Learned in March

April 3, 2020 / No Comments
  • In a somewhat humiliating way, I unfortunately needed to relearn that commas should not be used to separate parts of a compound predicate. I had forgotten this mechanical rule, and I was leaning on the “comma-conjunction rule,” forgetting it was superseded by the other rule, and made a lot of mistakes while writing some important things. I was so convinced I had it right! And then when I looked it up in one of my grammar books, I didn’t! So, my apologies. You’ve probably been dealing with a lot of unnecessary and likely distracting commas in this space for the past few years. I’ll do my best from now on. I promise!
  • When The Banana was in the throes of completing her History Day project and needed to cut out 750 words (nearly half of what she had written) I was reminded how annoying word count limits, (and truly I do hate them) do have their purpose in producing tight, concise writing.
  • Even though Mom School has only been going on for half of the last month, I’ve learned and relearned a lot. I now understand fractal patterns so much better after forcing The Devious Snail to draw some, build a 3 model of Sierpinski’s Triangle, and answer some research questions.
  • I pulled out lots of my English Teacher books to give myself a little structure and inspiration to teach writing. There’s a lot of writing going on here! I’m really excited about this aspect of Mom School, because I have known for a long time that we needed to figure out how to supplement our public education with some At Home writing instruction.
  • I relearned how to identify all of the countries in South America and Europe (even the countries that weren’t countries when I was in Geography Class) on a map. I also had the opportunity to review where all those tricky eastern U.S. states lie, and got a crash course in capital cities in all of these places as well. Hooray for geography! This is another subject that I knew needed a little attention and that I have been incorporating into Mom School.
  • I am just discovering how Siri’s speech to text features can really help a certain smaller dyslexic writer feel more happy and confident. This kidlet is so relieved to have a way to check how to spell words.
  • I learned all about Joseph Stalin. What a gruesome guy.
  • Mr. TOF and I read a lot about Sonia Sotomayer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg and how they ended up on the Supreme Court.
  • We learned about residential boarding schools and their effects on Native children living near and above the Arctic Circle.
  • I learned about Dalsland, a region in Sweden, and about the history of Sweden.
  • I am learning how to teach piano lessons on FaceTime. It’s so hard! There is definitely a learning curve, and I’m greatly looking forward to the time when I will have my students sitting next to me in person.
  • I learned to make buttermilk biscuits. Yum.
  • I learned a few smaller pieces on my cello, as well as one larger one. I am also improving my bow hold and working on vibrato (as always).
  • At the piano I’m back to learning accompaniments for some new pieces The Banana is learning. My piano practice schedule has gone out the window with Mom School, so I need to work out something so that my playing is a bit more focused.

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