Pages

Monday, June 15, 2009

This one time? At band camp?

I went to band camp one summer. Quite memorable. But don't worry, I'm not about to blog about it... just yet.

In the meantime, I will confess to my own childrens' summer fates.

I make them solve problems in order to play video games. Not major problems like the national deficit or healthcare or border security. No, just your run of the mill math problem or two with perhaps a grammar topic thrown in for good measure.

We can't let things get rusty over the slothful days of summer, can we? They'll thank me someday, I'm sure.

Exhibit A


In exhibit A, we see Chaco adeptly solving a basic geometry problem to pre-pay for 20 whole minutes of XBox. I strive to give each of them problems that are within their reach, yet not so easy as to just be a "stupid exercise". That way, their brains get stretched a little, but not so much as to leave them throwing things in frustration of being kept away from their precious video games on account of not being able to, say, figure out the cost to tile a stupid floor.

And yes, he was able to get to the correct answer to this problem quite readily, and is now happily blowing things up on the XBox.

Should we tell him that he put his shirt on backwards?
.

10 comments:

Duble said...

That is freaking awesome, not the pay for play but the you'll post a photo of your kid on the net wearing his shirt backwards.

Anonymous said...

Look. The really smart ones can't be bothered with clothing issues. I was at a very high level micro engineering facility and I happened to look down adn every person had shoes without laces...either slip on or velcro. They were too smart and too busy to be bothered with the simple things. Just buy him reversable shirts.

Whodat? said...

I see an entrepreneurial opportunity here: Athletic logos brazenly applied to the backs of shirts, as if to say "I have a 20lb brain. I don't need your stinkin' athletics."

And a pocket protector on the REAL front!

They say Einstein sometimes didn't eat. It just didn't occur to him.

terri said...

You are such a smart mom!I need to make my kids work for their video games.

Herb said...

wow. That picture will be given to his therapist in another 40 years and then watch out...

Evie said...

Do they get a prize if they solve the problems? :D

Judy said...

We do the same thing with reading - read for 20 minutes, get 20 minutes of Nintendo. Read for an hour, get an hour of Nitendo. Win win!

Goes by the name of Anna said...

Haha - you're devious!

brandy101 said...

That is awesome. I dont have the patience to teach anything more than basic life skills...like doing chores!

Mine put away a basket of laundry without complaint so she got to play WEBKINZ on my laptop today.

Adam said...

I was a band geek, you know. And the American Pie jokes wore thin pretty quickly, thank you very much :P