

Growth spurts sometimes require the very same two supplements. My kids would get a fever sometimes with growth spurts. Cure:calcium lactate.

I love this thread because some of the extremes of good parenting/educating are on display.

Really Lewelma, reading about your steadfast determination to work around limitations to get to the genius, brought Anne Sullivan to mind.

Not a number, you bring out some of the most interesting posters to play.

[Not_a_Number]

3 minutes ago, drjuliadc said:

Said the mom who didn’t have kids with teething problems. My 3 bio kids started with teething symptoms at 2 months old. First tooth didn’t show up until 5 months.

So... here's the question. How did you know it's actually teething pains and not something else? That's always what I wonder. 

[drjuliadc]

What made me think it was teething was how the baby was moving his mouth and gnawing on his fist. The same thing that made my MIL think it. Shortly after that, drooling started.  He could completely wet my whole shirt front. 3-4 days after I started the D, the drooling stopped and never came back. Multiply that exact scenario three times with three kids.

My older sister had twins when I was 12. She lived at home with us until they were three.  She was only 17 and was very immature. I was very responsible and was heavily involved in their care.  Although after I had twins, I wished that I could go back and help her more.

My first child of my own was really the third baby I was responsible for.

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, drjuliadc said:

What made me think it was teething was how the baby was moving his mouth and gnawing on his fist. The same thing that made my MIL think it. Shortly after that, drooling started.  He could completely wet my whole shirt front.

I don't know about the Vitamin D, but all my kids drooled and gnawed on their fists from early on. They didn't have teething discomfort as far as I could tell, and they got their teeth late. DD4 didn't have any teeth until 8 months... didn't prevent the drooling in any way. 

Anyway, the problem with teething as an explanation is that it's hard to know what to do with it and it's not very testable. If you can see swollen gums and it's specifically ibuprofen that helps, then I see that as evidence. But in general... I dunno. I'm a skeptic 😉 . 

[katilac]

1 hour ago, Not_a_Number said:

So... here's the question. How did you know it's actually teething pains and not something else? That's always what I wonder. 

They might: stick their fingers in their mouth, rub their gums, grind their emerging teeth, pull fretfully at their mouth or cheeks. 

[drjuliadc]

It is unusual for children to have teething symptoms for as long as mine did before actual teeth came in.  When it comes closer together, the fussiness, gnawing, drooling along with the tooth coming through, it is more obvious.

The drooling didn’t stop in your children when their first teeth came in because they were still teething.  They had lots more teeth to come.

My children were quite fussy with their drooling and gnawing. The fussiness stopped within a few days of starting the D. This experience has been repeated with multiple patient’s children. I’ve also had lots of patients who had babies with no teething symptoms at all except the day or two the tooth/teeth broke through.

[Shoeless]

My kiddo was never fussy about teething. Our only hint was that he was "off his feed" for a few days. He would eat, but reluctantly.  Peek inside his mouth, and oh look! A tooth! 

No crying, no sleep issues. Our only hint was that he wouldn't want to eat. 

[Clemsondana]

I have a wisdom tooth that is unobstructed and has been slowly coming in for more than 20 years. The dentist of my youth had suggested letting it come in and then be pulled rather than cut out...nobody anticipated this.  It's the kind of thing that they look at and just say 'Huh...' 🙂    But, despite having all of my normal molars come in painlessly, there were times when this tooth was incredibly painful, often for a week or more at a time.  It's easy for me to imagine that most kids don't experience much but some have discomfort or pain for a long time. 

And, both of my kids were weird with teeth - one had none for ages, then got 8 in 2 months.  The other had a more normal schedule but when cutting their first tooth actually had blood dripping from their mouth one day.  They looked like a little vampire.  Then they lost their last baby teeth right around the same time as their sibling, who did it on schedule and was 3 years older...that's been good, though - they mostly had their braces at the same time, so I wasn't having to visit the orthodontist for years on end...so, yay for weird.  

[Porridge]

On 1/2/2021 at 1:34 PM, Rosemary said:

I’ve seen many people who were already homeschooling give the advice that school should take less than an hour a day and shouldn’t be started until they’re six or even seven.

To be fair, even many on this forum will say that in the earlier elementary years (k-1), an hour of academics is enough. I gave that advice to my friends who were emergency homeschooling this year. However my caveat is that that hour is the “seat work” part. And things obviously change as the kids get older.

...

wow. I lost track of this thread for one day and it’s all.... teeth?? 🤣😂😅

[maize]

13 hours ago, Danae said:

Yeah well.  If you ever find yourself in need of a middle school American Studies/English year focusing on African American and Native American history and combining AA and NA young adult lit with sci-fi and some intentional connections to the study of biology, hit me up.  That's where I'm putting my "making it up from scratch" focus this year and I'm pretty happy with how it's turning out.  For math, we're using AOPS.  🙂

That sounds delightful!

[Nichola]

On 1/4/2021 at 10:11 PM, JHLWTM said:

 

Edited January 21, 2021 by Rosemary

[Shoeless]

As a follow up to my previous posts about DS12 who's had so much conflict with instructors and all the dire warnings that he must have "something wrong with him", and I needed to get him medicated and treated, and homeschooling was running from the problems, and he'd be some kind of weirdo forever...

He's been in a Zoom math club for several months now, and given 2 presentations with little input from me. I am tech support to make sure files are saved/shared correctly for Zoom and I remind him to proofread, but I do not do it for him.  I have asked him a few times if he wanted or needed help, and he said "No, I'm fine. I've got it". 

And he's done SO well! The young man running the club told DS12 that his presentation was very clear and he'd turned in "excellent work". 

I just want to give a punch in the head to every one of those people that predicted doom and gloom for him. And then give myself a punch for ever staying away at night worrying that maybe they were right and I was failing him.  This kid is fine. ❤️ 

 

[Not_a_Number]

20 minutes ago, MissLemon said:

I just want to give a punch in the head to every one of those people that predicted doom and gloom for him. And then give myself a punch for ever staying away at night worrying that maybe they were right and I was failing him.  This kid is fine. ❤️ 

Honestly, they sounded like poopyheads, lol. Some people are really insecure, and they simply can't deal with being challenged by a child. 

Their response speaks volumes about THEM, not about your child. 

[Not_a_Number]

30 minutes ago, Rosemary said:

Given my situation, better advice for me would have been, “For younger kids, you can cover the essentials of math and language arts and handwriting in an hour of seat work each day, but if you’re wanting to include art or nature studies or read aloud books, that will take more than an hour a day. And if there’s a chance your kid will eventually go back to public school, you should look into your school’s grade requirements and keep those in mind as you plan your year.”

Yeah, that's much better and more balanced advice. You CAN save time by working with a child on reading and math one on one. But you certainly can't fit EVERYTHING into an hour. 

Our academics in grade 1 probably took a bit under 2 hours a day. But all the classes we took, which were absolutely important to my daughter and which she loved... those took a whole lot longer, especially if you factored in transit 😉 . 

Homeschooling is a full time job. There are no two ways around it.