Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion The ultimate brag thread

Wow, these are amazing and fun stories. I'm going to have fun going back and reading them all.

DD7 gifts seem to be in language arts, but this one always impressed me and had more of a "wow" factor to me than anything related to language.

At age 5 she disappeared into her room for a longer time than usual and emerged with a complete working, two-player foosball game--you know, the one with the soccer players on a crossbar--made from cardboard, paper, tape, pens, toilet paper rolls and sticks (literally, twigs).

Apparently her inspiration came from being at her friends house where they have a real foosball table.

Fragile though it was (it only had two players on the field as well), it totally worked and was actually fun to play. Besides the obvious design and materials challenges, she figured out the feet (toilet paper rolls cut up) were needed on it for stability and also to allow the goals to be cut out and inset so the ball stayed in the goal when scored.

I think part of the wow factor to me was realizing had I the same time and materials I don't think I could have done as well.

Although he is more than capable, DS10 hates to write which has consistently brought down his Language Arts grades and test scores. Before a recent statewide test, his teacher asked them to do their very best. He loves his teacher and "tried his best." He received a higher score on that portion of the test than any of her other students in the past 20 years! Now we have the proof to remind him that yes he CAN do it when he tells us he's no good at writing!

Good for him!!!! Writing is so important, as is carries over to so many subjects.

A couple of months ago dd (just turned 8) who loves to play kids games online was getting very frustrated that she couldn't go that far with the game because she had to pay money(more so that we would not pay money for her to play the game to that extent).
She anounced to us that she will be making her own wedsite with games she would like to play and would make it fun for anyone who would like to join. My husband has been helping her set it up and build the website (all her ideals) when she (and dh) finishes it up I'll post the site for all to see...so far it is very cute. I suggested to her to put some boy stuff in there to appeal to a bigger audience,lol will see if she does, it's looking pretty girly so far

How creative! I'm very interested to see.

I forgot to give the baby sitter the key, so they were locked out for three hours, late at night. (Ok, that's _not_ the brag!)

The babysitter is constitutionally incapable of underballing anyone's capacity for anything. She asked DS (almost 2) what he would like to do. So they went to the playground untill she was too cold, at which point she told him she was too cold, and could he show her how to get to the pizza place (which she knew was walking distance from our house, and that he often picks up pizza from on our games night, but which she had never seen before). It's about 5 blocks from the park, on boring residental streets with exactly one corner store per corner with very few exceptions.

He did. He took a wrong turn at one point and apparently said "oopsie," so she asked if he'd taken a wrong turn, and he said yes, looked around, and got back on track.

Did I mention this was the first time this particular person has ever babysat for us?

We arrived home in terror, having discovered the error, to find them trotting happily down the street with dinner for us (!).

Apparently they both found it all VERY funny.

-Mich

That is funny, Michaela.

__________________________________________

DD is working on a persuasive essay on Romeo and Juliet.

She's to assign blame for the deaths of the pair, and then spend a few pages backing it up with evidence.

Since she's a stellar debater, this is actually rather entertaining for her-- if not particularly challenging, since the entire play is definitely "old news" to her. (She first read-- and we first took her to SEE R+J at OSF when she was just seven-- this is a kid that KNOWS some Shakespeare...)

So she upped the challenge by presenting DUAL arguments-- one from the twenty-first century adolescent viewpoint... which she regards as rather trite, actually. Rather "Twilight" if you think about it, as she notes. Not particularly compelling if you happen to not be in the midst of adolescent angst yourself. Which hardly explains the enduring popularity of the work.

The other perspective is that of Shakespeare's audiences. That is, the perspective of the average European of ca. 1600 London. This would include the philosophy of marraige as a contract and property arrangement, not a matter of the heart, and one which was indubitably best arranged by one's elders.

In this instance, she squarely blames the two protagonists for their own fate. Basically, all would have been well if not for their "foolishness and headstrong immaturity."

Juliet, at least is a creature of action; of course this doesn't turn out very well, and she really comes off as something of an ungrateful spoiled brat whose parents may have encouraged this by overindulging their only child...

Romeo, she characterizes as "inherently weak; his immaturity allows him to be pulled into a swirling vortex of deceit and blood" by the conniving and equally immature Juliet. After all, he's a pretty fickle guy when you get right down to it-- he goes to the party in the first place because he's looking for ONE girl that he's pining for, and winds up with one who is ripe for ANY boy that her parents don't approve of...

Their poor parents are really powerless in the face of that.

Gotta love an HG kid.

Dad even suggested a title. "Love Stinks."

He quipped that someone should write a song... ROFL....

Oh man, I must be in the wrong century because that's what I'v always thought. I've never been able to stand Romeo and Juliet and instead of finding the play romantic I always get annoyed by the characters and how flighty their choices are. I do like his comedies but I've just never been able to enjoy Romeo and Juliet...

She's now added Tracy Chapman's Fast Car as an additional perspective; that Juliet may have been looking for ANYONE reasonably malleable and attractive in order to get a ticket away from her destiny.

In other words, she feels that things probably wouldn't have turned out as wonderfully as Juliet would have had them. In ten years, she might have wound up pretty mad that she was the one wearing the pants in the family... LOL.

She observed that the real tragedy is that the vastly entertaining Mercutio isn't around for the last act; she'd have been much more interested in his take on things than the smarmy guilt-ridden ending.

I took DD8 to school with me today because her teachers had a work day. I was teaching my honors physics class about light and it's properties and was asking a problem about microwaves(also a type of light wave even though we can't see it). Before I could finish my question DD raised her hand and asked "Mommy, are you talking about the microwaves in the ovens or the ones that are in outer space?" When I said they are the same kind of wave, her reply, "oh, that's right, I forgot" sent my class into spasms because they are still having difficulty accepting that. She then continued to participate in class as if it were her own!

Now, why is it we have her in third grade?????????