Classical Ed Schedule?
Pam Crouch
researching where I'm going with homeschooling, and am looking at different
methods.
Also, how do you get a child of 5 to stay interested in the desk work? Do
you try to do as much desk work as the WTM says? I only try to get my son
to do about 20-30 mins a day, but I'm interested in what others do.
I think one reason I'm interested in classical ed now is the history
component. History is definitely not one of my strengths, but I want to be
able to instill a love of history (herstory?) in my kids. Any idea about
how to do that since I'm a little "historically challenged?" ;o)
--Pam :o)
Scott Bryce
> Do you try to do as much desk work as the WTM says?
I have heard that not even the authors of WTM do as much as they say.
They wrote a VERY full schedule just to get in everything they o, even
though they never try to do it all in one day.
> I think one reason I'm interested in classical ed now is the history
> component. History is definitely not one of my strengths, but I want to be
> able to instill a love of history (herstory?) in my kids. Any idea about
> how to do that since I'm a little "historically challenged?"
J.Pascal
> Hi, anyone who's doing classical ed want to share their schedule? I'm
> researching where I'm going with homeschooling, and am looking at different
> methods.
>
> Also, how do you get a child of 5 to stay interested in the desk work? Do
> you try to do as much desk work as the WTM says? I only try to get my son
> to do about 20-30 mins a day, but I'm interested in what others do.
WTM?
> I think one reason I'm interested in classical ed now is the history
> component. History is definitely not one of my strengths, but I want to be
> able to instill a love of history (herstory?) in my kids. Any idea about
> how to do that since I'm a little "historically challenged?" ;o)
>
> --Pam :o)
Think about what you disliked most about History and *don't do that*.
:-)
My love for History has always been a function of distance.
When it was detailed and full of personalities it was fascinating.
When it was dates and places and grand overviews it was torture.
j.pascal
Pam Crouch
"J.Pascal" <ju...@pascal.org> wrote in message
news:b00d4ca5.04041...@posting.google.com...
<snip>
>
> Think about what you disliked most about History and *don't do that*.
>
> :-)
>
<snip>
>
> j.pascal
Truth be told, I still don't really like history all that much, I'm more of
a science and literature kind of gal. I only ever had one teacher that made
it seem interesting to me, and that was because she made the Tudor dynasty
seem kind of like gossip. Any thoughts on how a history-challenged person
such as myself can get the kids interested in it? Is it possible to present
all history as gossip/intrigue? Is it right to do that? I'm way out of my
league here...
--Pam :o)
Scott Bryce
> Truth be told, I still don't really like history all that much, I'm more of
> a science and literature kind of gal.
<snip>
> Any thoughts on how a history-challenged person
> such as myself can get the kids interested in it?
http://www.truthquesthistory.com/
I know, I posted it before. TruthQuest will make history look more like
literature.
--
Scott Bryce
TheMathWorkSite.com
Generate printable, custom math worksheets on-line.
Answer keys included.
Jayne Kulikauskas
My primary method of teaching history is encouraging the children to read
historical novels.
Jayne
Wendy Barker
news:<SpZfc.17912$QZ5....@newssvr22.news.prodigy.com>...
> >Do you try to do as much desk work as the WTM says?
>
> WTM?
>
Well-Trained Mind by Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise (daughter and mother)
Wendy
J.Pascal
Others have mentioned that History and Literature can be
all intertwined. My favorite History classes were often
"gossipy". A teacher who passes on the colorful tidbits,
scandals and what-not, makes it clear that real people
lived in those Historical times. I always particularly
liked when a teacher presented conflicting ideas of what
a particular person was like. Was Lucretia Borga (sp) a
murderess or a pawn of her family? Just a suggestion that
there may have been complexities beyond what was accepted
by Historians helped me to see History as something I
could think about rather than just memorize and test.
Though I suppose that Historians know all about the
complexities. It's textbooks that tend to refine something
so colorful and real into a washed out version that can
cover 500 years in 9 weeks.
What I really wanted to say though, is that your child might
become passionate about some other aspect of History than
you or I. Many people find the study of wars dull beyond
reason... others are utterly fascinated by military struggles.
Be observant and see what is likely to appeal to your child.
j.pascal
Pam Crouch
> > <snip>
> > >
> Others have mentioned that History and Literature can be
> all intertwined. My favorite History classes were often
> "gossipy". A teacher who passes on the colorful tidbits,
> scandals and what-not, makes it clear that real people
> lived in those Historical times. I always particularly
> liked when a teacher presented conflicting ideas of what
> a particular person was like. Was Lucretia Borga (sp) a
> murderess or a pawn of her family? Just a suggestion that
> there may have been complexities beyond what was accepted
> by Historians helped me to see History as something I
> could think about rather than just memorize and test.
>
> Though I suppose that Historians know all about the
> complexities. It's textbooks that tend to refine something
> so colorful and real into a washed out version that can
> cover 500 years in 9 weeks.
>
> What I really wanted to say though, is that your child might
> become passionate about some other aspect of History than
> you or I. Many people find the study of wars dull beyond
> reason... others are utterly fascinated by military struggles.
> Be observant and see what is likely to appeal to your child.
>
> j.pascal
These are some good ideas to get me started. My son does seem to be
interested in Bible stories, which is history. So, maybe if I can find
books for children about history told in story format? Do you think a 5 yo
would like Laura Ingalls Wilder? Sorry I'm so clueless on this...
--Pam :o)
Scott Bryce
> Do you think a 5 yo
> would like Laura Ingalls Wilder?
Yes, but it would be a little above his reading level. He'd like Little
Britches better. You want to read them to him because 1) it would be a
little above his reading level and 2) you want to deal with the couple
of swear words in the first book in the series. The swearing isn't bad.
Little Britches hears a couple of men damning this and damning that and
decides he will never use that kind of language himself.
The time frame is the same as Little House, but it is about a boy
growing up and doing a man's work.
Michael S. Morris
Sunday, the 18th of April, 2004
Pam:
Truth be told, I still don't really like history
all that much, I'm more of a science and literature
kind of gal.
I guess I don't exactly understand "history"
as being distinct from "literature". I suppose you
mean by "literature" imaginative literature, or
perhaps just novels. But, I think literature is
a much broader category, and ought to include
original works of science and plays and poetry
and especially I think narrative history at its best
seems to me that it is as thrilling
as any fiction ever could be.
Let me go back first to your original question.
The Morris family does something that I suppose is like
this "classical education", though we make it up as
we go (and I have not read _WTM_, so I can't compare
in any detail). But, we do subjects, and each
subject every day (mostly, that is---"field trip" days get a
zeroed or reduced academic load, and there are some
subjects we do only 2 or 3 times a week). So, if I
list these subjects, let me start with 1) math. We
really like Saxon. So, math is textbook-based. My school-age
kids are Helen (12) and Zan (14), and they do basically one
chapter a day in whatever Saxon volume they are in, which means
30 problems, and those problems have to be graded and
any that are wrong then corrected. Zan is finishing the Saxon
_Advanced Mathematics_ this spring, and will do _Calculus_
starting next year. That is basically the end of the Saxon
sequence, so I will be adding more advanced texts (we'll
probably do multivariate calculus and differential equations
at least) in the next several years (and the plan is to do
calculus-based physics for our science---probably Halliday and
Resnick et al---for the last two years of his "high school").
Helen is in _Algebra 1/2_ at the moment. The *reason* we really
like Saxon is for the problems---as I said, the kids do them *all*,
and Martha and I both find that the repitition and development
in the problems is absolutely necessary to get the kids
to the level where the arithmetic (and by this I mean also
algebraic manipulations) becomes second-nature to them.
You've got to take it to that level, or you can get lost
in the difficulty of the manipulations when you are taught
new stuff that may be conceptually not that hard, but seems
to be hard because one has an uncertain mastery over the preceding
material. Umm, for the younger ages we used a thing called
"Cornerstone Curriculum Project: Making Math Meaningful" and
the kids did that K-6. They marched through it in fact in
about two or three years. The problem we found with it
was they simply had not mastered it at the level they needed
to in order to go on. Plus, it was pretty basic---four
operations arithmetic, and there were lots of side topics
that, well, I think are important and were elided (geometry,
logic, programming, base notation). Anyway, we switched to
Saxon, backed up a year or two in it (we took the Saxon middle
school placement test and then I think backed from that
recommendation a year or two into _Saxon 43_ at that point) and
we have stayed with Saxon ever since. With
our youngest, Galen, who is 5 and who will be doing kindergarten
next year, we plan to start with Saxon from the beginning.
2) Science. Helen is working her way through a pre-algebra
physics text, _Conceptual Physics_ by Paul Hewitt. It's
really a high-school or even middle-school text, though I once
inherited using it at university for a "Physics for Non-science
Types" class. She'll be in that for at least another year. Zan
is in the middle of _Introductory Chemistry_ by Zumdahl. This is
a high-school level text. We did two years of Geology with both
kids together reading and working through a college-level
Geology 101 text. So, we have been doing science as an everyday subject
for maybe three or four years now. My sense is, though, in order to do
that, kids have to be at a certain reading level, and for some
subjects to have a good bit of math at their disposal. Before
the middle-school ages, the science we did was more "unit studies"---
leaf collections and identifications of trees, 6 weeks
on bears, birds, or dinosaurs, or the planets, that kind of thing.
3) Literature. Both kids read some chunk of something (usually
that has been set for them by Martha or me, though we are open
to what it is they express preferences for) everyday. Umm, Helen
this year has read "Othello", _The Odyssey_, "The Merry Wives
of Windsor", _Candide_, "Lord of the Rings", "Rhinoceros",
and she's in _The Once and Future King_ at the moment. Zan has
been reading an unabridged "The Arabian Nights" for the whole of
this year (it's about 4000 pages). He should just finish it by the
time we are done this spring.
Umm, both kids do lots of other reading on their own---Zan has
been reading Star Wars books and Terry Pratchett (thanks there to
recs from Kanga and her daughters) and _Eragon_ and Philip Pullman.
Helen just started Terry Pratchett, and she reads pretty much
anything to do with horses.
Reading we regard as fundamental to all of school. And our
house has just about every inch of wall space devoted to
bookshelving. And we bouht this house with wallspace for
bookshelving in mind. I'd guesstimate there are 4000 volumes.
Plus we have and use library cards. The idea is to read whole
books and unabridged and to avoid textbooks or anthologies
wherever possible (math and science and at some levels
foreign languages being the exceptions where textbooks
really are the best way to do them). Anyway, there was a point,
maybe in third or fourth grade, where we switched from "Reading"
as a subject to "Literature". There was this initial period,
where we used the McGuffey's Readers (the Primer and then
grades one through six), and the kids would learn to read
by reading aloud from them on our laps. (Zan was already
reading well by the time he started that, and Helen learned
to read that way.) Anyway, in those younger years the kids
did McGuffey each day and then also read to us from some
more extended story books (the Pooh books, Narnia, and eventually
all the Laura Ingalls Wilder books). The point is, by the time you
are done with McGuffey, you are reading Tennyson, Macauley, Longfellow,
Shakespeare, Daniel Webster, and like that. There isn't anything
but, say, _Finnegans Wake_ which might be beyond you, except
insofar as it utilizes a specialized vocabulary. The idea is to
build then vocabulary and get to the point where the kids can
read whole books of adult literature, and forget about worrying
to make things "age-appropriate" (I mean, except in the sense
that they need some age in order to have some persepctive on
some books---I'll probably hand Zan _Crime and Punishment_
next year, but Helen isn't ready for that yet). Around the
time they finished McGuffey, we cut them loose from having
to read aloud books to us and let them read silently to
themselves.
4) Writing. Both kids work on writing projects every day. This
has been kind of hit or miss with us. Kind of like reading/literature
we initially did more grammar and spelling and handwriting.
Handwriting was a failure. Both kids' handwriting is atrocious.
But, in that they are no different than their parents. Their spelling
and grammar can both be bad, too. Though, whenever we have done
those things as subjects, they do them perfectly well. Both have
been through _Jensen's Grammar_, which I recommend as kind of the
"Saxon" of grammar. Anyway, for a while there we'd do writing and
they'd write the most minimal number of words necessary to
fulfill the requirement, and, in their writing, they would make plenty
of spelling and grammatical errors which they'd already demonstrated
they knew better when we had done spelling and grammar as separate
subjects. Then about two years ago, Martha gave in and basically
let them type stories on the computer. And now we get these long
sometimes multi-chapter stories from them. Typically these are
fantasy or science-fiction stories and they tend to be very
"derivative" of stuff we know they've read or seen in films,
but we're kind of thrilled that they *are* writing, and correcting
grammar and spelling in their writing in response to the red pen.
I suppose at some point we ought to tackle different forms of writing,
especially book reports and research papers, but at the moment
we're pretty happy with what they're doing.
5) Spanish. Zan is reading and working his way through a reader
titled _Susana y Javier en España_. This has passages in Spanish
and you answer questions about the reading. And Helen is doing
the same in a similar book titled _Realidad y fantasia_. We are
very happy with Spanish at the moment with both kids, although
over the years we have kluged together materials and found it
difficult to find materials that would advance them without
sticking them with endless grammatical exercises. I've always
viewed reading the language as the important thing but I would
still love to get some sort of native speaker to come and
converse with us as a family on a regular basis, because
conversation they are not getting.
6) Latin. Latin is going pretty well at the moment with both
kids working in _Wheelock's Latin_. We have gone through
periods for instance of Zan trying to read Caesar, where
progress was nonexistent, and it hot frustrating for everyone.
We started having the most success with foreign languages
where I've gone and got materials from Schoenhof's Foreign
Books in Cambridge, Massachusetts: <http://schoenhofs.com/>.
Their selection goes way beyond what you might find at
a mall bookstore.
7) Poem. Martha reads them a poem every day. At the moment,
she's been reading from _Women Poets of China_ by Kenneth Rexroth
and Ling Chung.
8) Recitation. Both kids work on memorizing a poem
each day. Zan is doing "Little Orphant Annie" at the
moment, and Helen just finished on Friday "To Daffodils"
by Robert Herrick.
9) Both kids practice half an hour on piano each day,
and there is a piano lesson to drive to usually on Mondays.
10) Zan practices guitar for half an hour each day,
and there is a guitar lesson to do on Mondays.
11) Art and Music appreciation. These alternate with each
other 2 or 3 days each a week. Artists are usually studied
with Martha getting a book of short biography plus another or
two of reproduced paintings, and they might all read separately
and then look at the paintings together. This year, they've
done Magritte, Seurat, and Frida Kahlo. And this included
watching the film "Frida" and a filmed performance of
"Sunday in the Park with George" and trip to Art Institute
in Chicago to look at Seurat's masterpiece "Sunday Afternoon
on the Island of La Grande Jatte".
For music we typically do a composer and listen to
a lot of stuff. We've done Bach and Beethoven and
Mozart and Tchaikovsky and Scott Joplin. Umm, we
also spent a year doing "American Popular Music"
from 1850's minstrel music to rap and everything
in between. The last two years, we've been doing opera,
with Verdi taking up last year and the fist part of
this year. So, the kids read _Verdi with a Vengeance_
by William Berger, which does a biography and then a
plot summary of each opera, and we got as many of
the operas as we could on DVD and watched them
in the evenings. So, there are 26 Verdi operas plus
the Requiem, and we watched "Ernani", "Luisa Miller",
"Attila", "Macbeth", "La Traviata", "Il Trovatore",
"Aida", "Stiffelio", "I Vespri Sicliani", "Simon
Boccanegra", "Un Ballo in Maschera", "La Forza del
Destino", "Rigoletto", "Don Carlo", "Otello", "Falstaff",
and the "Requiem".
So for example, when Helen read "Othello" and
"Merry Wives of Windsor", those were chosen as
tie-ins to the operas "Otello and "Falstaff",
which we watched towards the beginning of this year.
Zan has already read "Othello" in a previous year,
but he also got assigned "Merry Wives" to read before
we watched "Falstaff".
For most of this year, however, we have been doing
Wagner. The kids have been reading William Berger's
_Wagner without Fear_. Again, there is a biography
followed by plot synopses and guides to each of Wagner's
operas. We have so far watched "Tannhaeuser", "Lohengrin",
"Tristan und Isolde", and "Die Meistersinger von Nuernberg".
We are about to begin the Ring. The kids have read Berger's
synopses of it. Both of them read _The Volsunga Saga_,
which is a Norse source for much of the story, and
they are now reading an English translation of Wagner's
text. Then they'll look at Rackham's illustrations for
the Ring and read a pretty cool comic-book version of
it, and as soon as they are done with that, we will begin
watching our first complete Ring-cycle (which will be
the Patrice Chereau-Pierre Boulez one done at Bayreuth
in the early 1980s---we're talking 14 to 15 hours of opera).
That'll be it for this year, but in the fall of next year
we plan to come back at the Ring one more time, this time
reading probably Owen Lee's _Turning the Sky Around_
(a short book on the meaning of the Ring) and we'll listen
to Deryck Cooke's two CD set of the leitmotifs, and then
watch the early 1990s version of the Ring at the Met with
James Levine conducting. Finally, we'll finish Wagner
with the Hans Jurgen Syberberg film of "Parsifal".
(We are spending lots of time with the Ring because my
kids love both Tolkien and Star Wars, and the Ring is both
an ancestor to both and a great fantasy epic in its own
right.)
(I'm also trying to illustrate how reading and literature
aren't confined to the school Subject heading of "Literature".)
12) History. (Last but not least.) Zan is reading the Will
and Ariel Durant "Story of Civilization" as a tour of world
history. He just finished Volume 6, _The Reformation_.
He and I, usually, discuss what he has read, though I spend
less time making him summarize to me what he has read,
as I've gotten more comfortable with his understanding and
retention of what he reads. With each volume of Durant,
after he has read the table of contents, he chooses
two subjects to read about in more depth, in parallel
with the main text. So, for example, this year with Volume Four,
_The Age of Faith_, he read (and disliked for its dryness)
Gwyn Jones's _The Vikings_ and read (and enjoyed) Stephen Runciman's
3-volume "history of the Crusades", and then with Volume 5,
_The Renaissance_, and since Runciman overlapped the first half,
he chose one extra topic, Leonardo da Vinci, and read the two
volumes of da Vinci's notebooks. With _The Reformation_, he chose
Joan of Arc and the Black Death. So, I gave him Shaw's "Saint
Joan" to read, which serendipitously happened also to be
performed at Butler, and he and I went to see it. And then
he read Vita Sackville-West's biography of Joan. And now he
is in the middle of Philip Ziegler's _The Black Death_.
Helen is doing American history. Her main text is Samuel
Eliot Morison's _Oxford History of the American People_.
I cannot recommend this work, or Will and Durant's history
enough. These are profound writers of narrative history,
and these works are just a pleasure to read. Anyway, our
approach with Morison is that Helen will read a chapter and
then summarize it to me and possibly with Martha present
each morning, and Martha and I will add our commentary
and try to make sure Helen is getting what she
is reading. If any subject strikes us as meriting extra
time, we will suspend Morison and go off and read another
book especially on that topic, or watch views, or both. Helen is
in the second volume of Morison's three-volume set at the moment,
and we just covered the XYZ affair and the undeclared naval war
with France during Adams's administration in 1797-98. Umm,
with Helen we have so far stopped and she's read Morison's
biography of Christopher Columbus _Admiral of the Ocean Sea_
and we stopped and did the Revolutionary War using James L.
Stokesbury's _Short History of the American Revolution_
supplemented by "Liberty", which is a 6-hour PBS series
on the revolutionary war. She also stopped and read Thomas
Paine's _Common Sense_, and she read Catherine Drinker
Bowen's lovely _Miracle at Philadelphia_ (about the writing
of the Constitution in convention in 1787) and we read
and discussed all through the Constitution and all amendments.
Also, just about a week ago, she was reading Morison about
Washington's first administration and the development of political
parties and Hamilton versus Jefferson. So I had her read
abridgments of (in a set of books I have that are
called "The Annals of America") Hamilton's "Report on the
Credit", a passage from Jefferson's memoirs ("The Anas") where
he talks negatively about Hamilton, Jefferson's and Hamilton's
opinions on the Bank that Washington asked them to write,
and then Hamilton's "Report on Manufactures", and we discussed
these over the course of a couple of days, especially
the whole Hamiltonian versus Jeffersonian constitutional
thing around the bank opinions (i.e. Hamilton: government
should have the power to do anything not explicitly forbidden
by the Constitution, and Jefferson: government cannot do
anything unless that thing is an explicitly listed power
in the Constitution).
Let's see: Zan has already been through Morison, and we've done
lots and lots of supplementing and expanding with other books
and films where useful, which we'll do again with Helen.
Before starting Morison with Helen and Durant with Zan, we spent
one year doing Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece, and Ancient Rome
with the two of them together. Then, before Morison with both
kids, we read aloud to them through the whole ten volumes of
Joy Hakim's "A History of US". And then probably we had no
specially organized subject of "History" before that point
(I'm guessing without looking it up around second or third grade).
History was a subject that we began on its own only
after we felt ourselves through with grammar and spelling
and reading-in-order-to-learn-to-read as separate subjects.
History is *stories*. Especially forget textbooks
and the way history was taught to most of us back
in the schools. It's just story after story and
wonderful literature and, if your children can
read, then there is no reason not to turn them
loose on real adult narrative history. And I
don't mean historical fiction (though I'm all in
favour of that as a supplement). Some recommended
works of history: _Histories_ Herodotus, _The
Peloponnesian War_ Thucydides, _The Persian Expedition_
Xenophon, _Campaigns of Alexander_ Arrian, _Ab Urbe
Condita_ Livy, _Histories_ and _Annals_ Tacitus,
_History_ Polybius, _Lives_ Plutarch,
_History of the Conquest of Mexico_ William H.
Prescott, _Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee_ Dee Brown,
"France and England in North America" Francis Parkman,
_Arguing about Slavery_ William Lee Miller (thank you,
Kanga!), _The Longest Day_ and _A Bridge Too Far_
Cornelius Ryan, _Black Hawk Down_ Mark Bowden. There
are just great reads in almost any direction you
want to turn. _The Decipherment of Linear B_ by Michael
Ventris. John Julius Norwich's _Byzantium_ or
Stephen Runciman's "History of the Crusades". Or Alistair
Horne's _A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954-1962_. Eric
Foner's _Reconstruction_. Dumas Malone's six-volume
biography of Thomas Jefferson. Shelby Foote's
"The Civil War: A Narrative". Bruce Catton. The
trilogy _Heaven's Command_, _Pax Britannica_, and
_Farewell the Trumpets_ on the second
British Empire by James Morris. _The Campaigns of Napoleon_
by David G. Chandler. Samuel Eliot Morison's "The European
Discovery of America" (two volumes, northern and southern
voyages). Or Samuel Eliot Morison's 14-volume "History of
US Naval Operations in WWII". _Longitude_ by Dava Sobel.
_The First Salute_ or _A Distant Mirror_ or _The Guns of
August_ by Barbara Tuchman. Robert K. Massie's _Nicholas
and Alexandria_. _King Leopold's Ghost_ by Adam
Hochschild. Thomas L. Heath's two-volume _History of
Greek Mathematics_. Raul Hilberg's "The Destruction
of the European Jews". _The Blue Nile_ and _The White Nile_
by Alan Moorehead. Carl Sandburg's "Abraham Lincoln".
_Gods, Graves, and Scholars_ by C.W. Ceram. _The Double Helix_
by James Watson. Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire". R.W. Southern's _The Making of the Middle Ages_.
"The History of the Second World War" by Winston Churchill.
_The Waning of the Middle Ages_ by J. Huizinga. Richard Rhodes
_The Making of the Atomic Bomb_. "Lee's Lieutenant's" by Douglass
Southall Freeman. _The Codebreakers_ by David Kahn.
Robert Hughes _The Fatal Shore_. Paul Johnson, _Modern
Times_. Edgar Snow's _Red Star Over China_._Augustine of
Hippo_ by Peter Brown. _The Last Place on Earth_ by Roland
Huntford. Thomas Hodgkin's "The Barbarian Invasions of
the Roman Empire". Alexander Wheelock Thayer's _Life
of Beethoven_.
For general outlines of American and world history,
and once one's child can read at an adult level on
his own, as I said above I cannot recommend Morison's
3-volume "Oxford History of the American People" and
Will and Ariel Durant's 11-volume "Story of Civilization"
highly enough. And there are just all kinds of directions
one can go to supplement these in, depending on what you want
to expand on. The Morison goes to the death of Kennedy
(so space program, Vietnam, Watergate, civil rights movement
are sadly lacking---although my kids also got introduced to
those already with Joy Hakim's "History of US"), and Durant
goes only to the end of the Napoleonic Wars (so much is sadly
lacking). I don't have good recommendations for single volumes
that catch either of these up to the present, so what we've
done with Morison and Zan is pick specific events to cover
(we did space and Vietnam---this depended on what materials---
books and films---we could find). I don't know quite what
the plan will be when we finish Durant's world history at
1815 and the end of the Napoleonic era (Hobsbawm has a series
of four volumes covering 1789-1991, and one could add Paul
Johnson's _Birth of the Modern_ plus _Modern Times_, I don't
know). For younger children, we read "History of US" to them,
and, before that, history was not so much a separate subject as,
well, what we discussed or what they picked up in reading
the "Little House" books and stuff like that.
Oh, our kids have gone through some years where they have dawdled
and tended to stretch the day's checklist into the evenings.
But, one day of school equals one day's completed checklist for
us, so we have held the line on that, and they have learned that
work not completed has to be made up on the weekend, in the
evenings, and so on. For the last several years, it has
gone pretty smoothly. They're up at 7:00 am and done with
everything by noon (and that usually means they're mostly
done with everything by 10, and they spend an hour or so
playing video games or some such, and then Martha gets around
to grading what they've done, and there is then a second turn
of correcting anything that was wrong, by which time lunch
is on). "Done by noon" is pretty generally true, but it does
not include trips to piano lessons and guitar lessons (leave
home Monday at 11:00, return home by 4:00, unless mom and dad
are doing their dance lesson as well, in which case 6:00 pm is
more like it getting home), fencing class (Zan gets driven
to Indianapolis---everything there being "an
hour away" for us---on Thursday nights and Saturday afternoons),
"Homeschool Swim & Gym" at the YMCA (happens Wednesday
12:30-2:30), riding lessons (Helen and Martha ride a mile
up the road to a neighbour's riding arena and take private
lessons---dressage and jumping---on Sunday mornings---they
leave the house around 10 and come back around 1), nor does
it include eveing watching of operas, say, or supplemental
history films.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Pam Crouch
remember what their schedule was like in preschool years? For now, I rarely
do sit-down work, and I mostly allow them to choose when they're ready to
work on something (my kids are 5 and almost 3).
Thanks for sharing all this. I loved reading it. :o) It's great to know
what other HS'ers are doing. We've done a few things you mentioned for the
younger kids. A few things of interest:
_Once_and_Future_King_ Excellent choice! I can't say enough good things
about this book. One of my all-time faves. It was read aloud to me when I
was around ten, I think. I wonder if seven would be too young for this? I
think this is the book that turned me onto Arthurian legends.
"Little Orphant Annie" My mom also had me memorize this poem...
"Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" When we visited Chicago
and Brandon was a toddler, I nursed him to sleep in front of this painting.
I couldn't believe how big Seurat's magnum opus was! The lady's fan alone
was bigger than a pizza pan! It drove home the point that there is a world
of difference between a picture in a book and real, live art.
Another thing I remember seeing at that museum were the Lautrec paintings.
I was never a big fan of his, but the painting of the woman underlit with
limelight was so eerie, yet somehow alluring. I loved it. In the same room
was a Degas, whose work I like, but had never seen in person. I was
delighted to see that in real life, you can sense the dancer's lifted leg
moving "up!" How did he do that? I was also quite impressed with the Van
Gogh painting of his room. Somehow, even using bright yellows and oranges,
this painting of a room conveyed sadness and alienation. It actually made
me feel a little suicidal for a second. We didn't get to stay long, but I
had a great time and learned a lot there...
I'm relieved to hear that you didn't have history as a subject per se, right
away.
I agree with the things you said about textbooks: much more appropriate in
the natural sciences than in most other things...
--Pam :o)
"Michael S. Morris" <msmo...@netdirect.net> wrote in message
news:4082DE46...@netdirect.net...
Michael S. Morris
Sunday, the 18th of April, 2004
Pam Crouch wrote:
Wow, this is great! Yeah, that sounds like classical ed.
Do you happen to remember what their schedule was like
in preschool years? For now, I rarely do sit-down work,
and I mostly allow them to choose when they're ready to
work on something (my kids are 5 and almost 3).
I can't remember, but I *can* lay my hands on their
daily attendance/curriculum record books. And,
in particular, I have pulled out to hand Zan's for
Kindergarten in 1994-95, followed by his 1st, second,
and 3rd "grades".
For Kindergarten (september, 1994) I see records of 1 or 2 hours a day,
and Zan would have been 4, turning 5 in November (meaning
locally he wouldn't have been able to start Kindergarten
until a year later). Looks like the first day he is reading
_Berenstain Bears and the Missing Dinosaur Bone_. Then Mom
read to him _Know About Time_. Zan does colouring in a
_Time_ workbook and Martha and Zan do _Making Math Meaningful_
Module 1. Monday the 10th of October: Zan read _Power Rangers:
The Terror Toad_, Chapter 2. Martha read to him _B. Bears: Trouble at
School_, _Old Hat, New Hat_, _What Is an Eclipse?_, and _Davy
Crockett_ Chapter 6. Zan did _Let's Go_ workbook, number 1.
He did math section 5K, he recited "Sing a Song of Sixpence"
and got assigned "Pat-a-cake" for next recitation. On January 5th
he read (aloud to Martha) _The Bad Dream Machine_ chapter 3,
Martha read him _Dinosaur Bones_, and _Digging Dinosaurs_ pp 29-32,
and _Prince Caspian_ Chapter 6. Zan read and did lessons 11-32 in
_McGuffey's 1st Reader_. He wrote out a sentence, "I like
Rock and Roll music." He did lessons 9A and drill sheets #2 and #3
in Making Math Meaningful. And he listened to the Bach "Goldberg
Variations". And worked on "Goosey Goosey Gander". On day 158, June 23,
he read _Deep Trouble_ chapters 21-23, Martha read him _The last Battle_
Chapters 4 and 5. He finished lesson 45 in a thing called "red book"
(looks like _Learning Language arts through Lit._ Level 2) and he was
doing Addition flash cards (in 4minutes 45 seconds) and subtraction in
4 minutes 10 seconds. And he recited "Good and Bad Children" and
"Escape at Bedtime" (Robert Louis Stevenson, I think). And we
listened to six Bach organ works. On the year, he's been read to the
whole of Narnia, he's got the two sets of flash cards down to about
2 and a half minutes each, he's memorized a bunch of nursery rhymes
and children's verses and recited them, and looks like he's
through MMM module 1 through chapter 15, and has listened to lots of Bach.
For grade 1 (Zan 5 and 6), he's starting with McGuffey's Third
Reader, Lesson 1, which he reads aloud to Martha, and Chapter 11
of _Old Yeller_. He got read to _History of US: The First Americans_
Chapter One. He was given 10 spelling words and wrote them in sentences
for spelling test on Friday (oral drill through the week, then written
spelling test, and next week's test will be 10 new words *plus* any
missed this week). He wrote an entry in a journal. He did Math 16A and
first half of 16B, and timed flash cards at 2:524 and 2:321 and did
adition and subtraction drill sheets. He was assigned the "Satr-Spangled
Banner" for recitation/ He did Spanish for Beginners pp2-7. He started
a unit study on Mexico with _Take a trip to Mexico_ by Keith Lye, and
read _Jackson Pollack_ by Mike Venezia. Looks like this year he got
through McGuffey's Third and Fourth readers, he read aloud through the
"Little House" books to the end of _Little Town on the Prairie_,
was read to two chapters a day of "A History of US" through the end
of _Book 7: Reconstruction and Reform_, did weekly spelling lists,
listened to more Bach, then Scott Joplin, then Mozart, began
piano, looked at art by Roy Lichtenstein, Picasso, Dali, Edward
Hopper, and Pollock, studied in various books of Spanish throughout,
did unit studies on electricity, bird identification, and Mexico,
worked through a grammar workbook or two, and memorized the Gettysburg
Address and the Preamble to the Constitution and The Night Before
Christmas. He got the addition and subtraction flash cards
to under two minutes, which had been our goal for him (i.e.
as good as Daddy can it---the rule was he had to do a deck
three days in a row under 2 minutes each day, and he did that
in October). Then, mid-year we started "Oral Multiplication Drill".
Here, the idea was to recite times tables for integers from 0 to 25
and do from times 0 to times 25. So, 19s would go "19 times 0 is
0, 19 times 1 is 19, 19 times 2 is 38, ....., 19 times 25 is 481."
And the goal here was to do each table three days in a row under one
minute. Umm, that's cooking---you've got to know them so well
there's no time to think---but it looks like he finished through
the 19s by May.
Grade 2 (age 6 and then 7) looks like Zan worked through reading
McGuffey's Fifth Reader, finished the "Little House" books
(through _the First Four Years_), read _Treasure Island_,
_Prisoner of Zenda_, _Kidnapped_, "taming of the Shrew",
was read to through the end of the "History of US" books (10
volumes in that edition),
and was also read to a single-volume history _The Story of Canada_.
He finished Math through 36E (I'd have to dig those out to know
what that means, and he finished "Oral multiplication drill"
through 25s. Spelling tests continued and Spanish and Mozart
through the whole year and Goya and Klee and Georgia O'Keefe
and Leonardo da Vinci and unit studies on bees and the human body.
For third grade (he was 7 and 8, 1997 and 98) he finished his
way through McGuffey's Sixth Reader, he read _White Fang_, _Island
of the Blue Dolphins_, _A Study in Scarlet_, "Agamemnon", "Eumenides",
"Libation Bearers", "Oedipus Rex" (these were whole-family reads
staging them with teddy bears as I recall), _Tom Sawyer_, _Huckleberry
Finn_, _Bridge to Terabithia_. We must have been finished with
Making Math Meaningful the previous year, because we spent all math time
this year on C++ programming, on Visual Basic Programming and on
working through the manual for his new calculator. This was the
year we spent in history with both kids doing 1/3 of the year
ancient Egypt, 1/3 ancient Greece, and 1/3 Rome. Spelling drills
continued trough the year. For science, Zan started the _Conceptual
Physics_ by Paul Hewitt, and was through chapter 12 by the end of
the year. Looks like we did world geography throughout the year, and
Beethoven for music appreciation for the whole year, and piano,
and art appreciation was for that year Egyptian art then Greek
art then Roman art. he's doing Spanish and starting Latin as well.
Looks like some or "recitation" was devoted to memorizing songs
that he and Helen were doing for this musical theatre thing we
had them in called "Broadway Kids".
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Scott Bryce
> Do you happen to
> remember what their schedule was like in preschool years? For now, I rarely
> do sit-down work, and I mostly allow them to choose when they're ready to
> work on something (my kids are 5 and almost 3).
If you want to know what a classical education looks like for children
that age, look here:
http://triviumpursuit.com/articles/ten_to_do_before_ten.htm
Many classical educators recommend their book, Teaching the Trivium,
before they recommend WTM.
--Scott
Kanga Mum
> Wow, this is great! Yeah, that sounds like classical ed. Do you happen to
> remember what their schedule was like in preschool years? For now, I rarely
> do sit-down work, and I mostly allow them to choose when they're ready to
> work on something (my kids are 5 and almost 3).
I'm not Michael, though I often take his recommendations for books to
use for school. We don't really do classical, although what we do is,
in some respects, similar.
Anyway, along these lines, and addressing other things you've said in
the thread, I thought I'd share some of the things we've been doing
with our youngest two this year. This also struck me as a pretty
interesting thread, and I'd love it if others would share what they
do, too.
Our youngest is 5, and he does not know his alphabet and it seems he
will have the same trouble with learning that as he did learning to
talk. He was quite late, compared to his sisters, and when he tried
to get the words out, you could see him struggling to get his brain
and his mouth to connect the way he wanted them to. I can see the
same expression on his face when he tries to remember the alphabet, so
we're not pressuring him.
I had kind of thought we'd delay school with him, but he had other
ideas. His sister was 8 the end of February, and our 5 y.o has
insisted on sitting in on school with her. He loves it.
We curl up on the couch for almost _all_ of our schoolwork.
Here's what we do:
Bible- We've been reading through the Pentateuch this year. We
finished that and are now in the beginnings of Joshua. I read a small
portion, just enough to cover an episode (when doing the ten plagues,
for instance, we would do one plague a day). After reading, I ask
them to narrate, or simply tell back what I've read.
Here's a narration from our 5 y.o.:
"Balaam was a cursing man and God would not let him curse the
children of Israel. And the Moabites and other people (I forget
what they were called) worshipped idols and sent for the Israelites
to worship idols and they ate the feast and after that they bowed
down to the idols and so God was very angry and sent snakes to kill
thousands of them.
And they wandered in the wilderness and then God let them go into
the land of Canaan."
--------------
If you know the story you will see he got some details quite wrong-
he seems to have thought that Balaam was being asked to swear at the
Israelites, and he confused the pestilence of the Balaam story
(pestilence is the word used in the version we read) with the snake
plague of a few stories back. This is not really a problem at his age.
When he finished talking, I just told him what a pestilence was.
I'm quite tickled that he remembered words and phrases like Balaam,
children of Israel, Moabites, wandered in the wilderness, and land
of Canaan. And while he got some details wrong, he did get the gist
of the story right. I love his characterization of Balaam.;-)
Since he's only been speaking in sentences for something like two
years, I really wildly happy with how he does.
Anyway, back to what we do- then we have a story from one of the
Gospels. We've been going through Luke, *very* slowly. We follow the
same process- I read a short episode, they narrate, I correct anything
they got terribly wrong, we discuss anything we think needs
discussing.
Reading both stories and the narrations and discussions- perhaps 20
minutes.
Memory Verses: Next they recite their memory verses and work on any
new ones. This takes about 5 or ten minutes, most.
History:
WE've been reading from several books for history. The first (and one
of my favorites) is An Island STory, also called Our Island Story, by
H. E. Marshall. I liked it so much that I supervised the project of
getting it online as an e=text so others could enjoy it too.
It's online a couple places. One of them is here:
http://www.mainlesson.com/display.php?author=marshall&book=island&story=_contents
Most often, the book is about battles fought and kings killed. My son
loves this book for that reason, and my daughter complains loudly
about having to read about people who just keep dying, but she really
likes it, too.
We also read some of the stories from Fifty Famous Stories Retold,
online here:
http://www.mainlesson.com/display.php?author=baldwin&book=fifty&story=_contents
Horatius at the Bridge was a favorite, and we acted it out afterward
with blocks.
And we read Viking TAles, online here:
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/hall/viking/viking.html
We don't do each of these each day, but after every reading, my kids
tell me back some part of the story. Viking Tales was such a big hit
that when they found a fallen tree, hollowed out and curving over part
of a boggy marsh in our woods, they promptly named it their Viking
ship, and our son is HOrsa and our daughter is Gudrid. The sail all
over the world and have many battles. This game became utterly cool
when they found a cow's skull in the woods and hung it up over the
prow of their ship. One day I hope to have a picture of it online.
Then we do math, about 20 minutes. We'll be using Miquon Math and
Math U See, but right now we're doing a lot of games and working with
manipulatives, matching dominoes, finding all the ways we can make ten
with the rods, and playin guessing games about what rod I have in my
hand.
After math, we do some singing- at least one hymn and one folk song
every day. We choose folksongs from here:
http://www.contemplator.com/tunebook/irshmidi.htm
http://www.contemplator.com/folk.html
http://members.home.net/bntaylor/canmidi.htm
And hymns from here:
http://cyberhymnal.org
We pick a new hymn every month, a new folksong about every two months.
Hymns we've done recently include Man of Sorrows; Beneath the Cross
of Jesus; Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence; Jesus Paid it All; Guide
Me, Oh Thou Great Jehovah
Next, we do some American History and maybe something like Social
Studies.
Books we've been reading here include:
the Rainbow Book of American History; the D'Aulaire's books about Abe
Lincoln, George Washington, and so forth, A book about the Pilgrims
published by Christian Liberty, and a little book we picked up at a
yard sale called, "Stories of Great American LEaders." Umm, we also
have read books like Jean Fritz's Where Was Patrick Henry... in this
time slot.
For 'social studies,' this is where we'd do some extra reading about
other people live. Currently, we're doing a sweet spirited little
book called Little Herder in Autumn. It's about the daily life of a
Navajo Indian girl. We are reading this very, very slowly, maybe one
or two pages a day. I've also used Material World for the same
purpose, and at an even slower pace, and also a book called something
like From Ashanti to Zuni, a book about all the languages for which
there is no Bible (it's an older book, the Bible has been translated
into Zuni).
Then we have poetry-, we do a poem a day. We've read through a good
Mother Goose (several times when they were younger) Robert Louis
Stevenson's Child's Garden of Verses, A. A. MIlne's When We Were Very
Young and Now That We Are Six. Now we are reading through an older
(1940's or so) Childcraft collection of poetry. When we finish that,
we'll do the Oxford Book of Children's Verse by Iona and Peter Opie,
or this collection (which I did help compile):
http://amblesideonline.homestead.com/files/Year_1_Poems.txt
We used to do poetry recitations, but haven't done that with these two
for a while. When we did, we typically did Mother Goose. My 13 and 15
y.o. still do poetry recitation (my dh's car accident earlier this
school year really played havoc with our school organization).
Then we do Aesop's Fables, one fable a day. We have an old copy by
Milo Winter that we are particularly fond of.
Next is copywork- for the 8 y.o. this is a sentence or more from books
or poems we are reading. Usually I try to have a selection that
presents an opportunity for her to learn something about grammar or
punctuation usage.
Our 5 y.o.'s copywork consists of me holding up a flashcard with a
letter, and he copies it, and, we hope, tells me the name of the
letter. He's great at copying, not so hot at remembering the names of
the letters.
This takes perhaps 10 minutes, then we spend a couple minutes learning
things like the Pledge, the words to the STar Spangled Banner, etc.
Geography: For Geography we've been reading Holling C. Holling's
Paddle to the Sea, Seabird, Tree in the Trail, and now Minn of the
MIssissippi. We find places on the map. We narrate.
Shakespeare: We are reading through some of the Shakespeare plays
retold in Lamb's Tales from Shakespeare. We go slowly, we use paper
dolls to keep people separate in our minds, and we narrate. We spend
about four weeks on one story, then take four weeks off, then do
another story. We've done Midsummer Night's Dream, The Taming of the
Shrew, and The Merchant of Venice. I'm not sure what, if anything,
the 5 y.o. has gotten from this, but he likes sitting there with us,
and sometimes he surprises me. I make out a tentative plan of what we
are going to study, but if ever we have an opportunity to see a play
live, we drop my plans and switch to reading the play we will see.
It's nearly always better to see it. Last winter we switched my plan
and went to King Lear, because we planned on seeing King Lear
performed at a nearby college. We ended up being unable to go because
of our daughter's foot injury and surgery, but apparently that was a
Very Good Thing.
We take a break for jumping rope, playing outside, tossing a ball,
riding bikes.
Reading: Alphaphonics for the 8 y.o., the 5 y.o. is still playing.
The 8 y.o. also reads McGuffey's
Nature STudy: Depending on the day of the week, we do one of the
following here:
Comstock's Handbook of Nature Study; The Burgess Animal Book (we
finished the Bird book, both are online), a very silly but popular
Enid Blyton book about Pip and the things he discovers about the
natural world around him, or a nature reader from Christian Liberty.
WE also like the Selsam science books. We also spend some time trying
to identify the tracks of animals in our woods, the wildflowers,
trees, and birds that come by.
Fairy Tales: We're reading through the Blue Fairy Book, and have done
a couple others.
Character: We read from Wisdom and the Millers, Goops and How to Be
Them, POlite Moments, or something similar.
Beowulf: Stories of Beowulf Told to Children
http://www.mainlesson.com/display.php?author=marshall&book=beowulf&story=grendel
Somewhere in our day we fit in some time on French and Spanish- for
both we are using a computer program called TriplePlayPlus!
And at the end of the school day we read aloud from a more advanced
children's book. We did the first two Little House on the Prairie
books earlier this year, and both the 5 y.o. and the 8 y.o. absolutely
adored them. They played Little House, they called our woods The Big
Woods, they pleaded to read longer, they hugged the books, they were
in raptures over these books. We've only stopped because I want to
get in Charlotte's Web and Peter Pan sooner than I can if I have to
read the rest of the Little House series first. So yes, to answer a
question you asked in another thread, I think a 5 y.o. boy would love
and easily understand these books.
At bedtime, or in the mornings in bed, depending on dh's schedule, he
reads to them book like: The CAbin FAced West; Bread and Butter
Indian; The Courage of Sarah Noble; Matchlock Gun
Somewhere in there we also have art and music, plus drawing. For
Drawing we are using Draw, Write, Now. For art and music we pick an
artist and a composer. We read a biography, and listen to music by
the composer or look at works of art by the artist. All other things
being equal, I kind of like to choose composers and artists that match
up with the time period we are studying, but I'm pretty flexible about
that.
Recently, we worked on Brahms, because we had a wonderful chance to
hear Brahms' Requiem performed by the Indianapolis Symphonic Choir, an
opportunity made possible for us by one of the members of the choir,
our own Mike Morris (thank-you again!). I took the 20 y.o., the 15,
13, and 8 y.o. and we all had a thrilling time. It was truly
marvelous. During the Soprano solo and chorus, I got goosebumps on
my scalp. Lovely experience, and most delightful. We hated for it
to end, and on the drive home the 13 y.o. lamented the fact that we
have no tape or CD player in the car, so we couldn't listen to a
recording of it all over again (live is much better, but a recording
would have helped). We left in a very uplifted and gladsome frame of
mind.
Anyway, that's what we have been doing this year. Sorry so long!
Kanga
Michael S. Morris
Scott Bryce:
If you want to know what a classical education looks
like for children that age, look here:
<http://triviumpursuit.com/articles/ten_to_do_before_ten.htm>
Many classical educators recommend their book, Teaching the Trivium,
before they recommend WTM.
I went to this site and stumbled upon the following passage:
Sometimes I would just stop reading — the book was not
worth the bother. The book which taught me this lesson
was Tarzan, by Edgar Rice Borroughs. Nathaniel was young
when he wanted to read this book, and because it is an
old book, I thought it must be acceptable. After Nathaniel
finished reading the book he told me that the main character
in it committed adultery. I think it was that Tarzan
committed adultery in his heart, not in actual fact. He
did not think he should read any more books by Borroughs.
I was rather upset that Nathaniel had not stopped reading
the book immediately when he came upon that incident, but
I was nevertheless glad that he told me about it. It taught
me that I need to be more careful concerning what the
children read, and that just because a book is old does
not mean it is good. If you cannot keep up with the boy's
reading, then you may choose to have him re-read approved
books.
Umm, I have zero invested in Borroughs or Tarzan (Martha
says the books are hilarious for their depiction of
Tarzan's innate English nobility), but this in my opinion
depicts the *antithesis* of education. So, if this kind of
thing is "classical education", we won't have any of it
around here. I want my children to learn their minds are
bigger than any book, not that books are bigger than them.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Scott Bryce
> So, if this kind of
> thing is "classical education", we won't have any of it
> around here.
It has less to do with Classical education than it does with Christian
education.
Philippians 4:8
Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is
right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if
anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things.
Some things aren't worth spending mental energy on.
That doesn't mean that we don't expose our kids to ugly concepts. It
means that we don't dwell on ugly concepts unnecessarily or excessively
or present them to our kids in a way that makes them enticing.
--Scott
Pam Crouch
was looking for. When the kids were younger, did you like to spread it out
through the day, or was it the same as it is now, with school in the
morning?
Also, do you guys teach logic in the philosophy vein? (I noticed you were
doing computer programming, so that contains logic too...)
I've had a lot of people who do classical ed say that in the tween years,
the child's reading level can be really high, but the content they are
emotionally ready to handle is hard to find at that level. For instance, I
found a great used picture book about ships and seafaring, but on one page,
they had a little blurb about Bluebeard, and his fate, and right above it is
a realistic drawing of a rotting, severed head hanging from a mast! That
would definitely give my kids nightmares. Have you had things like that
come up?
We've read a Narnia synopsis out loud, and are reading Pooh and Paddington
out loud. I like the idea you had about using Berenstain Bears for readers.
One problem I've had with a lot of mid-level readers is that the stories are
dumb, so BB would be better.
--Pam :o)
"Michael S. Morris" <msmo...@netdirect.net> wrote in message
news:408319BE...@netdirect.net...
J.Pascal
> Monday, the 19th of April, 2004
>
> Scott Bryce:
> If you want to know what a classical education looks
> like for children that age, look here:
>
> <http://triviumpursuit.com/articles/ten_to_do_before_ten.htm>
>
> Many classical educators recommend their book, Teaching the Trivium,
> before they recommend WTM.
>
> I went to this site and stumbled upon the following passage:
> was Tarzan, by Edgar Rice Borroughs. Nathaniel was young
> when he wanted to read this book, and because it is an
> old book, I thought it must be acceptable.
Glurk!
(...)
> Umm, I have zero invested in Borroughs or Tarzan (Martha
> says the books are hilarious for their depiction of
> Tarzan's innate English nobility), but this in my opinion
> depicts the *antithesis* of education. So, if this kind of
> thing is "classical education", we won't have any of it
> around here. I want my children to learn their minds are
> bigger than any book, not that books are bigger than them.
I rather like Tarzan. It's racist, sexist, classist, serial
pulp fiction at its best. ;-) And yes... quite hilarious
from time to time because of that. I didn't notice those
things quite so much when I read them in high school. I bought
the first couple thinking I'd read them to my children and
only a skim through showed me that they weren't appropriate
read-aloud books for little ones. They are, at the moment,
on my 13 year old's book shelf for him to read if he cares
to.
Not to malign someone I don't even know, but I am boggled by
the lack of *participation* in literature (or pulp as the
case may be) that is shown by the preconception that
"old" = "good". And I wonder if that lack of participation
might translate to the lack of objectivity that makes it
so necessary to avoid any depiction of immoral behavior in
a book that children will read.
Evidently this person learned that "old" doesn't equal "good"
but still missed the concept of participation vs. passivity.
Or something.
j.pascal
Michael S. Morris
Monday, the 19th of April, 2004
Pam Crouch wrote:
Gee, thanks for taking the time to dig this
up and share it! This is what I was looking
for. When the kids were younger, did you like
to spread it out through the day, or was it the
same as it is now, with school in the morning?
"Like to" are the operative words here. We have liked to
get things done quickly and have valued both kids and
adults having large vistas of leisure time in the day.
The whole point to us of homeschooling is doing a better
job, covering more and better material in less time, than
the schools would do. The kindergarten year was intentionally
only a little bit each day, but we clearly added more subjects
in time, and then did things like deleted reading and spelling
and grammar and replaced those with literature and writing and
reading much more for history and like that. In any event, the
kids have gone through phases of doing a lot of dawdling and,
well, we played along to the extent that work stretched into
the evenings, or they had to make up work on the weekend. So,
the enforcement of the rule that "1 schoolday=a completed
pre-set amount of work no matter how long it takes you" took
awhile in our household to sink in. So, I would say the answer
to your question is, we did less stuff to start, and mostly
in the morning, then we added more and the kids went through
a phase of dawdling so that schooldays got to be lengthy, and
then they finally caught on that there was a way to work
efficiently and get things done and still end up with lots
of leisure time.
Pam:
Also, do you guys teach logic in the philosophy
vein? (I noticed you were doing computer programming,
so that contains logic too...)
The computer programming does some logic, I guess. Zan
and I worked through a C++ for Dummies book (with a
CD-ROM that gives you a little DOS-window programming
environment) and then a "Teach Yourself Visual Basic",
which I think he enjoyed much more. Later, we've done
some robotics with Lego Mindstorms, and there's a gui
programming language that comes with it (where you write code
by stacking different coloured LEGO-like bricks on your PC),
but there are some lovely books of robotics projects where
you have to go out and buy extra sensors and motors and
stuff, and you program in a textual C-like language
you can download online and that gives you more power
than the LEGO-supplied language.
Also, Saxon does some work in classical logic,
but, I don't really have logic worked into my master
plan. I have some books on formal logic, but they
tend to get pretty mathematically abstract pretty
fast, and I'd only work them in as math courses
later, if there's time. Then, there would be doing
philosophy, and I suppose we would get at least through
syllogistic logic with Aristotle, but even that would
mean I'd have to aim for more than a standard college-level
Philosophy 101 course would do.
Pam:
I've had a lot of people who do classical ed say that
in the tween years, the child's reading level can be
really high, but the content they are
emotionally ready to handle is hard to find at that level.
I think this is true, though parents can differ a lot on
what emotional content different kids can handle.
Pam:
For instance, I found a great used picture book about
ships and seafaring, but on one page, they had a little
blurb about Bluebeard, and his fate, and right above it is
a realistic drawing of a rotting, severed head hanging from
a mast! That would definitely give my kids nightmares.
Have you had things like that come up?
I believe Martha and I were living in Canada, and Zan was 2,
Helen not born yet, and we decided to "get out of the house
and see a movie". Terminator 2 was on at the drive-in, so we
figured Zan tends to sleep in the car, and we'd go to the movie,
he could sleep in the back seat, and it would be fun. This was
a little Mercury Topaz---Zan stood up and watched the whole movie
from between the front two seats. I don't know if you know Terminator
2, but it is mega-violent. For about a year afterwards, Zan would
remember the helicopter blowing up every time we'd see a
helicopter. Zan has loved action movies (like I do) ever
since. Basically, we don't watch TV, but we do love movies,
and we have exposed them to sex and violence in the movies
ever since, and mostly at their call (Zan chose to see "The
Passion", Helen chose not to). I.e., both Helen and Zan (and
Galen, too) like to watch an action film, and they'll all
tend to bow out of anything that's "adults talking".
I don't know---I'll steer them to stuff and sometimes it
works and sometimes it doesn't. I think Martha suggested
_Once and Future King_. I was thinking it might be a little
adult for Helen, but she seems to be liking it. I suggested
"Rhinoceros", which if any do not know it, it's a
Theatre of the Absurd play by Eugene Ionesco. The plot
is that people start turning into rhinoceroses. And the
protagonist goes through all stages of reaction to this
event, until in the end of the play, he's the last human
left unchanged, and they're coming for him. She loved it.
Zan liked Twain, especially the funny Twain of the short
stories. On the other hand, I thought he'd really like
Horatio Hornblower, and he hated it.
Pam:
We've read a Narnia synopsis out loud, and are reading
Pooh and Paddington out loud. I like the idea you had
about using Berenstain Bears for readers. One problem
I've had with a lot of mid-level readers is that the stories
are dumb, so BB would be better.
Well, the McGuffey's Readers kind of acted as our "graded readers",
and we let both kids choose what they wanted to read at first
for story books, and that tended to be from their collection
of children's books. It's like what we started doing was little
different from what we had been doing all along, and then
McGuffey kept pushing the bar up and building vocabulary, so
that longer and longer storybooks became more appropriate. Pooh
is good for read-aloud, and soon on in there Harry Potter and
The Hobbit and Madeleine L'Engle and _Wind in the Willows_ and
the full Narnia series and Mother Goose
and "Redwall" and _Alice in Wonderland_ and _The Oxford Book
of Story Poems_ and the Andrew Lang Fairy Tale Books and
Charles Perrault and the Brothers Grimm and Greek Myths
and Tales from Shakespeare and Tales from the Bible and
Lloyd Alexander and L. Frank Baum. Some will work at this
age, and some won't until a year or two.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Pam Crouch
word!
So, Kanga, what do you do about mythology? Do you worry about presenting
stories of other "gods" to the kids, or how do you handle that aspect of
classical ed? I know that's one aspect that's important in the Bluedorn's
philosophy, so I'm curious about what your thoughts are.
About the Bible readings: what version do you use? NLT? Right now, I'm
reading to the kids from a Bible storybook by the American Bible Society
that my son really likes. He loved the story of Joseph, especially.
You mentioned that your daughter complains about the people in the stories
dying. That is something that I hear a lot around here, even though I try
to be extremely careful to screen out any violence, death, or other
non-exemplary behavior in their books. Can you see why we're reading Pooh
and Paddington? My kids are so sensitive that if someone in the story dies,
they don't even want to finish it sometimes, and they get a little depressed
about it. You should have seen my son's reaction to the tale of the flood
in Genesis. We had to have a long talk about theology before he would let
me continue.
So what should I do to give them more "culture" until they are emotionally
ready for more real lit, where people do die, and not everyone is nice? Can
anyone share their experiences with this?
--Pam :o)
"Kanga Mum" <kangamaroodoes...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:b62b291b.0404...@posting.google.com...
Michael S. Morris
Monday, the 19th of April, 2004
I was writing:
Then, mid-year we started "Oral Multiplication Drill".
Here, the idea was to recite times tables for integers from 0 to 25
and do from times 0 to times 25. So, 19s would go "19 times 0 is
0, 19 times 1 is 19, 19 times 2 is 38, ....., 19 times 25 is 481."
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Now that *is* what I would call ugly and ignoble---far worse
than the most seductive passage about adultery in literary
existence, in my opinion, and, anyway, it's 475.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Michael S. Morris
Monday, the 19th of April, 2004
I said:
So, if this kind of thing is "classical
education", we won't have any of it
around here.
Scott:
It has less to do with Classical education
than it does with Christian education.
Well, I would suggest this lady and I have a different
opinion of what education should be, regardless
of whether it's Christian or no.
Scott:
Philippians 4:8
Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is
noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever
is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is
excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things.
Yeah, but this is one Bible verse among many other Bible verses
which, when I read them, suggest to me thoughts about what is
ignoble, wicked, impure, ugly and condemnable.
In any event, I'm not convinced that reading about that
which is ignoble, wicked, etc. *causes* one to think ignoble
or wicked thoughts (as distinct from thinking perfectly righteous
thoughts about ignoble or wicked things). I.e., the fact that I
read about prophets of God telling the Israelites to go and commit
genocide certainly doesn't induce me to want to go and
exterminate other people. In fact, I rather condemn these
prophets. Likewise, Lord Greystoke's behaviour, if in fact
he's committing adultery, doesn't necessarily induce me to
want to commit adultery.
Scott:
Some things aren't worth spending mental energy on.
I agree.
And yet, in my sketch of Zan's early schooling
work, Martha was reading to him some stuff that was
good, but also he was being asked to read aloud from
books of his choosing, and there was definitely a Power
Ranger/Goosebumps phase. Was it schlock? Definitely
yes (I remember Martha railing about how bad the
writing was). But, he learned to read thereby, and
we got him weaned off of it eventually. I suspect
I might have a radically different opinion about what is
unworthy.
Scott:
That doesn't mean that we don't expose our kids to
ugly concepts. It means that we don't dwell on ugly
concepts unnecessarily or excessively or present them
to our kids in a way that makes them enticing.
So, do we have any evidence that Tarzan's adultery
(or maybe it was just adulterous lust, I'm not sure) was
presented to this Nathaniel as enticing? Seems to
me the kid recoiled from the book. Seems to me he
was being enticed by his mother to practice such a
recoil, and ultimately---the lesson she drew from this---
to even avoid reading that which someone else has
labeled for him as "contains ugly enticements".
That strikes me as the same kind of behaviour and
littleness of mind as the ones who would judge Salman
Rushdie's book as blasphemous, when they have not read
the book. Or the ones who picketed "The Last Temptation
of Christ" as a blasphemous film when they had not seen
it.
To me, this women's counsel to restrict children's reading
to recycling only through approved-list books is something
that is ignoble, wicked, et cetera. Good thing I'm above
actually doing that sort of thing.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Michael S. Morris
Tuesday, the 20th of April, 2004
Kanga:
Recently, we worked on Brahms, because we had a
wonderful chance to hear Brahms' Requiem performed
by the Indianapolis Symphonic Choir, an opportunity
made possible for us by one of the members of the
choir, our own Mike Morris (thank-you again!). I
took the 20 y.o., the 15, 13, and 8 y.o. and we all
had a thrilling time. It was truly marvelous.
During the Soprano solo and chorus, I got goosebumps
on my scalp. Lovely experience, and most delightful.
We hated for it to end, and on the drive home the
13 y.o. lamented the fact that we have no tape or CD
player in the car, so we couldn't listen to a recording
of it all over again (live is much better, but a recording
would have helped). We left in a very uplifted and
gladsome frame of mind.
I thank you muchly, both for your kind words and
for your lovely company at dinner. My concert post
mortem is that we rocked. I was transported by it,
off in some out-of-body experience (though brought to
earth I confess intermittently by physical and vocal
exhaustion---it had been a long week, with rehearsals
Tuesday through Friday evening). I think the tempi
our director took in the three big fugues (well,
technically, two fugues and one fugue-like section) were
all just a smidge faster than we had yet done, and I
suspect this was deliberate on Eric's part---it put
everybody on edge, and the effect was this explosion
into joy. Anyway, I've still got parts of it playing
around in my head---especially the start of "Der gerechten
Seelen sind in Gottes Hand".
The one negative I thought there was was that I was less than
thrilled with the baritone soloist, Damian Savarino. He
was adequate, but the guy who sang that part when we performed
this in 2000 with the Indianapolis Symphony was Wolfgang
Holzmair (the soloist on the Herbert Blomstedt/San Francisco
Symphony recording that both you, Kanga, and I have), and my
memory of it is that Holzmair's voice could've peeled paint off
the back wall of that church, so that Savarino disappointed by
comparison.
There have been two concerts this year that have rated
Wows from me---this one and the concert with the Indianapolis
Symphony back in February, which was our first under the new
maestro, Mario Venzago. In that one we did short works by Mozart
and Schumann and Ravel (quite a strange program, though I've
learned to expect that from Venzago), and the piece
that stopped the show was the most exquisite rendition of
"Ave Verum Corpus" I have heard or been a part of. Sadly
for us, neither concert appears to have been reviewed by the
Indianapolis Star. But, sometimes them's the breaks. It's
such an ephemeral thing, a musical performance, and recording
only can do it partial justice, I think.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Kanga Mum
> No need to apologize for the length, I love hearing this stuff! Read every
> word!
>
> So, Kanga, what do you do about mythology? Do you worry about presenting
> stories of other "gods" to the kids, or how do you handle that aspect of
> classical ed? I know that's one aspect that's important in the Bluedorn's
> philosophy, so I'm curious about what your thoughts are.
The Bluedorns and I are not in agreement here, but it's not a big deal
to me. By that I mean that I don't have a problem with reading fairy
tales and mythology to my kids, but I don't think those who don't are
idiots, either. It's their call, and there are all kinds of reasons
why one choice might be better for one family than another.
For us, our entire lives are so saturated with our Christian faith,
which includes knowing the stories of idol worshipping in the OT, that
I cannot see how hearing a few stories from Greek, Roman or Norse
mythology each week could possibly confuse my children. We pray to
God before meals and throughout the day, we sing songs to God
throughout the week, we talk about our relationship with God on a
daily basis- so hearing a story about Thor once in a while is hardly
going to shake their faith, and if it were, more shame to us.
>
> About the Bible readings: what version do you use? NLT? Right now, I'm
> reading to the kids from a Bible storybook by the American Bible Society
> that my son really likes. He loved the story of Joseph, especially.
>
We use: the KJV, a Bible Story book called The Story of the Bible, by
Charles Foster, published in 1873, and an American Bible Society
translation of Luke that I am less than thrilled with. It's much too
watered down, but I've had it for a couple decades, and I have always
liked the water color illustrations. What I've been doing is reading
the ABS story from Luke, and then the story from the KJV, but I think
I'm going to start letting them look at the pretty water colors while
I read from the KJV.
> You mentioned that your daughter complains about the people in the stories
> dying. That is something that I hear a lot around here, even though I try
> to be extremely careful to screen out any violence, death, or other
> non-exemplary behavior in their books. Can you see why we're reading Pooh
> and Paddington? My kids are so sensitive that if someone in the story dies,
> they don't even want to finish it sometimes, and they get a little depressed
> about it. You should have seen my son's reaction to the tale of the flood
> in Genesis. We had to have a long talk about theology before he would let
> me continue.
>
> So what should I do to give them more "culture" until they are emotionally
> ready for more real lit, where people do die, and not everyone is nice? Can
> anyone share their experiences with this?
>
Short answer- I don't really know.
Middle answer: I have some guesses. Keep on trying, feeling around
for what works for your family and your children. I think we can help
them get emotionally ready by being exposed to a little bit more than
they are comfortable with- just like we increase our level of exercise
by stretching just a bit outside our comfort zone. I'd much rather
than my child's first experience of death be in fiction than in real
life. I'd much rather that their only experience of betrayal be in
fiction than in real life. I'm not going to get my way, but I can at
least make sure that through literature they learn something of human
nature before they are confronted with some ugly stuff the hardest way
of all- I think literature can even help give them some tools to
recognize certain problems that may come up in real life.
Long rambling nonanswer:
This particular daughter complains, but she isn't really _distressed._
She's more, umm, indignant, if I'm making the distinction clear. Now
two of my older girls are really sensitive plants. One of them cries
when fictional characters die outside a state of grace. We read
almost no Christian fiction, so it's not that she got used to the
Sunday School happy endings of much that passes for Christian
literature. She's 19, so I am not sure she's going to outgrow it, but
I sure hope she does. On the one hand, I don't want her completely
calloused and indifferent to suffering, but OTOH, I certainly don't
want her walking around with no skin on, so to speak, so emotionally
raw and with all her nerve endings out, ready to be stomped on. Right
now I am trying to kind of insist she read something a little sadder
than she prefers, but not so sad as to make her suicidal.;-) So she's
reading Fifty Acres and a Poodle: A Story of Love, Livestock, and
Finding Myself on a Farm (by Jeanne Marie Laskas), a lovely, warm read
which includes the death of a beloved cat (okay, just trust me, this
is *seriously* sad to my animal lover daughter and to my animal
tolerating self), but I wouldn't foist Anne Frank on her. About
holocaust books, she says that she knows what happened and she
understands it was dreadful, and sees no reason to torture herself
with the details.
My 15 y.o. nearly broke her heart when she was about 10 or 11 or so
over the death of Nancy in Oliver Twist, and she positively revolted
over reading anymore of Wild Animals I Have Known after the first
chapter (serious anthropomorphizing and then the animals all die
terrible deaths).
Soooo, I'm no expert.
Kanga
Kanga Mum
> bigger than any book, not that books are bigger than them.
>
Okay, yeah, but... I just don't see that this is really the issue, not
even with the Bluedorns.
I understand, and to a point agree with you that the human mind is
capable of overcoming anything another human mind can conceive and be
confronted with in art and literature. I agree with you too, that the
work itself does not have the power to make one do evil or think evil.
However, the reason I think that is true is because I kind of believe
that some level of evil already exists in every human heart and mind.
I'm not quite a Calvinist, but I do think they are right that a
capacity for some level of evil exists in every human heart.
I also think that just because the human mind _can_ overcome
anything, that's not in itself enough of a reason to give it stuff
that must be overcome. A perfect example for me would be the movie
The Passion. As I've said before, I am not at all interested in
seeing it- there are a couple scenes I'd like to see, but overall, I
just don't care to have those pictures in my head. I don't like
graphic violence except when it is coolly digital, and obviously so.
I loved the Matrix for just that reason- the graphics. I think the
plot and the philosophy was kind of bubble-gum, but I think the
visuals were just lots of fun and stylistically cool. I'd watch it a
few more times as a music video or with the sound off, because I think
the dialogue is lame. But when a film gets the violence pretty
realistic and life-like, I don't like the pictures in my head. I see
no compelling reason to put them there, especially when it would take
more of my efforts (time and money and transportation) to put them in
my head than it does now to keep them from gaining headroom. Yeah, if
they're there, I can ‘overcome' them, they don't make me a violent
person, they don't make me do evil, they don't even have to give me
nightmares- but they aren't pictures I like or see a need to have in
my head, so why bother to put them there in the first place? If I
thought the crucifixion was a picnic in the park, then maybe it'd do
me good to see it- but I know very well it wasn't, I have a good idea
how horrible it was physically, so I see no reason to put somebody
else's images of it in living color, complete with Dolby Surround
Sound inside my own head. I'm not 'afraid' of it, I just don't like
it. I am not afraid of Jackson Pollock's art, either, but I don't
want it in my living room.
Which brings up the quality issue- I think most people have a natural
affinity for the lowest common denominator. I mean, ask us whether we
‘feel' like reading a light, fluffy, cozy read, or something a little
more meaty, and most of us feel like going for the light stuff more
often than not. I also think that what we read most often as children
will kind of be the default mode for our tastes as adults- I don't
mean the same books, but kind of the same type- if we read tripe lots
of tripe, or only tripe, as kids, we'll gravitate toward tripe as
adults. _Of course_ we can overcome this, we can make an effort,
slight for some, larger for others, and stretch ourselves, we're not
limited by what we read as kids- but I'd like to do what I can to up
the ante for my kids and make their default choice a little better
quality than mine. You can always read down from what you're used to,
it's a little harder to read up.
So I make choices for my kids in many areas. We pretty much chose
where they'd live, and I'm the one who does the grocery shopping, so I
choose what foods we eat, and I try to choose with some eye to some
principles of health and economy and variety. I want my children to
have flexible, mature tastes. I don't want them to be the kind of
kids who go to a meal at somebody's house and ask for hotdogs because
they don't have the palate for anything better or different. It's a
rare kid who needs to be trained to like Twinkies; they pretty much
taste great to the average kid on the first bite. They might need a
little assistance to develop a taste for legumes- and that assistance
might just be consistent exposure to legumes with less exposure to
Twinkies.
So- in literature- I make choices for my younger kids in this area a
lot- I will not bring home books from the library that I think are
shoddily written. I will not buy them. My younger kids don't read
books with gratuitious sex, violence, vulgar language, or just rude
behavior (gratuitous is somewhat in the eye of the beholder). I shall
probably slither on the ground in your estimation hereafter, but I
even have taken white out to the language in a few of our books- I
felt like a vandal, and I was embarrassed, but I decided that was a
cultural stricture I didn't care to follow- they were my books, and I
could do what I wanted to with my property without being embarrassed
about it.;-)
When I want a light fluffy, nonthinking read, I read some really junky
pulp fiction that I'm going to even identify here. When my two eldest
girls want to read something light, fluffy, and not requiring much
thought, they read:
Terry Pratchett (Tigger, Jemima doesn't like him much), Jane Austen
(both girls), Pascal (Tigger), Ngaio Marsh, Dorothy Sayers, and C.S.
Lewis' nonfiction (both girls). I know this because we were
discussing it in the last couple of days, and they were making fun of
me and my low life reading tastes when I want to just read for
relaxation. I'm kind of tickled that they are ahead of their old mum.
That was my goal in limiting their exposure to certain books, and
it's looking to me like it worked.
I see no reason to put certain things in my kids' heads until they
are old enough to make a more informed choice for themselves about
what they can handle, or until they've had a little more time to
develop their tastes (I also don't give my kids any sugar in any form
until after their second birthday, and to me it's kind of the same
principle). I also notice that when I'm reading, say, Richard
Mitchell or C. S. Lewis, I write (and think) a little more clearly
than when I'm spending all my reading time reading Miss Silver
mysteries. So while my kids' brains are developing, since they can't
read everything, I'd rather they used their limited time reading stuff
like Charlotte's Web or Lloyd Alexander's Prydain series than
Animorphs or whatever it is that's cool these days.
And it seems to me that we are obviously influenced by what we read
and see- otherwise, why read at all? Things we come across in books
and movies do contribute to our store of ideas- I mean, my son never,
ever, thought of tying a rope across the bedroom from his upper bunk
to the chest of drawers and swinging across the room on it until he
saw Swiss Family Robinson, nor did he try to set rope booby traps up
in the living room to trip up his sisters until SFR.=) No, we didn't
ban SFR, but we do make more of an effort to see things as he might,
so we can make appropriate rules (DO NOT DO ANYTHING WITH ROPES
WITHOUT ASKING A PARENT FIRST). I don't mean he was a perfectly well
behaved little boy before he saw SFR, I just mean that particular sort
of mischief hadn't occurred to him until he saw SFR. He was young
enough to get the bright idea from SFR, but not old enough or wise
enough to think out the consequences of his actions.
WEll, it's taken me the better part of an hour just to get this on the
screen, and I've been interrupted about fifty two times, and there is
not an end in sight to the interruptions (perhaps this is why I
usually post in the wee hours of the morning?), soooo, I have no idea
if it makes half as much sense on the screen as it makes in my head.
I hope so, because I can't fix it. Currently my head is full of,
"Mommy, what's a science fair? Mommy, the cat's on the screen again.
Mommy can we go to Grandma's? Mom, we found two errors in our math
book (they did, too). Mom, what's a recipe for unsweetened carob
chips? Mommy, look at the car I drew. Mommy, look at the bird I
drew. Mommy, they are annoying me. Mommy, he's annoying us. Mommy,
where is Charlotte's Web? Mom, did you do your Spanish homework yet?
(no)
Mom, we're out of milk. Mommy, can I have strawberries? Mommy, did
you know that worms are both girls and boys? Isn't that gross?
Mommy, it's gross when you adn Daddy kiss..."
Off to do my Spanish homework,
Kanga
J.Pascal
(...)
> pulp fiction that I'm going to even identify here. When my two eldest
> girls want to read something light, fluffy, and not requiring much
> thought, they read:
> Terry Pratchett (Tigger, Jemima doesn't like him much), Jane Austen
> (both girls), Pascal (Tigger), Ngaio Marsh, Dorothy Sayers, and C.S.
> Lewis' nonfiction (both girls). I know this because we were
> discussing it in the last couple of days, and they were making fun of
> me and my low life reading tastes when I want to just read for
> relaxation. I'm kind of tickled that they are ahead of their old mum.
> That was my goal in limiting their exposure to certain books, and
> it's looking to me like it worked.
I just had a thought, Kanga, for what it is worth.
When I was a child I thought as a... wait, that wasn't it. When
I was young I had a brain. Honest. I had self-control. I had
the discipline to make resolutions and stick to them. I made pledges
to God. I stuck to those, too. In college, if I wasn't deep in
my studies I may not have been reading literature, but I chose
books that were full of challenging ideas, complex plots, and
no holds barred vocabulary.
For comfort reads.
For giving my brain a break and an escape.
These days my favorite author's new releases sit on my self
waiting until I feel *up to it.* All of my attention spans
have been short for *years*. (Something of which usenet
takes advantage.)
(...)
> WEll, it's taken me the better part of an hour just to get this on the
> screen, and I've been interrupted about fifty two times, and there is
> not an end in sight to the interruptions (perhaps this is why I
> usually post in the wee hours of the morning?), soooo, I have no idea
> if it makes half as much sense on the screen as it makes in my head.
> I hope so, because I can't fix it. Currently my head is full of,
> "Mommy, what's a science fair? Mommy, the cat's on the screen again.
> Mommy can we go to Grandma's? Mom, we found two errors in our math
> book (they did, too). Mom, what's a recipe for unsweetened carob
> chips? Mommy, look at the car I drew. Mommy, look at the bird I
> drew. Mommy, they are annoying me. Mommy, he's annoying us. Mommy,
> where is Charlotte's Web? Mom, did you do your Spanish homework yet?
> (no)
> Mom, we're out of milk. Mommy, can I have strawberries? Mommy, did
> you know that worms are both girls and boys? Isn't that gross?
> Mommy, it's gross when you adn Daddy kiss..."
And this is partly why. Or even mostly why. And even in the same
household your daughters do not, in any way, have the same responsibilities
to other people... to keep track of those other people and what they
are doing... to manage and direct and coordinate labor and activities.
They are undoubtably tremendous helps. But they don't have the responsibility
and they don't have the burden that you do that occupies a *big* chunk
of your available processing cycles.
Are those simple plot pulp wonders a factor of our *taste* in books
or are they a factor of the fact that when we get down time we are
just that much more *depleted*?
j.pascal
J.Pascal
> > No need to apologize for the length, I love hearing this stuff! Read every
> > word!
> >
> > So, Kanga, what do you do about mythology? Do you worry about presenting
> > stories of other "gods" to the kids, or how do you handle that aspect of
> > classical ed? I know that's one aspect that's important in the Bluedorn's
> > philosophy, so I'm curious about what your thoughts are.
>
> which includes knowing the stories of idol worshipping in the OT, that
> I cannot see how hearing a few stories from Greek, Roman or Norse
> mythology each week could possibly confuse my children. We pray to
> God before meals and throughout the day, we sing songs to God
> throughout the week, we talk about our relationship with God on a
> daily basis- so hearing a story about Thor once in a while is hardly
> going to shake their faith, and if it were, more shame to us.
Has anyone read any books by Lars Walker? Norse Mythology is
a big part of what he writes. I've got two of his books in
my "shopping basket" at Amazon. Baen books has the first
10 chapters of _ The Year of the Warrior_ on the Baen web-site.
I know that I have read the beginning of _Wolf Time_ but it
doesn't seem to be available any longer.
The Amazon reviews compare _Wolf Time_ to the "Left Behind"
series. It is set in the "present day" so when I read the
very start of it some time ago I didn't buy the book or read
the whole thing since fantasy set in the here and now isn't
my "thing." What I didn't catch on to in the least was that
the subject matter was *christian*. Present day fantasy still
isn't my thing, and "Left Behind" is definately not my thing,
but now I'm curious to see what he's done with it.
Because... it turns out that he works in the home missions
office of the *very small* denomination that I grew up in
and I went to bible camp with his boss when I was in high
school and went to the Bible School so we know quite a few
of the same people.
_The Year of the Warrior_ is a reprint of his first book
with a "Part 2" added. 10 chapters are available to read.
It's harsh. Set in the year 1000ish at the time that
Scandinavia became christian. The story is told through
the eyes of an Irish slave... it begins with the viking
raid and the rape of his sister. He was kicked out of
"monk school" but was still wearing his robe... A Norse
Christian buys him because he needs a priest because his
father killed the last one he brought home. He doesn't
even believe in God, hates God, but agrees to be a "priest"
because it gives him the best chance of survival.
The Christian who buys him is an historical figure.
I am looking forward to this one. In 10 chapters depicting
Norse society at that time, which wasn't pretty, it seems
that God will use him despite his disbelief and his sins.
Norse mythology is real and the Norse gods oppose the white
Christ. (They called him "white" because he was a coward.)
So... has anyone read these books? I'll be sure to report
back once I do. If anyone is interested, here are the
links...
http://www.baen.com/author_catalog.asp?author=lwalker
j.pascal
Michael S. Morris
Tuesday, the 20th of April, 2004
I had said:
Sadly for us, neither concert appears to have been
reviewed by the Indianapolis Star. But, sometimes
them's the breaks.
But, I was wrong. I'm pretty sure this didn't show up in
the edition that was delivered to us, but ofttimes that edition
is different ("West Suburban" or somesuch). Anyway, Whitney
Smith, their usual classical-music reviewere did this:
<http://www.indystar.com/articles/0/139093-7620-065.html>
He's right, too, about us tenors being outnumbered. This
was 150-160 voices, where we were augmented by the forces
of the Butler Chorale. And the tenors were 17 in the Symphonic Choir,
plus another 5 or 6 maybe from the Butler group.
Mike Morris
Kanga Mum
>
> I just had a thought, Kanga, for what it is worth.
>
> When I was a child I thought as a... wait, that wasn't it. When
> I was young I had a brain. Honest. I had self-control. I had
> the discipline to make resolutions and stick to them. I made pledges
> to God. I stuck to those, too. In college, if I wasn't deep in
> my studies I may not have been reading literature, but I chose
> books that were full of challenging ideas, complex plots, and
> no holds barred vocabulary.
>
> For comfort reads.
>
> For giving my brain a break and an escape.
Well, I'm impressed, but when I was young I didn't have self-control,
I didn't make resolutions and stick to them, and in college I did not
choose books that were full of challenging ideas, complex plots ,and
no holds barred vocabulary for comfort reads and giving my brain a
break and an escape. Those twaddly, fluffly, utterly deplorable pulp
fiction books I mentioned that are my chosen comfort reads? I
'discovered' them in college, and read through them like some people
at through a box of chocolates.
>
> These days my favorite author's new releases sit on my self
> waiting until I feel *up to it.* All of my attention spans
> have been short for *years*. (Something of which usenet
> takes advantage.)
>
I actually read more and read better books now than I did when I was
in college.
It's just that I still like these silly, inane, and foolish little
books for comfort reads, just like I did in college.
>
> And this is partly why. Or even mostly why. And even in the same
> household your daughters do not, in any way, have the same responsibilities
> to other people... to keep track of those other people and what they
> are doing... to manage and direct and coordinate labor and activities.
No, they don't have *quite* the same supervisory capacity that I do-
but I don't do any housework and precious little cooking- I made lunch
yesterday and it was a very big deal. My eldest has taken on so many
responsibilities of late that I don't even keep track of her or direct
her activities in any way- she makes me feel quite superfluous
sometimes.
> They are undoubtably tremendous helps. But they don't have the responsibility
> and they don't have the burden that you do that occupies a *big* chunk
> of your available processing cycles.
>
> Are those simple plot pulp wonders a factor of our *taste* in books
> or are they a factor of the fact that when we get down time we are
> just that much more *depleted*?
>
Clearly, this may be so for you, since you were so much smarter and
wiser than I was as a college student. But I really don't think I can
honestly say this is true for me. I really wish I could agree that
this is really why I like the particular junk reading I do, but I just
don't think so.
Kanga
Kanga Mum
> Anyway, Whitney
> Smith, their usual classical-music reviewere did this:
> <http://www.indystar.com/articles/0/139093-7620-065.html>
>
> He's right, too, about us tenors being outnumbered. This
> was 150-160 voices, where we were augmented by the forces
> of the Butler Chorale. And the tenors were 17 in the Symphonic Choir,
> plus another 5 or 6 maybe from the Butler group.
And he is also right that y'all hammered home Death has no sting, very
much so. And you are right that y'all rocked.
I agree with you assessment of the baritone tenor- I have not the same
reference for comparison, and it wasn't exactly that I thought he did
a bad job, I just was ready for him to wrap it up so I could listen to
the choir again.
And we want to find our Requiem CD and we cannot find it. We have no
idea how it could be lost in this small house, but it's missing, and
those of us who went to the concert are quite forlorn. We want to
hear it, again and again.
During the performance, I ended up on the end of the pew, with the
translated score which you kindly lent us, and Calamity Jane next to
me. I realized shortly into the program that I should have been in
between the 13 and 15 y.o., so they could share the score with me, but
I didn't want to shift seats and disturb anybody. Periodically I
handed the score to the girls so that they could see where we were.
At one point, I think during "Denn alles Fleisch es ist wie Gras..."
the 15 y.o. started to hand me back the score, and the 13 y.o. was so
engrossed in following along that she snatched it back and kept it for
the entire chorus. Being the Mother is hard sometimes.=)
We were thrilled to be in the audience for such a performance.
Kanga
Michael S. Morris
Wednesday, the 21st of April, 2004
I wrote:
[ ] I want my children to learn their minds are
bigger than any book, not that books are bigger than them.
Kanga:
Okay, yeah, but... I just don't see that this is really
the issue, not even with the Bluedorns.
I think the context of reacting to "there is adultery in _Tarzan_"
with "books need to be pre-screened" makes this precisely my
issue with the Bluedorns.
I ran this about Tarzan past Martha and Isabelle and they both
just laughed. Martha read them years ago, and pretty much agreed
with with every one of Julie's list of "ist" adjectives, though
she couldn't remember any such thing in it as adultery, though
she thinks maybe Tarzan does lust after Jane but then his
Englishly noble blood takes over and somehow he just cosmicly
knows it is all best saved until after they're properly married.
It just seems to me if the objection is to "this book depicts
some sinful thought or action"---and it certainly seems to be
that and nothing else here, and the counsel is to not read
books that do that, you've just jettisoned almost the
whole of great literature and great art, including the Bible.
I don't get that.
Kanga:
I understand, and to a point agree with you that
the human mind is capable of overcoming anything
another human mind can conceive and be confronted
with in art and literature. I agree with you too,
that the work itself does not have the power to make
one do evil or think evil. However, the reason I
think that is true is because I kind of believe that
some level of evil already exists in every human heart
and mind. I'm not quite a Calvinist, but I do think
they are right that a capacity for some level of evil
exists in every human heart.
I am happy with that observation.
Kanga:
I also think that just because the human mind _can_
overcome anything, that's not in itself enough of a
reason to give it stuff that must be overcome.
And I also more or less agree with that one.
Well, on second thought, let me emphasize what I would
mean by "less". I'm wanting to take my children at
the very minimum through calculus in math. That *is*
something for their minds to overcome. I think the mind-stretch
is a good thing for them, for their minds. Likewise, I
see the moral complexity of great literature (and I
would certainly include the Bible in that) presents them
also with healthy mind-stretching. I want them to learn to
sit in judgment, and so, as quickly as I can get their
technical reading abilities there, I want them to read
about sex, violence, murder, nihilism, sin, and so forth,
because that is what great literature and great art is
built out of. Even at the level of fairy-tales, I
dislike the bowdlerized ones. My sense is that there is
no reason even pretty young kids can't handle whatever.
Again, Mrs. Bluedorn (it may be my assumption that that was
in her voice) was not saying that Tarzan was fluff or poorly written
or anything like that. She was saying it contained adultery
(by which I understand her to mean it contained a description of
lust). I just don't get shielding my children from such a thing.
Kanga:
A perfect example for me would be the movie
The Passion. As I've said before, I am not at
all interested in seeing it- there are a couple
scenes I'd like to see, but overall, I
just don't care to have those pictures in my head.
I understand this reaction to The Passion perfectly I think.
I did not choose this reaction for myself, and I make it a rule
not to. As I see it, I choose rather to engage what I see
as the cutting edge of my culture head-on, and try to wield
strong opinions about it. That is, I believe in free speech,
and not only that government ain't got no business using its
power to stop any speech, but that the most freedom of speech
possible around me is the best in which my mind may flourish.
Now, I probably put some emphasis on "cutting edge"---that is, I
see Gibson's film as higher art than, say, "Survivor". I don't
feel compelled to watch "Survivor", and I hate subjecting my
brain to the jitteriness of television. But, I guess I'm saying
that just because I expect some aspect of the film to be
disagreeable, that isn't enough for me to decide against
seeing it.
[...Matrix stuff snipped...Though, I'm puzzled by "the philosophy
was kind of bubble-gum". I guess I'm most impressed by it's
philosophical dimension. I mean by that not that I think it gives
me anything to live by, but rather that I see the film---I'm
thinking of the first one, the latter two degenerated into just
eye candy, I think---as a realization/visualization of
the "brain in a vat" argument, which is a 20th-century update of
Descartes "evil genius" argument. The issue is how do we know,
or can we know, that the material world (of physics) is what there
is? And the argument is that we cannot. That we could well be "brains
in vats" and the world in which we think physics rules apply is
really a virtual reality simulation. It gives us a simple counterexample
of a *possible* alternate metaphysics, in which rules of physics
in this world may be bent by "hacking the code" within the other world.
It also shows how ethical rules in this world change as a result of
the overarching metaphysics. Murder, for example, becomes ethically
not what it was. I think you Christians believe in something that is
more than a materialist metaphysics, and think that this changes
how you think about ethical questions in this world (childhood leukemia
means something different to you than it means to me). In a sense,
I think The Matrix puts materialists/physicists in our place---
illustrates how it is our whole science is built upon metaphysical
assumptions that we can never make to be more than assumptions.]
Kanga:
If I thought the crucifixion was a picnic in the park,
then maybe it'd do me good to see it- but I know very
well it wasn't, I have a good idea how horrible it was
physically, so I see no reason to put somebody else's
images of it in living color, complete with Dolby
Surround Sound inside my own head. I'm not 'afraid' of
it, I just don't like it.
I don't know. I have seen numerous depictions of the Crucifixion.
I have read the Bible's descriptions of that event. I think there
is reason many great artists have addressed themselves to depiction
of that event. And to other unpleasant events in art. If you like, I
think there is something True and Good (with a capital T and capital
G) in it, and therefore, in my Platonism, necessarily something
Beautiful (with a capital B).
Kanga:
I am not afraid of Jackson Pollock's art, either, but I don't
want it in my living room.
There, we part company in taste. I'd very much enjoy a
Jackson Pollock in my living room. In fact, there's a sense
in which the negative criticism of Jackson Pollock
is that all his art is is a decorative scheme. I wouldn't
want Matthew Gruenewald's painting of the Crucifixion in
my living room.
Kanga:
Which brings up the quality issue- I think most people
have a natural affinity for the lowest common denominator.
I mean, ask us whether we 'feel' like reading a light,
fluffy, cozy read, or something a little more meaty, and
most of us feel like going for the light stuff more
often than not. I also think that what we read most often as
children will kind of be the default mode for our tastes as
adults- I don't mean the same books, but kind of the same
type- if we read tripe lots of tripe, or only tripe, as
kids, we'll gravitate toward tripe as adults. _Of course_
we can overcome this, we can make an effort, slight for
some, larger for others, and stretch ourselves, we're not
limited by what we read as kids- but I'd like to do what I
can to up the ante for my kids and make their default choice
a little better quality than mine. You can always read down
from what you're used to, it's a little harder to read up.
I both agree with this and I disagree. I guess I see my mission
as my children's educator as providing access for my children
to the best that humans have been able to make. In art, in science,
in mathematics, in literature. That is, I need to give them access
to Shakespeare. Which means I've got to raise their vocabulary
to a level that is far higher than what they would need to read
Newsweek or Animorphs. Or I have to get them to Wagner at the
moment. Or Zan to calculus this next year.
I make choices, because what we can cover in school is limited, and
I think school time ought to be devoted to giving access to the
higher stuff. Otherwise, I agree with John Taylor Gatto, that
everything that is simply societal functionality is teachable
in about a week or two, when the kids are ready for it.
Where I disagree with you is that I don't think that one
naturally gravitates towards fluff. I think rather that the
bar is so low for most children in public schools that fluff
is all they are taught to be capable of. I darkly suspect (with Gatto)
that this is actually useful to "the powers that be" to have
people trained up so as to be manipulatable by ad men and to have
low taste. In other words, I do not see myself as out to
exclude my children from low stuff, but more to give them the
alternative of high stuff by giving them access to it.
[...]
Kanga:
So- in literature- I make choices for my younger kids in this area a
lot- I will not bring home books from the library that I think are
shoddily written. I will not buy them.
Whereas, our house rules are that the kids bring home any books
they want to read from the library, and they get to have mommy
or daddy buy them 1 book or CD of their choice in any bookstore
we happen to visit. (I realize that this rule is a blessing of
having dollars with which to implement it, and I would certainly think
twice about it as a standing rule if I had seven children.) I think
Martha and I steer a bit---we pushed from the picture-book
stage to the chapter-book stage with each child, and I guess
we've vetoed the occasional "took" (toy that masquerades as a
book). But, the thing is, they are surrounded with a big library
of good stuff at home. And, with their school stuff, they are
assigned to read out of that (tempered with being permitted their
choice of Power Rangers and Pokemon schlock when they were
first reading-aloud to us).
Kanga:
My younger kids don't read
books with gratuitious sex, violence, vulgar language,
or just rude behavior (gratuitous is somewhat in the
eye of the beholder).
See, I wouldn't hand Galen, or even Helen at the moment,
_Crime and Punishment_ to read. But, it's more my estimate
that that book is about mature things, and needs a certain
maturity to appreciate. I wouldn't give it to Helen because
I think she would hate it right now, whereas in 3 or 4 years she
might love it. But, it sits on the shelf, and if she wanted
to read it, I wouldn't object or say she couldn't. Ditto
for _120 Days of Sodom_ or _Tess of the D'Urbervilles_ or
_Ulysses_.
Kanga:
I shall
probably slither on the ground in your estimation
hereafter, but I even have taken white out to the
language in a few of our books- I felt like a
vandal, and I was embarrassed, but I decided that
was a cultural stricture I didn't care to follow-
they were my books, and I could do what I wanted
to with my property without being embarrassed
about it.;-)
Sacrilege! I'm partially kidding, of course, and your books
are yours, but I don't think I could do that to any book
whatsoever. I just can't imagine any reason for doing that.
Martha tells a story on herself: She worked as a librarian
during college and came across this children's book with
some title like _I'm glad I'm a boy, I'm glad I'm a girl_.
And it had stuff in it like "Boys build houses. Girls keep
houses." She was so offended by it, she stole it precisely
to keep it out of circulation. I considered banishing
her forever from my bed, but my resolve didn't last very long.
Kanga:
When I want a light fluffy, nonthinking read, I read
some really junky pulp fiction that I'm going to even
identify here. When my two eldest girls want to read
something light, fluffy, and not requiring much
thought, they read: Terry Pratchett (Tigger, Jemima
doesn't like him much), Jane Austen (both girls), Pascal
(Tigger), Ngaio Marsh, Dorothy Sayers, and C.S. Lewis'
nonfiction (both girls). I know this because we were
discussing it in the last couple of days, and they were
making fun of me and my low life reading tastes when I
want to just read for relaxation. I'm kind of tickled
that they are ahead of their old mum. That was my goal
in limiting their exposure to certain books, and
it's looking to me like it worked.
Mine certainly went through their Power Rangers
and Goosebumps phases, but Zan chooses for himself Terry
Pratchett, Star Wars serial novels, Garth Dix and
Phillip Pullman, and Tolkien, and "Far Side"
cartoons and "Fox Trot". And Helen is into horse
books at the moment---Marguerite Henry, _Black Beauty_,
"Thoroughbreds" series.
Kanga:
I see no reason to put certain things in my kids'
heads until they are old enough to make a more
informed choice for themselves about what they
can handle,
I think it unlikely my children are going to commit adultery
at present. It's like when they are younger, they
won't like to read that stuff anyway, and when they are
ready to read it, they are old enough to begin
making an informed choice. But, I certainly handed
Zan the complete unexpurgated 4000 pages of the Arabian
Nights to read this year, and it's full of lots of sex
and lots of violence.
Kanga:
or until they've had a little more time to
develop their tastes (I also don't give my
kids any sugar in any form until after their
second birthday, and to me it's kind of the same
principle).
We eat out well a lot, and we cook a variety
of stuff (and often strongly spiced) at home.
And, yes, I regard this as educational, too,
and I am pleased that my children actually
like my version of chicken tetrazzini, which
goes heavy on the cayenne. But, we haven't forbidden
sugar, and they are familiar with McDonald's,
too. So, again, I see the pattern with us of positive
choice of the better, but not necessarily negative
exclusion of the worse. Maybe I see myself as having
grown out of growing up in front of the television
set and TV sitcoms in the 60s and 70s, and eventually
having turned off the thing in favour of spending my
time with better stuff. I think one hungers for
better stuff, and that, well, "it's hard to keep
'em down on the farm once they've seen Paree".
Kanga:
I also notice that when I'm reading, say, Richard
Mitchell or C. S. Lewis, I write (and think) a little
more clearly than when I'm spending all my reading time
reading Miss Silver mysteries. So while my kids' brains
are developing, since they can't read everything, I'd
rather they used their limited time reading stuff
like Charlotte's Web or Lloyd Alexander's Prydain series
than Animorphs or whatever it is that's cool these days.
I wholly agree with this, and I share your
preferences for what is better for them and what is
worse. But, for us, there are large stretches of time
where the kids may choose their leisure activities for
themselves, and, if it's Animorphs, then it's Animorphs.
The thing is, I've watched them grow out of that,
and I'm convinced it's the stretching to the better stuff
we do in school that makes it so that the schlock will no
longer satusfy them.
Kanga:
And it seems to me that we are obviously influenced
by what we read and see- otherwise, why read at all?
[...]
But, this is like asking about any tool which may
be used for good or ill. The issue is whether the
tool uses us or we use the tool. Guns may be a good
example. We gave Zan a .22 rifle for his 13th birthday.
I'll bet there are people who think that's too early for
a kid to be given a gun.
But, maybe another difference between me and the
Bluedorns is that I think lust is a good thing (platonically,
the chariot of the soul ain't ever gonna fly without it), and
so is my desire to roundhouse punch terrorists off of the
back of 747s, and the occasional well-placed expletive
is just the thing for when I send a hammer down onto my
thumb. I do not buy that this is anything so simple as
non-Christian versus Christian, since I think there
are Christians whom I think agree more with me than with
them, but, anyway, I do think schlock is worse than
"contains adultery", and yet I permit my children to read
schlock, because I do not believe that schlock will
train their taste to schlock. Rather I believe that
access to the better will unfit their taste for schlock.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Michael S. Morris
Wednesday, the 21st of April, 2004
Kanga:
During the performance, I ended up on the end of the pew, with the
translated score which you kindly lent us, and Calamity Jane next to
me. I realized shortly into the program that I should have been in
between the 13 and 15 y.o., so they could share the score with me, but
I didn't want to shift seats and disturb anybody. Periodically I
handed the score to the girls so that they could see where we were.
At one point, I think during "Denn alles Fleisch es ist wie Gras..."
the 15 y.o. started to hand me back the score, and the 13 y.o. was so
engrossed in following along that she snatched it back and kept it for
the entire chorus. Being the Mother is hard sometimes.=)
I should have lent you more scores. I had reserved one identical
to the one you had thinking Martha would want to use it,
and she did when she heard us on Thursday night's rehearsal,
but then it turned out she had to drive Helen to Ohio, and
so I could have perfectly well lent it to you. Especially
when Zan surprised me by not wanting it himself. I also had a
full orchestral score, which is harder to follow, but probably
would have worked.
Charles Manning, our accompanist---and he played the organ
in the performance, gave an encomium and led us in a
standing ovation for Eric, our director, in
rehearsal last night. Charles pointed out what I had
not noticed at least consciously before, but Eric
had done the whole thing from memory.
Kanga:
We were thrilled to be in the audience for such a performance.
I was thrilled to be in the middle of it. It is such
a privilege. I get tired, especially with a week of rehearsals
like that one, but then I think that there are people who were
spending that time watching TV, and I don't regret a minute
of it.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
J.Pascal
> > Are those simple plot pulp wonders a factor of our *taste* in books
> > or are they a factor of the fact that when we get down time we are
> > just that much more *depleted*?
>
> Clearly, this may be so for you, since you were so much smarter and
> wiser than I was as a college student. But I really don't think I can
> honestly say this is true for me. I really wish I could agree that
> this is really why I like the particular junk reading I do, but I just
> don't think so.
I don't know if you are getting on my case because I came
across as saying I was so smart, or if you really think I'm
smarter than you, which is a pile of that horse stuff. You
are at least as smart as me, or moreso, if its possible to
measure those things, and you are undoubtably better educated.
Anyway, I wasn't meaning to compare myself to you nearly so
much as I meant to compare myself to your daughters. It bothers
me, if, as it sounds, they are contributing to your feeling
down about yourself and your choices of fluffy reading. I
don't disagree with what you said about encouraging our children
to read good books and how this will affect their reading
habits for their lives. I'm sure that is true. It isn't
the *only* thing that is true, however.
Interruptions *do* affect your ability to think. In fact,
I'm about ready to string up my kids by their toes because
they insist on demanding my attention while I'm trying to
type this and I CAN'T THINK! It's tear your hair out
frustrating! Whatever I *could* do when I had only myself
to be responsible for I can't do it now. My life is utterly
interrupt driven.
I probably had something important to say. It has left me.
The half a brain I have available just quit.
j.pascal
Dalene Barnes
>
> Interruptions *do* affect your ability to think. In fact,
> I'm about ready to string up my kids by their toes because
> they insist on demanding my attention while I'm trying to
> type this and I CAN'T THINK! It's tear your hair out
> frustrating! Whatever I *could* do when I had only myself
> to be responsible for I can't do it now. My life is utterly
> interrupt driven.
>
I understand this feeling; however, may I suggest that we, as home school
parents, need to see our children as our first "chore" and highest priority.
They, then, cannot possibly be interruptions. Other things, by necessity
then, are viewed as "things to do when children don't need us." There are
definite times when we MUST have undivided attention (balancing the check
book comes to mind) and hopefully, kids are being taught to respect that
boundary when it is set. In our house, tho, things like laundry, household
chores, my personal correspondence and reading, have become "filler" things,
so that I do not get angry with my kids for asking for my attention. For
this precise reason, I get up two hours before my kids do, so I can have the
time I need to read and think and pray and do some paperwork without either
pulling my hair or my kids' out.
Dalene
Kanga Mum
>
> I don't know if you are getting on my case because I came
> across as saying I was so smart, or if you really think I'm
> smarter than you, which is a pile of that horse stuff. You
> are at least as smart as me, or moreso, if its possible to
> measure those things, and you are undoubtably better educated.
Nah, I'm certainly not getting on your case. I think you are smarter
than me. I've always thought so. And the older I get, the smarter
everybody else around me gets.=)
I don't know what you mean about better educated- could be, I suppose,
but that's a different thing. Or maybe we're just smarter in
different areas, and the areas where you are smarter than me happen to
be areas I particularly admire, which would make sense. You hardly
ever post something that doesn't have me thinking, "Hmm. I never
thought of it quite like that." And the fact is that the description
you gave of yourself in your college years inarguably points to
somebody who at the very least had more wisdom at that age than I did.
>
> Anyway, I wasn't meaning to compare myself to you nearly so
> much as I meant to compare myself to your daughters. It bothers
> me, if, as it sounds, they are contributing to your feeling
> down about yourself and your choices of fluffy reading.
That's definitely my fault- I don't feel at all down about myself and
my choices of fluffy reading. I like my fluff, and I'm not giving it
up. I want my kids to do better, but for me, I can want that without
feeling bad about where I am.
Did I convey this impression because I won't tell what my drivel is?
I'm not telling what my *really* sappy fluffy reading is for two
reasons- the biggest reason is because I've made it quite clear that I
both love to read these books AND I think they are utter drivel- but
it's quite possible that somebody else in the ng reads them, likes
them, and does not think they are drivel. I just don't want to get
into culture war or flamefest over them, nor do I wish to hurt
somebody's feelings by insulting some books they may think are high
art (though it's hard to imagine that somebody would). It also might
distract from my main point. Somebody might want to argue about
whether or not they _are_ drivel, and I don't think it matters.
Or is it my self-depreciating (but still, of course, brilliantly
witty) sense of humor? Or is it because I said the girls were making
fun of me? I might have worded that a little differently, I suppose.
Different households have different views, of course, and what is
rollicking good teasing here may be rude put-downs somewhere else. It
was all in good fun. No hurt feelings. I like my drivel, I'm glad my
girls' personal standards are higher, and I'm glad we can tease each
other about it. And for some reason, I just think it's very funny
when my teenaged daughter looks at my reading choices and rolls her
eyes and sighs, "Oh, _Mother_."
I
> don't disagree with what you said about encouraging our children
> to read good books and how this will affect their reading
> habits for their lives. I'm sure that is true. It isn't
> the *only* thing that is true, however.
>
> Interruptions *do* affect your ability to think. In fact,
> I'm about ready to string up my kids by their toes because
> they insist on demanding my attention while I'm trying to
> type this and I CAN'T THINK! It's tear your hair out
> frustrating! Whatever I *could* do when I had only myself
> to be responsible for I can't do it now. My life is utterly
> interrupt driven.
Yes, I agree with what you are saying. I get interrupted constantly
at the keyboard, and it is hard to think under those conditions. I
agree it's tear your hair out frustrating. I know _exactly_ what you
are saying.
But here is where I think my household is just different from what
people expect of a household with seven offspring, a dog, several
cats, chicks, pigs, horses, and one bathroom. I _can_ read without
interruptions here, even during the middle of the day. Reading is
about the only thing I can do without interruption, but it's an
important thing.
It's very, very hard to interrupt me while I'm reading for one
thing. I tune out everything and could probably read through an
earthquake and not know it. Come to think of it, I think I have. My
kids have gotten used to the fact that Mommy with a book is kind of
just a warm body in a chair- the body is there, the spirit is
elsewhere and can only be recalled by strong efforts. I do try to
wait until the younger kids are in bed before I start reading, because
it can make them kind of feel abandoned, cause really they kind of
are.
On a hsing list I'm on the other mothers are constantly talking about
how they don't have time to read, they don't have time for 'mom'
stuff, they don't know when or how they can squeeze in any personal
reading- and then they embarrass me and ask for my advice. I don't
know what to tell them. I feel a little embarrassed, or maybe just
sorry for them- but I have never had that problem, and I am not sure
why. I don't know how to answer that question without sounding like
I'm gloating or something, when what I mostly am is just baffled.
I read several books a week, quite frankly, and I am generally able to
read them cover to cover. I have no trouble tuning things out while I
am reading- it would actually require more of my efforts to _not_ tune
things out. I can't do that with other activities, but reading acts
like a drug on my awareness of the external world. I don't hear, I
don't smell, I don't see, I am not aware of anything except my book.
It's either a gift or a curse, depending on who you ask.=)
Kanga
Kanga Mum
> Wednesday, the 21st of April, 2004
>
>
> a privilege. I get tired, especially with a week of rehearsals
> like that one, but then I think that there are people who were
> spending that time watching TV, and I don't regret a minute
> of it.
>
I've been reading your posts to the kids, and Jemima liked this bit so
much she asked me to send it to her. She says she read recently that
TV turn off week or some such thing is coming up, and she heard on the
radio that 75 percent of Americans think this is a great idea, but
only a quarter of that group actually turn off their televisions.
More of them would turn off their televisions, they say, if only there
were more affordable entertainment options available to them. Have
they no cards, no books, no parks, no museums, no board games,
projects to work on, no songs to sing, no babies to tickle, no
toddlers to laugh with, no teens to make fun of be fun by in return?
No pets? No paints, no places to walk (kids saw a woodchuck today,
and some unfamiliar ducks), no friends to talk with, no newsgroups to
read, no internet service?
Tigger demands to know what we are going to do during TV turn off
week. She seems to think we ought to do something to mark the
occasion. Perhaps we should turn off the computer.
Kanga
Pam Crouch
First of all, I'm in agreement with you that it's kind of extreme to force a
child to re-read books just because you don't have time to preview their
books. If you want to screen their media, there are other ways to check it,
like looking for lists of books on the internet, or asking other
homeschoolers for ideas. There's no need to force the kid to be bored.
Furthermore, I agree that it's not just the content of a book that's
important, and if it were, you would be correct that the Bible would not
meet this standard the Bluedorns have set. I think what they failed to
mention on that web page is that it's not just the actions or events in the
book that are important, but the outcomes that result from those actions.
For example, in the Bible, you have David's infamous and adulterous
attainment of Bathsheba. However, you also have a much longer tale of all
the trouble it caused, how it sort of "cursed" his household, and how David
was sorry for his actions. So I think it is a finer point than just "bad
deeds" but more like "bad deeds that result in advancement or honor and that
are done with no remorse or punishment."
For example, I love Curious George, and we have a few of those books. I
don't mind it when George makes a mess, or even when he gets in trouble
sometimes. However, in one of the books we had, George gets angry and runs
away. Then *because* he ran away, he meets a lot of fun, new friends, and
he gets to be in the circus. George has a wonderful time, and he never gets
scolded or anything for running away. We don't have that book anymore. ;o)
I have enough trouble keeping track of my kids (last week at homeschooling
park day, they *both* got lost!)
Another example I can think of is a book I got from (I don't remember)
wherein the main character says "I hate school" on almost every page. Since
my kids like to repeat what they hear in books, and imitate books, I'm not
reading it to them. They are too easily influenced. If they were ten years
old, fine, they probably wouldn't pick that up, but they are still preschool
age.
And, I regret to inform you that I, too have expurgated books. We have a
book called "Goldie is Mad." Apparently, when Goldie is Mad, she talks
about hating her little brother. A LOT. So I used the labelmaker to change
"hate" to "don't like." I didn't want my kids picking up that word and
slinging it at each other. My husband and I don't use the word "hate"
either, so it's consistent with our views.
Also, I agree that everyone involved in this thread is capable of reading
pretty much anything that is widely considered of value, and be unaffected
by it, unless they choose to be.
However, I don't think that's the case with kids, especially until they
reach a stage at which they can think critically. My kids are both very
influenced by anything we read. If I read them something, I can be sure
that they will be repeating the words out loud, and usually acting it out
soon after we read it. Their beliefs and thought patterns aren't
established like ours are, so I try to "put in" only things I would like to
"get out." :o) Until they have that filter that is able to reject what
book characters say and do, I choose to avoid material that models
undesirable behavior.
I certainly don't intend to shield my kids from rude words and bad
situations forever, but only until they can think critically enough to
evaluate the behavior as being either "right" or "wrong." Also, they are
quite sensitive, as I mentioned, and get nightmares from scary stuff. My
little girl was watching a movie with us one night, and she didn't usually
look at the screen much, since she was only 18 mos. However, this night,
she watched as a man drove a car off a bridge. It didn't seem scary at all
to me, and you don't even see the man in the water, just the car driving off
the bridge. But our girl got very upset about it--"Man fall in waddur. Man
fall. Mama, man fell in da waddur." She talked about it for about a half
hour, so I think it was a little traumatic for her. After that, we were a
lot more careful what we had on the TV when she was awake.
I also want to mention one thing about minds overcoming things they are
exposed to:
> I also think that just because the human mind _can_
> overcome anything, that's not in itself enough of a
> reason to give it stuff that must be overcome.
>
> And I also more or less agree with that one.
>
> Well, on second thought, let me emphasize what I would
> mean by "less". I'm wanting to take my children at
> the very minimum through calculus in math. That *is*
> something for their minds to overcome.
I think that "overcome" in the sense of resisting temptation, salacious
content, and poisonous ideas is different from "overcome" in the sense of
pushing one's mind to accomodate new concepts. Just wanted to point out
what I see as a distinction. Learning is occasionally a painful process, in
which mental barriers must be overcome (like when I learned recursion in
functional programming, WHEW!). However, I feel that is a different kind of
conflict than the conflict of the actions portrayed with the child's moral
teachings.
--Pam :o)
"Michael S. Morris" <msmo...@netdirect.net> wrote in message
news:4086A406...@netdirect.net...
Nancy Manos
"J.Pascal" <ju...@pascal.org> wrote
> Interruptions *do* affect your ability to think.
Around our place, this is affectionately referred to as "Leaky Brain
Syndrome", by which I am greatly afflicted LOL!
Nancy
Kanga Mum
> Wednesday, the 21st of April, 2004
> Charles Manning, our accompanist---and he played the organ
> in the performance, gave an encomium and led us in a
> standing ovation for Eric, our director, in
> rehearsal last night. Charles pointed out what I had
> not noticed at least consciously before, but Eric
> had done the whole thing from memory.
[ ]
Which is another thing I forgot to mention- our seats gave us a good
sideview of Eric, seated up front and to the side as we were. The
girls have said they want always to sit where they can see the
conductor, because they found it so fascinating to watch him.
I also want to share a tidbit from an e-mail our 13 y.o. wrote to some
friends about it:
"We went to Brahms' German Requiem Saturday night. It was glorious. If
you have never heard his requiem, I suggest you listen to it. It is
positively amazing! The way we were sitting, I could see the
conductors face as, which was cool, he directed without the score in
front of him! (The requiem is one hour and ten minutes long.) ...I
don't see how some one could write something so beautiful, how someone
could hear the notes in their heads. I most certainly couldn't write a
song."
She and these friends are currently working on writing novels. They
each take turns sharing a chapter from their own individual novels,
and then they ask questions, make suggestions, and sharply criticize
each other. They must post in turn, so sometimes if one of them has
writer's block or is too busy to post her chapter on time, the others
get extra time to work on *their* next installment. The girl whose
turn it is seems to be stalled out at the moment, and my daughter is
complaining that the longer she has to wait for her turn, the longer
and longer her next chapter gets, "Although sometimes I work on it
like Brahms worked on his requiem. He said, when someone asked how it
was going, "In the morning I added a note, and in the evening I took
it out."
Oh, and not that this was distressing anybody but my family, but our
copy of the Requiem finally turned up. The reason nobody could find
it in this small house is because it was actually outside in the large
van. Jemima says that the CD is no longer satisfactory- it only makes
her wish to be back in the Christian church building one Saturday
night, listening to the entire performance all over again.=)
Kanga
Michael S. Morris
Thursday, the 22nd of April, 2004
Kanga said:
I also think that just because the human mind _can_
overcome anything, that's not in itself enough of a
reason to give it stuff that must be overcome.
I replied:
And I also more or less agree with that one.
Well, on second thought, let me emphasize what I would
mean by "less". I'm wanting to take my children at
the very minimum through calculus in math. That *is*
something for their minds to overcome.
Pam:
I think that "overcome" in the sense of resisting
temptation, salacious content, and poisonous ideas is
different from "overcome" in the sense of pushing one's
mind to accomodate new concepts. Just wanted to point out
what I see as a distinction. Learning is occasionally a
painful process, in which mental barriers must be overcome
(like when I learned recursion in functional programming,
WHEW!). However, I feel that is a different kind of
conflict than the conflict of the actions portrayed with
the child's moral teachings.
Well, I specifically mentioned math in this context because I
*do* think the one is *like* the other. That is, I think ethics
is a branch of philosophy, and math is another branch of it,
and both deal in rational deduction from axiomatic assumptions.
Now, I *do* think ethics is less clear-cut than is mathematics,
and this is because the consequences of actions in this world
involce other people, and (at least I believe) people are not
deterministically predictable in the same way billiard balls are.
Also, ethics involves some experiential input---one has to be
mature enough to be able to understand the ways in which
others (and in which one's self) might get hurt by one's
behaviours.
But, let's go back to my original complaint with the Bluedorns:
Tarzan thinks of having sex with Jane (and then apparently resists
this temptation until they are subsequently married). In the first
place, that story (as it has been told to me by Martha) seems
perfectly clear and perfectly morally instructive in a Victorian
prudish way. I.e., the moral or the little fable to the reader is
"it is noble and good and aristocratically English to resist
temptation to have sex until you are married". Contrast that with
the David and Bathsheba story. Yes, the murder and the adultery
have some tragic consequences, but I would suggest the biblical
story is ultimately much more morally complex---David sins, but
repents and much is forgiven him, and he goes down as an archetype of
a godly man. To a child reading these two stories, I would suggest
there is infinitely more to think about, and to overcome in rational
ethics, about the David and Bathsheba story than there is with
Tarzan. In fact, to me, who I stress does not believe in God or
that there is anything specially divine about the Bible, the contrast
illustates why I think the Bible is great literature and why the
report I have of Tarzan makes me think it is morality at the level
of a sitcom (although providing a fascinating insight into certain
historical prejudices and assumptions). The whole story of David and
Bathsheba is meaty---It's like Hamlet, something to be read and re-read
and to be bothered by and for thinking about and for chewing on
rationally for one's whole life.
Also, just a comment about this idea which I'll simplify so
that I can attack it as: Depiction of sin is OK, iff the bad
comes to a bad end and the good are shown to prosper.
The first thing that comes to my mind is Miss Prism's
line in _The Importance of Being Earnest_: "The good ended
happily, and the bad unhappily. That is what Fiction means."
The second thing that comes to mind is that I've mentioned
before that works by the Marquis de Sade sit on my bookshelves,
right there where my children may perfectly well read them.
I connect that fact to what I think may be the most interesting
observation I have culled from reading and writing on rec.arts.books
in a long time. Francis A. Miniter, a regular contributor to that
newsgroup wondered aloud at some point in the last month or so
if de Sade's _Justine, or Good Conduct Well Chastised_ was intentionally
a parody of Richardson's _Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded_. I don't know
if people know _Pamela_, but if you are into the 19th-century
English novel, as my wife certainly is, you probably have encountered
it. Samuel Richardson novel was one of the first English novels,
and was written in an epistolary format and published in 1740.
Pamela Andrews is beautiful girl of low station who
is abducted and imprisoned by this handsome lord who tries
to rape her and seduce her and everything else, and she manages
to preserve her "virtue" and is rewarded in the end by him marrying
her and raising her to his lordly "station". It is an *outrageous*
story on many levels, none of them intentional on Richardson's
part. Henry Fielding, an infinitely greater writer,
satirized it twice: With the short novel _Shamela_, and
then _Joseph Andrews_, basically going through the same plot except
with Pamela's brother. Anyway, in _Justine_, Justine is the same
sort of character, who *is* raped, kept as a sex-slave in orgies
of every description, and whipped and all as part of the fun.
The men who use her and abuse her all prosper as members of the
government, businessmen, and the church. She goes home to Paris
in the end a sadder, but wiser, woman.
I think de Sade was basically deeply conservative, and was writing
in reaction to this "liberty" thing that was all the rage
in revolutionary France. That is, I think de Sade was pointing
to there being a beast in each of us, and that, once the restraints
of tradition, church, authority of king, and so forth were lifted,
reason alone was not going to work to restrain this beast. Anyway,
here is my point: I rank _Justine_ and _Joseph Andrews_ as great
literature alongside the story of David and Bathsheba from the Bible.
There is ethical meat in these works. I'm not convinced that _Pamela_
contains anything that is ethically meaty, and I imagine _Tarzan_
to be similar. They are more in the way of historical curiosities.
Now, mind you, I'm not advocating handing _Justine_ to a
five-year-old. (But, I also would not be afraid that my
five-year-old, who is reading every dinosaur name he can
possibly find, would ever even want to read such a book---he
would find it utterly boring.) But, an intelligent and
*knowledgeable* 16-year-old, especially in the context of
Richardson's _Pamela_ and the development of the novel,
and with knowledge of the French Revolution and the
development of Enlightenment Liberal political philosophy,
and the reactions to it (left and right) especially after
the Regicide and the Terror, and I think this would be a
fine book to recommend. A deeply *moral* book, and not at all,
say, an inducement to an orgiastic existence or seduction to
sexual torture as so many fear it to be.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
J.Pascal
Ah, yes. :-) That describes it.
j.pascal
J.Pascal
>
> Or is it my self-depreciating (but still, of course, brilliantly
> witty) sense of humor? Or is it because I said the girls were making
> fun of me? I might have worded that a little differently, I suppose.
> Different households have different views, of course, and what is
> rollicking good teasing here may be rude put-downs somewhere else. It
> was all in good fun. No hurt feelings. I like my drivel, I'm glad my
> girls' personal standards are higher, and I'm glad we can tease each
> other about it. And for some reason, I just think it's very funny
> when my teenaged daughter looks at my reading choices and rolls her
> eyes and sighs, "Oh, _Mother_."
Yes, I'm sorry.
I think that mostly what it *is* is that I'm particularly stressed
right now. Which, of course, has nothing to do with you. I'm
not sure if life is conspiring against me or not, but it seems
like it lately. I plan to go out and "do" things and meet people
and maybe make friends and then mistake the 2nd for the 20th
and miss the event I agonized over the expense of. I proactively
seek out people who might serve as a support group for my writing
and am so thrilled to actually find a couple of ladies in this
town and get all this anticipation built up and then it turns out
they probably won't meet again until *next fall*. I decide that
I *must* go to the next homeschool convention possible because
I'm frustrated and isolated and then I find out that the yearly
NM conference started *today* and I can't possibly get registered
for it and get a baby sitter because I don't know anyone and I'm
going to *miss* it...
Poor hubby. I finally calmed down and he offered to take
today and tomorrow off work... then I realized that "start on
the 22nd" undoubtably means this *evening* and not this morning
though nothing on a web-site says so and the chances of anyone
answering phone calls or e-mail is next to nil because they
are all panicking by now... but I *am* going tomorrow morning.
I'm going to show up at a likely time and see if they will
let me in. In the state I'm in at the moment I'm almost
convinced that they won't. Which is silly. And any moment
now I'm going to remember that Christian ladies scare me.
But I think I'm going to try real hard not to think
about that and if anyone feels led to pray, please do.
j.pascal
Pam Crouch
You too? :oD
I've been asking myself why I never go to the ladies' meetings at church,
and I think this is one of the reasons. The other reason is probably low
self-esteem, as in, "I could never be a part of any club that would have
*me* as a member." I don't know, maybe some of it's just shyness. I
really don't like to attract unwanted attention to myself. I like to be
anonymous a lot of the time, and only get attention when I seek it out.
Kind of like a cat(?)
--Pam :o)
"J.Pascal" <ju...@pascal.org> wrote in message
news:b00d4ca5.04042...@posting.google.com...
Dalene Barnes
>
"J.Pascal" wrote:
"And any moment now I'm going to remember that Christian ladies scare
> me."
Pam Crouch answered:
> You too? :oD
That's probably some of the most off-the wall sounding (to me)statements
I've heard in a long time....especially coming from a Mom on a Christian
home school group. Scare? Care to explain further, either of you?
> I've been asking myself why I never go to the ladies' meetings at
> church, and I think this is one of the reasons. The other reason is
> probably low self-esteem, as in, "I could never be a part of any club
> that would have *me* as a member." I don't know, maybe some of it's
> just shyness.
I know why I quit going when we went to a large church. It is because of
the negative attitude towards those who don't chose to fit the stereotype by
1) not having two huge incomes
2) not living in the right neighborhood, driving the right car
3) not sending kids to public school
I got weary of explaining why we home school, and them immediately assuming
I was judging them because they did not; I was tired of everything having a
price tag, because for them, money was more expendable than time; I was
aggravated over and over again by the accepted assumption that teens WILL
rebel and choose bad friends, you just have to pray for them through it all;
I didn't like seeing women my age (OLD) wearing mini-skirts because it's the
trend;
I saw a bunch of "Christian women" who had chosen to conform to the world,
and it was not where I needed to be.
We have a new church home now, and its MUCH better.
Dalene
ISLC News
I will be homeschooling for my first year next year. I will have a 4th and
6th grader. We plan to loosely follow the WTM. Here's what we plan to use:
Sonlight Core 6 (World History Part 1) for history, religion, and
literature.
Writing Strands 3,4, & 5
Rod & Staff 4 & 6 for grammar and some writing
Spelling Workout D & F
Math U See
ABeka for Science
BJU Handwriting
Latina Christiana 1
Mind Benders to begin Logic
History is also not my strongest subject. I am very much a math/science
person. That is why I chose Sonlight vs putting the history/literature picks
together myself.
Mary
"Pam Crouch" <jaso...@nospammingswbell.net> wrote in message
news:SpZfc.17912$QZ5....@newssvr22.news.prodigy.com...
> Hi, anyone who's doing classical ed want to share their schedule? I'm
> researching where I'm going with homeschooling, and am looking at
different
> methods.
>
> Also, how do you get a child of 5 to stay interested in the desk work? Do
> you try to do as much desk work as the WTM says? I only try to get my son
> to do about 20-30 mins a day, but I'm interested in what others do.
>
> I think one reason I'm interested in classical ed now is the history
> component. History is definitely not one of my strengths, but I want to
be
> able to instill a love of history (herstory?) in my kids. Any idea about
> how to do that since I'm a little "historically challenged?" ;o)
>
> --Pam :o)
>
>
Pam Crouch
Christians, but do you ever feel a little like people in your church will
judge you regardless of what you do? If not, great. You are probably
healthier than me. Here is a list of some of the things I've felt judged
for in the past:
* Allowing my kids to stay with me too much (at church)
* Leaving my kids with someone else (at work)
* Not using herbal remedies (I live in Austin, it's hippie-town around here)
* Spending too much time with my husband
* Not being focused enough on household duties
* Making my house "too nice" so it makes others feel bad
* "Gossiping" (news I shared was that a woman had twins! How can you hide
that?)
* Not coming to church enough
* Not participating in ministry enough
* Participating in ministry, but not "doing it right"
* My cat interrupting Bible studies! (However, other people's kids can
interrupt all they want)
* Things I did a long time ago, when I was questioning my faith
I could go on, but I think you can see why I try to keep a low profile at
church. I didn't used to, but even at our church, which is very small, and
loving, I sometimes feel "darned if I do, and darned if I don't."
I know some of it's me. I'm really sensitive, so I guess I'm trying to
protect myself from some types of things that have happened in the past.
For some reason, I get more offended when Christians are rude than when my
nonChristian friends are rude.
We don't go to a big church, so it's not about image. We are not a polished
bunch--there are a lot of big families, and a lot of homeschoolers, so I
really like that.
I know you have heard of Dell Computer Corp. Our church is within a few
minutes of most of their campuses. You may also have heard of the thousands
of layoffs from Dell. As a result of that, there are a lot of people at our
church who are barely eeking out an existence. However, even before that
happened, it wasn't a status church. If it was, I would find another one.
--Pam :o)
"Dalene Barnes" <dal...@txbarnes.com> wrote in message
news:c6avep$qi1$1...@news.tamu.edu...
Pam Crouch
we do not have the same criteria for judging what is good or even acceptable
content. From what you've said, your criteria seem to involve the didactic
potential of a piece, and its value is based mainly on how instructive it
can be in the context of culture, history, and so on. Whereas my criteria
are more related to the reinforcement of morals I'm trying to teach, and
what I feel is appropriate subject matter for certain ages and personalities
of children.
I think we do agree on the literary value of most of the things you've
mentioned, but not on the ages at which to present them. Before I present
some of those things, I want to make sure my kids are able to evaluate them
critically in light of our religious beliefs.
To me, study of ethics systems and philosophy is a world away from
subscribing to a moral code, and putting it into action, so I see a
distinction between a mental stretch and a spiritual struggle. I think we
disagree there.
Also, I believe that although man is essentially corrupt (we seem to agree
somewhat on that) there is a possibility that exposure to certain images,
and even certain ideas can be a bad influence. So we disagree there, too.
Also, I have the Bible telling me "Everything is permissible, but not
everything is beneficial," and "Such as a man thinks, so is he," and "From
the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks" and "Whatsoever things are
true," etc, and "If anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me
to sin, it would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a large
millstone tied around his neck," which all make me think that I should
protect my kids from salacious, violent, or philosophically wrong content.
We don't agree on the authority of the Bible, so we probably won't agree on
life application of it.
Finally, I have my own life experiences influencing me. I was not all that
sheltered from scary stories, horror movies, scary images, and even
pornography. I still remember all those images I saw when I was three to
four years old. I wish I could forget them. I also remember the scary
stories I was told. I do think they influenced me, because I remember a lot
of fear I had related to them. So, that's another probable reason I have
this stance.
--Pam :o)
"Michael S. Morris" <msmo...@netdirect.net> wrote in message
news:4087EBD9...@netdirect.net...
Pants DaiLyon
> * My cat interrupting Bible studies!
I got in trouble when my cat started interpreting tongues.
Pam Crouch
It's in the bylaws.
--Pam :o)
"Pants DaiLyon" <pantsd...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:965205ef.04042...@posting.google.com...
J.Pascal
>
> "And any moment now I'm going to remember that Christian ladies scare
> > me."
>
> Pam Crouch answered:
>
> > You too? :oD
>
> That's probably some of the most off-the wall sounding (to me)statements
> I've heard in a long time....especially coming from a Mom on a Christian
> home school group. Scare? Care to explain further, either of you?
I was being somewhat tongue-in-cheek. Only somewhat, though.
Church ladies of my childhood were frightening. They were tall
and stern and I never quite knew just how fast I could run in
church or how loud I could be or whatever, before one or another
of them would scold me. So there is an element of being on edge
and being on the alert.
That translates to adulthood, too. It's not being afraid, exactly,
but it is an element of social discomfort because so many people
have strong feelings about things and until you know them well
you don't know what those things are. Because right *now* I'm a
bit fragile and lonely the consequences for a social gaff are
more severe.
The convention was fun. Of *course* no one acted like I'd
trespassed because I just showed up Friday morning. Some
parts of it were discouraging, though. The first session I
went to was really awful. I feel bad saying that, but it was.
I started taking notes and about a quarter of the way down
the page I drew a little scarecrow (quite an impressive doodle
if you ask me) and wrote "Straw Man" by it and underlined
it a few times. Who knows... maybe I expect people to be
judgemental because I'm so much that way. (I prefer the
word "discerning" though.)
The two sessions I went to this morning about homeschooling
high-school were fabulous.
> > I've been asking myself why I never go to the ladies' meetings at
> > church, and I think this is one of the reasons. The other reason is
> > probably low self-esteem, as in, "I could never be a part of any club
> > that would have *me* as a member." I don't know, maybe some of it's
> > just shyness.
There has only been one time when I *wanted* to go to any
ladies' meetings. It even surprised me at the time but I
went to the ladies' bible study at one chuch we attended for
years... even after we quit going to church there I still
packed the kids up and went every Friday. It was wonderful
for me. I do think there is a *big* difference between going
out of obligation and going because something is calling to
your spirit.
Part of it is an aversion for "girl stuff." I'm surrounded
by the "mommy thing" and the "domestic thing" day in and day
out. I don't think I knew ahead of time that the bible study
I attended wasn't going to be all about being a mommy and
a good Christian wife. It was a Bible study... we studied
the Bible. It was never about how the study applied to my
life *as a mother* or *as a woman.* It was about how the
Bible applied to my life. Period.
(This is my objection to feminism as well... I'm *me* before
I'm a woman. Why is the most *significant* thing about me the
thing that I share with over 50% of the world's population?)
> I know why I quit going when we went to a large church. It is because of
> the negative attitude towards those who don't chose to fit the stereotype by
> 1) not having two huge incomes
> 2) not living in the right neighborhood, driving the right car
> 3) not sending kids to public school
> I got weary of explaining why we home school, and them immediately assuming
> I was judging them because they did not; I was tired of everything having a
> price tag, because for them, money was more expendable than time; I was
> aggravated over and over again by the accepted assumption that teens WILL
> rebel and choose bad friends, you just have to pray for them through it all;
> I didn't like seeing women my age (OLD) wearing mini-skirts because it's the
> trend;
>
> I saw a bunch of "Christian women" who had chosen to conform to the world,
> and it was not where I needed to be.
>
> We have a new church home now, and its MUCH better.
I'm probably borrowing unnecessary trouble for myself but I'd
love to find a place I "fit." It may be that I don't expect to
be able to because my mother never managed to fit in church.
And it would be bad to bellyache about it when we haven't
even *tried* to find a church here yet. So please pretend that
I'm not bellyaching. ;-)
I don't feel any great need to conform to the world, but its
just that I don't feel the need to conform at *all*. My
theology is quite conservative and rather absolute so a "lets
be happy, social, and do good works" church wouldn't work. But
I'm not the least bit worried about the evils of evolution,
humanism, or same-sex marriages, so that lets out a good chunk
of the "into homeschooling" churches. I let my kids watch
things and do things that I know other people disapprove of
and I worry that other moms aren't going to want their kids
playing with mine. Which is silly. Even the lady at my
church in California didn't do that... she just printed out
"Pokemon is evil" stuff off the internet to give me.
I wasn't afraid of *her*.
So what's the deal? Honestly. If I didn't cause myself
unnecessary trouble I'd hardly have any trouble at all.
-Julie
Michael S. Morris
Sunday, the 25th of April, 2004
Pam Crouch writes:
I think we are just going to have to agree to disagree
on this one, because we do not have the same criteria
for judging what is good or even acceptable content.
Probably, yes.
Pam:
From what you've said, your criteria seem to involve
the didactic potential of a piece, []
We were talking about ethics. So, yes, the didactic potential
of a piece when *thinking* about ethics. Agreement with the author
or with a character in a piece is absolutely irrelevant to
how well a piece leads one to think well about ethical questions.
Pam:
and its value is based mainly on how instructive it
can be in the context of culture, history, and so on.
No, in the context of morals. Assuming it is morals we are speaking
about. That is why Mrs. Bluedorn suggested censoring Tarzan, is it
not?
Pam:
Whereas my criteria are more related to the reinforcement
of morals I'm trying to teach, []
Unless what you mean by "morals I'm trying to teach" is
deep, deep, then I see that most of great literature---and,
again, I certainly include the Bible in that assessment---is
*not* going to reinforce. It's going to question.
I think kids are smart enough to know when
they are being propagandized to, and I also think the
morals *I* am trying to teach are simply the right
morals---i.e., that people, thinking about ethics,
will arrive at the same conclusions about what is right
and wrong to do. Therefore, I think the way to go is
to teach my children to question moral things deeply,
and to think well about them, and I know of no better
way to do that than to give them the greatest books to
read. (Well, actually there's calculus and spelling and
grammar and dates and events in history and scientific laws
and principles and musical scales and all kinds of
mundane facts and tools and such to enable their
reading of these books, but, I'm sort of counting
all this as prep-work leading up to reading great
books and using them to think by.)
Pam:
and what I feel is appropriate subject matter
for certain ages and personalities
of children.
I'm simply not sure exactly what we are talking about here.
I think a book with explicit sex scenes in it would bore to
tears my five year-old in the first paragraph. And also my
12-year-old. So, I simply don't think there is any chance my
12-year-old will get her mind warped in some way by finding
a particularly "adult" book on the shelf and reading it. It
isn't a problem.
However, I will do with her what I already did with Zan:
That is, next year, I will hand her the KJV Bible to read
cover-to-cover. Something like 6 pages a day for a 180-day
schoolyear should do it. And that will be an assignment in
addition to other literature that she will be reading in
parallel, and probably her mother and I will discuss this
biblical reading with her daily.
Pam:
I think we do agree on the literary value of most
of the things you've mentioned, but not on the ages at
which to present them. Before I present some of those
things, I want to make sure my kids are able to evaluate
them critically in light of our religious beliefs.
Whereas I want to make sure my children are able simply
to evaluate critically.
Pam:
To me, study of ethics systems and philosophy is a world
away from subscribing to a moral code,
I simply do not understand "a moral code" here. I see moral
questions, such as "What ought I to do?" And I cannot begin
to understand any answer to such questions as distinct from
"study of ethics systems". Like physics, Pam. I want to know how
the material world works. I don't sit back and study "physics
systems" and adopt a "physics code" eclectically from some
multicultural mishmash. No, I study physics in order to determine
*the* laws of nature. Similarly I study ethics in order
to determine *the* Natural Law.
Pam:
and putting it into action, so I see a
distinction between a mental stretch and
a spiritual struggle.
You figure it is a spriritual struggle in order to know
whether we ought or ought not to commit adultery? I'd say
the ought not on that one is pretty darn loud and clear.
The spiritual struggle part there has to do with *doing*
the thing we ought to do, not with figuring out which it
is.
Pam:
I think we
disagree there.
Maybe.
Pam:
Also, I believe that although man is essentially
corrupt (we seem to agree somewhat on that) there is
a possibility that exposure to certain images,
and even certain ideas can be a bad influence.
So we disagree there, too.
Again, maybe. What I think is that if a man is exposed to
certain images or ideas and chooses corruption, then
this corruption is his choice, not some sort of causal
determinism from the images or ideas. I think that is *the
reason* for free speech as a principle and as a Right. I.e.,
it is not that images or ideas or speech cannot ever be evil.
They can. But, it is always better to hold us responsible
for how we respond to speech than to blame the speech. In
particular, I would assert strongly that offense is a moral
choice made by the person offended, and that, therefore,
no one can ever be granted a legal or a moral right to
be free from being offended. So, what I hope to do is to teach
my children how to choose *well* their offense.
Pam:
Also, I have the Bible telling me "Everything is
permissible, but not everything is beneficial,"
No one here said everything is beneficial. I
perfectly well believe there is evil speech,
there are evil ideas.
Pam:
and "Such as a man thinks, so is he,"
Not to mention a different verse I like better:
"Die Gedanken sind frei, wer kann sie erraten?"
(Thoughts are free, who can fathom them?)
Pam:
and "From the abundance of the heart the mouth
speaks" and "Whatsoever things are true," etc,
and "If anyone causes one of these little ones who
believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to
be thrown into the sea with a large millstone tied
around his neck,"
Well, this last yet another example of why I think
Jesus was not the wisest and best of moral teachers,
though perhaps one could interpret this verse a little
more kindly to him.
Pam:
which all make me think that I should
protect my kids from salacious, violent, or
philosophically wrong content. We don't agree
on the authority of the Bible, so we probably
won't agree on life application of it.
Even more fundamentally than that, Pam, is the
simple fact that the Bible is chockfull of
salacious, violent, and philosophically wrong
content.
And, no, I don't agree that this is a disagreement between
us, because I *am not* saying here necessarily that there isn't
some non-salacious, peaceful, and philosophically right
unity to it. I mean, I personally do not believe there is,
but I understand full well the possibility of such an interpretation
and that you Christians make it. (Or make multiple attempts at it.)
What I am saying, is you *still* have David offing Uriah in order to
sleep with Bathsheba. And that that has salacious content, violent
content, and ethically atrocious content. I mean, in point
of fact, it doesn't get any more violent or salacious or
philosophically wrong than the Bible gets.
Pam:
Finally, I have my own life experiences influencing me.
I was not all that sheltered from scary stories, horror
movies, scary images, and even pornography. I still
remember all those images I saw when I was three to
four years old. I wish I could forget them. I also
remember the scary stories I was told. I do think they
influenced me, because I remember a lot of fear I had
related to them. So, that's another probable reason I have
this stance.
I was cetainly scared by things at three or four that
I would not be scared by now. However, I also think that
being scared at three or four of scary stories (Bible
stories, for that matter) is a perfectly fine response.
(As for pornography, I can't imagine that I paid any interest
in it at all before the age of about 13, when my awareness
of things sexual turned on like a light switch. I can't
relate at all to a three or four year old being cognizant
of it.)
Anyway, I just don't get wanting to remove "scary"
from kids. I mean, sure, one doesn't force it on them,
or try to "get" them, and some kids are more sensitive than
others, but, sheesh, mine seem to relish scary stuff,
and go out of their way to get more of it. Leastways,
that's how I understand my five-year-old's fascination
with dinosaurs at present.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Kanga Mum
Well-Trained Mind.
Classical Education has several variations, and here's a link to a
summary of one of my favorite books on the topic, Norms and Nobility
by David Hicks:
http://mnatal.members.easyspace.com/arn/norms.htm#reading%20lists
This page looks pretty good. I was surprised to see it's by Aimee
Natal. I've seen Aimee's 'research' on some other educational topics
and she was embarrassingly sloppy. She must like Hicks.=) If you look
at the rest of her site be aware that Aimee has a habit of jumping to
unsupportable conclusions based on almost no data at all, or sometimes
even data that kind of points the opposite direction- but this book
is well worth reading for its own sake. I think it's a must read for
anybody interested in Classical Education.
He's interested in school reform, and in the preface he says,
"We are a nation at risk, but not simply because our children cannot
read and write, or keep up with the Japanese, or think and talk
intelligently about the basic ideas of our intellectual tradition.
We are at risk because our modern pedagogy has severed the vital link
between knowing and doing, because the moral marrow of who we are and
of what our purposes are is being schooled out of our children,
because we have become uncertain of our norms and have abandoned
education's transcendent and ennobling ends."
Kanga
Stainless Steel Streetrat
kangamaroodoes...@yahoo.com (Kanga Mum) writes:
>She says she read recently that
>TV turn off week or some such thing is coming up, and she heard on the
>radio that 75 percent of Americans think this is a great idea, but
>only a quarter of that group actually turn off their televisions.
>More of them would turn off their televisions, they say, if only there
>were more affordable entertainment options available to them. Have
>they no cards, no books, no parks, no museums, no board games,
>projects to work on, no songs to sing, no babies to tickle, no
>toddlers to laugh with, no teens to make fun of be fun by in return?
>No pets? No paints, <snipped>
paints are expensive <wg>.
Stainless Steel Streetrat
-----------------------------------
"Living is the best revenge" - Conan the Barbarian
AimeeN
I am Aimee Natal.
I find your comment interesting: "If you look
at the rest of her site be aware that Aimee has a habit of jumping to
unsupportable conclusions based on almost no data at all, or sometimes
even data that kind of points the opposite direction- but this book
is well worth reading for its own sake. I think it's a must read for
anybody interested in Classical Education."
To what exactly are you referring, besides my now 5 year old article on
Charlotte Mason that caused a minor stir?
"Unsupportable" and "no data at all"? My word, madam, how are others to
know that you are not guilty of doing what you accuse me of, by making
"unsupportable" arguments against me, based on "no data at all"?
I suggest you now be more specific and back-up your words.
Sincerely,
Aimee Natal
in CT
http://www.arborvitaeschool.org/arn/edpage/aimeesedpage.htm
MaG Douglas
news:3720966df66de991...@localhost.talkabouteducation.com...
> Hello Kanga,
><snip>
>
> I suggest you now be more specific and back-up your words.
On the other hand, "now" being 8 months after the post, I suggest Kanga just
leave the thread dormant like it was. (Unless she's feeling like chatting
with someone who may take a very looong time to reply.)
MaG
Scott Bryce
> On the other hand, "now" being 8 months after the post,
Google Groups stikes again.
> I suggest Kanga just
> leave the thread dormant like it was. (Unless she's feeling like chatting
> with someone who may take a very looong time to reply.)
Or someone itching for a fight.
In Excelsius Dago
You are responding to a post that is over 6 months old, fwiw. Not that
there exists some statute of limitations on this discussions - you're
certainly welcome to call Kanga to account since she mentions your
work in less than complimentary fashion. Note: Kanga is my friend and
I hope you can be a friend. I hate to see friends in a spat, unless
it's a cat-fight.
cheers...
On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 18:04:38 -0500, "AimeeN" <arnm...@sbcglobal.net>
wrote:
My ancestors swung by their necks, not their tails.
I suport publick skool.
Under republicans, people exploit people (under democrats, it's just the opposite.)