Year of the Rock

There seems to be a confluence of curriculum in 1st, 4th, and 8th grades in the Bloomington Public School system. All three kids are doing earth science this year. Elizabeth's science class began with an overview of the geo-spheres and now they're discussing geologic time. Robert was waxing poetic this morning about metamorphic rocks and just a few weeks ago they were studying erosion. His classroom worked with models of the Elwha Dam so they could predict what will happen when it is removed. Colleen's classroom is keeping it simple and fun by gathering a rock collection.

Speaking of our good earth, what's with the trees this year? Our leaves all turned and fell but our neighbors' trees are mostly still green. Should we be concerned?

More about Dimensions Academy

We've raved a couple times about the school experience that Elizabeth has received here in Bloomington and ranted (more privately) about the poor experience we had in Minneapolis public schools.

Minnesota Monthly magazine caught on to all the fuss about what's going on here in education in Minnesota, and specifically in Bloomington, writing about Dimensions Academy, the gifted program Elizabeth spent her past year in in sixth grade, and Elements, which Robert will be joining next year as a third-grader. Many people commute their kids from our former Southwest Minneapolis neighborhood to take advantage of the program, and in fact, Robert has a friend with an older sibling who gets driven in from Prior Lake to attend Bloomington schools for the DA program. Even not in the Elements program this past year, Robert received just a fantastic education from his second-grade teacher, Mrs. Evans.

I shudder to think of where we might be living and where the kids would be attending school if the gifted and talented coordinator at our Minneapolis school hadn't told us, off the record, about Dimensions Academy.

I recommend reading the article.

Robert's journey continues

I really should let Cate write this blog post, since she has worked very hard on this all year, but we only have a few minutes to blog today, so I'm here to report that Robert got into the Elements program for the Bloomington schools for next year.

After a disastrous first-grade year, we weren't sure if Robert was going to realize his potential, but he's really blossomed at Ridgeview and with Mrs. Evans as his teacher.

Elements is the relatively new second- and third-grade version of the Dimensions Academy (gifted and talented) program that Elizabeth is in. Cate has been painstakingly collecting Robert's work and tidbits for this program ever since we found out we couldn't apply for the program last year. (We didn't have the test scores and Minneapolis Public Schools was extremely unhelpful. We were glad to commit to leaving MPS for Bloomington even though we didn't have a house here at the time.)

We are so psyched. He is going to do great.

Happy Easter from the Colemans!

The pork shoulder is about ready to fall off the bone, so I don't have time to write, but it was a full first Easter in the new house. Although we had opportunities to spend the day with the extended family, we had some things we needed to get done, like find some of the good hiding places for eggs in our new yard and the like.

We took plenty of photos but in brief:

• All dressed up for church -- similar to what we wore to Amelia's second birthday party the day before but different enough that it deserved another photo.
• Easter egg hunt in the backyard. Cate and I banished the kids to the basement for a little while while we put the eggs out in various levels of difficult hiding places.
• Cate crocheted Easter baskets for each of the kids. You can see them in the photos. Elizabeth just said, "I really like my basket, Mom!"
  
• After the kids all found their eggs, they hid eggs for me and Cate to find. One got lost in the shuffle and another accidentally went over the fence for our neighbors to have.
• Pork shoulder has been marinating since yesterday afternoon and has been roasting in the oven since 11 a.m. today. Ready to pull it momentarily, which is why I'm being brief.
• Visited Pa, and there's a photo of him with the kids in the photos link above.
• Lots of chocolate was consumed.
• Hello to all we missed today!
  

And then some other items from today:

After Colleen got dressed this morning, she looked at the mirror in the living room and said, "Ooh, I look good!" And she did. She was twirling -- the dress is definitely made for twirling.

If you get a chance to look really closely at the photos from Amelia's second birthday (also on Facebook) and compare them to the photos from today, you'll see that Robert is missing a tooth. Cate pulled it yesterday afternoon. It had already been knocked looser in a Monopoly accident on Friday afternoon (Robert hit his own face maniacally shaking his dice) and Cate finished it off.

The kids gave a name to each of the 24 or so plastic eggs we got for hiding. So sorry that Jose didn't get to fulfill his Easter destiny of being hidden and then found. The kids were playing with him in the basement and he never got out.

Elizabeth: "We ate awesome cake that Mom made yesterday. There!"

Some of the eggs in today's hunt didn't have rewards, but challenges. I think Elizabeth was a little confused when she opened an egg that said, "Hop on one foot for a minute." She was not allowed to continue egg hunting until the minute was up. Colleen found one that said, "Do five jumping jacks," and another that said "Go kiss Daddy." I was surprised when she came tearing around the house and grabbed me around the leg and kissed me. Elizabeth also found one that said, simply, "This is a plastic egg."

We got a chance to test out just a few of the great hiding places in our yard. Elizabeth's egg was hidden on the roof of the garage, for example. Robert's was hidden out of his reach in a tree. I buried one halfway in a planter box and another underneath the chin of a decorative rabbit in the front yard. Each of the kids had one with his or her name on it and a special treat, then they were competing for the rest of the eggs.

The forsythia are in full bloom at Nonna and Da's, as well as the pussy willows.

Hooray for a new school year

Yesterday was Day 7 for Elizabeth and Robert in their new schools. I picked Elizabeth up yesterday and asked her what she did in school and got a 20-minute explanation of a really cool project they did in their science class.

Beats the heck out of fifth grade. She's really fired up.

Where did everyone go?

It's been kind of a quiet June on the blog, and for that I apologize.

Currently, Cate and the kids are visiting Patty at the Jersey Shore. I hear they're having a good time and loving the water. They also visited the Philadelphia Zoo and the Franklin Institute.

I'm still in Minneapolis. I auditioned for and got into the Minnesota Chorale, which sings with the Minnesota Orchestra in Orchestra Hall downtown and all sorts of good stuff, so if I had gone, I'd have missed the first two or three rehearsals for our Aida concert in August. I'd have been pretty royally screwed. Luckily, there were good airfares and they could fly instead of us all driving.

The kids spent their last days in Lake Harriet school a couple weeks ago. We'll be putting both Elizabeth and Robert in Bloomington public schools next year. Elizabeth got into Dimensions Academy, a gifted and talented program that is at one of the junior highs. We feel pretty fortunate that she got in, since the program starts when kids enter fourth grade and there aren't many spots that open up after that.

Hope you and yours are doing well and enjoying the beginning of summer.