Shakespeare in the Hood

So, David and I started reading Hamlet today. We first each took two of the four characters (that speak; the Ghost does APPEAR), and read the parts. I stopped him periodically to discuss the meaning of words and phrases. I told him that he would be given an exercise wherein he would analyze a set of quotes, and "translate" them into modern English. He has decided, on his own, to translate them into "Ghetto." Bernardo is now Bernie, et.al. "Whaz Up" has replaced a more Shakespearean greeting.

I have created a monster, or the genius has created himself.

Stay tuned.

Poetic ...

I have taken over some more of David's education. In addition to his College Algebra (yes! the 16-year-old is working in College Algebra), I am working with him on Programming and English, and have found some decent online science courseware (although I am more monitoring than teaching).

I decided to include some poetry at this point. So we read some famous poems that include references to trees; and, after discussing them, He was surprisingly - at least to me - very receptive. I asked David to "compare and contrast" two of them. This is how his paper started:

Poetry, I must admit, is a great art. You can write about many things in many certain styles. 

Bright young man. Very bright.

"It's Michael"

That's what we say when he does something that *obviously* has a rationale - we just can't figure out what the rationale is.

To reach our house from our where the boys live, you can either take the freeways roughly West and South or other freeways South then West. (Think of it as a big rectangle, with no diagonal freeway.) Alternatively, you can "step" down the surface streets.

My daughter-in-law normally takes the freeways. Lately, Michael has been requesting that she take the 22 freeway as part of the trip.

"It's Michael."