First, a topic. He wanted Titanic, a story he knows. Last year, he toured the exhibit at the Franklin Institute with his father. He bought a toy version of the ship there. The Cameron movie is too intense for him. But we have one book on the subject, level 3 reading. He cannot read that book himself, so we visited the bookstore on Sat. morning after a level 1 version. They didn't have it. We looked at level 2 and he couldn't read it either.
Looking through the level 1 subjects, he picked Rockets and Spaceships. He read it that evening, sort of. I wasn't very impressed with his reading, actually. Jeff says that he reads very well. So does his teacher. But he doesn't read for me. He'd much rather that I read to him. He's got no desire to "show off" to me, I guess.
Anyway, Sunday was busy with a BBQ which I should blog about a little. Then, after swimming last night, we settled down to complete the paperwork side of his book report.
On the first page, he had to supply the book's title, author and illustrator. He had to draw a picture of his favorite part on the first page, in a way, making a new cover for the book.
On the second sheet, he had to tell what happened first in the book. What happened in the middle and what happened at the end. Well, the first part was easy: the rocket blasts off from earth. The middle part involved landing on the moon and doing experiments. The end of the book looked forward to the day when visiting and even living in space becomes more commonplace. His favorite part showed geosynchronous satellites orbiting the earth.
We talked about two things: that the satellites won't collide with each other because they are "parked" in a particular location above the earth and follow that point around as the earth rotates. And we talked about radio waves having different frequencies so the signals don't interfere with each other. He tried to explain the first bit to his teacher this morning but she can't even spell "satellite" (I have the proof!), so I don't think she understood him. When I was explaining to him the part about wave frequencies, I compared them to waves on the ocean and I showed different "frequencies" incorrectly, actually, but altering amplitude instead of the cycles per second. I just thought it was easier for him to see the difference ... and it was easier for me to draw it. Oh, well, his seventh grade teacher will set him straight. "Yeah, but my mom said ..."
Not to mention that he had his regular load of homework on Monday evening, too. A page each of spelling, vocabulary and math problems. But we got it all done. Now, is tonight's homework done? Even started? Nope.
This morning, he showed his teacher his book and she said that she would like to hear him read it. So, he walked around the room as she got her work ready for the day, reading from the book. And, he read much better to her than he does to me.
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