Family Themes
Vn38.01 Robby’s Place in the Project 6/28/77 Robby raised a very difficult question today — how much of the work he does at Logo will be a part of my doctoral thesis. The answer Robby required, and it is a superficial answer, that the thesis will be about Miriam’s development, was bound to disappoint him. …
Vn031.01 Collecting Tolls 6/19/77 Robby and Miriam each receive a nominal ‘allowance’ weekly, regardless of whether they’ve been ‘good’ or ‘bad’ or done what we parents have wanted them to. They know it is computed by multiplica- tion: for each child the ‘allowance’ is 5¢/year times the child’s age. Thus Miriam recently began receiving 30¢/week. …
Vn56.1 TicTacToe 7/19/77 These games of tic-tac-toe followed immediately the arithmetic of Home Session 13. The focus of the session is on the bipolar (i. e. competitive) quality of tic-tac-toe. This focus is maintained by contrasting the game with playing SHOOT around the issue of clever tactics. (My moves are numbers; Miriam’s are letters.) Game …
Vignette 27.1 Emberley’s Faces (2) 6/17/77 A large portion of Miriam’s drawings during the past year have taken the form of presents she makes to others. She has spoken of them as presents many times. One formal element of these notes reflects that character. Each typically bears a tag of the form: “TO _______/ LOVE, …
Vignette 22.1 Emberley’s Faces 6/6/77 Miriam’s wheezing was so severe this evening she couldn’t sleep. About 10:30 she came from her room to ask if she could sit up with me because it was so lonely in bed and she didn’t want to read any more. I brought from my briefcase Ed Emberley’s Drawing Book …
Vignette 25.1 TicTacToe (4) 6/3/77 Miriam wanted to play a few games of tic-tac-toe before going to bed this evening. After vignette 15’s instruction in the proper ordering of three rules, 1. Look for a way to win (complete a row of three) 2. Look for a way to lose (make all forced moves) 3. …
Vignette 23.1 Arithmetic Ripples 6/5 & 11/77 Miriam does not yet recognize the existence of negative numbers. The typical problem this causes her was shown as we rode home from buying a Sunday paper (the children go with me to buy chewing gum). Miriam was discussing making change with Robby. She knew that paying for …
Vn020A In the Gymnasium 6/2/77 Twenty four children filing into the gym, a space about 20 by 40 with a wall-wide, wooden climbing rack at one end. During the half hour, when any children did not want to play some game or other he might climb around on that climbing rack, come sit on the …
Vn019 Rehearsal 6/2/77 Last night Miriam asked me to come to kindergarten this morning to help out with a rehearsal of ‘Goldilocks.’ (see Logo Session 17, 5/1). When Miriam began showing an interest in plays (cf. Vignette 3), I mentioned to her that those years I spent at Yale were in the Drama School, that …
Vn01704 Arithmetic Ripples 6/1/77 When she came home from school, Miriam asked to stay home today. I suggested we do her second adding session. Miriam then countered that we should do math at Logo and use the computer. I agreed. At the lab, while I was logging in, Miriam began playing with a pile of …
Vn01703 Arithmetic Ripples 6/1/77 Miriam was playing in the kitchen with Scurry this morning. Gretchen and I were discussing some topic, and I mentioned a division problem. Miriam piped up, “I can divide, Daddy. . . . 8 divided by 8 is 1.” I congratulated her on her prowess. For Miriam the formula she recited …
Vn017B Arithmetic Ripples5/30/77 As Robby and Miriam came in from play for a little refreshing juice, I heard from the kitchen the squabbling one expects of near-aged siblings: Miriam I can add big numbers. Rob Oh brother! Miriam I can. I can do one thousand and thirty five plus two thousand. Rob Easy. Miriam No. …
Vn017A Arithmetic Ripples 5/28/77 After the session in which I introduced Miriam to adding large numbers (see Home Session 4, 5/28), passing Miriam’s room I noticed in her open loose-leaf book a page of computation. Miriam later gave it to me and I include it as Addendum 17 – 1. Note that the written form …
Vn015 Tic tac toe 5/24/77 Miriam emerged from her bath not at all ready for bed but looking for someone to play with her. I agreed she could stay up and that we could play together while Robby was getting ready for bed. The game was my choice. My objective was to induce Miriam’s copying …
Vn014.1 Housekeeping Corner 5/24 & 27/77 Since Miriam started recounting where she spends her time in kindergarten (see Vignette 12), it has become clear that she spends most of her time in the ‘housekeeping corner.’ When I’ve been in the kindergarten class, I’ve usually found myself playing with blocks, or making designs and elaborate towers …
Vn013 Phonemics 5/23/77 In discussions some weeks ago with a distinguished Genevan psycholinguist, the question of instructing children in phonetics came up. My earlier work on children’s conception of wordhood (‘Pre-Readers’ Concept of the English Word’) and pig-latin (not available) had convinced me that children should learn how to read before delving into phonetics. (Such …
Vn012 Miriam Collecting Data 5/23/77 While the children were awaiting the school bus this morning, I noticed the little blue notebook in which Miriam was to record her kindergarten activities. I took it out and offered it to her. She said she didn’t want it when I reminded her what it was for and then …
Vn011.01 Taking Hints 5/22/77 One of Miriam’s proudest achievements since her 6th birthday had been learning to successfully ride her bike without training wheels. Because it had been her custom to make a considerable fuss on the occasion of a small scrape (from tripping over the dog, for example), I was disinclined to help Miriam. …
Vn009.01 Tic Tac Toe (2) 5/22/77 Miriam asked Robby to play with her this afternoon, offering “Sorry,” “Raggedy Ann” and “Chinese Checkers.” All were refused. Robby finally agreed to playing TIC TAC TOE. I asked the children to come sit in the reading alcove. They did so while I got out my tape recorder. Two …
Vn008.02 The Lemon Twist 5/12/77 I had purchased the hula hoop in the morning and was setting up the music room for our later use when one of the boys in an on-going class from CAPS (the Cambridge Alternative School Program) asked if he could use the hula hoop. After doing a hula, he let …
Vn007.02 A Willing Subject 5/19/77 As the children left for school this morning, I asked Miriam if she wanted to come to Logo today. She said she would not come. When I asked why not, Miriam replied, “I just need a day off.” After the previous day’s tensions, it seemed a most reasonable request. I …
Vn006.02 Magic Words 5/15/77 Miriam tried again her ‘magic word’ game, “It begins with ‘p’ and ends with ‘e’.” The choice of time was unfortunate; I was in a hurry to some other purpose, so I snapped back “please.” “That’s not it,” Miriam claimed, for who can tolerate any conundrum’s immediate solution? Sensing my impatience, …
Vn006.01 Magic Words 5/14/77 While she was in the kitchen and returning to the dinner table, I asked Miriam to bring me something. She asked, “What’s the magic word?” My grandmother avers that the ‘magic word’ is ‘please,’ which can make so many things easy that would be impossible without it. We have never played …
Vn005.01 Tic Tac Toe 5/13/77 Years ago I bought a tic-tac-toe game for playing with Robby. The board is 12 x 12; the X’s and O’s are large yellow pieces. At that time I taught Robby a single strategy for playing the game: look for two ways to win. Robby quickly became quite good at …
Vn003.02 Journals5/11/77 When collecting the data reported in ‘Pre-Readers’ Concept of the English Word,’ I was shown by one of the children, Tina, a 3×5 notebook her mother gave her for writing down any words she wanted to learn to read. I bought Miriam such a notebook (a green one) some weeks ago for such …
Vn002.01 Productive Cheating 5/9/77 Today was a difficult day. Snow in mid-May for a beginning. Before that problem appeared, Miriam came early with me in to Logo in our joint expectation of going to the Coop to buy a hula hoop. With that option closed by inclement weather, Miriam pushed me early in the afternoon …
Vn001.02 Commutativity 5/8/77 As I sat transcribing the dialogue from recent logo sessions, I heard Robby inquire of Gretchen, at work in the kitchen, how many were 5 twelves. Gretchen simplified the computation by elaborating the problem: 5 twelves is half of 10 twelves. How much is 10 twelves? As Robby worked away on that …
Vn 001.01 Everyday Calculation 5/7/77 Miriam suffered a queasy stomach today, so she didn’t join us at our evening meal. She lay on the loveseat near our dining area. The speakers for our radio are directly behind the loveseat, thus more enforcing Miriam’s attention than ours. During a radio commercial we others chose to ignore, …