Now that we've made it to the weekend and can relax I'll try to record a few [schooling] moments because although we experienced many interruptions, we did manage to accomplish some things.


Firstly, Math-U-See. As you know, Tama 1 is working through Gamma. We're steadily working through Lesson 25 at present and we're making tremendous progress.

A Big Thumbs up for Steve Demme's method

Honestly, it is just wicked! Once I sat down and figured out how to do it myself, it was incredibly simple to implement. In a matter of minutes I understood the workings of it and I have only word to describe it - awesome! Yes indeed, for my little non-mathematical brain to have understood it is jolly impressive.


In all fairness, I can say that Tama 1 understands both the 'traditional' method and the 'Math U See' method, so he's flexible enough to move between the two if need be, ie recognise different methods. The problem last week had nothing to do with using the traditional method, but rather, it was the fact that he had bigger multiplications to do, ie not just single or double digit numbers. Now that he's advancing into triple digits and upward thereof, he was simply daunted by the amount of work to do; or more to the point, the amount of work to do on his own. When I sat with him (acting as nothing more than his study-buddy) he managed the equations all on his own because simply by having me nearby he was able to relax. I can relate to that. I can remember being quite frightened being wrong in front of my fellow students and teacher when I was his age because it was at the multiplication stage of my short enjoyment-in-life-of-math that everything went pear-shape for me. In my case "embarrassment equalled failure."

Returning to last week again, I figured out quick-smart that one of the problems for Tama 1 when doing the bigger multiplication problems, is the fact that there's no columns or ruled lines across to act as an aide for the child. As soon as I drew lines down and across, hey presto!, he mastered each equation. Once he's run out of room in the manual, he moves to writing on a pad of paper [... hence the photo included above]. Tama 1 takes pride in his presentation, which I freely accept he gets from me! lol. In order to keep his workings out with the manual, I think I'll trim the sides to fit and glue along the top of the workings page then pop it in the manual that way. He prefers to draw the lines as opposed to mum printing out the grid pages and that's fine by me. Whatever makes it more enjoyable and understable for the kids then that's the way we'll do it.

The main thing is, Tama 1 is doing fine with his multiplications. It's still rather intimidating to look at more numbers for him and I know he is daunted at the prospect of working on even bigger equations (having glanced further along in Gamma). However, I know we have worked out a way to assist him and if I'm honest, I'm actually quite keen for him to do more than one page per day so we can get to those bigger equations already!!!! (tsk tsk mum! So much for learning some patience, lol).

Saturday, 8 o'clock at night

Tama 1 takes a pad of paper to whaiāipo and says, "I think this is how many hours there are in a year ... and this is how many in a leap year." He was absolutely correct on both accounts.

Then he decides to calcuate how many minutes there are in a year! Now THAT was a big equation so I helped him out just a little, ie indicating it was a two-part equation and explaining he'd need to add an extra zero when calculating as he would be multiplying by three digits. (There's probably a technical term to explain this, but I'm sure you'll understand what I'm saying. I know it's to do with place value, but if there's a special term I apologise, but I can't think of it right at this time.)

1. There's 60 minutes in one hour and there are 24 hours in a day. He multiplied 60 x 24 without a problem. Total = 1440
2. Now for the biggie - 1440 x 365. That's where I needed to teach him to add an extra zero:

Now, if you aren't familiar with MUS's method or you haven't reached Gamma yet, you may or may not understand how this works. It's a neat way of carrying over your figures. You write them in the body of the equation as opposed to placing them at the top of the equation. Such a simple yet very effective method!!


Tamāhine 1 has been working well this week on all areas of her schooling. There is one area though that I have neglected a little and that's her handwriting practice. I got a little lax about practicing daily, so over the past few weeks I have made a more committed effort to re-establish it into our routine. I'm sorry the photo below isn't as clear as I wish it could be, but I was trying to provide an example of how she's come back to it like a duck to water. It took her a lot longer to produce her work, but once I reminded her to sit straight and relax her arm, she found it easier. The tendency to lean onto the forearm initially certainly exhausted her so I sat with her and with subtle yet encouraging reminders of what to do, she soon found her feet again and as the days passed, all aspects improved.



And finally, just a quick reminder to any whānau members checking in. Hopefully you have sent in or voted online (like I did).

I thought it was pretty flash to receive the form with secret code to vote online. Tumeke alright.

I cast my vote on receipt of the form on Friday rather than wait because (1) of the ease of convenience to vote online; (2) even though I have until 10 December, I already knew who I would vote for; and (3) we have a busy few weeks ahead what with two birthdays within six days of each other and getting myself organised with baby clothes etc for our new baby arrival. Besides, it's a good feeling knowing I've got another task out of the way (albeit small).

Monday
Today I sat down with tama 2 while tama 1 worked on Gamma Math-U-See Lesson 24 and tamāhine 1 did online MUS exercises. [Tamāhine 1 completed Beta on Friday 30 October, but I won't be moving her into Gamma just yet as I want to practice certain math facts for a while longer, hence online practice.]

Unfortunately it didn't go well with either boys. Tama 2 became hoha about reading, so I ended up letting him step away and play after less than 20 minutes because I knew he wasn't going to cooperate. I just wish I'd been quicker about letting tama 2 go because I probably would've avoided a little meltdown from tama 1.

Being the intelligent, deep-thinking and probably over-analysing son that he is, tama 1 can easily become upset when he gets something wrong.

Experience has taught me how to manage these moments, but today no amount of coaxing, cajoling, inveigling was going to work. So, I ended up sending the kids outside to play and said we'd come back to school after a long break. [Again, that's experience with our kids talking.]

I knew it meant a two hour plus break. During this period I too could take a breather and figure out what the underlying problem was. After much thought, I realised:

One problem: They could all be tired. I suddenly remembered tama 1 went to sleep at a very, very late hour last night. No wonder he couldn't focus. Of all days to try moving him into bigger multipication equations. Nope, today was possibly not the best day to have him work on it.

Another (possible) problem: I was teaching tama 1 to do the equation in the traditional method of multiplying, and not the Steve Demme way. I now blame myself that I hadn't used the new method; after all, I have followed the philosophy of Math-U-See all along, but I was uncomfortable changing the method to multiply simply to suit myself! I don't like to use the expression, 'you can't teach an old dog new tricks,' but it kind of rings true for me at this juncture. My head swirled trying to change to the MUS method, so I stuck to what I knew.

If you're familiar with Gamma Lesson 24 then you'll know what I'm talking about. I wasn't taught to do multiplication this way at all and yet, my reasoning to use the traditional method is because whaiāipo and I have used our method in front of, and with the children, on many occasions, yet I made the terrible mistake of thinking tama 1 was comfortable with this method.

Once I left tama 1 to it, he got himself bamboozled. I'm sure his mind would've been swirling with questions like ...

Do I add this carry-over number to that digit?

Do I multiply the totals? ...

When he did the first few examples with me, he was fine, but he obviously wasn't ready to move on alone. Throw into the mix a double-dose of tiredness and a big dollop of "I don't like to get things wrong" and voilà you have the perfect recipe to become upset.

Needless to say, when we did finally return to school work, we left maths and did other subjects instead. Everybody was a lot happier and able to concentrate.

Phew!!!


I started the day with a photo of tamāhine 1. I'll end with a photo of her as well. Our beautiful 6 year old lost her third tooth as she cleaned her teeth getting ready for bed tonight! No, she's not singing ... I had to ask her to open her mouth for the photo because when she smiled you couldn't see where she'd lost her tooth, lol.




Yesterday the bulk of my attention was centred around the boys. I tried to move across to tamāhine 1 and help her also, but it was more in the form of sitting at one end of the desk and asking, "are you doing okay tamāhine 1?" and that sort of line of questioning. When I did finally get to sit with her, I could see she was doing fine, and I just thought "that-a girl!!!"

Today it was important I did something with her, so while tama 1 had fun practicing his spelling on Wordcentral I sat with tamāhine 1 as she worked on her math lesson. She'd already completed the Venn Diagram lesson by the time I sat with her, so I made sure I was there as she worked on Patterns.

One of my aims with tamāhine 1 at the moment is to improve her spelling. Phonetically, yes, she's fine. By building her love of reading I know she will pick up many words so it's a two-fold process. Keep the reading up and build the spelling. Tamāhine 1 probably has more language arts in her daily work than she may like, but at least I'm finding different things for her to use to keep her interested. Two of the library books she read today were:



It's always nice to have a 'real' book to read, as opposed to reading from the computer, nē rā?!

She made a good job of reading these books. Words she found difficult:

mosquito
swatter
pimple
alfalfa
Emperor
Attack
Brie
fromage de vache ... any surprise there? ... hardly
musk
Juanita del Zorro - I pointed out Juanita is my friend's second name
Dolores del Zorro
Mildred
Elsie

Click on the link to access your free copy.

You can choose by age, language, short or long story etc. There's a great selection and like I say, being able to enlarge the text area makes a very big difference. Something for everyone.


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This website is a great resource. We followed this link as part of tama 1's Lesson Pathways Science programme.


I scrolled down and found a section "Habitats: Desert and Forest." So, we started on that after our MUS lessons. We learned more about what types of cacti are located in different deserts and how they retain water. Interesting to learn that the Saguaro Cactus has a large net of roots which extend far away from its trunk.  It has a pleated expandable stem, so water keeps the saguaro alive until the next rain.

We read about many different animals in deserts all around the world.  My least favourite so far is called the Thorny Devil from Australia.  To quote from the website "the grotesque thorny devil is the only species in its genus and one of the strangest of lizards." 

Grotesque is right!!!

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We didn't achieve as much school work as I would have thought today, however, I'll share some of what we did discuss during our science lesson from this afternoon.


I have more notes on deserts because I don't know much about deserts. Considering we only have Rangipo Desert (known more affectionately as Desert Road), it is the closest NZ has to a desert but that's only because of the poor soil quality and drying winds.

One of the first things I [we] learned about was something called a "Rain Shadow". Some deserts are made from what's called the rain shadow effect. When warm moist air rises over the mountains, its water vapour condenses into rain or snow. The mountains catch all the moisture so the air reaching the other side is dry as a desert.

The next thing we learned were some of the animals found in a desert. Okay, I've at least heard of Roadrunners and Jack Rabbits but I didn't know why the Jack Rabbit has such big ears!!! Well ...

You know how a car radiator cools off hot water from the engine? Some desert animals have big ears which do the same thing. When the warm blood moves through their big ears it gets cooled off in the same way...

Some of the animals I've never heard of before are Collared Lizards, Gila Monster or a Horned Lizard. I admit also that I didn't even realise there was such a thing as a Desert Tortoise!!! I couldn't see how a tortoise could handle the heat ... Hello!!!! They have an underground shelter (yes, a tortoise burrow). How clever's that?! Here's me thinking they only live near water!!!!

I did at least know that when the sun goes down the desert totally changes, ie different animals appear.

Oh, here's another animal I hadn't heard of ... Peccary - a desert relative of a pig!!! I think they come out at night? Could be wrong about that, but hey, it's okay to be wrong ... like I tell the kids all the time ... we learn from our mistakes.

So we learned that animals learn to run fast, or have spikes to avoid being eaten. Put another way ... Everything in the desert has adaptations to help cope with life in the desert.

And of course, we talked about the fact that although it may not rain often in the desert, it does receives some water at some point in time. One of the most prominent plants we would ever associate with a desert is cacti. We learned that it retains the water and has a waxy exterior to help keep that moisture in.

Really clever how the plants and animals adapted to meet their requirements. It's all a case of survival.

I thought I would share some of the websites I used to do my research on my chosen Maori leader. If anyone is interested in learning something about our culture, heritage and leaders of the past, then you may find the following websites of interest, and good starting points. I chose Sir Maui Pomare because he was our first Māori doctor. Well, that's pretty much my main reason. That and the simple fact I felt he was an important enough character in our history.

The first website is an interview with his great grand-daughter. I like reading first-hand personal accounts. They bring the character to life and you read things you wouldn't find with other write-ups eh?

Puke Ariki
NZ History
Te Ara

We had fun creating this thermometer and practising how to read in Celsius and Fahrenheit. We watched the weather report last night to see what they said the temperature would be for today and noted their prediction of 16°C. Using our thermometer print-out, we worked out that would be 60°F. Then we [tried] to check the real thermometer around lunch time to see if it did in fact reach 16°C.

We kind of missed the best time to check because whaiāipo came home around 12-12.30pm. He had a fall during work hours and had concussion. So, school went on the backburner for a while eh?! When we did check the thermometer however, it read 14°C-15°C, so that was close enough. We'll try again for tomorrow but there's a high probability whaiāipo will be home tomorrow to rest from his ordeal. He has quite a lump on his head and a saw jaw from where he knocked himself.

Because he was home, the children were allowed to finish work a little earlier than I planned because I wanted to keep an eye on whaiāipo as best as I could.


The children revised some math facts this morning. As much as I might say it was a waste of time what we covered, I would also say it is important to cover even the simplest of facts as often as possible to ensure the children haven't forgotten such basic skills. If there's one thing I have learned - it doesn't take much to forget certain facts once you move on to new facts.



In the afternoon we moved into Language Arts and Social Studies. We learned a little bit about Alaskan Inuit. I didn't even know that Inuit = "the People" or the "Real People", so I learned something immediately!!! We touched a little bit on what physical characteristics means and why they live near the sea (for hunting and fishing).

Get in quick and download a free copy of this Unit Study called Autumn Treasures from The Old Schoolhouse.

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When our friends were packing in preparation of their return to Reporoa, we were the lucky recipients of much needed clothing etc. In amongst some of the wonderful things we were given, I found the following and decided it was too good to leave lying around anywhere, and thought perhaps it may be encouraging for us all to read from time to time and what better place to store it, than on your blog!!!!

View an online version of this email

Friday 9 October 2009 Dear Parents and Eggsplorers, We are proud to announce that ABC Reading Eggs has received Kidspot's Best Website for 5-7 year olds for the second year in a row! What makes this award so special is that parents who use and love the ABC Reading Eggs program took the time to vote. ABC Reading Eggs is parents' Number 1 website for 5-7 year olds! The feedback from parents, carers and teachers has been overwhelming. It has encouraged the ABC Reading Eggs team to continue working to produce new content for the program that is fun, interactive and educationally sound. Tell your friends and family about ABC Reading Eggs! If you are enjoying ABC Reading Eggs, why not tell your friends with children aged 3-7, about the program? For each new unique user who registers on the site by the 31st of October 2009, using the code below, The Institute has a fantastic record in researching ways to improve the chances of children fighting cancer. The vision of the Institute is to cure 100% of children with cancer through world-class research. To access your FREE time on ABC Reading Eggs, simply sign up by clicking on the Register button located on the top orange bar at www.readingeggs.com. Then add the code: KLW99SAT by 31st October 2009. Not only will your friends thank you for helping improve their kids' reading skills for up to 3 weeks absolutely FREE, but you will also be helping a great cause! Help us raise $10000 this month! Yours sincerely Matthew Sandblom Chief Eggsploring Officer

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Last night, while whaiāipo gave tama 1 and tamāhine 1 another math lesson, our little man, tama 2, hovered about doing his own thing and (obviously) picked up on what was being discussed. While daddy was in mid-flight with an explanation about this and that, tama 2 came over to me and showed me these π equations. He made such a fantastic attempt at it that I simply couldn't resist sharing it to this blog. Of course "π" is "pie"!!!!


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It is not our intention to be solely computer-aided learners, yet it would seem of late that my posts are about exactly that ... e-learning/online learning/call it what you will. Aah well, it's like any fad I guess --> when it's working well and you have loads you want to share about what's new and exciting, you kinda end up talking about it for as long as you need to huh?

Today was such a muddle. Thursday mornings I check the bank accounts, move funds around if needed and pay the bills online. This means the kids get to do whatever they like for a little bit longer. The bills don't actually take too long, but I always like to get that side of finances organised so that by the time we do the groceries in the afternoon, I'm sorted knowing exactly how much I can spend.

{Ooh, that reminds me!!!! We went into Pak 'n Save and I am not entirely sure if this is relevant to all Pak 'n Save stores, or whether it's only the Rotorua store, but just in case you are doing your groceries, and spend $150 or over then get in before Sunday and you will get 20 cents off per litre of petrol!!!!}

Whaiāipo left for work yesterday saying to the kids that if he got home early enough, they would do some more math if they wanted.

I made sure we had dinner on the table by the time whaiāipo arrived home, and once we'd let the meals settle, the kids asked dad if they should grab a pencil and paper...

The children learned about degrees first (eg a full circle is 360° and also used a full circle protractor to help demonstrate this).

Whaiāipo quizzed them on square roots and they got all of them correct. Whaiāipo tried to be cunning and asked tama 1 what the square root of 10,000 was. He got the shock of his life when tama 1 questionly responded, "100?"

Whaiāipo was impressed beyond belief!!!

Then they went back over circumference and volume. To aid his teaching, whaiāipo grabbed a couple of biscuit tins and a ruler. [He was going to use an ice-cream container but I pointed out the little ones would think that meant dessert... but as it was, tama 3 still took the biscuit tins to mean dessert and headed off to the cupboard to grab some bowls!!!](Tama 2 wasn't missing out on math. Whaiāipo assigned him some exercises and he busied himself to impress daddy too.)


After another 10-15 minutes, I needed to take tamāhine 2 and tama 3 to bed. I suggested everyone come upstairs so the littlies didn't get upset that they were going upstairs but everyone else was still downstairs. So, class continued in the boys bedroom. I think it's traditional to "read stories" to your children before bed, but not Romankids, we talk about math facts, lol.

Because I was getting tamāhine 2 and tama 3 off to sleep, I didn't have the opportunity to take a photo of the older kids with their dad.

We practised some multiplications using the cards we brought yesterday for $4.00 from ...

When we got home on Sunday I opened the box and held them up to tama 2. We got through nearly half the pack and he had answered the bulk of the cards himself. Granted, many were __ x 0, __ x 1, __ x 2, __ x 10 and __ x 11. But isn't it exciting to know your child of four actually knows so much? So at $4.00, I was pleased with the cheap purchase.

The kids got stuck into school work around 10 this morning. Considering they had worked with whaiāipo until late last night, I wasn't expecting them to start any earlier. Until they started with Math-U-See, tama 1 actually worked on yet another construction design.

I am amazed at his ideas, concentration and method of design. He just gets so involved and enjoys being accurate with his method. Although I wanted him to start his maths, I held back on saying anything because I believe it is important to allow the children time to explore their own learning and if this is the sort of learning he wants to do, then I encourage him. I do get excited watching him. He looks so grown up, as if he's been employed to design something.

Following on from his lesson with his dad last night, I know that he tried incorporating what he had learned into his design today.

When whaiāipo got home tonight, tama 1 and tamāhine 1 both asked him if they would be doing more math like last night. I know that whaiāipo was pleased as punch they were keen, so here they are, 7 o'clock at night following their kai and they're up at the bench already.

Tamāhine 1 especially can hardly hold back her little grin that daddy is teaching her something and when she would get the answer correct, she has a particular grin she makes. Although I couldn't capture it tonight, I think this grin is gorgeous enough.

Whaiāipo spontaneously held a math lesson with the kids after kai tonight. He seemed keen to re-visit π. I encourage such lessons and I'm glad the kids didn't hesitate to focus rather than saying, "but I wanna watch the rest of the movie ..."

We don't expect the children to retain everything, but to be familiar with the workings of real life things, ie relating what whaiāipo was teaching them to everyday activities they know about.

Whaiāipo started off by giving tama 1 a triangle to work out the perimeter.

Then they started talking about volume!!! By this stage I'm on Skype to my brother in Auckland and then phoning my younger brother to see how mum is doing.

Tamāhine 1 tuned in to the lessons by this stage though if I recall.

I think whaiāipo used a hot water cylinder as one of his examples for the kids to relate volume with ...

Shocking photo of the next one, but I don't expect anyone to double click to get a good look at the picture. The pictures are really only there for me to record what dad taught his kids tonight.

Anyway, they discussed circumference, diamater and radius. I can at least say that tama 1 remembered that π = 3.142 from whenever the last time whaiāipo spoke to him about such things. That was impressive to me that he could remember that!!!


And then to top off the lesson, he had the kids working out how many kilometres per hour they are going. The first hour they were travelling at 100 kph and the second hour they could only go 50kph. So in two hours, they travelled .... 150kms.

Tama 1 just asked whaiāipo if you can write kilometres per hour as "km/h".  Not bad.  I'm impressed with his working out.  I know he understands kph, but to ask about km/h I don't think I taught him that.  Jolly good.

I enquired two months ago (possibly not even that long ago) about subscribing to Big Universe, because (1) we've been enjoying the site for a very long time now, and (2) I wanted to take advantage of their Create & Publish area.

So anyway, I made the decision I'd join and as I tried filling out the online form, I was stopped at the point where you're asked to provide your "State". There was no option for "outside the USA", so I fired off an email and within a matter of days had the reply "sorry, Big Universe is not available outside the USA at this point in time." Of course they added "we'll keep you in mind/on the list for the future ... rah-dee-rah-rah ..."

Oh well, to be in honest, I am kinda okay with not being able to subscribe. Save money 'n' all eh? Besides, we really enjoy having the weekly free reading books so as long as that's still available, I'm okay with it.
What sparked me to mention this site today is the wet, miserable Sunday afternoon we're having. Just before lunch, I decided to look at the free reading for this week to break the boredom of being stuck indoors, and decided it was an opportune moment to share Big Universe with anyone who hasn't discovered it yet.


Tamāhine 1 read this first book without too much trouble. Only the words "meddling" I think and "YEOWCH" were slightly tricky for her. Hardly Dolch words now are they? lol

We haven't read the next one at the time of blogging, but that's because we're having a late lunch. We will read it a little later this afternoon though.

Anyway, I thought I would share what website we use from time to time online and hope you enjoy it also.

A few reasons I like reading from here is that it's (1) free; (2) something different to read when we can't get to the library; (3) quite often has educational books such as the latter book, "Migrating Animals of the World" and (4) you're emailed links to the current week's free reads so you don't forget (which I'm notorious for doing).

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[I thought I'd quickly pop this link through while I thought about it. Hopefully I'll return with some discussion about our school day a little later.]


Although I haven't purchased a great from Curriculum Concepts, I will at least take advantage of their free downloads when I can and keep an eye on prices on anything that tickles my fancy.

This week's freebie is called "Sequence Stories Book 1". If you're interested in it then follow any of the links.


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