Today was a ME day. Just me, myself, and I doing what we wanted to do. This is something I have not done in years. I started planing this this morning, right after I heard the boys making a ruckus of noise at 6:30AM. What the heck were they doing up that early? They went to bed after midnight and should have slept until at least 9. Oh well. I went downstairs, had SK make OJ and coffee while I cooked some bacon and scrapple. Then DH came in with breakfast from Helen’s Sausage House.

Now there’s a restaurant that knows how to serve up a great breakfast. DH handed me my sausage sandwich….ummmmm…….a photo wouldn’t even do this justice so let me describe it. Take a hot dog bun, layer in there two sunny-side up eggs, layer on two sausages that would shame any hot dog in diameter and length, and no, it doesn’t all fit within the bun and no, you cannot put the entire diameter into your mouth at once. Can’t be done but the sandwich is sure to fill you up until dinner for sure. Oh, the bacon was eaten entirely by MK after he ate his sausage sandwich—-must be time for another growth spurt —- while the scrapple went into the frig.

I headed out the door while SK and one of his Mission Possible partner’s headed out to work on their project. Desperate for some new wares I headed off for clothes shopping, a task I do not enjoy since I’m 3 sizes larger than where I should be / want to be /… but I picked out tops and skirts and pants and tired them all on. Reluctantly I found some things that will do for the upcoming season and realized that it was now close to noon. Thinking about whether I should do without lunch, after-all I am not pleased with my size, or visit my favorite subshop, I opted for the visit to the Big Elk a liquor store and deli that has the biggest, juiciest, subs or hoagies this side of the Mississippi. Or they did. I became a bit concerned when I noticed that all the usual help was not there as to whether the place had been sold, but I ordered my usual sub. HA! My usual. It has been over a year or two since I had eaten at the Big Elk but still, it was the only item I ever ordered. Over the last two years though I often stopped in there and purchased dinner for SK and MK so I had seen the subs, was familiar with the help, and had had a bite here or there.

With my sub in hand I drove off to a little park to eat and enjoy this big, juicy, meat-filled treat. Ahhhh, it looked the same. I took a bite. No, where was the juice? where was the meat? I looked and my eyes confirmed what my mouth had tasted. The bun was filled with lettuce, chopped iceberg lettuce—-there must have been a quarter-head of lettuce in there—-and one slice of ham and one slice of provolone across the opening to hold that quarter-head of chopped iceberg lettuce in that bun. UGH!! At least Helen’s Sausage House hasn’t changed management.

I stopped at a few more stores but couldn’t get my disappointment off my mind. I had a few phone conversations too on my day away from it all. One was really disappointing too; or at least I find it disappointing when folks who are dear to you do not believe that SK and his partners are working on their Science Olympiad events without adult intervention; or even that they are the ones doing the work but thinking that we adults are the ones designing, building, running the events. Remind me not to have a day away again. It is much pleasanter to just stay here.

MK and I went out food shopping this morning. Just a quick run to the store to pick up coffee, milk, doughnuts, mail a book-box, and pick-up Starbucks coffee. Ummm, is that good. On the way back I listened to NPR and heard a Dad talk about his young dd who died at age 8. He regretted not taking enough videos or photos of his dd. Then I received this email. I hadn’t read this one before and the end of it touched me, and hope it touches you too—-plus, this photo is so beautiful.  I haven’t found out how much the photo was touched-up or not.   

The most beautiful rainbow

As we grow up, we learn………

You’ll cry because time is passing too fast, and you’ll eventually lose someone you love. So take too many pictures, laugh too much, and love like you’ve never been hurt because every sixty seconds you spend upset is a minute of happiness you’ll never get back. Don’t be afraid that your life will end, be afraid that it will never begin.

Here’s to life, and I sure hope my camera returns from the repair shop SOON.  I want to take some photos, lots of photos.

Please stop by and visit our Science Olympiad website, and visit our photo gallery.

THANKS!!!!

This is that time of the year when folks start debating and thinking about standardized testing.

Should we or shouldn’t we? What will it tell me that I don’t already know? Do I really want to put my child through this process of being compared to some ’standard’? Do I really agree with the standard?….

oh, and the list of questions go on and on and on. I’ve read the debates on the various homeschool Yahoo loops I’m on, and frankly, I’m not interested in getting into the debate. Just like I will not get into a debate of whether or not it is best to approach hs’ing through a Classically approach or Unit Studies or Charlotte Mason or Unschool or use a little of all of the above. Our approach works for our family but I will admit that depending on the day or the time of the year or the season of our life we have used each of the above approaches. Right now we are very much following an unschooling approach for SK through this Science Olympiad season but it is bugging the heck out of him, for sure It is not his preferred style but it is what is needed at this point. Oh, yes, there’s also school-in-a-box and on-line Charter Home Schools but we haven’t used those, and I’m sure there’s several other approaches I’ve failed to list.

But back to Standardized Testing.

Each year my boys have taken a standardized test and this year it is happening again. Tomorrow MilitaryKid’s friend will arrive at our home and shortly thereafter the two will commence taking the IOWA. My reasons for going through this process is simple so that the boys become familiar with the how to take a test. So that taking a standardized test is semi-familiar to them and not some scary monster they should dread. I do not want their first standardized test to be the PSAT or the SAT when so much more is on the line. Really, with the IOWA nothing is on the line for them. When the test results come back I usually do not find any surprises but DH likes having the benchmark, the ‘official proof’ that DS is where he is.

Interestingly there are all sorts of free standardized tests on the web too. I recently used one with MK. MK’s friend’s mom shared that Texas and some other states have their old standardized tests on the net. To find them I did a google search on Texas Standardized Tests.

Yesterday I had MK take the Texas 5th grade math test and then I fed the results in to be scored on-line. I wasn’t interested in where he stood relative to their standard, but what topics the PS hit that our math program missed or hit lightly. Looking over items that MK missed because his Singapore program does not cover these topics at the 5th grade level, but are in the Texas PS Standards, included finding the median, and probability questions. This not something that I will lose sleep over, but I can make a decision to either hit these topics or ignore it. My decision. It was interesting to me that they hit statistics and probability quite a bit. I taught Statistics at the college level so this will be something easy for me to include and expose MK to throughout the school year.

I also use standardized testing to see what areas MK missed that I felt he should know ‘cold’ and of course the topics he really GOT. It was nice to see:

The student will demonstrate an understanding of the mathematical processes and tools used in problem solving. 8/8

YES I screamed with joy when I saw that. Singapore’s approach to teaching the kids to THINK, to problem solve mathematical problems is a strength of their program and a huge reason I use their program rather than some other program.

Then I examined the problems that he missed, talked with him about them so that I could understand why it was missed, and what needs to be taught or focused upon a bit more.

I also used the test to show MK how to eliminate the answers he can see right off the bat as being incorrect, or how to use the 4 answers given to ID the correct one. Decisions. Maybe by having my boys take standardized tests I’ve helped them to figure out how to eliminate a few possible choices and make decisions a bit easier to make. SK has shared that he uses this approach quite often in other aspects of his life.

I never thought about that possibility when I first made the decision for us to do a standardized test every year……decisions. I just know, that for our family at this point in our lives, doing a standardized test is a part of my sons’ school year education.

I wrote before about Fibrodysplasia Ossificans Progressiva, and about a little boy in my town, in my homeschool community who has this disease. A story about Justin is in my local paper today and about his mom.

Here’s how you can help:

The association is sponsoring a “Stride to Cure” on May 6 in conjunction with the annual Bay Bridge Walk, a 4.5-mile walk across the scenic Chesapeake Bay Bridge.
Wendy Henke, of Middletown, whose son suffers from FOP, said at least 100 family and friends will take part in the fund-raising walk. For information about walking and obtaining pledges, visit the group’s Web site at www.ifopa.org.

We need you to join in on the “Stride to Cure” walk on May 6th, or we need you to sponsor a walker. If you live in the DC/Baltimore/DelMarVa area, come out for the walk! If you live further away, make a pledge by visiting the IFOPA website posted in the article. The”Stride to Cure” link can be found on the top-right side of the IFOPA website.
Please, We NEED you to help.

“If we head out west next summer can we go through the Badlands again?” asked MilitaryKid.

“Sure. You really liked the Badlands?”

“Yea, It was a neat place. Did you know that Teddy Roosevelt really liked the Badlands?

Of course that was before he was President.”

Actually it was while he was Mayor of NYC”

Now where did he come up with that information?   But it soon came out.  

Last year I placed 30 or 40 paperback books for MK to read on his desk bookshelf and told him to read these books as his required reading books. He never did. About a month ago I rearranged books and moved a few boxes of books to our schoolroom bookshelves, and cleaned out a few boxes of books too. The books on MK bookshelf were moved to a low-lying milk crate. I didn’t make any mention of these books to MK but one day he asked me:

“Mom, is this book on my required book list?” He was holding up Escape from Warsaw, a sad story about the occupation of Poland in WW2 by the Germans and the struggles of a few children trying to survive and hold their family and hopes together.

“Sure. If you’d like to read it, go right ahead.”

Ok, so we aren’t studying Modern Age but the Ancients this year, but since the child is showing interest in reading, I’ll let him read. Screw the history schedule, he wants to read and so he will absorb some of this part of history too, even if it doesn’t fit into one of our present school subjects. Maybe it will stick a bit more now than if he waits until we do Modern again. It turns out that MK has been working his way through that milk carton of Modern history non-fiction and historical fiction books Sneaky isn’t it. That’s how he discovered that Teddy Roosevelt liked the Badlands and was a Mayor of NYC before he became President.

Unfortunately there isn’t a Ben & Jerry’s anywhere close to my home so I won’t be having a Ben & Jerry free cone on Tuesday.  But maybe there is one close to your home and you can go there and have a Free Cone for me.  I love Ice Cream.  To find the store near you just click on the above link and locate one.

What a fun day we had today, well, right after I checked on MilitaryKid to confirm that I had been dreaming that he was being beaten up, and that he was OK. Ever have a dream like that? I hate those kind, where you aren’t sure if what just happened was in your mind or in reality. Every-once in a great while I have one where I think there’s a mouse or a rat running over my bed, or in my bed. Now, I don’t need to have these dreams analyzed but just so weird, and so real. Except there was a time when I did have a mouse run over my bed, but I was in a sleeping bag, in a cave, sleeping. Probable that’s where my fear of having a mouse in my bed comes from. Of course, I have no idea where my fear that MK is being beaten up comes from. But he was fine. I could not fall back to sleep so I got up and was downstairs rearranging books at 4:30 AM. By 7AM I had listed about 100 books For Sale on a couple of my loops and tonight all but 12 of the books are sold. Ahh, I love the net for bringing buyers and sellers together.

Brutus and I went for a short walk at 7am. Only the birds were out, lots and lots of Robins. We are keeping his walks quite short these days since the Lyme Disease seems to have adversly affected his joints. If we walk him too much, say a mile which really isn’t that far, he starts limping. We did just that on Tuesday at my Dad’s so that he would be worn out and not misbehave. He limped all Tuesday, and Wednesday, and Thursday. Yesterday he finally was walking with just a little limp so I took him for just a little walk this morning. He heeled quite nicely, wagged his tail allot, but begged to cut through the backyards to get back to our home quickly. I took him back the way we had come, and only walked about 3/4 mile. I’d rather walk 3-4 miles with him but that doesn’t look to be in his future. Such a shame to have a lame puppy at age 5m.

One of the trial events at NSO will be Geo-Caching and MK will be doing this event. The Delaware AeroSpace Education Foundation had a family day today with Delaware’s Geo-Caching Club running a booth. We headed off to the event with high hopes that someone there could teach MK all about Geo-caching. The place looked geared for little kids with the fire trucks and fire men, the book-worm book mobile, and the paint booths. I started getting worried that this was going to be geared for little kids and not help MK. Why do I worry so much? Finally we found the Geo-caching club’s booth and chatted with a couple members. They quickly oriented MK to putting latitude and longitude into his GPS, and how to use the FIND-IT button. We went outside and followed MK as he walked off to the first cache site.

The one Geo-Cacher mentioned to me; “gee, maybe we can get him to smile soon.”

“Yes, That will be a miracle. He rarely smiles but when he does you know he is really enjoying himself.”

MK found the cache, opened it, and retrieved a piece of chocolate candy from the box. As he ate the candy, the smile came across his face, and he asked; “is there another one we can find?”

He was hooked! The club had 7 stations set-up and MK traveled from one spot to the next, smiling the entire time. They weren’t all easy to find but MK really enjoyed himself. He wants us to go out and do some geo-caching soon.

While we were away ScienceKid and his SO partners for Mission Possible were at home working away on their box. Their procedure is to run the apparatus and see where one of the simple machines fail, analyze why it failed, and then rebuild that section of the MP. Today they also worked on measuring the sand timer device. At NSO the judge will tell them the total operating run time for the device, which will fall between 90 sec and 150 sec. The closer their run time is to the required run time the more points they receive. The only device they are permitted to adjust is the sand flow rate in the sand timer. WHEW, to figure that out takes quite a bit of engineering. The boys are having lots of fun, but quite frustrating to them at times. And of course, we adults have to stay out of the way since it is their project, so it is best when I just stay away so it isn’t frustrating to me too.

With being away all day we went out to dinner at our local Chinese Buffet. At the end of the meal ScienceKid opened the first of our fortune cookies:

A Family Reunion in the coming months will be a tremendous success.

Interesting. There is an upcoming family reunion however, ScienceKid and DH will not be coming since SK will need that weekend to prepare for NSO. Next, MilitaryKid opened the next fortune cookie:

In the coming month you will have tremendous success.
OK, this was getting spooky, and there was a bit from one boy wishing he had opened that cookie—as if a fortune cookie makes a difference. But then SK opened the next fortune cookie:

Believe it can happen.

He took this one and and as he stuck it in his pocket he said “I’m going to look at this often. Yep, as I’m studying for Heredity….” Starring at it he shook his head, YES. He so wants to medal in Heredity at Nationals, so wants to prove that his result at State’s did not represent his knowledge set, that he is able to be in the top 6…..

DH took the last fortune cookie and opened it:

A friend asks only for your time and not money.

That’s a keeper too. MK got my time today, all day, and it was quite enjoyable.

Today at noon we returned from a trip to my Dad’s home, and our visit to Penn State University’s Earth and Mineral Science Museum. Sometime in my youth I visited PSU’s Mineral Museum and google-eyed all the minerals and rocks. Vast displays of these ‘things’, all labeled and neatly displayed, so of course I thought of PSU as a place to take ScienceKid to help him prepare for his Rocks & Minerals NSO event.

Having driven to Penn State late Monday night, after SK’s SO partners left from their afternoon session of working on Mission Possible, we were ready to get going on our next mission. Early Tuesday morning we drove over to Penn State’s campus, parked in a garage, and walked over to Old Main.

Beautiful building but not where we were headed. After a bit of a walk we found Deike Building, and had 20 minutes to sit and gaze into the museum waiting for it to open. Thirty minutes later I asked in the main office if we were at the correct location, and this prompted the museum to be opened for us.

We walked in and searched the small space for the 22,000 specimens PSU’s web site states it has. Surely they would have 10% of them on exhibit…..OK, maybe 1% would be on exhibit…….maybe 0.1% of them out……..We looked at the half-dozen quartz samples they had on display before moving to the Geo-Wall. SK played with the Geo-Wall, a 3-D, interactive tool to examine mineral crystal structures. He was enjoying himself and finally our guide, Dr. Graham showed up. He quickly explained how the Geo-Wall worked—-we weren’t interested in that, we wanted to see rocks and minerals, after-all this was a Mineral Science Museum. Their web site stated that it was:

“a unique mineral museum. Our main gallery display includes displays of fine minerals such as azurite and ‘velvet’ malachite from Bisbee, Arizona, and amazonite crystasl from the Pikes’ Peak, CO, area….. Many of these specimens are on display………Also, the Museum houses the world’s most extensive collection of mineral properties exhibits. These “push-button” electro-mechanical exhibits demonstrating dozens of the electrical, optical, and physical properties of minerals and materials such as fluorescence, radioactivity, magnetism, conductivity, flexibility, triboluminescence, piezoelectricity, double refraction, resistivity, and much more….”

But no, as Dr. Graham explained to us, the museum does not have rocks and minerals on exhibit. It doesn’t have what its website states as having. They are now an Earth-Science Museum and as such they do not have minerals out on exhibit. I felt the need to scream. Yes, they did have lots and lots of rocks and minerals in their previous museum but not now, now those are in storage, ….someplace…. We left, walked back to the car and returned to my Dad’s home. On the bright side we would have more time to visit with my Dad.

The afternoon was spent visiting with Dad while the boys watched a movie; neither know really how to interact with the other. I knew I could force the issue, force the boys to ask questions of Dad, but they’ve gotten tired of doing that. I let them be. My sis and her dh came over for dinner….. early this morning we packed the car and headed back to Delaware.

If you are looking for a great, little known mineral museum check out University of Delaware’s Mineral Museum. Great specimens, and great folks who are willing to share their knowledge and answer kids questions.

If you are looking for first rate ice cream, visit PSU. Their creamery is tops, at least they got one thing right.

Something I have been hearing often, way too often, is the misuse of the pronoun ME. It grates on my nerves, I shudder, and I slip into quickly stating when I hear:

Me and Sam want to get together to play, can we?

Sam and I ….

And then it happens again by the child’s parent.

Me and Mr. Smith ate at Red Robin last night.

And so it goes on and on. Where ever I am I hear the same grammar error over and over. Would you say:

Me ate at Red Robin last night.

Of course not! You would say:

I ate at Red Robin last night.

For some reason I thought news anchors would be exempt from making such a silly grammar error. But no. It seems more and more frequently I hear folks saying;

“Me and Sally……” UGH! Rip off my ears now!

It doesn’t matter who you are, if you are around me I will correct you. So be prepared. If you hear someone say;

Sally and I…

it just might be me. Or you, you could join me in my fight to have proper grammar spoken. Here’s to I being used as the subject noun.