Thursday: Moodle

I remembered what I wanted to say a few weeks ago.  It's about Moodle.  That's the classroom management system we use.  It got upgraded over the summer.

There were some annoying things about it previously.  At the beginning of the school year, there were several very annoying things about it.  It seems as though one or two have been fixed, except for the main one.

There is too much clicking.

Say you're grading a homework assignment.  You put in a grade.  You then have two options.  You can click the "go to next student" to which it gives you a warning that you didn't save the grade and that it will do it for you and after you click ok it tells you the grade was saved.  (3 clicks)  Your other option is to click the save grade button, click ok when it tells you the grade is saved, and then click to go to the next student. (3 clicks)

Three clicks per student!  It used to be one.  "Save and continue to next student."  I definitely don't need a click that tells me it was saved.  Not only do I just assume that it happened, I can see that the score I put in goes from 1 to 1.00.

There are still a few other annoying things, but I can work around them.  (Such as not being able to grade in the order work was turned in.  I have found several plagiarism cases because they turned their work in at the same time.)

To be fair though, the highlight-what-day-we're-on is much more visible.  Actually, the preview works pretty well too and saves me one click on some assignments.

Wednesday: Joshua

Joshua and I were riding my bike to the library....

J: Mom!! Look!!!!!
A: It's a cement truck!!  How exciting.
J: Yeah, it's where we get our food.
A: What?  We don't get our food from a cement truck.
J: So where do we get our food?

J: Mom!! Look!!
A: A double dump truck!  Neat!

A: Ok, we're coming up to the railroad crossing soon.  Is it safe?
*The lights suddenly turn on and the dinging starts*
A: Oh, I guess not.
*No train appears and the lights turn off*
A: I guess it was just a test
*As we cross, we see a train changing cars or something*

Later
J: Dad!  We saw a train test.
J: A train test today
J: Dad! Did you see the train test?

The boys also wanted to run in the sprinklers tonight.

Tuesday: going to bed

I should go to bed in the "going to bed on time" campaign that I'm doing with myself.  Ben then proceeded to call it the "get in bed on time" campaign, which seems much more appropriate.

In other news, I tricked a computer twice yesterday into thinking I was a random coin toss.  Two out of two.  I was excited.  (https://nrich.maths.org/6078 - but you might need to use Internet Explorer).

In other other news, Isaac's best part of the day was playing with his new best friend.  The other child is probably not in Isaac's class and may be in a young fives program.  I'm fine with that.  As long as there is someone that he is playing with.

Monday: Isaac

Isaac got school lunch for the first time today.  He liked it.  Growing up I got to have it once a week...for the time being, it seems like a good way to do it for him too.  Maybe I'll change my mind after the 100th lunch though.

Next he wants home lunch with a water bottle, so that he can put his token in the last pail.  (Normally he gets just milk.)  Then he remembered that he really likes milk, which is why he usually get it.  I guess we'll save it for an extra special treat.

I also ordered a scholastic book for him.  Those are going strong, just like when I was a kid.  Joshua gets them too, but I usually just look and see if there is a robot book since those are not as common as one might think.  Anyway, I found a book for Isaac.  I figured that if we don't have to pay daycare expenses the least we can do is get him a book once a month.

He found a beautiful leave today.  He wanted a picture of it.  I usually use such occasions to get a picture of him.  He also made a new type of chalk running line...a funnel.  The line stops near the top of the driveway and near the bottom there's a catcher.  Why didn't I think of that?!?!  It would be so much easier to draw.  Maybe I'll need to do a trampoline.

Sunday: last night

A while ago I read a good book series, Bobiverse.  Since I enjoyed it quite a bit, I looked at a few other Goodreads lists that it was on, seeing if there was anything else that the online library had.  There was, Leviathan Wakes.

A few days ago Ben suggested a TV show to watch, The Expanse.  I watched two episodes and was finding it a bit dark...distopian, as Ben put it.  I said I'd watch one more episode, but I probably won't.  It just didn't catch my fancy and I'm listening to a good audiobook, so it'll probably be permanently shelved for me.

Last night the book was finally available, so I checked it out and eagerly started reading it.  It seemed a little familiar.  I kept reading.  It seemed really familiar.  I kept reading.  When I was 2% of the way through the book I called it out...it was the book the TV show was based on.  I had read about half of the first episode and there were too many similarities...er, plots points that were exactly the same... for it to be a coincidence.

It was weird to have the same story line brought to me in two different ways over the course of the weekend.

Saturday: relaxing day

The boys were gone most of the day, so Ben and I spent most of the day relaxing.  (Not all of it though.  Some work got done.)  We slept in, played computer games, and I quilted and napped.

When the boys got home Joshua was inconsolable for about five minutes because he wanted to stay at Grandma's house.  So apparently they had a good time. :)  We got a bunch of cute pictures throughout the day.  (And Joshua is smiling in all of them...I can never get him to smile that much for pictures.)

Friday: up late

Dad and Pat took the boys to the cottage with them for the night.  So I'm staying up as late as I want to, because I can sleep in tomorrow.