Day 147 - Expert Share

Thought of the day: Jasmine did her last "expert share" presentation in her elementary school today.  In "expert share", a student is supposed to make herself an expert on a subject that she is passionate about, and then share her knowledge and observations with the rest of the class in three mini-presentations, each ending with a Q&A session.  Jasmine skipped the first step and jumped right into sharing - OK, she did spend an hour each night before a presentation to read some facts on the internet and make a poster for the next day.  It was partly my fault - I forgot to inform her that her expert share was coming up until the last minute. But in any case, I think she still got a lot out of this.  There are a number of interesting activities like this in school, for example, the Science Fair and Destination Imagination.  These activities can be both challenging and rewarding at the same time and are great for young minds that are developing rapidly both intellectually and emotionally.  Literacy and math are certainly important, but I wouldn't be surprised if these optional enrichment activities could have a broader and deeper impact on their development than the required curriculum.

Photo of the day:

Jasmine doing her "expert share" on Star, her darling betta fish, which I brought into the classroom today.  She was holding the poster on the right and her teacher was holding it on the left.  The topic of this third and last sharing was "how to maintain the tank".  Jasmine took care of Star all by herself so, in a way, she is an expert, despite the fact that she hasn't done much research or reading on betta fish.

Day 137 - Jasmine and Bunnies

Thought of the day: The grand plan when we flew down to the bay area this time was to get some chickens to live in my parents' yard.  Jasmine was all excited and giddy.  Unfortunately it turned out that Palo Alto required a "chicken permit" and it was not even easy to obtain.  The "chicken permit" lady requested to inspect the coop first to make sure that it's "humane and up to standard".  And then we needed a signed letter from our next door neighbor, who's currently out of the country, to give us permission as the coop was within 25 feet of the property line.  In addition, only hens were allowed in the city and the chicks we could get were only about "96% female", which meant that there's a 22% chance that we might have to return one of the chicks if we got all six of them as allowed by the city.  In any case, it was certainly a lot more hassle to get a handful of chicks than one would have expected.  So when we visited a pet shop in Half Moon Bay and spotted a pair of cute and fluffy bunnies in a cage, we decided to get them instead.  No permits necessary so we could just take them home.  The chicken coop my dad built worked beautifully for the bunnies.  I think they like their new home - a lot.  They looked pretty sad and barely moved about in their cage in the pet store, but after spending a little time to get used to their new dig, they are now running about like all happy bunnies should.  Jasmine and Lila are excited beyond words to have these bunnies join our family.  Now they have even one more reason to visit the bay area!

Photo of the day: 

Jasmine was a little sad saying good-bye to the bunnies (behind her in the cage) before she left for Colorado. I was glad that her favorite stuff animal would keep her company along the way.