... can vary from child to child. Me: Esau might have been able to gather ingredients to make his own stew. If that's the case, what does that tell us about Esau? Quinten (8): That he wasn't a good cook.
For those types of questions, I really give my son a lot of leeway. I know that the curriculum is looking for a specific answer, but really there could be a million ways to answer it, and I don't want to shove him in a box....unless his answer is really out there, lol.
That's what's great about homeschooling...if the answer isn't right, yet it really isn't wrong either....you can count it as right. Hmmmm....that sounds confusing, but you probably know what I mean. I hope. I remember one year we did Connections Academy and one of the questions on a quiz was: What season would you wear a sweater? My son answered: fall. The correct answer: winter. So, he got it wrong and his score went down. Needless to say, he wasn't too happy with that (and neither was I....Grrr at CA). ETA: why does "that's what's" look so wrong?? Yet....I think it would be right (that is what is). LOL!
A little off topic, but here's a question from Sherlock Holmes. He and Watson went hiking in the Appalachians and, at dusk, decided to pitch their tent. With all the fresh air, it wasn't long before they fell asleep. In the middle of the night, Holmes nudged Watson and pointed to the stars, which were shining brilliantly above: "So, Watson, what do you make of it?" "Well, Holmes, it tells me of the brilliance of creation, of mysteries we will never fathom, of the greatness of God, of how insignificant we are as humans, of how small is our world." Holmes' answer, of course, was the correct one... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . "Someone stole our tent!" It's all a matter of perspective, right?
Your son was quite right. The fact that he might also need a coat in winter is irrelevant. (Mind you, in Britain, you need a sweater in summer, too.) It reminds me of the following question: How many months of the year have 28 days?" Answer: they all do.
I shared a similar story on FB the other day. Q: What keeps a ship from going anywhere? DD's answer: an iceberg. Correct answer was "anchor". LOL. It's really a good thing we can homeschool these "out of the box" kids!
Oh, you almost got me on that one. You are just full of these mind twisting questions, aren't you. :lol:
Really, we were just having a discussion. There was certainly no right or wrong answer. (Though further along in scripture, we're told that Isaac requested a meal cooked by Esau because he was such a great cook; but Quin didn't know that part of the story.) I was just trying to get them thinking beyond the text. My 10 yo was fascinated by the idea that Esau was so unimpressed with his birthright, which likely included the promises God made to Abraham, that he just gave it up so easily. He was amazed that one poor choice might have cost him the title of Israel. THAT is what I'm going for... the thinking and musing and puzzling over things. From my 8yo, I'll happily take the answer given; because it means he's using logic to ponder what the deeper meaning might be, even if there's no great lesson or spiritual significance. That's not the point.
Love his answer! When dd14 was in PS 4th grade, she had a worksheet where she had to choose the thing that didn't belong. Her choices were-bird, dinosaur, lizard, snake. The "correct" answer was bird because the others are reptiles. DD chose dinosaur because it was extinct. The teacher refused to give her credit, even after she explained her reasoning because that's not what the teacher's book said. I took it to the G/T teacher and she said that, although she could see the logic, we needed to teach dd to think about the answer that MOST people would give.
I have a real problem with teachers assuming there is one right answer to an "odd one out" question. In one way or another, you could argue that any one of the answers you quoted is the right one. (I might choose 'snake' because dinosaurs are genetically linked to both birds and lizards.) What it's really pointing out is a poorly constructed question. This final Jeopardy question is another example.
