Extreme Engineering

We watched a Discovery Channel DVD called Extreme Engineering last week, highlighting projects such as the Bering Strait bridge concept. 30 years in the making, this project is still only an idea. However, all the boys were fascinated by the magnitude of the project and the extreme conditions that need to be taken into account if this project ever should go ahead.

The DVD included coverage of the Confederation Bridge which joins New Brunswick to PEI. Since the older boys have all crossed that bridge, it was quite a meaningful experience to learn about its construction and the challenges the engineers had to overcome in designing the structure.

How many words?

Skye and I had read recently that, by the age of 2, Aaron should have 50 words in his vocabulary. Both of us felt certain that he was a long way from that goal.

However, when Austin, Aidan, Aaron and I were driving home from Aidan's ENT Specialist appointment at Children's Hospital on Friday, it occurred to me that Aaron actually has a rapidly expanding vocabulary. So, I invited Austin and Aidan to help me count how many words Aaron knows. We reached about 70, and still weren't done. A few times, Aaron piped up with a word we had missed - it was so cute - as if he understood what we were trying to do!

Austin has been working with Aaron to teach him new words. Austin explained how he uses positive reinforcement as Aaron demonstrates his knowledge. Austin has been paying particular attention to the word, "please," both verbally and in sign. Aaron signs, "please" regularly and has expressed delight at our ability to understand and respond to his requests. For instance, if he asks for a sock while we are in the living room, I walk him to his room, open the top drawer and reach for a pair of socks, and he squeals in delight, repeating, "sock," "sock!"

The Socialist

This conversation started with Austin's observation that Daddy spends a lot of time on the computer. "It's like he's choosing the computer over his family." To take this into context, Austin wasn't feeling very good about losing allowance for the day, because he had wilfully ignored Skye's reminders to prepare for bed so he could be in bed on time today (one of the daily criteria for earning allowance). I explained that Daddy needs to unwind after his workday. Austin said it would be better for Daddy to unwind by spending time with his family, than by getting back on the computer after being on a computer all day at work (I guess he doesn't realise that Skye actually spends very little time on a computer at work).

Austin said, "Companies need to start paying their employees to spend time with their family." Employees could earn money for spending time with their kids or friends/family because they are helping the future generation. This will be good for everyone on the Earth.

I asked Austin how companies will be able to make money if they are paying their employees to be away from work, spending time with their families. Austin explained that the employees will want to work hard because they have such good employers who are doing such good things for the world. So, the companies will make money, and families will be less stressed.

I asked Austin about the employees who don't have kids, and he said, "Well, they do want kids, eventually." I said, "Some people choose not to have kids. Some people feel it is responsible not to have kids, not to contribute to the population explosion." Austin feels that we don't have a population explosion ... this was a bit unclear, but Austin said we have evolved to be so smart. We (humans) used to be more spread out, but now we are living close together. Austin says, "It's natural to want to have kids ..." I could have debated this further, but wanted to stay on topic.

Austin gave other examples of when employees could earn money when not working to contribute to company earnings. If an employee were feeling grumpy or angry, and left the workplace to buy a coffee to make himself feel better, that would be good for the company and good for the employee, so, even though the employee wasn't spending time with family, he would still pay them, because what they were doing is for the greater good. If, however, an employee stayed home and did nothing (what does doing nothing look like?) but watch TV, for instance, he couldn't pay them - they'd just have to take an unpaid day off.

I was particularly impressed by Austin's astute statement, "The only reason we haven't been able to change is because we haven't gotten enough people to agree. Until we have enough agreement, nothing will change."

A Riddle

While driving to Po-Co with Austin today I gave him a riddle to solve.

What English word is pronounced the same when four of its five letters are removed?

We worked through the clues over the next 40 minutes. One of the main clues that he arrived at was that the final "word" is a single letter word so we started going through the alphabet to see what single letters also made words. Some of the ones he came up with were:

• Why
• Pee
• Pea
• Sea
• I
• Cue
• A
• You
• Are
• Tea
• Tee

None of these there were 5 letters long but he was close so I helped by introducing him to the word Queue which he hasn't heard much. We then discussed how in England it's the preferred way to describe what we would call a line-up of people in North America (as in the bit in Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy movie where Arthur Dent says, "OK. Leave this to me. I'm British. I know how to queue.").

The Cove

Tonight we watched the documentary called The Cove about the Dolphin killing in Japan. Quite an impressive show and it's a shame that there is so much corruption and lying about all this. There were segments on how the world's fisheries may be only 40 years from a global collapse. Austin's reaction was to say that he didn't want to ever eat a fish again. So we started looking into if any fisheries are maintained in a sustainable way. I found this reference that a friend had given me before.

The Gift

Austin and I went to meet with Sue Hall, from Positive Dyslexia http://www.positivedyslexia.com/. Sue uses the Davis Method, designed by Ron Davis, author of The Gift of Dyslexia and The Gift of Learning. Sue refers to dyslexia, dysgraphia and dyspraxia as a "Talent."
Sue explained about how Austin's brain works when he is writing letters and numbers. It's really cool, how she described that dyslexics and dysgraphics see, in their mind's eye, in 3D. So, it is very challenging to know which way to place a letter on a 2D page. That's how Austin is able to write "5" backwards (I find it challenging to do this) and a "g" upside-down and mirrored.

Sue delivers a program that takes a full week, Monday to Friday, 9:00-4:00, working with her one:one. The medium she uses is clay. The students she works with, learn writing and math skills that enable them to use their brain the way it was intended to be used, instead of how schools try to force them to use their brains. This way, students can create similar output to their counterparts in a school/work setting, though they are using their 3D brains in the way nature intended. Sue suggested that Austin has devised reading strategies to decode words, enabling him to read very well for his age.

Sue's program sounds very interesting, but it is very expensive. If we qualify for a bursary, we may be able to put Austin through the program, if he is willing and interested.

Incentive to type

Skye and I have been challenged to find ways to positively motivate Aidan to get in regular practice on his violin. His teacher asks him to only practice for 10 minutes per day. It might be hard to believe this, but even that is challenging when we don't have it built into a daily routine. Prompting Aidan at various times of the day, to practice, hasn't been successful so far. We've considered getting him into another lesson, closer to home, in the middle of the week, but this will cost at least another $80/month, and may require an additional trip to the lesson, if we can't coordinate with Austin's music lesson time slot.
On the way to Aidan's lesson on Saturday, I was inspired to try the same incentive program that was so successful for both boys, when learning to toilet train ... Lego!!! Only this time, it's big-boy Lego. I bought Aidan the Star Wars Separatist Shuttle and Austin the Power Miners Crystal Sweeper.
Aidan earns 19 pieces per day, for 2 weeks and Austin earns 22 pieces per day, for 3 weeks.
Aidan earns pieces each day he practices his violin for a minimum of 10 minutes, and Austin earns pieces each day he practices typing for a minimum of 15 minutes. So far, it's working like a charm.
And we have the side benefit of a lot of math figuring ;) They've been going through the instruction books, to find out how far they'll get "tomorrow," and how many days it will take to get to various stages in the building process. They work out how many pieces they'll have in a week. Austin worked out 7 x 22, by starting with 10 x 22, then subtracting 3 x 22. He arrived at 144, because he had worked out 3 x 22 to equal 76, in his head, so he subtracted 10 too many. Once he realised where he went wrong, he corrected, but accidentally took another 10 off to arrive at 134, and caught himself quickly to change his answer to 154. I worked out the answer by multiplying 7 x 20 = 140 and adding 7 x 2 = 14, 140 + 14 = 154.
This incentive program might be a way to teach our boys a bit of patience, too. They are so accustomed to not having to wait for what they want, and not having to work for it. Not entirely, of course (they do chores to earn pocket money), but Skye and I feel that it's very difficult for our kids to understand what it's like to have to live without things you want, when they seem to be surrounded by such abundance.
Anyway, it is achieving the primary goals to motivate Aidan to practice his violin and Austin to practice keyboarding.