Back to school

After a very busy summer, our house is a tad quieter. My university age girls have left: one is in Winnipeg studying music at Canadian Mennonite University, and another has begun a Nursing program in Regina. I still have two teenagers at home: one doing online high school courses, and the other in grade 9, which brings me to a rather startling realization-- this is my last year of full-time tutoring. We've had our ups and downs on our homeschool journey--lots of fun and lots of challenges. It's hard to believe that the end is in sight: I'm already having mixed feelings. In the meantime, does anyone need eight years' worth of books and curriculum? If I sold it all, maybe my hubby could retire early. 

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Wherein he extols the virtues of Catholic confession!

I kid you not. He also lauds atonement, redemption and metanoia! The audio is not the best, and there is no video. (You may do as I do, and LISTEN to it as you go about your daily household chores, or your various commutes.)

The wisdom and inspiration in this lecture is off the charts. I truly do praise the Lord for what this person is accomplishing in the world today. There is a reason why the mainstream media is attacking him so viciously, but basically the devil is behind it. Dr. Peterson is improving (and sometimes saving) people's lives, and he's even leading nihilistic, addicted atheists to Christ (see this video/podcast by James Fox Higgins).

Enjoy. Be inspired.


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An interview so remarkable

That I was tempted to change the name of our blog to "Sane Women Doing Sane Things." Seriously, I can't believe there are living, breathing North American university professors who openly say such things (and I mean that in a GOOD way). Strange times, indeed.  Professor Paglia sees the death of Western Civ looming (don't we all), but I'd like to hope that if a few more of us have the courage to speak up and denounce the lunacy of post-modernism, there is still a chance to keep barbarism and totalitarianism at bay. Thank you, Dr Peterson, for all you continue to do. It has been life-changing for so many of us.

This video (like all his others) is worth every minute*, I assure you.



*Some may ask: "Where do you find the time to watch a video that long?" You may as well ask how a football fan finds time to watch a game, or how a chick finds time to watch a chick-flick, or how an epicure finds time to enjoy a dinner at his favourite restaurant.

PS Apologies for the sporadic blogging. I'd really meant to do better, but September decided to be a rather insane month.
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Whenever I get the urge to correct bad grammar

I give in. The feeling never passes. 

Poster seen at a local bargain store. Some bargain.

1) The first line should read "work [space] out," not "workout."  "Workout" is a noun, not a verb/infinitive.

2) "Lie" not "lay". Lay is a transitive verb, requiring a direct object. You can lay bricks, or a wreath, or floor tile or an egg. You cannot "lay down."

Yes, I am a grammar geek. It's not about shaming people; it's about defending Western Civ. The way we speak (and write and spell) does matter. Just ask Professor Higgins. Or Dr. Jordan Peterson.
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Passive Aggression 101

How to complain about schoolwork, without really complaining about school work. Note sentences 2 and 6. 

Our town was so poor...

We couldn't afford a third 'N'. 

Dictionaries: they weren't that hard to come by, not even in 1967. Now of course, there is how-do-you-spell.com.
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Why Johnny can’t read.

And why he can’t write a complete sentence.

And why he doesn’t know who Jane Austen is. Or Chaucer. Or Tolstoy.

Remember high school English, anyone over 50? You did two things, basically: they were known as “Lit and Comp” As in studying “Literature” (good books, plays, poems and stuff) and then writing things. That was Composition. (That included grammar, style, sentence structure, literary devices, rhetoric, all that jazz.)

No more. Now they study Equity, Ethics, Diversity, Inclusivity and a host of other diseases.

Yes, I homeschool, but when my kids reach the high school years, they usually opt to do (credited) online courses. This is so that they can get transcripts to get into post-secondary and so forth. Yes, I know there are other ways to do high school at home; that's a discussion for another day. 

The online classes vary widely: they come from a variety of different sources (individual school boards all over the province provide courses; there is no longer any such thing as the one-size-fits-all “Government Correspondence School”). There have been some good courses and many excellent teachers. Other times, not so much. 

Oh, the funny stories I could tell. Like the teacher who revealed (via a Power Point lecture) that he couldn’t read/pronounce “tuberculosis,” (but his version, “Turb-you-locus” kept us in stitches for months).

I can relate the anecdote below now that the child in question has finished high school and left home. In fact, I can’t even remember which school board in the province developed this English course. I just recall that it made my head explode on a fairly regular basis.

The first section “Equity and Ethics” of my daughter’s grade 10 English course dealt with "learning styles" (fair enough, since it helps students identify theirs) but then followed the questions below (keep in mind: this is the VERY FIRST ASSIGNMENT of the year, in a course meant for 15-year-olds.)

(I have taken the liberty of providing my own answers, in red. They are not the answers my daughter gave to the questions when she did the assignments.)

1. A student is blind, but wants to take visual art as a course in Grade 10. The student cannot see, yet a major portion of the Grade 10 course is all about the colour wheel and it is mandatory that every student in the class does a project involving the visual effects of colour on design trends. Ethically, how should that student be assessed on their [sic] learning for this part of the course?

1) Response:

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?

Yes, should they so opt, blind students have the right to study visual art, just as a quadriplegic likely has the right to be on the track team. If they can’t “see” colour (what is “seeing” anyway?), there are ways to “feel” and “intuit” colour. You just need a teacher who is sufficiently imaginative, artsy or new-agey to assist with that.

A blind artist could not possibly produce anything worse than some of the modern art that is already out there. To demonstrate “yellow” for instance, one could submerge a photo of Jackson Pollock in a jar of pee.

Oh, and the [sic] in the last sentence? “Their” is a plural pronoun, and the antecedent (“the student”) is singular. But then it’s not as though we’re studying Grammar and Usage or anything. This is just high school English.

2. A deaf student is registered in the Distance Learning B10 course, in which there are a number of listening and speaking activities. It is required that all students demonstrate their skills with listening and speaking, but it is decided that this student does not have to do these portions of the course. Another student who is extremely shy to speak aloud is failing the course because she did not do any of those activities. What is the ethical thing the teacher should do here?

Response:

The teacher should take a leave of absence, possibly to university, and take courses such as Ethics and Equity, Psychology, and Curriculum Implementation: Brainstorming Solutions in an Inclusive World, instead of asking her 15-year old students to solve her classroom problems for her.

3. Johnny is a student who has extreme difficulty with keeping his hands still while in English class. Often, during reading time, he is disruptive and interrupts the quiet atmosphere the teacher has created in the classroom so all can concentrate. The teacher spends a lot of time trying to keep Johnny quiet, and his parents have refused the request to send Johnny to another room with a teaching assistant during reading time. Ethically, what should be done to provide an opportunity for Johnny to learn, as well as time for the rest of the class to read?

Response:

1) It had to be “Johnny”, didn’t it?

2) Johnny should be held down forcibly and given his dose of Ritalin.

3) Johnny’s parents are evil and stupid. It’s not a solution, but we do want to reinforce this point in the child’s mind.

4) Sentence two is self-contradictory: if Johnny is being constantly disruptive, then is it accurate to claim that the teacher has created a “quiet atmosphere” in the classroom? But then, they don’t teach Logic in Teachers’ College anymore.

5) Johnny’s parents (who are probably being maligned, since no parents in such a situation would refuse the one-on-one services of a TA, knowing that their child was a disruption) should withdraw him from school and home-educate him.

Wow. Is it just me, or is it absolutely INSANE to expect 15-year-old kids to be able to solve these kinds of dilemmas? What are we paying teachers and school counsellors and psychologists for (to say nothing of the gargantuan bureaucracies that develop curricula and administer programs)?

But as Gary Larson’s cartoon caveman would say, “It get better.”

The next section in my daughter’s "English" course was called:

We Want to Know How Superstitious, Anti-Choice, Reactionary, Conservative, Anti-LabourUnion and Bigoted Your Parents Are

Factors that Influence our Learning

Students are asked to answer the following:

1. What are your views on work?

2. What do you believe about death and an afterlife?

3. Summarize what you believe about criminals and the justice system.

4. Do you think terminally ill people should be allowed to end their own lives, or not? Please explain your answer.

5. Should Canada allow illegal immigrants into the country, and assist them financially once they “in”? Support your views with at least one solid reason.

For the love of Learning, this is NOT the study of law, sociology, class warfare, or contentious social issues! Can anyone explain to me what any of this has to do with the study of English?? This is ENGLISH (Lit! Comp!) not Political Correctness 101.

Equity and Ethics indeed.

When do they get around to studying “Sentence Construction”? I’m not going to hold my breath. 

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I'd better move #5 a little higher

At the beginning of the school year, I'd asked Miss P #7 to list her favourite subjects in order, so that we could devise a schedule that would make getting started each day a little less onerous. (Mybad: "Religion" didn't even make the list. Oh well, I console myself with knowing: Faith isn't a subject in school; it's a Way of Life.)

I am not crazy

Family Circus archives

I am not crazy. I am not talking to myself. I am a homeschooling mom, and I'm having a parent-teacher interview.

A blast from the past: here's one of the first articles I ever published about homeschooling. It first appeared in Nazareth: A Catholic Family Journal, oh, I'm going to guess 1998. I've had the odd request for this one, and since the now defunct NJ magazine is not archived online, here it is.

I agree with Simcha: Ditch the Prom

Classic Simcha. This is a great article, and you should pop over and read it for yourself, especially if you have kids in high school. (h/t Daria on FB)

The prom has long since ceased to be formal and dignified. It's a circus at best or (no apologies) a Slutstravaganza at worst. It's hard to believe that in some parts of the world, girls want to go to prom mostly naked and (so to speak) drop acid, and in other parts of the world, girls have to wear body bags in public, and sometimes get acid thrown in their faces, just for wanting to go to school.

Never give up on a dream

Follow your Dreams

Believe in Your Dreams

Don't Stop Believing...in Your Dreams

Dream for Tomorrow...Today

Today is the Tomorrow you Worried About Yesterday

Trust in Tomorrow 

Today is the First Day of the Rest of Your Life

...as a Quadriplegic if You're Foolish Enough to Drink and Drive

Word: homeschooling. My first three high school "seniors" (graduates) never wanted so much as a dinner or even a small family party to mark the occasion (which is a bit sad, but there you have it). #4 is having a grad party: along with the families of 3 other cousins, we rented a church hall and are having a by-invitation potluck dinner and an old-fashioned dance, with real music and real dancing. But you don't need to homeschool: any student and his family could do the same. And yes, I do realize that some schools are good, and have nice proms and graduation ceremonies on a relatively modest scale. 

I'm just not much for that sort of thing. When I graduated from high school, I was part of a rebel movement to have our theme be: "Another Brick in the Wall" (yes, we wanted the Pink Floyd ditty as our grad theme song). We had votes on our side, but the Principal vetoed it. He could not, however, stop me from wearing a Halloween costume to my graduation, which I did. (Relax, it was a gown, but I'd borrowed it from my sister, who had worn it as a Halloween costume, which I also did six months before I wore it to grad. It was a peach-coloured lacy pioneer-lady type gown. The material point is that I paid nothing for it, and was not the least bit freaked or ashamed that I had not kept it under wraps --like a wedding gown!-- as some folk apparently think is necessary.)

I guess I also have a thing about long, boring speeches. At my husband's convocation from Engineering, I slipped out as soon as I saw him receive his degree, and went shopping at a nearby mall. At my own convocation, as soon as I received my degree, I slipped out and went to play in a badminton tournament with Mrs. Beazly. Good times.
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Sometimes a beard is just a way to keep your face warm.

Just ask Mr. P, who grows one every winter (autumn, actually), and shaves it off every spring. But if it's going to become a political statement (make that a politically-incorrect statement), I might try to persuade him to keep it on all year round. Beards are starting to grow on me (and I mean that in a metaphorical, not menopausal, sense).

The link adds to the enormous list of reasons why 90% of modern university programs should be flushed down the toilet. But what more can you expect from a guy who's a grad studynt in womyn's studyys?

 Give me real men any day of the week. And twice on Sundays.

The peeve rolls on

Same writing book: now I've come across a sentence that says, "He outshined all his teammates."

GGGGEEEEAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!

Oxford English Dictionary: past tense of "outshine" is "outshone."

With writing curriculum like this, who needs illiterate barbarians? Once more, I've wasted my money.

Come on, Kumon! Somehow, the dazed, wall-eyed, not-quite-happy face in their logo says it all...

Gee, ya think?

However, the Campaign for Real Education said it was a waste of time and would "lack weight" with employers.

University students choosing majors/degrees. Hmmm... should I study Jane Austen and Shakespeare or Metallica and Black Sabbath? (Professor Ozzy Osbourne as guest lecturer, anyone?) As Hillary Clinton says: What difference, at this point, does it make? Civilization is doomed anyway.
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Eats shoots and, leave's

The grammar nazi in me could not resist. The "blog" of "unnecessary" quotation marks.  Enjoy.

h/t Pundette

And it just had to be: there is also a blog entirely dedicated to the apostrophe. And thank goodness.

Mrs. B. chimes in:

Speaking of signs, I didn't even have to go to the internet for this one. I spotted it in a curling club last year.

Bysides, we drangk them oll at are sign makeing partY!

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I got magnetic Scrabble tiles for my birthday.

I find they are really handy for when you're waiting for supper to finish cooking, or just whenever something is weighing heavily on your mind....

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Ich bin ein Home Schooler!

In a political asylum case involving a German family that fled to the United States to be able to homeschool their children, the U.S. Justice Department is arguing that the freedom to choose to educate one's own children is not a fundamental right.

Good thing the U.S.J.D. knows who the real enemies of America are: people who want to educate their own kids.

  "There are two major portions of constitutional rights of citizens – fundamental liberties and equal protection. The U.S. Attorney General has said this about homeschooling. There is no fundamental liberty to homeschool. So long as a government bans homeschooling broadly and equally, there is no violation of your rights. This is a view which gives some acknowledgement to the principle of equal protection but which entirely jettisons the concept of fundamental liberties."

As long as there's a boot on everyone's face, why, then no one is getting treated badly because everyone is equal!

 "It is important that Americans stand up for the rights of German homeschooling families," Farris concludes. "In so doing, we stand up for our own."

How do you say, "You can take our lesson planning books from us when you pry them from our cold, dead hands!" in German?
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My writing students, past and present, will be pleased.

And so will Miss Pinkerton #2, who is currently studying German in university. A short article about the implementation of the new universal language at the European Union. 

For those of you out there who are currently trying to teach children things like grammar, spelling and writing, relax. You may carry on as before. Parents will be placated to know that the rules will soon be for naught anyway.

h/t Mr. P's brother and his lovely wife, who emailed me the link. 

St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, Pray for Us.

Especially those of us having trouble with school, be it home education, correspondence courses, or  enrollment at a local institution. None of them are perfect, and as Mrs. P. said to me a few days ago, it helps nothing to "close ranks" and pretend that whatever path we have chosen is without difficulty. On many days home schooling is wonderful, some days it is lonely and fruitless. Sometimes there is great joy in seeing a child flourish at a new school, sometimes there is great frustration that the school is not offering everything it ought. Sometimes teachers are valued for the great good they do, sometimes they suffer for teaching the  truth. Sometimes parents are acknowledged as primary educators of their children, sometimes they are deprived of the right to have any say in what their child is taught. In all the joys and sorrows, in all the triumphs and frustrations, on the A+ days and especially on the ones that get an F, St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, pray for us!

Here is her story.
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You knew I wasn't about to let this headline slip past me...

CBC trashes homeschooling mothers as incompetent, uneducated, and sexually irresponsible

They say that like it's a bad thing! Let's think about this for a minute. The journalist in question is a left-lib feminist who works for a lefty, anti-family, anti-life, anti-faith state broadcaster--the CBC. Come, fellow homeschoolers, it would be an insult to be applauded by these people. If they approved of us, it would mean we were not doing our jobs properly. So rejoice, as the Beatitudes say. 

Now let's deconstruct:

"The professors hated them. But the kids had fun."

The professors, of course, were ultra-liberal. You know, the kind that are all into peace and justice and tolerance, and not hating anyone.

One of those tolerant liberals wrote of homeschoolers:

"The husbands and wives in these families feel themselves to be under a religious compulsion to have large families, a homebound and submissive wife and mother who is responsible for the schooling of the children, and only one breadwinner."

He says that like it's a bad thing!

Then there's this (I warn you, it's NOT satire):

Dana Goldstein, writing in Slate, urged her fellow progressives to resist the temptation to homeschool, arguing that the practice is “fundamentally illiberal” and asking incredulously: “Could such a go-it-alone ideology ever be truly progressive?” She went on to argue that the children of high-achieving parents amount to public goods because of peer effects — poor students do better when mixed with better-off peers — meaning that “when college-educated parents pull their kids out of public schools, whether for private school or homeschooling, they make it harder for less-advantaged children to thrive.” She does not extend that analysis to its logical conclusion: that conscientious, educated liberals should enroll their children in the very worst public schools they can find in order to maximize the public good.

Money quote: "A political class that does not trust people with a Big Gulp is not going to trust them with the minds of children." True.  Read the rest, and enjoy!  Truly brillaint. 

Homeschoolers, the last radicals  by Kevin D. Williamson at NRO

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