I spent the weekend in Boston attending my second-cousin's Bat Mitzvah. Before you begin asking "what exactly is a second-cousin and why do I care?" please be informed that I know my family very well. My senior project in high school was researching my ancestors - I now have over 1100 people on my family tree and I keep adding them. But I digress.
Aside from the fun with my family, the service, the massive amounts of food (hey, we're Jewish after all) I had one of the most intriguing discussions with little sister of the Bat-Mitzvah girl. She is 11 years old and explained to me quite well why "Columbus was bad" in reference to the Taino tribe occupying the West Indies in 1492. Granted, she simplified the experience quite a lot, but the fact that an 11-year old is learning about the nuances of colonial travel and its effect on the local population excites me! She continued to tell me about her math class and how to subtract negative numbers correctly by using manipulatives, something I never did in elementary school but is becoming standard practice across the country - something proved to work with research to back it up.
I don't really have a moral to this blog post - I just wanted to share my experience with this wonderful girl. I hope she grows up to be as fun-loving and educated as possible.
(As an aside, immediately following our conversation, she collected all the balloons from the luncheon and looked like she was going to be lifted in the air by them)
Aside from the fun with my family, the service, the massive amounts of food (hey, we're Jewish after all) I had one of the most intriguing discussions with little sister of the Bat-Mitzvah girl. She is 11 years old and explained to me quite well why "Columbus was bad" in reference to the Taino tribe occupying the West Indies in 1492. Granted, she simplified the experience quite a lot, but the fact that an 11-year old is learning about the nuances of colonial travel and its effect on the local population excites me! She continued to tell me about her math class and how to subtract negative numbers correctly by using manipulatives, something I never did in elementary school but is becoming standard practice across the country - something proved to work with research to back it up.
I don't really have a moral to this blog post - I just wanted to share my experience with this wonderful girl. I hope she grows up to be as fun-loving and educated as possible.
(As an aside, immediately following our conversation, she collected all the balloons from the luncheon and looked like she was going to be lifted in the air by them)
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