Rehm and the Wobbegong

Rehm has been "working" on an "independent" study project for one of his classes at school since January. It has been a frustrating experience for his parents as he has spent the majority of his time search the web for "fun facts" about his subject instead of doing the real work.

We finally got him focused and on task and this is what he(we) produced. He is a great idea guy, he is not great with follow through. We would work for ten minutes and he would want to know if we could quit and he could go play DS. " NO! of course not! If you had actually worked on this in class, instead of pretending to or instead of telling your teacher you were working on it at home with your parents, that might be an option. But for you, young man, the answer is 'NO!'" Can you tell I was a bit frustrated with the boy?

Each class member had to pick a sea creature to do their presentation on. Rehm, of course, picked and obscure shark. Their presentation was supposed to be more of a story than just a presentation. So Rehm was a marine biologist from the Loceanograpic Aquarium in Valencia, Spain. His task was to design a new exhibit for the aquarium featuring the wobbegong shark.

Here is the video of his dress rehearsal at home. Part of the reason I videoed the dress rehearsal was so he could watch it see for himself how he did. I did not video his actual presentation as I wanted to just sit back and enjoy it.



His actual presentation blew his dress rehearsal out of the water. He is completely in his element speaking in front of a group of people. His whole 2nd grade class came to watch him present. He did a great job and added several facts that we had not practiced, but did so in a very cohesive and appropriate manner. At the end he had members of the audience come up to play a game - they had to find the wobbegong in a picture. He gave prizes when they successfully found it. Before chosing the second participants he said something along the lines of "you only need to raise your hand if you are really smart," I about died. I looked over to see his two teachers chuckling with each other.

Rehm presenting

Rehm at QUEST Fair

Wednesday night is the final step in this process. The school has a fair where everyone can come and see all of the presentation boards and ask questions of the students. I'm so glad this project is over. I hope he is more on task when it is time to do next year's independent study.

Jenn