And he was right about that!

Oh my, our sons should get together to play drifting continents LOL My DS is 6 and when drifting continents were his passing obsession, he drew dozens of world maps showing Pangea and Gondwanaland.

Over time I've wanted to teach my son study skills.  He just watched khan academy you tube division video.   He asked for his white board markers and took the phone in there and making use of the pause button he took pretty thorough notes for the 17 minute video.   He put notes for every major point of the video on the board.  I was excited he made all those notes on his own and that he asked for his marker and decided to do it on his own too.  He didn't teach himself division, but he learned how to take good notes already.  I have an idea that's a big part of being able to teach yourself or to learn anything you want.  He's just over 4.5 yrs. old.  and he already made his own notes on a division video.  I guess I couldn't brag so freely about this one without pointing out it's the acquired note-taking skills that I'm bragging about. 

DS2.5 picked up a plastic toy beetle, poked me with and said "Look mama, it's a bug and he's BUGGING you!" He proceeded to crack himself up...lol!

Two brags. One is HUGE!

Wolf just got promoted to blue/red belt after his best testing ever!

Bear (5 years, 4 months) finally for the first time EVER pooped on the potty!!! It took a full sized candy bar sitting on the counter taunting him for a week and a half, but be finally did it! AND he's finally willing to wear pull ups again only nine months after he was traumatized by a bad counselor.

WyldKat...amazing sucesses! What a great way to start summer!

Maybe not so much a brag but cracked me up: My DS5 adores maps. He was looking at Hawaii. I asked him what he knew about it. He answered, "It's full of beautiful waterfalls, amazing volcanoes, luxiurios hotels, and scenic golf courses." Where did you hear that? "Wheel of Fortune," he smugly replied. I was rolling!

Re Wheel of Fortune: My son, 15, jokes that he is planning to write a book, Everything I Need to Know I Learned in Video games. It's amusing when he comes up with a correct Jeopardy response and says, for example, I learned that in Age of Empires. Many of the games in question are historical simulations, which goes to show an eager learner can amass knowledge whereve he can find it. . It's the approach to the material; not the material.

DD4
- asked me to teach her how to read a clock so that I would get her a watch (analog) (she caught on in about 30 min while she was taking a bath lol)
- DD asked me about odds and evens...she caught on to the concept in about 15 minutes
- we were looking for new puzzles / games and found some neat puzzles of different part of the world...asked her which one she wanted and she chose Africa "because I have never been there"
- she loves geography and wants to constantly discuss how it is warmer near the equator; how when it is day here, it is night in India; that the moon reflects the sunlight; that when we flew from the midwest to FL, we were going south and slightly east
- she also asked me the other day how many stars were on the flag (50)...oh, one for every state. I asked her were she learned that and she said she did not remember...

Many of these conversations happen in the car on the way home from school...I am usually shaking my head and laughing at the same time

My 8yo son has qualified for the Study of Exceptional Talent by scoring at least 700 on the math section of the SAT. His verbal and writing scores were in the 400s, which are also good at his age.

He prepared as follows. After finishing Honors Beginning Algebra at EPGY I challenged him to get a 600 on the math SAT and mentioned 700 as a "reach". He read an SAT math book by Richard Corn as well as The Official SAT Study Guide and a Kaplan book, and he took three practice tests (just the math sections). He has participated in MOEMS (Math Olympiads for Elementary and Middle Schools) for 2 years.

Besides his scores, I am pleased by the effort he put forth to prepare and to sit for a 4-hour exam. My advocacy of a grade skip in math has failed so far (skipping 3 grades to 8th grade Algebra I would be conservative), but so far our after-schooling appears to be successful.

That's great Bostonian!!!! Very very impressive - both in terms of work ethic and in terms of talent.

I hope that the scores also help with advocacy. There is something magic about SAT scores for people who live in the New England states that is worth more than 1,000 words.
Smiles,
Grinity