(no subject)
My sweet J spent about half an hour talking on a live phone yesterday, helping someone with math. This is remarkable for several reasons. For one: did I say live phone? This must be a first for her generation! These kids do not talk. They text, they chat, they email incessantly, they tweet, Facebook, like and unlike. But they do not talk.
Yesterday, J talked.
And the amazing thing was: I got to hear it! She was doing math and then bio. She said "ATP" and "organelle." She said, "I just don't get ATP. I don't get where it goes. If I don't get a certain part of things, then I don't get the whole. I need to know where ATP goes."
I remember thinking the same thing when I took bio. Which I loved.
But the point is, I never ever hear what's going on in school like that. The cell phone and email mean silence. All I hear about is the grand romp she's having in P.E. I am not even kidding about that.
J is the queen of her math class. She spends all of her time reteaching the material which apparently comes very easily to her and not to anyone else in her group. Her group will probably rock the SAT verbal charts, but they are maybe not so hot with math (whereas she struggles in English, despite being in an English-focused program). I don't think there's anything wrong with her math teacher either. I liked him very much at back-to-school night. He stood in the corner for most of it and tried to give us as little info as possible. His posture said: I teach math. What more do you need to know? "You can always email me with questions later," he said. "I've been using email for a long time." By which I assume he meant since the 80's. Secretly, I imagine him liking my sweet Bean because she translates what is so obvious to him for all the other kids in the class. I have no idea what the man really thinks. Mathematicians are weird. They're the weirdest of the bunch except for physicists. "I've been using email for a long time." It's like something a grandfather would say. I had to suppress the urge to high-five him on the way out.
Yesterday, J talked.
And the amazing thing was: I got to hear it! She was doing math and then bio. She said "ATP" and "organelle." She said, "I just don't get ATP. I don't get where it goes. If I don't get a certain part of things, then I don't get the whole. I need to know where ATP goes."
I remember thinking the same thing when I took bio. Which I loved.
But the point is, I never ever hear what's going on in school like that. The cell phone and email mean silence. All I hear about is the grand romp she's having in P.E. I am not even kidding about that.
J is the queen of her math class. She spends all of her time reteaching the material which apparently comes very easily to her and not to anyone else in her group. Her group will probably rock the SAT verbal charts, but they are maybe not so hot with math (whereas she struggles in English, despite being in an English-focused program). I don't think there's anything wrong with her math teacher either. I liked him very much at back-to-school night. He stood in the corner for most of it and tried to give us as little info as possible. His posture said: I teach math. What more do you need to know? "You can always email me with questions later," he said. "I've been using email for a long time." By which I assume he meant since the 80's. Secretly, I imagine him liking my sweet Bean because she translates what is so obvious to him for all the other kids in the class. I have no idea what the man really thinks. Mathematicians are weird. They're the weirdest of the bunch except for physicists. "I've been using email for a long time." It's like something a grandfather would say. I had to suppress the urge to high-five him on the way out.