So, What About Math?

Sure, I plan to return to the world of consonant blends, digraphs, object pronounds, et al. However, I had an interesting experience at the dentist's office the other day. The office where we were has two dentists. One was working on me while the other was talking to the boys, who were right outside the door of the room that I was in. The dentist who wasn't working on me told the boys that he was going to explain the Pythagorean theorem to them. Right, I thought. Keep in mind that the oldest boy is eight and we haven't talked much yet about squares. So, I'm thinking: How is the dentist going to explain the whole a*2 + b*2 = c*2 thing?

He went on to show them a right triangle, which, I'm happy to say that they do know about. And he pointed to the shortest side and said, "This side is 3 inches long." Then he showed them the side that's middle in length and said, "This side is 4 inches long. How long is this side?" The final side, of course, being the hypotenuse, or longest side. "5 inches!" my eight-year old yelled. Well, I was impressed. Sure, we'll deal with the details later, but the dentist had managed to introduce the boys in a very simple way with something that is totally profound, as the Pythagorean theorem is.

As a homeschooling mama, I absolutely love it when someone else does a bit of teaching. :)