Parental Pride

I can't help it.  I tried and I tried to keep quiet, but I just can't. 

Angie has written her second book ever, and just like the first, it has a beginning, middle and end, complete with conflict and resolution.  (Because, as she said, "Mommy I noticed that in almost every book something happens, like something is lost or broken or someone does something wrong and then they have to figure out how to fix it.")  It is seven chapters (read: paragraphs) and she spent three days writing and illustrating it.  I printed it in booklet format for her from Adobe reader (thanks to Sandie for telling me about that nifty feature) and she is in heaven.  I'm so very proud of her.

I shall provide the text of it here, but if you want a copy of it, you'll have to make a request.  I'll have to scan and edit the illustrations before we can publish :).

The Mermaids’ Seashell
By Angie

Chapter 1

Once upon a time there were two mermaids named Jane and Marina. They were sisters. They were exploring the ocean. They found some pearls so they could make a necklace or bracelet. They were so excited that Jane fell. She fell on a seashell. It was a golden shell. Jane did not know what to do with it.

Chapter 2

Jane and Marina went to the king’s castle to ask the king if the golden shell was his. He said he had been looking all over for it. The two mermaids gave it back to him.  But he said, "You may keep it because you found it." The two mermaid sisters said, "Thank you so much."

Chapter 3

The two mermaid sisters went home to their cave. Marina had a whole collection of pearls. Jane had a whole collection of seashells. But none of Jane’s seashells were gold. Jane thought that it would be nice to give the golden shell to Marina.

Chapter 4

Marina loved the golden seashell. While Jane and Marina were sleeping , a crab came and took the golden seashell to live in. When Jane and Marina woke up, Marina did not see the golden seashell. She was very ,very angry. But Jane told her that she would help look for it.

Chapter 5

First they asked if the king knew where it was. But he shook his head. Next they went to Seashell Cave. But they did not find it. They also looked at Sandy Seashore. But they only saw regular seashells. They didn’t see it anywhere. So they gave up. They started to swim home when Marina saw it and a smaller one too!

Chapter 6

When Marina picked up the two golden shells, one crab popped out of each seashell! The bigger crab pinched Jane because Jane was older. The smaller crab pinched Marina because Marina was younger. Jane swam home as quick as she could ,while Marina was trying to pull the crabs out of the two golden shells. Jane came back with two swirly seashells. When Jane saw that Marina was trying to pull the crabs out of the two seashells she was very angry. Then Jane said, "Leave the poor things alone."

Chapter 7

Marina let go of the two crabs. Jane said, "Here crab". The crabs crawled into the two swirly seashells. Then Jane said to Marina, "Wasn’t that so much easier than pulling them out?" Marina said, "Yes".

When the two mermaids got home, Marina gave the smaller shell to Jane. They went to a shipwreck to find a glass jar to put their golden seashells in. But this time they didn’t leave the seashells behind. When the two mermaids returned to their cave ,they were as happy as could be.

One Year's Temperatures

Many of the decisions made in today's world are dependent on the collection and tabulation of great amounts of data.  And trends in data can often be seen by graphing, a skill which too many children lack.  In the sciences especially, where the correct analysis of data leads to new discoveries that can potentially impact the world, graphing is one of many tools that scientist need.  And because I'm a very math and science minded person, it's important to me to teach my children how to read and create graphs that relate one quanitity to another. So we've begun a project called "One Year's Temperatures".  Here's how it works:

I printed out a graph with temperatures ranging from 0 to 96 degrees Fahrenheit marked every 2 degrees on the vertical axis and the days of the month (1 - 31) on the horizontal axis.  It uses 2 pages in landscape mode, taped together to form one graph.  This hangs on the wall in our Calendar section of the room.

Each day, Angie checks a Weather Channel page ( which you can find for your town by Googling "yesterday's weather yourtownnameandstatehere".  It'll be similar to this link:  http://www.weather.com/weather/pastweather/90210 ) for the previous day's high and low temperatures.  With a red marker, she marks the high temperature and connects it to the previous day's data point with a line.  With a blue marker, she marks the low temperature and connects it ot the previous day's data point with a line. 

Now, we have the kind of line graph that is found so prevalently in stock charts and other time valued data graphs. 

What's wonderful is that she's beginning to understand the idea of a coordinate system and is looking at the graph from an analytical point of view.  For intance, when the temperature plummeted 24 degrees overnight, Angie declared, "Wow, Mommy, do you see that!?!" as she drew the line.  She imeediately understood that the steepness and downward slant of the line indicated a tremendous drop compared, especially, to the relatively minute changes we'd been seeing over the last few days.  She has now related slope of a line with rate of change and direction of slant with increasing or decreasing behavior.  These are Algebra 1 topics, folks.  And my 7 year old (and yours too) can understand them because she's seeing them daily.

Our plan is to complete a temperature chart for each month and string them altogether on the longest wall in our house.  And then, as we gaze at the entire assemblage, we'll mark the changes of the seasons and remark on the cyclic nature of temperatures.  We may even take a single day and graph the temperatures hourly to see how it compares to the yearly one, getting in a discussion of similarity and fractals at the same time!  (Note:  Angie is also already noticing how the monthly charts are similar even though the temperatures are  a bit lower than last month's.)

Oh how I love math!