School Days

We are coming to the end of school and I am really going to miss the boy's first grade teacher. She has become a friend to our family. She is originally from Pittsburgh and went to the same schools as hubby's Mom's family. She taught both kids first grade and she is amazing. She tailors the curriculum to the students needs, by enrichment reading and math programs for those kids that are doing well. It is her philosophy that the kids need to be engaged so that boredom doesn't set in.

This was the boy's homework assignment last week. I know I wasn't doing this type of math at 6 (or even now without a calculator). Luckily, the boy loves math. As you can probably tell by his writing, he doesn't like writing that much.

The boy is in the reading enrichment program. They just read a book about the ocean and wrote a play that they performed for their class and the kindergartners. The boy was a swordfish. I don't think that was by accident. He had recently done an ocean report on a swordfish. Their assignment was to research and write about an ocean creature. Once he read about how fast the swordfish can swim (60 mph) it was all over.

I am happy the kids have had such amazing teachers that foster a love of learning.

The girl's former second grade teacher has requested the boy for next year. She is also fantastic! Though, she is known as the "handwriting police" around school. A name she loves! So, we may have a bit of a challenge in that area next year.

Dog Days

We haven't posted any pics of the puppy (or more accurately, the 35lb menace that thinks he is a lap dog). So, here is Deacon at 4 months.
Here he is getting caught! He (like the other members of my family) thinks that if he looks cute and innocent that he might get away with not only being on the couch, but on one of the kids pillows on the couch. It didn't work.

I just thought this was a cute pic. He looks quizzical. His ears are no longer flapping around. The are starting to look more like Shepherd ears.

Maybe, he is part bat?

When we first got Deacon he could fit (barely) through the cat door. Currently, only his head fits and I am not sure how much longer he can do it without getting stuck. This is his pose when he he is looking into the garage. Either at the cat or one of us humans. It is kind of cute to watch him watch me as I am doing the laundry. He also can't walk by the cat door without quickly poking his head in to see if there is something interesting. This only happens about 50 times a day.

The Physics of Roller Coasters

The girl's class went on a field trip to a local museum. The museum held a class on the physics of roller coasters. The kids had so much fun! After a Q and A session of physics, where the kids knew more than the parents, they started their experiments. For their first assignment the kids broke into teams and had 12 minutes to make a roller coaster where a metal ball (which stood in for a coaster) would land in a cup 13 inches away from the base of the coaster. They were give tinker toys, duct tape, a metal ball, a cup and flexible Styrofoam tubing. They were allowed to go anywhere and use anything in the class room. After the time was up, each group had one minute to test their roller coaster and tell one problem they had to over come.

Us parents and the teacher were amazed at how they figured everything out. Most of the time the problem was the ball would bounce out of the plastic cup. They all solved the problem in creative ways.

For their second assignment, they had 10 minutes to design a coaster with a loop in it where the ball landed in the cup. There was no limitations on how far the cup had to be from the base of the coaster.

The girl's group was the only one to successfully have the ball land in the cup on both experiments. I was especially proud, as her group was the only one with 4 girls and one boy. The boy was great and went along with the girls ideas without any fuss.

The girl can't wait to go to engineering camp this summer.