Okay, so we had this subtraction problem tonight. Mommy and Daddy could easily solve it in a fairly quickly fashion. BUT, we could solve it with our old-school way of doing math, the way the rest of the entire planet does math, except for those victims of a little experiment government is trying out with our next generation called Common Core. It was slightly frustrating, as Madison hadn't remembered exactly how to get to the answer via this obtuse way of doing things. And although we could solve the problem easily, we wanted to respect the convoluted process, whatever that may be. It is only comforting to know that simultaneously, millions of other parents are enduring the same problem. We are separated from being partners in teaching our own children, mainly because we don't have a clue how to do math this new way.
Daddy may actually wind up taking a new math class to learn himself, just so he can be useful to Madison. Which seems so Billy Madison, but there is apparently a class for grown-ups so they can learn the new way of doing math. You know, that one where things take a lot longer?
Let's change the subject. Today is Wednesday, which is a busy work day for Daddy. We began our small groups tonight, where Daddy once again was hosting and teaching the third grade. This is where it all began - many years ago. Daddy's first work with KidPak was with a small third grade class. Daddy and Mommy would spend all their time developing lesson plans for the third grade, building up somewhat of a service flow for that smaller group of kids. That's how it all started. Mommy and Daddy were asked if they wanted to be teachers, and Daddy said no to begin with. But we tried it out after a time, and sure enough, it was fun to do. And that expanded to actually doing service flows for the entire KidPak service. Which we've been doing ever since.
So here we are, back in the third grade. Some of those kids in that original third grade class are getting married soon. That's how long ago we started this off. And it comes full circle, of course, with the very fact that Madison is in third grade this year.
Class went well tonight - although there wasn't as much time to prepare for it. One of the reasons for this was our time spent writing something for Christmas. Yes, we've been doing that lately. The idea at this point is to do something related to "A Christmas Carol." To that extent, we've written about five or six good pages thus far. As far as scripts go, these pages are bigger, so we've written more than what you'd think.
Tonight, Daddy continued reading from a book Mommy got called "Sleep Hollow: Birth of a Legend." The premise of the book is to discover where Washington Irving got his inspiration for the places, people, and stories behind the classic story. There are a lot of details in this book, but there are some interesting factoids in there that take you back a few hundred years. Of course, the relevance of the book is that a few of the names mentioned in the book are some of Daddy's ancestors, some of whom are buried in the the cemetery of the Old Dutch Church. That said, there's an extra bit of interest in it for us that helps carry us through the more tedious geographical details - I imagine those familiar with the landscape would be more interested in that sort of thing.
Daddy got new medication for Mommy's healing process, a step down on strength, which is actually a good thing. She's doing well - really well. She's up and about the house, attempting to keep it in order. Well wishes still pour in, and life is good!
Before going off, here's what we did in the classroom - a mad-lib that Daddy created to sort of go with our chosen memory verse. It turns out that this was actually the last service related to "The Quest," a little message we put together for each room...
Props:
1. Old man wig
2. Old man beard
3. Adventurer hat
4. Backpack
5. Bible
6. Printed script in notebook (just below)
7. Pen
8. List of words (at bottom) to read off and get from volunteers
9. Staff
10. Old Robe, possibly
STEP ONE:Collect words for Mad-Lib from various kids and adults in room. See list below - be sure to read out examples of words as well, so that kids know what kind of word we're looking for.
Have a volunteer fill in the words in the story, filling in blanks with the words that are called out. Make sure they know what they're doing!!!
STEP TWO
Get two volunteers. You should have already gotten with the first volunteer, actually.
1. Firstly, an adult volunteer to stand outside in hall, where he puts on beard and wig, and possibly a staff and old robe. He comes in at appointed time, and has one line to memorize, a preaching point, actually.
2. Second, a boy who is not afraid of standing in front of everyone and being silly, and being poked fun at a little.
STEP THREE
Read story, and have participants act it out.
THE STORY!
HOST: "Once upon a time there was an adventurer named _____________."
HOST: "He was a sturdy looking adventurer, rugged and ________________. He smelled manly, like a wild _____________, but that's besides the point."
HOST: "Make a muscle adventurer! Yes, you see - his muscles were as big as __________________!"
HOST: "Well, our story begins one day when our hero was off on an adventure. He heard of a famous person named Jeremiah, who was filled with all the wisdom and knew the locations of all the treasures you could ever want! So, with this goal in mind, he would find this Jeremiah!"
HOST: "He started his journey at once! He grabbed his lucky backpack - inside was everything he needed for his journey. There was a ___________ in there."
HOST: "Oh, and also a ____________, ____________ ___________ in there too!"
HOST: "But the most useful thing he had in there was his Bible! Pull out that Bible and show everyone!"
ADVENTURER does as instructed.
HOST: "See? I wasn't making that up. Anyway, it was time to leave. He stuffed that Bible in his backpack, and began to march like an adventurer would.
ADVENTURER marches.
HOST: "No, that's not quite it. This is how you should do it. The adventurer _____________ across the room with boldness!"
ADVENTURER does as instructed.
HOST: "Yes, quite right. And so he traveled all through the day! And all through the night!"
HOST shuts light switch off.
HOST: "And it was early one morning. We know this, because we could hear the rooster crow."
HOST shuts light switch on.
HOST looks at one of the adult volunteers expectantly.
HOST: "And that, my friends, is when he found himself on a mountain top, at a place where very wise and old monks live. Why, here comes one now!"
VOLUNTEER enters with a wig on and an old beard, and possibly a cane or robe.
HOST: "This wizened old man came in and said, ' _____________!'"
OLD MAN repeats.
HOST: "Our adventurer had no idea what that means. He apparently speaks a different language! Such is the way of these mysterious monks. Anyway, our brave adventurer asked, 'Are you Jeremiah?' Go ahead. Ask the wizened old man."
ADVENTURER repeats.
HOST: "The wizened old man spoke in his native tongue, and said, '_______________!'"
OLD MAN repeats.
HOST: "Which basically means no. Oh no! Alas, this was too upsetting for our adventurer, for he had by this point traveled ___________ miles to get here! He sat down, and sobbed, crying like a little ______________."
ADVENTURER does as instructed.
HOST: "But the wizened old man asked him this question here: '_____________, ___________, ___________, ____________?'
OLD MAN repeats as instructed.
HOST: "Translated, this means 'Who is Jeremiah, and why do you seek him?' The adventurer stood up and explained how he heard a man named Jeremiah was filled with all the wisdom and knew the locations of all the treasures you could ever want!"
HOST: "But the old wizened man had no idea what he was saying. So the adventurer communicated to him through... interpretive dance!"
ADVENTURER does as instructed, and OLD MAN nods
HOST: " And suddenly the wizened old man knew exactly what he was looking for. And he suddenly spoke in English too!"
OLD MAN: "The Jeremiah you seek is actually in THE BIBLE."
HOST: "Ah, yes! I knew it! The adventurer pulled out his Bible, and found it right there! Jeremiah 33 says this: ‘Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.’"
OLD MAN: "When we have a relationship with God, and call out to Him, our lives will be an adventure unlike any other. When we knock, He will answer, and show us things that we've never known before!"
HOST: "And with that knowledge, our adventurer had a smile that was bigger than a ____________."
HOST: "Because a life with God IS an adventure. And it is a glorious one at that!"
HOST: "THE END"
Daddy may actually wind up taking a new math class to learn himself, just so he can be useful to Madison. Which seems so Billy Madison, but there is apparently a class for grown-ups so they can learn the new way of doing math. You know, that one where things take a lot longer?
Let's change the subject. Today is Wednesday, which is a busy work day for Daddy. We began our small groups tonight, where Daddy once again was hosting and teaching the third grade. This is where it all began - many years ago. Daddy's first work with KidPak was with a small third grade class. Daddy and Mommy would spend all their time developing lesson plans for the third grade, building up somewhat of a service flow for that smaller group of kids. That's how it all started. Mommy and Daddy were asked if they wanted to be teachers, and Daddy said no to begin with. But we tried it out after a time, and sure enough, it was fun to do. And that expanded to actually doing service flows for the entire KidPak service. Which we've been doing ever since.
So here we are, back in the third grade. Some of those kids in that original third grade class are getting married soon. That's how long ago we started this off. And it comes full circle, of course, with the very fact that Madison is in third grade this year.
Class went well tonight - although there wasn't as much time to prepare for it. One of the reasons for this was our time spent writing something for Christmas. Yes, we've been doing that lately. The idea at this point is to do something related to "A Christmas Carol." To that extent, we've written about five or six good pages thus far. As far as scripts go, these pages are bigger, so we've written more than what you'd think.
Tonight, Daddy continued reading from a book Mommy got called "Sleep Hollow: Birth of a Legend." The premise of the book is to discover where Washington Irving got his inspiration for the places, people, and stories behind the classic story. There are a lot of details in this book, but there are some interesting factoids in there that take you back a few hundred years. Of course, the relevance of the book is that a few of the names mentioned in the book are some of Daddy's ancestors, some of whom are buried in the the cemetery of the Old Dutch Church. That said, there's an extra bit of interest in it for us that helps carry us through the more tedious geographical details - I imagine those familiar with the landscape would be more interested in that sort of thing.
Daddy got new medication for Mommy's healing process, a step down on strength, which is actually a good thing. She's doing well - really well. She's up and about the house, attempting to keep it in order. Well wishes still pour in, and life is good!
Before going off, here's what we did in the classroom - a mad-lib that Daddy created to sort of go with our chosen memory verse. It turns out that this was actually the last service related to "The Quest," a little message we put together for each room...
Props:
1. Old man wig
2. Old man beard
3. Adventurer hat
4. Backpack
5. Bible
6. Printed script in notebook (just below)
7. Pen
8. List of words (at bottom) to read off and get from volunteers
9. Staff
10. Old Robe, possibly
STEP ONE:Collect words for Mad-Lib from various kids and adults in room. See list below - be sure to read out examples of words as well, so that kids know what kind of word we're looking for.
Have a volunteer fill in the words in the story, filling in blanks with the words that are called out. Make sure they know what they're doing!!!
WORD LIST
1. NAME (Tad, Slagator, Cheryl)
2. ADJECTIVE (Slime-ridden, ridonculous, Slightly pink)
3. ANIMAL (tree sloth, banana slug, giant vampire bat)
4. PLURAL NOUN (funny looking grandmothers, mexican food trucks, tiny hairless cats)
5. NOUN (Spider-Man comic, Rhubarb Pie, Barbie Dreamhouse)
6. ADJECTIVE (Exploding, Smelly, Jiggling)
7. ADJECTIVE (Wooden, Bright Green, Sickly)
8. NOUN (Rhinoceros, Tinkerbell Doll, Wafflemaker)
9. VERB (way to get from here to there, past tense) - (hopped, skipped, crawled)
10. ANY WORD (Antidisestablishmentarianism, Taylor Swift, clambake)
11. ANY WORD (diarrhea, flapjacks, combine harvester)
12. NUMBER (2, 91 billion, 3.14)
13. NOUN (hedgehog, pork chop, pair of Spongebob boxer shorts)
14. ANY WORD (spoon, taquitos, sparkplug)
15. ANY WORD (giant squid, Dracula, flame thrower)
16. ANY WORD (garbage truck, chihuahua, spatula)
17. ANY WORD (walnut, tugboat, Supercalifragilisticexpealadocious)
18. NOUN (spinosaurus, banana holder, old-fashioned Mississippi steamboat)
1. NAME (Tad, Slagator, Cheryl)
2. ADJECTIVE (Slime-ridden, ridonculous, Slightly pink)
3. ANIMAL (tree sloth, banana slug, giant vampire bat)
4. PLURAL NOUN (funny looking grandmothers, mexican food trucks, tiny hairless cats)
5. NOUN (Spider-Man comic, Rhubarb Pie, Barbie Dreamhouse)
6. ADJECTIVE (Exploding, Smelly, Jiggling)
7. ADJECTIVE (Wooden, Bright Green, Sickly)
8. NOUN (Rhinoceros, Tinkerbell Doll, Wafflemaker)
9. VERB (way to get from here to there, past tense) - (hopped, skipped, crawled)
10. ANY WORD (Antidisestablishmentarianism, Taylor Swift, clambake)
11. ANY WORD (diarrhea, flapjacks, combine harvester)
12. NUMBER (2, 91 billion, 3.14)
13. NOUN (hedgehog, pork chop, pair of Spongebob boxer shorts)
14. ANY WORD (spoon, taquitos, sparkplug)
15. ANY WORD (giant squid, Dracula, flame thrower)
16. ANY WORD (garbage truck, chihuahua, spatula)
17. ANY WORD (walnut, tugboat, Supercalifragilisticexpealadocious)
18. NOUN (spinosaurus, banana holder, old-fashioned Mississippi steamboat)
STEP TWO
Get two volunteers. You should have already gotten with the first volunteer, actually.
1. Firstly, an adult volunteer to stand outside in hall, where he puts on beard and wig, and possibly a staff and old robe. He comes in at appointed time, and has one line to memorize, a preaching point, actually.
2. Second, a boy who is not afraid of standing in front of everyone and being silly, and being poked fun at a little.
STEP THREE
Read story, and have participants act it out.
THE STORY!
HOST: "Once upon a time there was an adventurer named _____________."
HOST: "He was a sturdy looking adventurer, rugged and ________________. He smelled manly, like a wild _____________, but that's besides the point."
HOST: "Make a muscle adventurer! Yes, you see - his muscles were as big as __________________!"
HOST: "Well, our story begins one day when our hero was off on an adventure. He heard of a famous person named Jeremiah, who was filled with all the wisdom and knew the locations of all the treasures you could ever want! So, with this goal in mind, he would find this Jeremiah!"
HOST: "He started his journey at once! He grabbed his lucky backpack - inside was everything he needed for his journey. There was a ___________ in there."
HOST: "Oh, and also a ____________, ____________ ___________ in there too!"
HOST: "But the most useful thing he had in there was his Bible! Pull out that Bible and show everyone!"
ADVENTURER does as instructed.
HOST: "See? I wasn't making that up. Anyway, it was time to leave. He stuffed that Bible in his backpack, and began to march like an adventurer would.
ADVENTURER marches.
HOST: "No, that's not quite it. This is how you should do it. The adventurer _____________ across the room with boldness!"
ADVENTURER does as instructed.
HOST: "Yes, quite right. And so he traveled all through the day! And all through the night!"
HOST shuts light switch off.
HOST: "And it was early one morning. We know this, because we could hear the rooster crow."
HOST shuts light switch on.
HOST looks at one of the adult volunteers expectantly.
HOST: "And that, my friends, is when he found himself on a mountain top, at a place where very wise and old monks live. Why, here comes one now!"
VOLUNTEER enters with a wig on and an old beard, and possibly a cane or robe.
HOST: "This wizened old man came in and said, ' _____________!'"
OLD MAN repeats.
HOST: "Our adventurer had no idea what that means. He apparently speaks a different language! Such is the way of these mysterious monks. Anyway, our brave adventurer asked, 'Are you Jeremiah?' Go ahead. Ask the wizened old man."
ADVENTURER repeats.
HOST: "The wizened old man spoke in his native tongue, and said, '_______________!'"
OLD MAN repeats.
HOST: "Which basically means no. Oh no! Alas, this was too upsetting for our adventurer, for he had by this point traveled ___________ miles to get here! He sat down, and sobbed, crying like a little ______________."
ADVENTURER does as instructed.
HOST: "But the wizened old man asked him this question here: '_____________, ___________, ___________, ____________?'
OLD MAN repeats as instructed.
HOST: "Translated, this means 'Who is Jeremiah, and why do you seek him?' The adventurer stood up and explained how he heard a man named Jeremiah was filled with all the wisdom and knew the locations of all the treasures you could ever want!"
HOST: "But the old wizened man had no idea what he was saying. So the adventurer communicated to him through... interpretive dance!"
ADVENTURER does as instructed, and OLD MAN nods
HOST: " And suddenly the wizened old man knew exactly what he was looking for. And he suddenly spoke in English too!"
OLD MAN: "The Jeremiah you seek is actually in THE BIBLE."
HOST: "Ah, yes! I knew it! The adventurer pulled out his Bible, and found it right there! Jeremiah 33 says this: ‘Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.’"
OLD MAN: "When we have a relationship with God, and call out to Him, our lives will be an adventure unlike any other. When we knock, He will answer, and show us things that we've never known before!"
HOST: "And with that knowledge, our adventurer had a smile that was bigger than a ____________."
HOST: "Because a life with God IS an adventure. And it is a glorious one at that!"
HOST: "THE END"
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