Rock garden part 2

Good things come to those who wait. I just wish inorganic substances crystallized like this!

Rock garden

Yesterday we went grocery shopping. Our list included ammonia and bluing. Till yesterday, I had no idea what is bluing, where to find it, and how to use it. Apparently, it is used to "brighten whites", and it is found in the laundry sections of grocery stores. The bottle is, appropriately, blue.

These supplies were requested by 8 yo to grow rock crystal gardens. He took out a book from the library about crystals about a month ago and now finally got around  to it.

When we finished our schoolwork yesterday, we set up the basic solution:

• 3 tablespoons of salt
• 3 tablespoons of water
• 3 tablespoons of bluing

Mix them together, then carefully and slowly add one tablespoon of ammonia.

The resulting solution was more than enough for our three gardens.

1. A few different rocks and pieces of charcoal.

2. Crumpled and shredded paper towels

3. Crumpled aluminum foil and a few toothpicks on top.

Spoon the solution on top, mixing gently. They suggest not pouring it on.

Rock garden, before the solution

rock with the solution

While we saw some crystals form right away, the real beauties awaited us in the morning. I just wish my proteins from grad school crystallized like that!

What's going on:

These are salt crystals. Water is needed to dissolve the salt. Bluing contains powdered fragments which seed the crystals and let them form. These fragments attach to the materials (coal, rocks, paper, etc) and provide scaffolding. Ammonia helps water evaporate faster, so that crystals can grow quicker.

The best part was that this experiment came out of kids' desires, so they were eager to check on it and show it off to my husband.

white crystals

more crystals

As another aside to my science coverage worries, we visited Goodwill this past Friday and walked out with two textbooks. One was World History and another was 4th grade science. 8 yo grabbed onto the science one and browsed it the whole Shabbos. There was a vocabulary preview at the beginning of a unit. I conducted my own experiment and asked him if he knew any of the words. He said that he knew all of them. I asked him about the meaning of mimicry. He immediately gave me the example of a milk snake and coral snake. Same went for the next section, about plant parts. He knew all the words except for one, and did not mind looking through the chapter to find it. I breathed a sigh of relief. Even without formal schooling and memorization, he surely knew the concepts and the vocabulary.

what does Judaism mean to you?

Today I got a phone call, asking about homeschooling and one of the questions raised was, what do I do to make being Jewish special to my kids? In other words, how am I assured that my kids will not turn after the surrounding world and abandon Judaism at the first opportunity.

I did not have a good answer on the phone. I said that, in my opinion, for kids, making being Jewish special sometimes leads to being snobby and thinking that others are somehow less than you. I said that my kids are confronted with being Jewish and being different all the time; when they are asked about the head covering, when they are asked how they celebrate holidays, when we skip on certain events because they conflict with Shabbos or take place in a church. They know that they are different. The caller was insisting that I need to make being Jewish special, or it will be too late, and they will be not religious.

Once I got off the phone, I started thinking: do I really need to pull out Uncle Moishy "I am so happy to be a Jew" to increase  my kids' positive feelings about Judaism? Is being Jewish to them all just about restrictions and differences and not fitting in?

Then I thought about the reasons I am homeschooling. One of them, from the outset, was to make Judaism not just something that we do because everyone else is doing it, but to bring meaning and logic to it. When I learn Chumash with 8 yo, I try to stick to the p'shat, and show him how many wonderful lessons we can learn. When we talk about davening, I explain how it builds our relationship with Hashem. When we talk about halacha, I mention the underlying logic. When Israel comes up, it is a holy place, our land, with a long and storied history. When we go to a rally, it is about showing our support for other Jews. Somehow, I hope, my kids get the idea that being Jewish is different and special.

Since this question was still bugging me, I asked the boys during dinner what they thought about being Jewish. In hindsight, it is quite brave, because it is not like they have a choice. 8 yo immediately gave it thumbs-up. 6 yo was more nuanced, he said being Jewish is sometimes good and sometimes bad. I asked him to elaborate. His answer: "It is good because we know about the true G-d, and it is bad because we don't get to do everything." 8 yo changed his mind, and sided with his brother's answer. He added that being Jewish is good when you can say Shema and think about Hashem protecting you. It is bad when you cannot drum on Shabbos, or watch Pokemon.

And that was it, no dwelling on missing out, no confusion over what it means to be Jewish.

So, for now, I think we are OK.

When we were in Houston, an old rabbi gave a d'var torah in which he said an amazing thing. He said that he was not guaranteed that his kids will stay religious, but now, that he sees that his grandchildren are frum, he feels assured that he has a legacy. Think about it: he waited till his grandchildren to see how his children will turn out. There are no guarantees. Nobody knows what will happen. You do your best, and hope for the best. And you think about these things, not just assume that because the kids are getting a Jewish education, or you keep mitzvot, that everything will turn out fine.

What do you do to make sure that your kids feel special about being Jewish?

surviving doctors' appointments

This past Friday, I had two doctor's appointments back to back; one was prenatal visit and one for the chiropractor. I scheduled them like this because the offices are very close to each other and are quite a distance from our house, so it makes sense to load everyone in the car once instead of twice, especially now that I have to be getting more of those prenatal visits.

I brought all three kids with me--there weren't many volunteers offering to watch them for me. Over the years, I had my share of doctor visits, and most of them were not routine. The only upside to all of this is that I come prepared now. Oh, and my kids know exactly what to expect.

So here are my steps to a sane visit:

• Inform the kids the night before about the visit. First of all, they need to know what to expect. Second, it will be less scary if they know it is not an emergency. It also allows for them to assimilate the information and ask any questions. Tell them what kind of doctor visit is planned, if it's routine, and if there is blood or shot.
• if you have any specific questions to ask the doctor, write them down! Chances are, even if you mulled them over while driving, nothing distracts you like trying to keep your kids quiet.
• bring non-crumbly snacks: cheese sticks, apple slices. Even if you just fed them breakfast or lunch, you might be waiting for a while, and nothing brings on the munchies like waiting around for an unknown amount of time
• bring books to browse/read/color. Some offices will ave kids' books and toys, others won't. I try to pick practitioners who welcome or tolerate kids, especially if you will have to come back often.
• bring snack cups for toddlers, and an umbrella stroller. This way, you can strap your kid in as you are getting examined or having blood drawn. Cheerios from snack cups tend to make a mess, so reserve them just for the time that the doctor is in the room.
• explain what is going on. Point out the scale, tell how the blood pressure cuff squeezes but does not hurt, talk about anatomical models (if it's not obstetrics, chances are it's a model of an ear or a nose), show the cool features of the exam table
• make a "chicken": take an exam glove ( most exam rooms have boxes and boxes of the,. blow it up and tie at the wrist. The thumb becomes the beak and the fingers are the comb. Hand it over and some time will pass in play
• bring a pen with you, and doodle on the exam table paper. Let the kids take turns drawing or writing. 
• when the kids are older, let them choose whether to come with you to the exam room or to stay in the waiting area. This only works if you know that your kids will not leave and know where to find you. Ask office staff if they are OK with this.
• also, teach your kids about privacy. I expected my boys to stay outside while I am getting undressed/dressed and for any internal exams. Luckily, 2 yo seems to follow their lead and wait with her brothers. 
• reward good behavior with a mint at the end of the visit. This meant that my kids got candy, twice, before 10 am, but this also means that my sanity was preserved.

While all of these have the potential to make a visit bearable, if you can have someone watch the kids while you go, take that offer!

Aren't you glad you are homeschooling?

In light of the recent massacre, and the amount of friends who had a particularly hard time letting their kids go back to school on Monday, this idea kept coming up. Aren't you glad that your kids are not in school? Aren't you glad that you do not have to drop them off at a place which seemed safe and, all of a sudden, isn't?

These ideas were peppered with plenty other finger-pointing and blaming. It's the guns. It's the lack of guns in schools. Every teacher should pack heat. Let's station armed guards at every school. It's mental illness. It's the lack of mental institutions. It's the lack of oversight. It's the permissive violent culture. It's the video games and movies. I am probably just scratching the surface here of all the different things which could be the contributing factors. as to why this happened and what needs to be done to prevent future violence.

I am a fatalist, and I do believe there is such thing as evil. There is no protection from it. If a bunch of armed thugs want to break into my house and really harm us, there is very little I would be able to do to defend myself and my kids, guns, krav maga and 911 included. If somebody decides to shoot up random cars (remember DC sniper?), there is no protection. Similarly, if someone plants a bomb, or stabs people, or shoots up a mall, or just decides that we trespassed on his lawn, what can we do?

As a child, growing up in Moldova, I happened to live there during the local civil war when Transnistria tried to secede from Moldova. This was just a short distance away. I remember playing outside with some friends, when down the street rolled an armored vehicle. The top was down, and a young soldier, with his chest puffed up, had a gun pointed right at us, kids, street level. There was no war in town, so he was probably an 18 year old punk, showing off. Pray tell me, what prevented him from pulling a trigger and producing more war casualties? And chances are, you probably never even heard of this teeny civil war.

When I was in Stern College in Manhattan, Sept. 11th happened. We saw the towers, we smelled the smoke, we witnessed the removal of debris from Ground Zero. I was an RA on duty when there was a bomb scare in Empire State Building two days later. One of the dorms was evacuated, the girls ran into the lounge, hysterical. I was told... to serve shabbos party food: nibs, pretzels, candy. The guards were talking about abandoning their posts and running. If there was actually a bomb, what would those nibs do?

Later, we lived in Far Rockaway. Remember the tsunami of 2004? We were in a flood zone, first floor apartment. I just had my oldest. I remember thinking that if there is a tsunami here, we will be licked clean, and I will not make it up the stairs with the baby.

Still later, I taught in Chabad school. The horrible shooting in Mumbai happened. Our school talked about beefing up security, being aware of strangers, and letting the secretary at the front desk decide what to do with visitors. We talked about code red and code yellow and where to evacuate the kids. Preparedness, yes; realism, no, not so much. I cannot fathom evacuating 40 preschoolers and hoisting them over the fence to safety if a terrorist is inside the building...

So ask yourself: realistically, is my child's school any more unsafe than it was before?  And are the safety measures that the schools are bound to undertake to calm jittery parents really making us safe, or are they there to quell our fears and make us feel that we are doing something?

Just in case you are considering homeschooling due to the recent events, I can guide you to an excellent article as to why you shouldn't make a rash decision. Yes, I am glad that we are homeschooling, but not for the reasons of fear.

watch date

As I was woken up this morning by a cranky 2 yo, I was greeted by this sight in the living room: 6 yo is sitting on the couch, reading "It's Not the Stork!" 8 yo is sitting nearby, reading a chapter of American History highschool textbook. I guess I could check science and social studies off the list for today.

My kids had a watch date this morning. That's like a playdate, except that you plan to watch movies together. For this, we got together with another homeschooling family. Everyone pulled out their favorite DVD or show. There was Ultraman, Pokemon, Aquaman and Barney. There was freedom of choice both what to watch, whom to watch it with, and whether to watch it.

There was also peace and quiet and semi-civilized tea-drinking for two mommies.

Afterwards, we did do some schoolwork. No, the kids did not gladly grab their pencils and eagerly cracked the books. There was whining and moping (quite a bit) about the two items on the agenda. Both boys did math. 8 yo came up to multiplication of 12s. Those he got quite quickly. Now the challenge is to get the rest of the table down pat so that Bruster's sundae will happen. He was convinced that he was getting it today, but he is still shaky in 7s and 8s. Part of me says: drill it now, and he will thank you later, even if he is not seeing the benefits. Another part says: it will come with necessity and then the motivation will kick in. The reality seems so be somewhere in between. After we finished math, we moved on to Chumash. He finished the second perek of Chayei Sarah, the really long one. Today we just had to review the last pesukim and then I asked him to do a review project. As I was tucking in 2 yo for her nap, he calculated that there are 67 pesukim, and if each pasuk had 4 words, that means that he read 268 words in this perek. I grinned and said that he knew that many pesukim were longer than that, so he has quite an accomplishment on his hands. I did not dare breathe about successful application of multiplication.

6 yo finished reviewing addition facts to 10. He knows them cold now. He also has been listening in to the multiplication practice, and he memorized quite a few of the facts. Sometimes I have to stop him from blurting out the answer before his brother had a chance to think. There are definite advantages to one-room schoolhouse/Montessori multiple grades approach.

8 yo decided to type up a short summary of the perek in Word. This involved fancy fonts and clip-art. Also this involves computer skills and typing. Two birds with one stone...

Fortuitously, I came across this article today. So my kids are learning, but not in a linear, easily assessible fashion. I guess they are getting a modern education.

Postscript: It is 9 pm. I tucked the kids in at 8 pm. At around 8:40, 8 yo wandered out of his room. Highly uncharacteristic, usually when this kid hits the pillow, all you hear is the sweet sound of snoring. He said that he is on edge about something and cannot sleep. When we spoke about it a bit, it turned out to be monsters, with griffin bodies and snouts and claws, watching him. After a bit more talk, he said that it's a scary part from SciQ, and some other movie watching that he did earlier today. No talk about saying Shema again and talking about Hashem's protection seemed to soothe him. I suggested drawing the scary monster tomorrow, and he seemed horrified at the thought.

What have I done? I forgot that this is the same kid who was afraid of dragon in Baby Einstein and of the falling cow in Sesame Street. This is the kid who does not want a movie night because all movies are too scary. Basically, even though he was excited to watch unlimited movies in the company of his friends, his psyche was not ready to process what he saw. When the kids were watching, my friend commented how cartoon violence is removed from people violence. Beneath all the tough big-boy exterior, here is a kid who is not ready for people cruelty and violence.

Big mistake on mommy's part here. We are going back to nature documentaries.

science "curriculum"

During most recent orthodox homeschoolers online chat, someone asked about resources for teaching science and a lively discussion ensued. I sat back, listening and feeling bad: I am not doing any curriculum with the kids. I do not have a textbook, or agenda, or even a loose schedule or units.  I do not schedule science in, like I do math and Hebrew and Story of the World. I have some ideas floating around in my head, but none of them came to fruition. Is science missing from my children's education?

The past couple weeks have proved otherwise. First of all, we have a large collection of Magic School Bus books, which boys read and reread at will. Then there are other science books hanging around the house, from an old textbook, to my occasional science reading. Then there is library, and boys pick out whatever interests them. 8 yo is still working his way through the dinosaur section. Then there are documentaries, both on Netflix and through the library. The latest one that the kids are enjoying is called SciQ. It is made by Smithsonian, and they cannot stop talking about it.

Then there are dinnertime discussions. One night this week 8 yo started the conversation by informing us about lizards which reproduce by cloning, without a male. We discussed advantages and disadvantages of this: no need for males, ability to colonize an island with just one lizard. Then we discussed disadvantages: passing on genetic defects without variety and reducing the odds of survival. My husband asked if a genetic disease could be an advantage, and brought in an example of sickle cell anemia and malaria. In order to have this kind of discussion, my kids knew what are red blood cells, what are their functions and what they normally look like. 8 yo also knew that malaria is spread by mosquito bites. 6 yo wanted to know how many  red blood cells are there in an average person. I found myself marveling  when I taught middle schoolers, I could not take the knowledge of basic facts for granted, and here are my kids, without formal curriculum, who are able to hold and comprehend this level of conversation.

When we go on a hike, 2 yo spends some time talking about the roots we step over, the big and small trees we see, the leaves underfoot, why is it winter, and the birds around us. Just this Friday, as we were waiting for the boys to loop around the lake, we opened up a seed pod which was just lying by our feet and looked at the small seeds inside. I have no idea which tree it came from, but it did not matter much. I stressed that each seed can grow into a big tree, and that prompted my daughter to open more pods and to count how many seeds were inside.

But what about scientific method? Experiments?

the set-up

Last night was the last night of Chanukah. As we were setting up candles and oil after Shabbos, 8 yo wondered about olive oil burning the longest and the best. I said that he could test it out and that's what he did this morning. We used three clean yortzait candle holders. He squirted 30 ml of water into each one, and then topped each with 20 ml of the different oils we had in the house: canola, corn and olive. Then he floated a wick in each, lit them up, and made a chart to see what happens. In the process of setting up this impromptu experiment, I told him how we want to have only other thing different ( a variable), while everything else has to be exactly the same (control). He figured out on his own that he needs to label the glasses, to know which oil is in which. He also proposed a hypothesis (thank you, Dinosaur Train) that canola will burn the shortest.

The results: olive oil burned out the fastest, after 6 hours, followed by corn an hour later, and canola, in another half an hour. 8 yo's conclusion: we should light with canola. An argument about the original menorah and the traditional use of olive oil fell on deaf ears. Afterwards, I speculated to my husband that they did not have good oil blends then, and maybe canola is today's olive...

the results

Science comes easily to me. I can probably come up with experiments all the time. The reason I don't is because those experiments would be answering the questions which were not asked yet. If a concept does not bother my kids, how much interest would an experiment hold? Moreover, why should I invest my time and energy and be pressuring my kids to do something which is not interesting right now?

There is a time and a place for everything. Since the time for science is "all the time", the questions and conversations about it happen all the time. There are no tests, no grades, no standards. But there is also no pressure.

I just wish I could say the same about Judaics...