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J.J. Abrams Personally Solves Kid’s Algebra Problem

Last week, a (rightfully) proud father's Facebook post went viral as he shared his 8th grade son's homework. The assignment? To create an algebraic expression into a word problem. And his son Cody's answer (with no help from his parents)? In case you're having trouble reading the above, it says: J.J. Abrams is making Star Wars Episode 7. He rented three speeder bikes which was 700 imperial credits to start. He must pay 100 imperial credits to keep his speeder bikes daily. If he does not pay daily, Prince Xizor and other Black Sun members will kidnap J.J. Abrams, bring him to Mustafar, and sacrifice him. J.J. Abrams is also paying 5 bounty hunters to keep separatist spies out. That costs 200 imperial credits...

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Summer Camp

Claire and Aerin are now halfway through their first summer camp experience. 8-)   The camp is run by Claire's Montessori school; it is set during the hours that would otherwise be taken up by classes during the school year. And while the school continues to run educational programs and activities at camp, these summertime sessions tend to be less structured with more "fun" activities like outdoor games, messy art projects, visits from exotic animals and their handlers, and even field trips. For a small additional fee, children ages 3 and over — like Claire! — can take a bus to the local pool and take 2-hour group swimming lessons twice a week. Aerin's first week was admittedly tough with some tears and extra clinginess toward her mommy. But...

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Why Chinese is Hard

Most of my readers know that we have been teaching Claire three languages since she was born. And at this point, at 16 months of age, she understands Cantonese Chinese the best, and more than half the words she speaks are Cantonese. I have no problem with this. I believe that Chinese — regardless of the dialect — is one of the most difficult languages to learn, and that our children having a good foundation in Chinese will not only help them more easily learn additional languages in the future (because you use both hemispheres of the brain with Chinese and other tonal languages), it may also be benficial if they choose to study music. I actually took two semesters of Mandarin...

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How to Find Kentucky on the Map

When I was in 3rd grade, I became the first person in my class to memorize all the states and their capitals in alphabetical order. I was also the first to correctly identify each state on a map of the United States. Sadly, that was the peak of my geographical knowledge. I can now only correctly identify perhaps half of the states on a U.S. map. (I imagine I will have a lot of catching-up to do before my kids start school. After all, we can't have a mommy who knows less than her grade-school aged children, can we? ;-)) And it is always those pesky middle states that give me the most trouble...

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