Masterclass

As many of you may know, Greenhills School has also been putting together a production of As You Like It, which was performed (by 12th graders) about two weeks ago. On Friday, our class was fortunate to be visited by the Greenhills director, Ben Cohen, and two of his star actors, Amy and James. They came to school around 9am on Friday, and stayed with us for an hour, working on character and line interpretations. I believe they were quite impressed with our actors! This was a great opportunity for the kids; Ben is a very experienced director, and Amy and James are both terrific actors, and all three of them gave a lot of energy and enthusiasm to working with the Summers-Knoll crew. I was very proud of my students, who absolutely held their own in the presence of these visiting stars.

Word roots

Last week, I presented the kids with the following challenge: Imagine that a new element has been discovered. It was found on a fragment of meteorite; it is solid at room temperature; it is slightly radioactive; and it has a greenish hue. Invent a scientific name for this element.

We completed the challenge as a class, brainstorming words we knew in French that related to the characteristics of this imaginary element, and consulting a Latin-English dictionary to find helpful word roots. We also looked at the Periodic Table to see what element names usually sound like. The goal was to come up with a name that gave hints to at least a few of the characteristics of this imaginary element. Here are some of the root words we discussed (the ones we wound up using):

xeno—alien

terrestrial—earthly

ver (vert, verde, verdant)—green

saxum—Latin word for rock

And here are the element names we finally settled on, with endings taken from the Periodic Table:

Xenoversaxon (or Xenoveraxium or Xenoversaxum)

Xenoterrestrion

Read-in!

On Friday, December 18—a half-day at Summers-Knoll, and the last day before our winter break—our class will be having a read-in! Please send the kids to school with pillows, pyjamas, sleeping bags or blankets, and a BIG STACK OF BOOKS. With one break for snack and recess, we'll be spending the whole morning curled up, snug and excited, with our favorite books. I'll provide hot chocolate, too!

Note: This is still school reading, so I'm going have a rule that the books the kids bring in cannot be comics or picture books. This is a chance for everyone to really sink into some good books. Of course, the school's books will still be available, too.

It should be a nice, relaxing morning; I'm sure we'll all have some resting to do after our play performance next week. Read-ins are a very fond memory from my own school days!

Balderdash

Another stunning couple of rounds, today:

Xanadu (picked by Stanley):

- a super rare element that is found in thin layers of rock

- a time or place that cannot exist because of a paradox

- a place of idyllic beauty

- an authentic doodoo

- a type of dew

- a crystal whose exterior is very valuable

- a rare type of Mediterranean flower, ranging in color from dark blue to dark purple

afterclap (picked by Mike):

- the echo of a gunshot

- a clap after a marvelous production or play

- a sarcastic type of clap that shows disliking

- applause slightly delayed after the line or action being applauded, which interrupts a continuing performance

- an earthquake that hits right after the first earthquake, and is twice as dangerous

- a clap of thunder that happens moments after a flash of lightning that strikes a tree

- clapping multiple times

- the round of applause used to get an encore in a big theater

- an unpleasant squeal

As You Like It performance

We have a date, a time and a venue!

Our class's production of As You Like It is scheduled to take place at 7:00 on the evening of Wednesday, December 16, at the Kerrytown Concert House (415 N Fourth Avenue). There will be a dress rehearsal earlier in the day (during school hours). Parents and friends are all invited to attend!

This does mean that we have a lot of rehearsing and line-learning to do in the next three and a half weeks. Please help your children to practice at home (as they need). I'm also wondering whether the children might be available for some after-school rehearsals in the coming weeks. Is there a day of the week that works best for everyone? I'm quite open after school, most days.

I will put this in an email, as well...

A story of apples

"There once lived in Damascus an enterprising peasant who had three daughters. One day, the peasant told a qadi, a judge, that his daughters were not only very intelligent but blessed with rare skills of the imagination. The qadi, a jealous and stingy man, was annoyed at hearing a peasant speak so praisingly of his daughters' talents. [...] The qadi had the three girls brought before him. Then he said to them, 'Here are 90 apples for you to sell in the market. Fatima, the oldest, you will take 50; Cunda, you will take 30; and Shia, the youngest, you will take 10. If Fatima sells the apples at a price of 7 to the dinar, you other two will have to sell yours at the same price. And if Fatima sells her apples for 3 dinars each, you two will have to do the same. But, no matter what you do, each of you must end up with the same amount of money from your different numbers of apples.'

" 'But can I not give away some of the apples that I have?' Fatima asked.

" 'Under no circumstances,' said the wretched qadi. 'These are the terms: Fatima must sell 50 apples. Cunda must sell 30 apples. And Shia must sell the 10 apples that remain. And all of you must sell your apples at the same price, and all of you must earn exactly the same profit in the end.' "

Such was the problem posed to our class by The Man Who Counted this morning. The kids ultimately came up with three solutions, and while none were the same as that presented by Beremiz, in the book, each was an example of creative and intelligent problem solving:

— The girls could sell their apples in unequal lots of equal price. So, Fatima could sell all her apples in a single lot of 50 for any price she chose; 15 dinars, for example. Then Cunda would sell her 30 apples in a single lot for 15 dinars, and Shia would do the same with her 10.

— The girls could combine their apples into a single lot (e.g. 90 apples sold en masse for 30 dinars), then split the profits evenly.

— Owning and selling are not the same thing. The girls could, on leaving the presence of the qadi, divide the apples evenly among themselves, deciding that each sister owned 30 apples. Upon arriving at the market, Shia could then hand 20 of her apples to Fatima to sell, on the understanding that the profits of the same would be handed back to Shia, the owner of the apples. Then, Shia would sell 10, Fatima would sell 50, and Cunda would sell 30 apples, and each receive the same profit.

What ingenious solutions!

For the curious, here is the solution presented by Beremiz:

"Fatima starts selling her apples at a price of 7 apples for 1 dinar. She sells 49 apples at this price, but keeps back 1.

"Cunda sells 28 of her apples at this price, but keeps back 2.

"Shia sells 7 of her apples at this price, but keeps back 3.

"Then Fatima sells her 1 remaining apple for 3 dinars. In accordance with the rules of the qadi, Cunda then sells her 2 remaining apples for 3 dinars each. And Shia then sells her 3 remaining apples for 3 dinars each. [...] Therefore, each made a profit of 10 dinars, and thus the problem set by the envious qadi of Damascus was solved."

Casting

We have our parts for As You Like It—check it out!

Maria: Rosalind

Mike: Celia, Adam

Alec: Phebe, Duke Frederick, Corin

Max: Orlando, Touchstone

Parker: Silvius

Peter: Oliver, Charles the Wrestler

There are a few parts still to be assigned (Jaques, Duke Senior, various attendant lords, etc.), and we will have to ask for some volunteers from Mrs. Carpenter's class to take on smaller roles, requiring less rehearsal time—but we'll get to that after our class is a little more firmly grounded in the play.

Since I've never produced Shakespeare with this age group before, I'm still uncertain of how long it will take before we're ready to perform; the show will be either just before the winter holidays, or in January. I'm expecting to make that decision in about two weeks. I also need to talk with Joanna about possible performance spaces—but I will keep everyone updated on our plans!

Poses of many kinds...

Last week, when the kids were teaching each other about math concepts they'd recently learned, one of my students had to teach me. He was showing me how to make parallel lines on a grid, and I realized... we were tiptoeing right on the verge of the concept of slope. Slope is something that's usually studied rather later in mathematics, but this seemed to me like one of those wonderful Summers-Knoll moments when one can take an idea and run with it. So, I made sure to introduce the concept with each group, last week, and today I wanted to review it with them a bit, just to solidify the idea. It's a bit of a tangent right now, but the concept will come up again, and not too long from now, for some of them. So, we began by reviewing on the board, but then we started looking around the room for something with a slope we could measure. It was Jesse who presented us with an option:

We measured her from her head to her heels, and found the slope she formed, using the floor and the table as our X and Y axes. (If I'm remembering right, her slope was something like 113/-120.) Go Jesse!

And here's just a taste of our ongoing dramatic efforts: Alec and Mike expressing unrequited love.

Science

This month's SK theme is "electricity and magnetism": our first scientific theme of the year! We began, today, by discussing the scientific method, since we'll be careful to use that in all our experiments. I gave the kids an example of an explanation arrived at without using the scientific method by writing a short story about a farmer in the middle ages who leaped to the conclusion that rats were spontaneously generated from the corn he'd spilled in his barn. We then talked about the story, our impressions of the farmer, and our own beliefs about where rats come from. The kids made some fascinating comments about the character of the farmer and his process of deduction; they said he "didn't think it through, just went with his first thought," "didn't go to school," and that he was "religious." These were particularly interesting comments because I hadn't put any information about the farmer's background into my story!

I want to find out a little more about what the kids already know about electricity and magnetism, and then we'll begin some experiments. Hopefully, that will include a trip to the Hands-On Museum in a couple weeks.

Epistolary novel

As your children may have informed you, our class has undertaken the group project of writing an epistolary novel (or, at least, an epistolary short story). The students have been taking turns writing letters in the novel; while the individual letters are left to the discretion of each student, the whole class is responsible for editing the novel for coherence and narrative flow. Thus far, I think the kids are doing a good job of striking a balance between enjoyably silly material and a serious concern for the progress and form of the novel; they've all participated quite passionately in our class discussions about where the story is going.

We've also been studying the difference between 'S's on the end of words that indicate plurals, and 'S's that indicate possession (basically, which words need apostrophes and which don't). To that end, yesterday I handed the kids a brief plot synopsis of our epistolary novel, with a number of errors to be corrected. I chose to use a plot synopsis for the exercise because I thought it would get them interested. They were even more interested than I anticipated, and have been talking about using this synopsis for the back cover the of the novel, should we ever bind and/or publish it! So here, for your reading pleasure, is the plot synopsis I wrote (without errors):

"If Aloha's pills aren't taken, her crazy spells may get worse. But, if the company of devils and skeletons gets its way, she'll have to take those pills! The location of her headquarters is hidden. Will all her enemies find her there? Will her schemes succeed, or will she be foiled by her enemies' plots?"

As You Like It

Our class has begun work on a production (to take place at some unspecified point in the future) of Shakespeare's As You Like It. I firmly believe that students should be introduced to Shakespeare much earlier than high school, since it is rather like learning a new language: best done young. Thus far, we have acted the play through once without Shakespearian dialogue; I told the story, the kids acted it out. Today we began using an abridged version of the script, and we'll be working our way slowly through over the next few weeks. Here are some rehearsal pictures:

Group rehearsal...

Rosalind and Celia

Drama games

Acro-balance

I'm not sure everyone knows that I've been doing some acro-balance with the class over the last several weeks. Acro-balance is a fairly obscure form: it is, essentially, a series of two-person acrobatic poses, one passing into the next. It's almost all a function of counterbalance, rather than muscular strength. I'm using it as an additional form of physical education, and as a trust-building exercise within the class, since partners and spotters are to some degree responsible for other people's safety. Thus far, we begin our (brief) sessions with some stretching, to get warmed up, and then proceed to two or three ground-level counterbalances. I'm hoping that if we stick with this over the year, by the end we may progress to slightly more advanced positions. We are taking it quite slowly—partly due to the difficulty of finding time to spend on this during the school day—but the kids seem to enjoy it a great deal. Here are a couple pictures of myself doing acro with some friends near the start of the year, so you can see what I'm talking about (the kids are not doing this sort of thing, yet):

One group finished some work early, yesterday, and had time for a brief round of Balderdash. It was a fascinating set of definitions:

Obsequies

- to squeeze an obtuse triangle

- funeral rites or ceremonies

- a group of objects that are transparent

- a sequence of identical objects

- something with no symmetry

the Mahabharata

Over the last few weeks, as some parents may have heard, our class has been listening to snippets of the Mahabharata whenever we have a few spare moments. The Mahabharata is one of two great Hindu epics (the other being the Ramayana), and of the two, the Mahabharata is the longer and the less clearly compiled. To the best of my knowledge, it is originally an ancient Sanskrit poem, some 15 times as long as the Christian Bible. The version I grew up on is the one I'm sharing with the kids: a 9-hour stage script by Jean-Claude Carrière and Peter Brook. (There is also a 6-hour film version.) I've told the kids some parts from memory, and some have been read from the script. It's a powerful story, with equally powerful language, and the characters often make strange choices even as they state their own profound and particular beliefs about the order of the world. We have not finished the story yet; we are still caught in the great, world-ending battle that takes up the last third of the script.

I'll include a passage here, simply because I love this poem and I want to give you a taste of the kind of lines we've been hearing and discussing during class and during recess.

(Yudhishthira, son of the god Dharma, unknowingly is examined by his father:)

VOICE: What is quicker than the wind?

YUDHISHTHIRA: Thought.

VOICE: What can cover the earth?

YUDHISHTHIRA: Darkness.

VOICE: Who are the more numerous, the living or the dead?

YUDHISHTHIRA: The living, because the dead are no longer.

VOICE: Give me an example of space.

YUDHISHTHIRA: My two hands as one.

VOICE: An example of grief.

YUDHISHTHIRA: Ignorance.

VOICE: Of poison.

YUDHISHTHIRA: Desire.

VOICE: An example of defeat.

YUDHISHTHIRA: Victory.

VOICE: Which animal is the slyest?

YUDHISHTHIRA: The one that man does not yet know.

VOICE: Which came first, day or night?

YUDHISHTHIRA: Day, but it was only a day ahead.

VOICE: What is the cause of the world?

YUDHISHTHIRA: Love.

VOICE: What is your opposite?

YUDHISHTHIRA: Myself.

VOICE: What is madness?

YUDHISHTHIRA: A forgotten way.

VOICE: And revolt? Why do men revolt?

YUDHISHTHIRA: To find beauty, either in life or in death.

VOICE: What for each of us is inevitable?

YUDHISHTHIRA: Happiness.

VOICE: And what is the greatest marvel?

YUDHISHTHIRA: Each day, death strikes and we live as though we were immortal. That is what is the greatest marvel.

An unusual week...

This is an exceptional week for Summers-Knoll in many ways, and especially for our class: the Tantre Farm field trip is tomorrow, the Howell Nature Center trip is on Thursday, we're gearing up for the Curious Epicures this coming weekend, and POOT is launching. It seems as though ordinary school work will have to be crammed in around the edges for the next few days; among other things, we're still creating our North African tiling to help decorate Cobblestone Farm on Sunday! All of the madness notwithstanding, I am bursting with pride over the résumé drafts that were brought in this morning. I see the kids taking great care with the style and content of their POOT writings, and I was overjoyed to hear their thoughtful contributions to our discussion of free speech on Friday. Our kids are doing a fantastic job of entering into the world of this Place Out Of Time, and I know they're going to hold their own admirably in the coming weeks.

The Man Who Counted

Each morning, as we begin math class, we've been reading a short selection from The Man Who Counted, by Malba Tahan. The book, written by a Brazilian mathematician, is a series of Arabian Nights-style stories that center around the character of Beremiz, a brilliant mathematician who is also known as the Man Who Counted. In each story, Beremiz solves at least one difficulty put before him by the beleaguered inhabitants of Baghdad, and explains the mathematical and arithmetical relationships through which he sees the world, as well as demonstrating principles of friendship and charity. As we get further into the book, we've begun trying to solve the problems in advance of Beremiz, and I was particularly pleased by everyone's efforts this morning. Beremiz was explaining that using four fours (the numeral 4, four times), and no other numbers, it is possible to create a set of equations that yield each number from 0 to 10. For example, (4/4) — (4/4) = 0. I'm including the photograph of the equations we came up with for each of the eleven numerals. The kids did a great job!

Brave Balderdasheries

Balderdash is a game wherein one person picks an unknown word out of the dictionary, and challenges everyone to create a plausible definition of that word. The person with the dictionary writes down the real definition, and shuffles it in with everyone else's submissions. That person then reads out all the definitions, and the class votes on which one they think is real. You get a point for voting for the real definition, and a point for each person who votes for your own. We played a round this morning, and included all those who come in for math (Jesse, Stanley, Lukas, and Selden). I was fascinated by the entries today, I think they show some interesting perceptions of the word, so I'm sharing them here:

The word was "virgule" (chosen by Parker). Here were the submissions:

- an irritated microfiber

- a type of material that's on a badge

- a person scared of depth

- a miniscule object

- a particle of living matter

- separates successive divisions in an extended date

- to have happiness

- a tiny person

- a green bud on a plant

- something vile

Can you guess which one is the true definition? Or who wrote the others?

Teaching Arabic

Here are some photos from our visit to Elaine's and Mrs. Adhikary's classes last Friday. I was incredibly proud of my students; they worked well with the younger kids, and I know they all put in real effort for this lesson.

Learning to Teach

Tomorrow our class will be visiting Miss Elaine's and Mrs. Adhikary's classrooms, with the aim of teaching the younger kids how to count in Arabic. We had a long brainstorming session this morning to create the lesson plan, and the kids took it quite seriously and came up with some lovely ideas. They'll spend some of tomorrow morning putting together the materials required for their plans... and after lunch, we'll head over to K-1 and they'll have a chance to try their hands as teachers! This will be the beginning of an ongoing relationship with Miss Elaine's class, and I'm looking forward to its flowering.

North Africa projects

As some of you know, our class has two main projects going on as part of our North Africa theme this month. We've been doing some independent research on aspects of the region or the history that interest us, and presenting that research in the form of letters to the Moroccan explorer Ibn Battuta. Last Friday we took a research trip to the Mallett's Creek branch of the Ann Arbor library, and I was immensely impressed by the children's independence and excellent time management. It's a small library, so it wasn't easy finding all the information we needed, but almost everyone did a great job of staying on track and being self-reliant about seeking out the information. At this age, I hadn't honestly expected that level of self-motivation, and it was a joy to see!

We're also just beginning a mapping project, wherein we'll be drawing blueprints/maps of a North African city as it develops through the ages (this is based on a wonderful picture book called "Umm El Madayan"). We've planned the stages our city will be undergoing, and today we began the process of creating the basic layout of the land on which the city will be built. Both discussions were fun and engaged, with the children presenting lots of well-reasoned ideas about the layout and progress of the city. We should be starting the real mapping process on Thursday.

Our first read-out-loud book of the year was The Magic Pudding, by Norman Lindsay; as we've now finished that, we're moving on to a book set in Tunisia called Benny and Omar, by Eoin Colfer. All in all, our North African theme is pulling us in some fascinating directions, and I couldn't be more pleased with the children's involvement.

Corpses and Calligraphy

Perhaps you're all familiar with the writing game "Exquisite Corpse", but in case you're not, the rules are simple: each person writes one sentence of a story. The trick is that you can't see anyone else's sentence, so when the story is read out, it's nonsense. (There is another version of the game wherein you can only see the sentence directly before the one you're writing, which makes for an equally disjointed but more more traceable outcome.) The kids wanted me to post our first attempt at Exquisite Corpse:

Once upon a time, a frog jumped out of a pond into a tree.

So Esibella said whatcha doing to Pheanis. And Knorm was like whatcha doing to do Fingeberge.

I was almost killed by the last shot.

Today was the day I went to the museum.

All of a sudden the Princess got hit by a wrecking ball and went flying over the cliff and drowned in the sea.

And so he hopped on his old donkey and rode off into the moon waving panty hose.

Everybody died.

The End

We also tried to make our names into different shapes, today, in the tradition of Arabic calligraphy—see if you can figure out whose names are embedded in these drawings!

Subscriptions

We've had an awfully fun week; I must say I'm really enjoying being part of Summers-Knoll. This week we've begun our North Africa theme by learning the Arabic numbers to ten, spelling our names in Arabic, and doing a little bit of reading about Ibn Battuta, the great 14th-century traveler from Morocco. We've solved riddles, and made our own (cleverly hidden inside Origami), and had a few interesting conversations about numbering systems, mathematical bases, and transliteration. We've started the math assessments, though those won't be finished until next week; hopefully, we'll also get those desks raised by then! The kids played a couple of really impressive rounds of Dictionary (also known as Balderdash) this morning, with some interesting definitions of 'villify' and 'zooanthropy' offered for our common perusal. We've also been reading The Magic Pudding, by Norman Lindsay, and I have to say that's been a lot of fun.

A couple of parents have let me know that they're having trouble subscribing to the blog. Thank you for telling me, since I'm new to this and not apt to notice missing features! I'm emailing Mrs. Carpenter to find out how she set up her subscriptions (since I can't seem to figure it out), and hopefully that'll be up tomorrow.

I look forward to seeing everyone at the picnic!

A great first day!

We had a fun first day of school: we solved riddles and then created them, measured ourselves for desk-fitting purposes, and searched our minds for any information they might contain about North Africa.

Morning snacks

Would it be agreeable to everyone if we took weekly turns at bringing in snack this year? Since there are only six children in the class, I’m certainly willing to take a turn with snack, as well, so we’d be on a seven-week rotation. (That would come out to about two turns each before the winter break.) We'll be eating morning snack every day, but I'm not as firmly attached to the idea of afternoon snack; it's harder to fit in, and it won't always be necessary. I had been intending to provide snack this week, since I hadn’t sent out any notice about it; however, Parker’s father was kind enough to bring in a big tub of pretzel sticks anyway, so perhaps that family would like to take a turn this week? It’s pretty much taken care of with the pretzels, anyway… No matter what we decide, thank you for the pretzels, Ron! That was very thoughtful.

I’m therefore proposing the following Schedule of Snack Rotation (currently randomly ordered; just let me know if you’d rather have a different week!):

9/8 - 9/11 Parker’s family

9/14 – 9/18 Peter’s family

9/21 – 9/25 Max’s family

9/28 – 10/2 Alec’s family

10/5 – 10/9 Maria’s family

10/12 – 10/16 Mike’s family

10/19 – 10/23 Renata

10/ 26 – 10/30 Parker’s family

11/2 – 11/6 Peter’s family

11/9 – 11/13 Max’s family

11/16 – 11/20 Alec’s family

11/23 – 11/27 Renata (Thanksgiving week)

11/30 – 12/4 Maria’s family

12/7 – 12/11 Mike’s family

12/14 – 12/18 Renata

Does that work all right? Tthere are only six kids in the class, so providing snack shouldn't be too onerous a burden.

I believe everyone's dealt with snack before, but here are some suggestions for healthy foods (shamelessly borrowed from Mrs. Carpenter's blog):

Fruit - strawberries,bananas, apples, grapes, raisins, applesauce
Vegetables - mini carrots, celery, cucumbers
Cheese and whole wheat crackers
Nutragrain Bars
Pretzels
Pre-popped plain popcorn
Yogurt
Bagels

Please remember to check for peanuts and tree nuts, including snacks made in a shared facility. Check labels for transfat and high fructose corn syrup and avoid those foods whenever possible.

Weekly schedule

Here's our daily/weekly schedule for this year, in case it's helpful to know:

Monday through Thursday, we’ll begin each day with one hour of math (along with the rest of the school), from 9:00 to 10:00. Snack/recess is 10:00-10:30. From 10:30 until lunch begins at 11:00, we’ll do more language arts-focused work, some of which will be tied in with our theme. On Monday, Tuesday and Thursday I have one hour with the children in the afternoon, and we’ll use that time to explore the current theme from other angles.

Our class’s specials are all in the afternoon this year, as follows:

Monday: Music, Art

Tuesday: French, P.E.

Wednesday: Music, Art, Latin

Thursday: French, P.E.

Please make sure the kids have appropriate clothes on P.E. days—thanks!

Fridays are left open for projects, field trips, etc.

Back to school!

I'm excited to see everyone on Tuesday, Sept. 8! I've met half of our wonderful group, and I can't wait to meet those I haven't seen yet. There are lots of exciting ideas floating around the school this year, and I'm eager to see what the oldest kids in school are going to think about it all.

See you soon... (don't forget your passwords...)