The Life of a Mathematician

It's always hard to get this thing updated again after leaving. Um...family camp was good. My roommate's family (all 11 of them) went. There were a lot of people there this year, and not just because of that. We probably had between 50 and 100, at a guess. It was good to get away from the usual routine, and I always enjoy spending time with those guys. On Saturday night we played board games. I played The Farming Game for the first time -- it's a lot more fun than I thought it would be. I also brought Clue: The Great Museum Caper, which was a big hit.

Another thing that's been going on is tutoring. I now have a calc I student on Monday and Wednesday evenings, and starting this Wednesday I'll have a second student on those days, but I haven't found out what class he's in. I've also probably got a basic algebra student early on Wednesday evenings, and another potential calc I student for I'm not sure what time.

This week was Promotion Sunday, when they move all the kids into their new classes. I lost four or five and gained that many or more. This week I had nine students. I think I've only got two boys. Eric is really glad that Bradley moved up, since John, Torey and Jordan are all in Junior High now. The new curriculum is starting in Deuteronomy, and will continue through Joshua and Judges, finishing up with a series of lessons on the birth of Christ (which will happen around December). I tried something new this week: I had each of the kids take turns reading part of the passage. Some are better readers than others, but they were all coherent. It think I'll keep doing that; it engages them more. I also need to talk to the boys about not whispering when someone else is reading.

They tried to teach my how to take orders at Taco Bell today. I took one inside order and accidentally punched it up as a drivethrough order without noticing. That created a minute or two of panic when someone figured it out.