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Oct. 7th, 2016 12:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
conulyAna and I were doing her math, and it was going swimmingly. (One downside of homeschooling is that Ana doesn't realize exactly how well she's doing. I'm going to have her take the Regents in June. Do you know, when I said that she went "But everybody else already took it!" Uh, no, honey. Only about half of all students take any Regents in middle school. Admittedly, if they do take a Regents it's probably the Algebra one, but that's beside the point.)
Midway through her math, my nose cleared, specifically, the left nostril. And I actually cheered, I was so happy to be able to breathe. Which led to a small discussion on why your nose stuffs up one nostril at a time. (Because some chemicals are better detected in slow-moving air and some in fast-moving air, your nostrils take turns becoming slightly swollen to change the airflow within.)
Eva commented that this was completely off-topic, and I was suddenly beset with a memory. I don't remember what class this was, or what teacher, but I was sitting in a class in high school once and our teacher talked about how Jimmy Carter's brother capitalized on his presidency to better sell his peanuts. Or attempted to, anyway.
That, too, was completely off-topic, and yet I suspect I remember that incident more than anything I actually learned in that class. (Hard to tell, since I don't exactly remember which class it was, but....)
I also remember a particular math teacher explaining that radical and radish and root are all related words, and I know for a fact I don't remember anything math-wise from that class. It is amazing how the human mind works, or fails to.
Midway through her math, my nose cleared, specifically, the left nostril. And I actually cheered, I was so happy to be able to breathe. Which led to a small discussion on why your nose stuffs up one nostril at a time. (Because some chemicals are better detected in slow-moving air and some in fast-moving air, your nostrils take turns becoming slightly swollen to change the airflow within.)
Eva commented that this was completely off-topic, and I was suddenly beset with a memory. I don't remember what class this was, or what teacher, but I was sitting in a class in high school once and our teacher talked about how Jimmy Carter's brother capitalized on his presidency to better sell his peanuts. Or attempted to, anyway.
That, too, was completely off-topic, and yet I suspect I remember that incident more than anything I actually learned in that class. (Hard to tell, since I don't exactly remember which class it was, but....)
I also remember a particular math teacher explaining that radical and radish and root are all related words, and I know for a fact I don't remember anything math-wise from that class. It is amazing how the human mind works, or fails to.
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Date: 2016-10-08 06:14 am (UTC)True .. But I think leaps of topic, pursuit of high-interest discussions, and the tendency of the memory to catch on odd things that stand out are features, not bugs.
And when it comes to long-ago classes, it's probably much more important whether one has retained the basic understanding of how to use the skills taught, rather than a narrative of the experience of being in class. I don't remember *learning* how to add and subtract, or how to solve for x, but I know how.
Betcha your kiddo learned something today. :)
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Date: 2016-10-11 06:41 am (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2016-10-08 12:57 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2016-10-09 12:11 am (UTC)"Some of the best conversations happen on tangents."
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Date: 2016-10-11 06:40 am (UTC)