honest truth
Pamela Sorooshian
Rosie who is 12 and Roxana who is 15 and I were driving along in the
car having a sweet and innocent discussion about what I should talk
about at the conference - they were giving me advice. I'm talking about
math - so that was the subject.
Rosie suddenly interrupts and says, "You know what I'm going to tell
people I want for my birthday?"
"Math workbooks."
"If I tell all my friends I'll probably get about 20 of them!!!!!"
Silence while I absorb this and try to figure out what to say next <G>.
Roxana steps in and says, "What kind of math workbooks?"
Rosie: "Mostly division."
Roxana: "Why workbooks?"
Rosie: "Because they're fun and Mommy gets tired of me asking her to
give me problems to do all the time, but she doesn't like to spend our
money on workbooks."
Roxana: "But for birthday presents?"
Rosie: "That's what I want."
By this time I'm trying not to laugh - the ludicrousness of this
conversation - right in the middle of them helping me with ideas for my
talk about "UNSCHOOLING math" -- is just cracking me up.
I think we can probably get her pages of practice problems off the
internet somewhere - that's really all she wants, an unlimited supply
of opportunities to do division over and over - kids often like to do
that kind of thing - kind of obsessively practice something. I remember
writing my own name over and over and over - filling a notebook with
it. And hitting a ball against the garage door with a tennis racket,
over and over and over.
-pam
car having a sweet and innocent discussion about what I should talk
about at the conference - they were giving me advice. I'm talking about
math - so that was the subject.
Rosie suddenly interrupts and says, "You know what I'm going to tell
people I want for my birthday?"
"Math workbooks."
"If I tell all my friends I'll probably get about 20 of them!!!!!"
Silence while I absorb this and try to figure out what to say next <G>.
Roxana steps in and says, "What kind of math workbooks?"
Rosie: "Mostly division."
Roxana: "Why workbooks?"
Rosie: "Because they're fun and Mommy gets tired of me asking her to
give me problems to do all the time, but she doesn't like to spend our
money on workbooks."
Roxana: "But for birthday presents?"
Rosie: "That's what I want."
By this time I'm trying not to laugh - the ludicrousness of this
conversation - right in the middle of them helping me with ideas for my
talk about "UNSCHOOLING math" -- is just cracking me up.
I think we can probably get her pages of practice problems off the
internet somewhere - that's really all she wants, an unlimited supply
of opportunities to do division over and over - kids often like to do
that kind of thing - kind of obsessively practice something. I remember
writing my own name over and over and over - filling a notebook with
it. And hitting a ball against the garage door with a tennis racket,
over and over and over.
-pam
[email protected]
Heres a site:
http://www.aplusmath.com/Worksheets/index.html
You or your child can create any kind you/they like. Laura
<<<I think we can probably get her pages of practice problems off the
internet somewhere - that's really all she wants, an unlimited supply
of opportunities to do division over and over - kids often like to do
that kind of thing - kind of obsessively practice something. I remember
writing my own name over and over and over - filling a notebook with
it. And hitting a ball against the garage door with a tennis racket,
over and over and over.
-pam
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
http://www.aplusmath.com/Worksheets/index.html
You or your child can create any kind you/they like. Laura
<<<I think we can probably get her pages of practice problems off the
internet somewhere - that's really all she wants, an unlimited supply
of opportunities to do division over and over - kids often like to do
that kind of thing - kind of obsessively practice something. I remember
writing my own name over and over and over - filling a notebook with
it. And hitting a ball against the garage door with a tennis racket,
over and over and over.
-pam
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
[email protected]
In a message dated 8/9/03 8:34:46 AM, pamsoroosh@... writes:
<< I remember
writing my own name over and over and over - filling a notebook with
it. And hitting a ball against the garage door with a tennis racket,
over and over and over. >>
Me too! If they had made us do that at school, we wouldn't have wanted to do
it for fun. And surely we wouldn't have wanted our birthday parties to have
any MENTION of it! <g>
I practiced my name
Sandra Adams
Sandra Lynn Adams
and as I got older I practiced my potential married names. I still find
those, in notebooks here and there, because I still have some folkmusic words
things, and mostly music things, and some diaries, with my practice names.
Sandra Chacon
Sandra Garcia
Sandra Tsosie (hard to pronounce)
by college I was too cool to practice "Sandra Singh" and it's not a good
pronouncing name, either.
Ended up Sandra Gill for a while
and Sandra Dodd for a LONG time.
I used to practice writing numbers, too, though, in patterns. It was partly
a speed race with myself to put numbers in columns and have the columns line
up really well.
Even now, when I reconcile my "envelope" (I do $200 worth of debit card at a
time, and keep the date/place/amount on the outside of a little coin envelope
that holds the card), I'd rather do it by hand than calculator, and instead of
doing it carefully, I do it lightning fast, two numbers at a time (like a
calcator does) adding one item/amount to the running sum each time. And then I
do it again, with the numbers in a different order, and if the two totals
match, that's it. If they don't, I go for two out of three.
So even though I did have school I can still amuse myself with math by hand.
Holly likes math workbooks that have pages with time or money or pie charts.
Sandra
<< I remember
writing my own name over and over and over - filling a notebook with
it. And hitting a ball against the garage door with a tennis racket,
over and over and over. >>
Me too! If they had made us do that at school, we wouldn't have wanted to do
it for fun. And surely we wouldn't have wanted our birthday parties to have
any MENTION of it! <g>
I practiced my name
Sandra Adams
Sandra Lynn Adams
and as I got older I practiced my potential married names. I still find
those, in notebooks here and there, because I still have some folkmusic words
things, and mostly music things, and some diaries, with my practice names.
Sandra Chacon
Sandra Garcia
Sandra Tsosie (hard to pronounce)
by college I was too cool to practice "Sandra Singh" and it's not a good
pronouncing name, either.
Ended up Sandra Gill for a while
and Sandra Dodd for a LONG time.
I used to practice writing numbers, too, though, in patterns. It was partly
a speed race with myself to put numbers in columns and have the columns line
up really well.
Even now, when I reconcile my "envelope" (I do $200 worth of debit card at a
time, and keep the date/place/amount on the outside of a little coin envelope
that holds the card), I'd rather do it by hand than calculator, and instead of
doing it carefully, I do it lightning fast, two numbers at a time (like a
calcator does) adding one item/amount to the running sum each time. And then I
do it again, with the numbers in a different order, and if the two totals
match, that's it. If they don't, I go for two out of three.
So even though I did have school I can still amuse myself with math by hand.
Holly likes math workbooks that have pages with time or money or pie charts.
Sandra