It won’t be easy skipping one day of school per week as there are so many new things introduced every day. But The Good Teacher Inga is more than supportive and she gave me yesterday’s homework and took a little time to catch me up on what I missed. Things still aren’t clicking too well for me, but I’m hoping one day they will. Today we had another go-round of all the prepositions, which are just horrible. For every preposition we have in English, they have two or three for the same word in Norwegian. And what makes it worse is most of their prepositions do double time and mean two or three different things so it’s all about the context in which it is used that makes it understandable. If you wanted to say “in the summer” for example, you would either say, “om sommeren” or “til sommeren” or “i sommer,” depending on if you are talking about “in the summer” that happens every year (the season), “in the summer” that’s coming up next or “in the summer” referring to what happens during the summer. The preposition “om” also means “during,” or “whether,” or “if” or a host of other things as it gets paired with other words to form a phrase and it takes on no particular meaning half the time. The word “til” is a commonly used word meaning “to” – so you give a gift “til” someone or you travel “til” a city. And the last preposition that kills me is just the letter “i” as it’s thrown in all kinds of places that and I’ve yet to figure out the whys and hows of it all. And these are just three of the lovely little words that are currently making me insane. I can honestly say I don’t think I’ll ever master the proper use of prepositions. But then, I haven’t done that in English either, so that’s no surprise. I HATE prepositions!
Kaleb had a great day at school as he used some of his free time to get a few pages of his homework done so he wouldn’t have to spend so long doing it at home. Last night as he was working an algebra problem he started whining that it was just too hard and he couldn’t do it. I saw it was something he knew how to do but he was just looking for excuses to not do it. I told him if he was able to figure it out, and I couldn’t, he could get some extra time on his Nintendo today. That sure lit a fire under his butt and he had it done in no time flat and got it correct no less. I however, hadn’t the foggiest idea how to solve it but it turned his whining into gloating in an instant. He so needs to be motivated to do anything. I was kind of hoping he’d be more of a self-starter, but I haven’t seen much evidence of that.
Today began Kaleb’s foray into the internet to do research, and it’s so nice he now has his own laptop to use for such a thing. This week his homework assignment was to find out three facts about the fire that burned down the city of Ålesund in 1904. The scene of the aftermath is pretty devastating (see photo) – the entire town burned down (850 houses) which displaced 10,000 people. The fire started in the middle of the night in a factory, and there were such strong western winds blowing that it took no time at all the burn up all the wooden structures. When the first fire alarm sounded the fire “trucks” had trouble getting to the scene because the horses, which pulled the water tanks, wouldn’t go near it until they were blindfolded. The only death was that of an elderly woman who went back to her house to get her purse. Many houses on the perimeter of town were spared, but there was just one house, in the midst of all the rubble that stands out in all the photos (if you double click on the photo you can see it – it’s a white house behind the smoke in the background). As the story goes, the man that lived in that house was a strong Christian. He said God told him if he left his house, it would burn and anything taken out of the house would burn; but if he stayed, it would remain unharmed. All the houses around his burned to the ground, but not his, as he believed God and he wouldn’t leave. His wife and children left, but he wouldn’t go. It must have been like the story in the Old Testament about Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego being thrown into the fiery furnace. Talk about putting a person’s faith to the test! His wife and children were okay, but they took some things out of the house which did get burned up. There was a documentary made about that man many years later. He is one guy who knows how to listen to the voice of God. I’m not sure I’m that well connected or have that kind of faith but I'm sure his faith touched many.
While the town of Ålesund was still smoldering, the last King of Prussia (Keiser Wilhelm II of Germany) who had visited the town previously and loved it, sent several ships full of supplies for the people, and building materials to rebuild the town in the Art Nuevo fashion it’s so well known for today. Most locals feel as horrible as the fire was at the time - in the long run it turned out to be a good thing. I hope people can say the same about me someday.
Kaleb had a great day at school as he used some of his free time to get a few pages of his homework done so he wouldn’t have to spend so long doing it at home. Last night as he was working an algebra problem he started whining that it was just too hard and he couldn’t do it. I saw it was something he knew how to do but he was just looking for excuses to not do it. I told him if he was able to figure it out, and I couldn’t, he could get some extra time on his Nintendo today. That sure lit a fire under his butt and he had it done in no time flat and got it correct no less. I however, hadn’t the foggiest idea how to solve it but it turned his whining into gloating in an instant. He so needs to be motivated to do anything. I was kind of hoping he’d be more of a self-starter, but I haven’t seen much evidence of that.
Today began Kaleb’s foray into the internet to do research, and it’s so nice he now has his own laptop to use for such a thing. This week his homework assignment was to find out three facts about the fire that burned down the city of Ålesund in 1904. The scene of the aftermath is pretty devastating (see photo) – the entire town burned down (850 houses) which displaced 10,000 people. The fire started in the middle of the night in a factory, and there were such strong western winds blowing that it took no time at all the burn up all the wooden structures. When the first fire alarm sounded the fire “trucks” had trouble getting to the scene because the horses, which pulled the water tanks, wouldn’t go near it until they were blindfolded. The only death was that of an elderly woman who went back to her house to get her purse. Many houses on the perimeter of town were spared, but there was just one house, in the midst of all the rubble that stands out in all the photos (if you double click on the photo you can see it – it’s a white house behind the smoke in the background). As the story goes, the man that lived in that house was a strong Christian. He said God told him if he left his house, it would burn and anything taken out of the house would burn; but if he stayed, it would remain unharmed. All the houses around his burned to the ground, but not his, as he believed God and he wouldn’t leave. His wife and children left, but he wouldn’t go. It must have been like the story in the Old Testament about Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego being thrown into the fiery furnace. Talk about putting a person’s faith to the test! His wife and children were okay, but they took some things out of the house which did get burned up. There was a documentary made about that man many years later. He is one guy who knows how to listen to the voice of God. I’m not sure I’m that well connected or have that kind of faith but I'm sure his faith touched many.
While the town of Ålesund was still smoldering, the last King of Prussia (Keiser Wilhelm II of Germany) who had visited the town previously and loved it, sent several ships full of supplies for the people, and building materials to rebuild the town in the Art Nuevo fashion it’s so well known for today. Most locals feel as horrible as the fire was at the time - in the long run it turned out to be a good thing. I hope people can say the same about me someday.
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