Fractions- We don't need no stinkin' fractions!

I keep a private blog for our homeschool, mainly because I like to have a place to keep up with our virtual links, online accounts, and other things I come across on the internet; otherwise I tend to keep notes and links scattered among all of our computers and various pieces of paper and notebooks around the house. We use the comments area to share links for each other that are accessible from either computer.

It is also a good way for me to keep track of what we have done throughout the school year for when I have to write my end of the year assessment for our records. Our first year I started out keeping notes on a legal pad, but this seems to work better.

I even added a Shelfari widget to make a virtual library on the blog to organize and display the hoard (yes, hoard) of free ebooks that I have collected for my Kindle.

Our little blog makes me feel super organized- even though I 'm really not. 

Since Padawan insists that we MUST do school, one thing that works really well for us during the official school year is for me to make a blog post at the beginning of each week for which lessons come next and to strew things for our tentative plans.

Over the weekend I take a quick look over the lessons from all of his curriculum, and add the topic for the scheduled lessons, then I strew some suggested activities, Youtube videos, links, and a couple suggestions from Netflix.

It doesn't take very long to do this and it makes everything look and feel official.

I said all of that so I could tell you this...yeah, that's how my brain works.




Yesterday while Padawan was at my parent's house to spend the night, I worked on the blog post for this week. I noticed that the 3 lessons from the Mystery of History that would be scheduled for this week are about Amenhotep & Nefertiti, King Tut, and Ramses II. I knew that the boy already studied Ancient Egypt when he was in public school in addition to various documentaries that we have watched about Ancient Egypt and the Pharaohs over the years.

When my parents brought him home this afternoon, I told him who this week's history lessons were about and that I knew he already learned about them before. I asked if he thought we should skip them.

The thing he says every time we come across anything that he already knows about is "I already learned that in 3rd grade", so I was expecting him to say that something to that effect at this point. (I really should thank his 3rd grade teacher, because as much as she made 3rd grade h.e.double hockey sticks for us during that year, she sure has made homeschool much easier for me.)

He said, "Yeah, we should skip those because it was actually 3rd grade when I learned about them in school".

I looked over at my Mom and said, "There you have it, he learned EVERYTHING THERE IS TO KNOW in 3rd grade......except fractions. Maybe one day he'll understand fractions."

That's about the time my recently retired Dad, who rarely says much of anything piped in, "NO! HE WON'T!"

I asked him why not.

He said, "*I STILL* don't understand fractions, and I don't see how anyone has ever a use for those things."

I heart my Dad!