Mt. Pleasant Classical Academy

What a day!  What a week!  And it’s just the beginning of the month.

We have Senior High Science Olympiad competition this Saturday.  I agreed to run the event ‘Junkyard Challenge’  I’m busy gathering ’stuff’, getting rules and score sheets together, getting totally familiar with the event.   I should spend the day preparing for the class I teach but I’ll fit that in some other day or more likely some night-into-morning time slot.

Michael is in the competition however he nor any of his teammates are in Junkyard Challenge.   Last evening we were at a public school working on one of his events: Trajectory.  This morning when he went looking for his calculator he realized he left it at the public school.  Opps.  Say goodbye to one TI89.   We went looking for my TI83 (which he borrows whenever he cannot find his) — it is not in the car. It is not in any of my book bags.  It is not on a shelf, or in a cabinet, or anywhere in our house.   Now, where did he leave that one?

This is a constant problem.  We can always tell where Michael has worked with things — his Calculus book is on the floor by the living room sofa, the Chemistry book is on the family room chair, the English book is on the floor by the fireplace.  It isn’t that he purposefully leaves these items out.  Oh no, there is no purpose in it.  Michael will work on something, finish with it and go off to do something else.  The item(s) get left behind as he shifts his focus onto the next task.

For years I have tried to address the disorganization, the items left here and there, even levying fines when books were left out.  Nothing has seemed to work.  And now we are down two calculators.   Maybe the calculator will still be in the room.  We’ll be there today, again, for more preparation work.

pa—TI83 has been found.  Whew!  Now we’re only down one $150 calculator.