1. The difference between “can I” and “may I”

“Mr. P, can I go to the bathroom?”
“Of course.” [Student gets up to leave.]
“Where are you going?
“To the bathroom.”
“Who gave you permission to leave the room?”
“You said I can go to the bathroom.”
“Of course you can. You’d have died long ago if you couldn’t”
“Ooooooh, right! “Mr. P, MAY I use the bathroom?”
“No.”

2. The answer to the question “Do you know how to divide?

Answer: “Does McDonalds Sell Cheese Burgers?” DMSCB: Divide, Multiply, Subtract, Compare, Bring down

3. The words to Schoolhouse Rock’s Tale of Mr. Morton

“Mr. Morton walked down the street.
Mr. Morton walked…
Mr. Morton is the subject of the sentence!
And what the predicate says, he does.”

Get that DVD player, Diana.

I love Conjunction Junction and other songs of Schoolhouse Rock. So much that I tried for three days to bring it to my kids.

The school’s DVD player has no remote, and you can’t navigate the menu from the player itself. Since there’s no way to play this DVD without navigating the menu, we were stuck.

We made heroic efforts to get ahold of a laptop with a DVD drive. For three days straight, we could not find one.

I meant to bring in my own DVD drive, but kept forgetting. That is our last hope, but it relies on my memory.

In the meantime, I showed the kids how to make up a song. We wrote a song together describing how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

And despite these defeats and tangential victories, I still envision the day when my students will behold Schoolhouse Rock.

Cheers,
Robert