Wednesday, August 18, 2021

 Wednesday, August 18, 2021

 

   Before I went to sleep, I treated part of my hip or leg with the acupuncture pen. Wonderful! I was pain-free for the rest of the night. I also did an exercise Katie, my PT, gave me. She had me lie on my back with my knees bent. Then gently rocked my knees from left to right as far as I could go without moving my hips. I felt it in my lower abdominal muscles, which I use now when walking.  

      I ran into Vince without Julie this morning. They have a solar water heater without grid backup; ours has backup. He told me that they didn’t have hot water for the first time. It has been badly overcast and rainy every day. This is weird for this time of the year. We all thought it was a result of global warming. The impact here was cooler weather and more rain. That was here in my microenvironment, not all of Hawaii. I shared the information Scott gave me that cleaning the solar panels can make a big difference. He hadn’t known that. He thought the rain would clean them. I see spots on my car, so the panels must be spotted too.

      I texted Jean M. about Henry’s Book, a movie on Netflix. It’s one of Jean’s favorite movies. She watched it several times. It stars Naomi Watts; how can it not be good?  

    I had sixth grade D. at 8:30. He said he saw a big difference as he focused on the vowel letters as he read. His reading was more accurate by a long shot. However, he was reading text at a 2nd-grade level. Most of the words in any text at any level are familiar words. He wasn’t reading those with fluent ease yet, just greater accuracy. I started with the Phase I analytics, where he identifies every sound in every word. Doing this even feels silly to me. It means hearing every variation on a sound. Been isn’t said with the long /e/; I say it with a short /i/, as does D. Is it necessary to identify every sound accurately? Well, that’s the premise of my teaching method. Not because you have to know the right sound, but because you have to hear the right sound. Hearing language sounds accurately, is the key. Also, recording a ninety-minute audiofile, saying each phoneme separately, impacted my reading speed. 

Today I had a surprise. Tongue was one of the words in the text. I assumed it was a two-syllable word. It’s not. If it were spelled phonically, it would be /tung/, but it’s not. It’s transcribed t-o-ngue. The ue is silent. Surprise! Well, at least for me. Why bother? This approach does help with spelling. You can compare the word’s spelling with the basic sound units. Which letters accurately represent the sounds, and which do I have to make an extra effort to memorize?

      I started a new story with D. He set it at the beach with his family in the mid-morning. He and his six-year-old brother were body surfing.  

      At the end of the session, I asked him to rate how he felt about our classes on a rate of one to 10. He said a 10. Great! I asked how he felt in the beginning. He said a 2. Then he said no. He was excited about our first class. He was interested in getting to know me. However, he was frustrated and felt bad about his reading. He was now on a roll and felt great.

    I was feeling lost most of the day. I didn’t have much to do, or I felt that way. I always had gardening and housekeeping to take care of, but I didn’t. I could also work on my videos and articles, but I was putting that off. I did sit down and write dialogue for that extra slide I want to slip in; I hope it clarifies this process. It’d gotten to the point that my process looked silly to me, too, despite my success using it. I think I was looking at it through the eyes of others. 

    I started reading The Life and Insights of Joseph Chilton Pearce. The folks at the Yoga Farm Ithaca recommended it. Oh, boy. He talks about the undivided self that we can accomplish anything when we achieve that state. He performed a life-threatening feat in that state and survived. While it’s a powerful state in that we can achieve just about anything and convince others to follow us, it is tricky. He even describes how he used the state as a salesman to separate folks from the hard-earned money for something they didn’t need. I was alarmed reading about his experience until he also recognized the immorality of what he was doing. Trump is an undivided self. I guess most sociopaths are undivided. They are not disturbed by the needs of others. Their focus is all on their own needs. People who are undivided within themselves are compelling. I don’t know why. What does it trigger in us? Fear would be a good response. It’s like facing off with the Pied Piper of Hamlin.       

     My godmother, a little nun from the Medical Mission Sisters, saw all states like that as being possessed by the devil. Reading Pierce’s description of his states, it does sound like that. She saw unusual feats of strength, an example of that state. However, we have examples of people who mysteriously find the strength to lift cars off people. Is that evidence of evil? I think the undivided self can be used for good as well as evil. But how do you guarantee that you will use this state for good rather than evil? Once you’re in it, it carries you along like rushing water. 

        I had K’s crew at two pm. Twin A was sullen and wouldn’t even answer questions. She had been watching YouTube when her mom forced her to sign into our session. This wasn’t ADD. It was willful noncompliance. I offered to do the work. All she had to do was listen. She became more involved as I modeled all the letters and sounds in the -at word family. I could see her mouthing the words, but she could only go so far. Then she became distracted. I asked her if she wanted to stop or finish the rest of the -at words. I had to push her and assure her that either answer was good. I did this because I was training her to take responsibility for her own learning. I seduced her to do the work when she hadn’t done anything. But now she had done a fair amount; I could allow her to quit.

    Next, I had Twin E. I started with sight word recognition, with the word the. I displayed it with two other words, 1) the, 2) there, and 3) that. Which one is the? Number 1. And then 1) there, 2) the, and 3) that. Which one is the? Number 1. Oh, dear. I compared the with the. Were they the same or different? The and there. Were they the same or different? How were they different? She did well. She seemed to recognize the word the. I pulled up sixth-grade material. I went through the text, underlining all the thes in the text. She could do that. Our next exercise will point to other words, and the and she will have to recognize when words are not the as well as the ones that are. 

       Then I had K. He said his teacher didn’t have to tell him once today to pay attention. I couldn’t believe that was true, but I’d bet it was much less.  

      K wrote, “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog,” and his name, copying the model his mother had written. I was amazed at how quickly he wrote it all. Also, it was well-spaced on the page. But there were some problems with the letter spacing. Then I looked at his mom’s model. Oh, boy. He had copied her model; his mistakes were hers.     

       The sky was generous today. The Power Walls were 80% loaded. We were going to make it through the night. I bought an eggplant Parmesan at Safeway the other day. The toaster oven wasn’t large enough for this item; I had to use the oven. I didn’t want to use it when we had so little sun. Tonight, it was good. I was surprised by how little electricity the oven took. The dryer pulls a lot more.

    Jean M recommended another video, Reign, about the life of Mary, Queen of Scots. It’s a little too modernized for me. I went back to Longmire.