"To be real honest, Jeffrey, you're not making much progress," said Greg. "Are you practicing at all?" "Well, yeah. Mom makes me. She sits there watching to make sure I'm getting the right fingering and phrasing." "Hmm. I might need to talk to her about that." Greg hated when kids were forced into musicianship. He had been teaching private music lessons for more than ten years, and had seen it often. Parents made their kids miserable. It rarely worked anyway. "You don't really want to take piano, do you?" "No, Sir." "Well... " "I wish my mom would let me take guitar lessons. That would be cool." "You know you'd get calluses like this." Greg held out left hand and showed Jeffrey his fingertips. "Yeah! My friend, Zach, has calluses. They're hard like plastic." "Well, you know, it hurts for a while--until you build them up." "I don't care. I love the guitar. I've been begging Mom to switch me from piano to guitar." "I'll talk to her." "Great! I already have a guitar and--" "--don't get too excited yet. We'll see what she says." "Thanks, Mr. Tenorly." He jumped up and ran for the front door. Then he stopped, rushed back over to grab his piano books, and raced out the door. Greg's 3:30 lesson had been cancelled, so he now had a thirty minute break. Oftentimes, during a break, he would step outside and wander down the sidewalk, observing the townspeople going in and out of the shops around Coreyville Square. But something was bugging him. His dad's birthday party was only a few days away. He hoped he wouldn't regret letting Cynthia talk him into going. Why will Greg probably regret the party? Pick the correct answer from the following options: - not enough information - he will have guitar practice - he does not get along with Cynthia - he does not like his Dad
he does not like his Dad

I end this small run of blog posts with the question posed by Professor Brian Boyd at the beginning of our evening: Do we want to close the achievement gap? We know we can close the gap. It's been done or almost been done before in Scottish education, but the answers have been ignored as they pass us by. The simple clue is this: poverty is single biggest predictor of achievement, and according to research (Hammonds sic, reference required), aged 10, a child living in poverty is 60% less likely to get to university. Boyd borrowed from his own mother's report card to ask us what kind of education we desire. Is it the academic success at all costs route, or is there another option we need to value as much, if not more? His mother's report card, one that prevented her from becoming a secondary school pupil in Glasgow, is filled with G and FG, until the last point: Character and conduct - excellent. What kind of pupils do we want to develop in Scotland? What do we value in our assessment system? Opening up opportunity for all is a tough game to play when the examination system rewards only certain types of behaviour, few of them related to what the Curriculum for Excellence says we stand for. In his own small community in East Kilbride, three secondary schools enter a period of meltdown as the local rag sets about creating its own local league table of performance, with those three 'teams' in competition for the top spot (or at least not the bottom one). Therefore, we must stop basing "the gap" largely on attainment. First of all, Boyd would like us to remove the traditional, and non-sensical academic/vocational divide. Is the law or medicine degree we value not vocational? (Are all General Practitioners not Plumbers, as Dr Murray on the panel suggests?) When did Boyd borrow from his mother's report card? Pick the correct answer from the following options: - After he asked us what kind of education we desire - Before receiving excellent character marks - Before he made G and GFs - not enough information
After he asked us what kind of education we desire

Q: What would you do you're driving past hundreds of citrus trees. With a better look, they're mandarins, or, more precisely clementines. On the roadside is a truck selling crates of them for 1 euro a kilo. You stop, right? And buy a crate of 10 kilos. Even though you have to get on a plane the next day. I couldn't help myself. Marco, who I had already made turn 180 degrees to drive back to the truck, gave me that look of disapproval when I want to do something totally unreasonable like impulse buy citrus fruit that we can't keep. "What are we going to do with these?" He questioned. I wasn't sure. I wanted to taste them, I wanted to photograph them. And maybe I could even squeeze some of them into our tiny bag to take home. "It won't be a waste, I'll give the rest away!" I reasoned. He just shook his head, giving in. I bought them, a big grin on my face. We were just outside the port city of Taranto, on the western coast of Puglia in Italy's deep south, where we spent a long weekend recently and where clementines have special IGP (Protected Geographical Indication) status. These clementines a hybrid of oranges and mandarins grow in the fertile soil around the gulf of Taranto, particularly around the town of Palagiano (also known as "the city of clementines" they celebrate the symbol of their city with a sagra, a food festival, every December) and the delicate fruit is harvested by hand. We don't get these in Florence, it was my only chance to taste them they are small with very few, if any, seeds, and they are very sweet. What is probably true about the author? Pick the correct answer from the following options: - the author likes to share fruits - the author likes fruits - not enough information - the author only likes to photograph fruits
A: the author likes fruits

*Question*
Everyone woke early on the day that Dogland's restaurant opened. Everything that needed to be done in advance had been done: white wire tables and chairs stood on the restaurant's green concrete patio, and a sign painter had lettered each of the restaurant's windows: Doggy gifts and Snack bar and Guided tours and Bring your camera! and Entrance with a stylized hand with a finger pointing toward the restaurant's front door. Ma, Mayella, and Francine had scrubbed the front room and the kitchen "from top to bottom," as Ma proudly announced several times. She wished her mother could come to visit, because she knew the place would never be so clean again. James had mowed the open land, and Ethorne had walked the grounds with a clippers and a knife, saying he had every intention of improving on perfection. Seth had lettered several sheets of poster board with the information that the kennels would not formally open until more dogs had arrived, people were welcome to stroll along the viewing path for free, and please don't feed the dogs. We woke at sunrise. Because this was a special day, Pa left to pick up the workers. Ma dressed us, telling us to stay clean and not to talk to customers unless they talked to us first and to stay by the house and not to get in the way and to always be polite and not to yell or make noise unless someone wanted us to get in their car or go anywhere with them without Ma or Pa saying it was okay first, and then we were to scream for all we were worth. Little Bit didn't want to wear a dress. When Ma asked if she wanted to be a little lady, she gave a decided "No," so Ma let her wear shorts, T-shirt, and cowboy boots like Digger and me. Who had scrubbed the front room and kitchen "from top to bottom"? Pick the correct answer from the following options: - not enough information - Ma and Francine - Francine - Ma
**Answer**
Ma and Francine