Help! My Kids Are Smarter than Me!

Cymatics: Sound and Creation

2009-08-20T14:29:00.003-05:00

I got this link from another homeschooler. It's a lovely five minute video on cymatics, the study of visible sound and vibration. The patterns that are created by sound waves and their reflection in living forms (tortoise shells, sunflower seed heads) is fascinating and just begging for a 4H or science fair project. Wish me luck in getting one of the boys to pursue it!

Lockhart's Lament or You Should Read This Now!

2009-06-19T23:43:00.005-05:00

I've read this before but apparently I didn't blog it. Can't imagine why--it's fabulous! Makes me want to go back and re-teach high school math to Wolfie. A living books approach probably would have kept him interested in math, which he isn't anymore. :(

Anyway, here is a bit of "A Mathematician's Lament"by Paul Lockhart, an elegant proof that we may be teaching our children about mathematics but we're certainly not teaching them mathematics.

"By concentrating on what, and leaving out why, mathematics is reduced to an empty shell. The art is not in the “truth” but in the explanation, the argument. It is the argument itself which gives the truth its context, and determines what is really being said and meant. Mathematics is the art of explanation. If you deny students the opportunity to engage in this activity— to pose their own problems, make their own conjectures and discoveries, to be wrong, to be creatively frustrated, to have an inspiration, and to cobble together their own explanations and proofs— you deny them mathematics itself. So no, I’m not complaining about the presence of facts and formulas in our mathematics classes, I’m complaining about the lack of mathematics in our mathematics classes. "

It's a great argument against schooling in general, since while he claims no other subject has been so sucked dry of life and reason for living, the same could be said about history, economics, and most science courses. I've even seen it done in English classes. Pretty much any class that uses a textbook is about as interesting as the pile of wood pulp used to make said textbook. Oh yeah, I went there!

Reporter Needs Your Help

2009-06-17T19:38:00.002-05:00

I just got this message. "I found your blog while researching an article I'm writing for Parents magazine. I'm looking to interview the parents of an exceptional/gifted child. The main goal of this article will be to help parents learn how to deal with their kids' separate needs. In many families, one child is the subject of much attention due to either a positive accomplishment (ie. academic exellence, mvp) or a negative situation (ie. chronic illness, behavior issues). When this happens, a perfectly normal/average child may begin to feel inadequate or left out. I hope to raise parents awareness of this situation and give them tools for dealing with it. I read that your children are grown, but I thought you might be able to connect me to a family with 2 young children (under the age of 10) because of your connection with the Mensa organization."

I'm always willing to help out a fellow writer, but in this case I'm not qualified because my kids are too old for Parents' target audience. Can anyone out there help a brutha' out?

The Mommy Wars: Oy Vey, Maria!

2009-05-22T15:12:00.002-05:00

Okay, okay, I found this several months too late to reply to Marguerite, a commenter on Judith Warner's NYT blog entry ""Families to Care About, but I have to reply and I have a blog, so I'm gonna.

The article was about those "Real Housewife"-type mothers who send their kids off to daycare so they can have some "me time," and how their whining about their husbands losing huge amounts of salary in the recession was falling on deaf ears. (Not so much at the NYT clearly, but I digress.) I don't usually read Judith Warner, because she strikes me as one of those whining opt-out mothers, and yes, I know writing a blog can be a full-time job, which is why I don't post so often anymore.

However, the commenter who signed herself Marguerite had this to say in response to the entry:

"There is nothing new in the news media providing a slanted perspective on gender roles. Over-coverage of kept wives and under-coverage of the working poor generates more interest, if not sells more papers - who wants to read about people being miserable and having to work their fingers raw? It’s a (journalistic) upper-class version of People and Star magazines.

That being said - I have zero respect for women who chose voluntarily to give up careers to be their husbands’ housekeepers. If they aren’t bored stiff, they clearly have a lack of intellectual aptitude - which is perhaps why hubby selected them in the first place. A nice contrast is Laura Bush vs. Hilary Clinton or Michelle Obama. Enough said."

Hold on, there, Marguerite. NOT QUITE enough said!

Let's not assume that stay-at-home moms = "women who chose to voluntarily give up careers to be their husband' housekeepers." Anyone who knows me knows that I am a terrible housekeeper. I'm a SAHM because we prefer to raise our own children.

Sentence #3: "A nice contrast is Laura Bush vs. Hilary Clinton or Michelle Obama."
Okay, if you say so. But didn't Michelle Obama give up her career to support her husband's presidency, and doesn't she now call herself the Mom-in-Chief? As for Laura Bush, according to the National First Lady's Library, she has a master's degree in Library science but retired from teaching for work behind the scenes on both her FIL (Bush 41) and husband's political campaigns. Granted, she doesn't have Hillary's strident voice or Michelle's biceps but let's not go assuming W married her because she's a pretty idiot.

I saved sentence #2 for last, because it's my favorite: "If they aren’t bored stiff, they clearly have a lack of intellectual aptitude - which is perhaps why hubby selected them in the first place." A-hem. Where to begin? Rather than listing the credentials I have accumulated since staying home, I'll just put it this way. If I call the last fifteen years "A Longitudinal Study of the Educational and Parenting Needs of Gifted Boys," can I have my IQ points back?

Peer Pressure Cuts Both Ways

2009-03-30T23:02:00.004-05:00

There's an article in the Guardian about the pressure gifted boys feel to dumb down and fit in. It's not just a smart-girl problem anymore. I'm not sure if that's a good or a bad thing.

ABCs for Baby Nerds!

2009-03-23T15:35:00.002-05:00

How awesome is this? A seller on Etsy has just come out with a set of ABC flashcards for nerd babies! Now I'm jealous that my sister has grandchildren and I don't!

C.S. Lewis on Education: The More Things Change...

2009-03-23T12:22:00.002-05:00

The More They Stay the Same. CS Lewis on the modern educational system of his time:

The scene is in Hell at the annual dinner of the Tempters' Training College for young devils. The principal, Dr. Slubgob, has just proposed the health of the guests. Screwtape, a very experienced devil, who is the guest of honour, rises to reply:

...The basic principle of the new education is to be that dunces and idlers must not be made to feel inferior to intelligent and industrious pupils. That would be "undemocratic. " These differences between the pupils - for they are obviously and nakedly individual differences - must be disguised. This can be done on various levels. At universities, examinations must be framed so that nearly all the students get good marks. Entrance examinations must be framed so that all, or nearly all, citizens can go to universities, whether they have any power (or wish) to profit by higher education or not. At schools, the children who are too stupid or lazy to learn languages and mathematics and elementary science can be set to doing the things that children used to do in their spare time. Let them, for example, make mud pies and call it modelling. But all the time there must be no faintest hint that they are inferior to the children who are at work.

Whatever nonsense they are engaged in must have - I believe the English already use the phrase - "parity of esteem." An even more drastic scheme is not impossible. Children who are fit to proceed to a higher class may be artificially kept back, because the others would get a trauma-Beelzebub, what a useful word! - by being left behind. The bright pupil thus remains democratically fettered to his own age group throughout his school career, and a boy who would be capable of tackling Aeschylus or Dante sits listening to his coeval's attempts to spell out A CAT SAT ON A MAT.

In a word, we may reasonably hope for the virtual abolition of education when I'm as good as you has fully had its way. All incentives to learn and all penalties for not learning will vanish. The few who might want to learn will be prevented; who are they to overtop their fellows? And anyway the teachers - or should I say, nurses?- will be far too busy reassuring the dunces and patting them on the back to waste any time on real teaching. We shall no longer have to plan and toil to spread imperturbable conceit and incurable ignorance among men. The little vermin themselves will do it for us.

Of course, this would not follow unless all education became state education. But it will. ..."

~ C.S. Lewis Screwtape Proposes a Toast From The Screwtape Letters, New York: Touchstone, 1961.

Letting Teens Sleep In Is a Good Idea?

2009-03-20T14:14:00.003-05:00

I say yes, DH says no. "The most productive time of the day is morning," which is why our school day begins at 9am at the latest. I have to agree that Wolfie has been very productive in the first hour study hall he has at the high school before German II.

However, my most productive time of day is noon to 2:30pm (second most productive time of day is 10:30 pm to 2 am), which dear DH, being a morning person, just cannot understand. Thus the ongoing battle at my house about bedtimes and school times.

Now it seems the head teacher (aka principal) at Hugh Christie Technical College, Tonbridge, Kent (UK) agrees with me. "[O]n Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays his 14- to 18-year-old pupils start lessons at 11.30am – because research suggests that that teenagers' brains work better if they get up later.

"Their punctuality and attendance has improved, their questioning and answering is better because they are more alert and the pace of lessons is often much quicker," Barker says."

I know such an experiment will not convince DH, but if there are any homeschooling families out there who need this bit of info to adjust your schedule more comfortably, you now have anecdotal research to support your decision.

See Shakespeare's Plays in a Whole New Way

2009-02-22T00:22:00.002-06:00

If your kids are into graphic novels, check out Classical Comics. Not only are they real, unabridged classics in graphic novel format, but they also come in original text (for example, Shakespearean English), plain text (modern English) and quick text (~elementary reading level modern English) so differentiation is a breeze.

I think the graphic novel format is perfect for Shakespeare's plays, which are much more understandable when performed than when read. The teacher's guides are designed for British schools Key Stages 2 and 3, which correspond roughly with late elementary and middle school in the states. They include activities, quizzes, and tests with copyable black line masters and answer keys.

We're using Henry V right now--original text for my reader and plain text for my non-reader, although I have to say the plain text is helpful even for advanced readers. I never really understood what the Archibishop's arguments in favor of war with France were until I read the plain text version, and I've read the play at least twice and seen the movie a half dozen times. The plain text also preserves Shakespeare's language where possible, so I don't think using that exclusively would ruin the educational experience.

For Language Learning, Check Rosetta Stone

2009-02-14T22:29:00.003-06:00

We've used Rosetta Stone in a number of languages over the past few years. Klaus tried to use it for homeschooling Japanese three years ago. It was a failure. We couldn't tell what he had completed and it seemed he was making no progress, even after spending several hours. Because of that, and the expense, and the fact that they didn't offer Irish, we tried Pimsleur and a number of other language learning products for Xavier last year.

They weren't very helpful, either.

Now, it seems, Rosetta Stone has realized that with some parental/teacher support, they can make their product well worth the expense. The homeschool edition offers reports for parents "suitable for adding to an education portfolio." All of their languages seem to be offered in this new homeschool version, including Irish.

Click here for an excellent, detailed explanation of what each package offers, courtesy of freelanguage.org.

Rosetta Stone itself is offering a $100 off deal, but you can also check out the group buy from the Homeschool Buyer's Co-op.

Merry CouldaShouldaWoulda!

2008-12-24T01:00:00.002-06:00

Tis the night before Christmas and all through the house
Not a creature is stirring 'cept the beep of a mouse
The children are nestled before the tv
While the new Call of Duty plays on the screen.

As I in my kerchief and DH in his cap
Had just settled our brains for a long winter's nap.
When what to my wondering eyes should appear
But a giant to-do list that reached to me ear!
Now Cookies! Now Wrapping!
Now Meatballs and Groceries!
On Christmas cards, pictures, please blur out the nose rings!

With a look at the list and a sigh of despair
I did all I could do at this time of the year.
Invite the guests early, tell them to bring booze,
for a calm Christmas Eve and an long Christmas snooze.

And I heard Santa say as the brick wall he topped,
"Merry Christmas to all! Perfect next year...(hic) or not!"

Great Stuff on Giftedness from EdWeek (Finally)

2008-11-20T20:01:00.004-06:00

Education Week, "The Nation's Education Newspaper," is generally pretty quiet on things gifted, but this week they hosted a live chat with the authors of The Development of Giftedness and Talent Across the Lifespan, a forthcoming book in which they argue that giftedness is not static, nor is it something you are born with, but rather, like talent in sports or the arts, specific abilities, varying by person, which need to be nurtured. (The "live chat" link takes you to the transcript of the live chat. Click the title to order the book.)

(EdWeek keeps insisting that the book says "Giftedness can be taught," which is not at all what the authors are getting at. "[Author] Rena F. Subotnik:
We are arguing that giftedness can be developed rather than taught. Development of giftedness in a domain comes from high quality instruction and curriculum (like the work of those you mention above), mentoring in how to be successful, challenging peers, and personal motivation. The work of Benjamin Bloom in Developing Talent in Young People is very relevant here. He and his colleagues reported on the development of talent in athletics, arts, and academic domains. In each case, three types of teachers were most effective at different stages. In the first stage, the teacher helps students to fall in love with the topic or area. In the second stage the teacher provides advanced skills and knowledge and shares the values associated with that field. In the third stage individuals get a kind of coaching to help them refine their individual voice and contribution. In this way giftedness is "taught" or developed.")

To go along with the live chat, Donalyn Miller, who blogs as The Book Whisperer, and Tamara J. Fisher, who writes Unwrapping the Gifted, also have gifted-themed blogs this week. (Admittedly, Tamara's is always gifted-themed.) Read Donalyn's Lowering the Bar and Tamara's "The Evolving Definition of Giftedness."

Have you ever seen?

2008-11-12T12:58:00.003-06:00

This is our spontaneous language arts lesson for today:
Have you ever seen...

A salad dressing?
A front porch swing?
The water ski?
A rubber band?
A Belgian waffle?
A horse fly?
Achilles heal?
A hole punch?
A gun range?
A fruit fly?
A baseball bat?
A copper dish?
A cigarette butt?
An ocean wave?
A killer wail?

Halloween at Our House

2008-11-01T10:43:00.002-05:00

I can't remember the last time my kids trick-or-treated in a costume that didn't need to be explained. (Actually, that's not true. Two years ago, Wolfie went as a knight Crusader.) This year we had two kinds of Grim Reapers--the Pink Reaper and the Wizard Reaper. Happy Halloween!

Oceanography - Hard to Study in the Midwest

2008-10-13T20:28:00.002-05:00

Hard, but not impossible. Thanks to Julie Knapp at The Homeschool Diner for this great resource: the lab manual for Oceanography 1L at City College of San Francisco! Granted we can't do all the experiments, but I think Wolfie will be able to do enough to justify earning a full credit of science for the year.

WoW: Blinded with Science

2008-10-07T12:31:00.003-05:00

In his article How Videogames Blind Us With Science (yes, I stole his title), Wired Magazine contributor Clive Thompson discusses research by Constance Steinkuehler and Sean Duncan at the University of Wisconsin-Madison into the flow of conversation between World of Warcraft (WoW) players and how it may contribute to learning. He writes:

"What did they find? Only a minority of the postings were "banter" or idle chat. In contrast, a majority -- 86 percent -- were aimed specifically at analyzing the hidden ruleset of games.

More than half the gamers used "systems-based reasoning" -- analyzing the game as a complex, dynamic system. And one-tenth actually constructed specific models to explain the behavior of a monster or situation; they would often use their model to generate predictions. Meanwhile, one-quarter of the commentors would build on someone else's previous argument, and another quarter would issue rebuttals of previous arguments and models.

These are all hallmarks of scientific thought. Indeed, the conversations often had the precise flow of a scientific salon, or even a journal series: Someone would pose a question -- like what sort of potions a high-class priest ought to carry around, or how to defeat a particular monster -- and another would post a reply, offering data and facts gathered from their own observations. Others would jump into the fray, disputing the theory, refining it, offering other facts. Eventually, once everyone was convinced the theory was supported by the data, the discussion would peter out. ...

"At one point, Steinkuehler met up with one of the kids who'd built [an] Excel model to crack the boss. "Do you realize that what you're doing is the essence of science?" she asked.

He smiled at her. "Dude, I'm not doing science," he replied. "I'm just cheating the game!"

For what it's worth, Wolfie and Xavier believe it was cheating as well.

A Review of the Homeschooling Literature

2008-10-06T11:10:00.002-05:00

From a friend on the Homeschooling Mensans list:

"A review of the literature on homeschooling, with excepted comments from Scholastic Achievement and Demographic Characteristics of Home School Students in 1998, by Lawrence M. Rudner, University of Maryland, College Park; http://www.economic expert.com/3a/Homeschooling.html; and Home-Education: Aims, Practices and Outcomes by Paula Rothermel, University of Durham, 2002.

Please note that these are direct quotes from the above sources and seem to represent an overwhelmingly positive view. Does anyone know of any research to the contrary?

During the last 20 years, the general public's familiarity with home schooling has evolved from a level of almost complete ignorance to one of widespread, if largely uninformed, awareness.

Research indicates that home schooled children in the U.S. and Canada regularly outperform their peers in both public and private schools. The international evidence on the academic performance of home schooled students is equally encouraging.

In the United States, at every grade level, home schooled students' average score placed between the 82nd and the 92nd percentile in reading and reached the 85th percentile in math. Overall, test scores for home schoolers placed between the 75th and 85th percentiles. In contrast, public school students scored at the 50th percentile, while private school students' scores ranged from the 65th to the 75th percentile.

Research also suggests that home schooled students are more sociable than their school peers, as well as more independent of peer values as they grow older.

Home schooling parents have above average levels of education. Among American parents who home school, 81 percent have studied beyond high school compared with 63 percent of parents nationwide. Interestingly, having at least one parent who is a certified teacher has no significant effect on the achievement levels of home schooled students.

A comparison of home schooled students' performance in a highly-regulated, moderately regulated, and unregulated American jurisdictions found no statistical difference. In other words, the degree of government regulation has no significant effect on the academic performance of home schooled children.

Even with our conservative approach, the achievement levels of the home school students in this study are exceptional. Within each grade level and each skill area, the median scores for home school students fell between the 70th and 80th percentile of students nationwide and between the 60th and 70th percentile of Catholic/Private school students. For younger students, this is a one year lead. By the time home school students are in 8th grade, they are four years ahead of their public/private school counterparts.

Studies show that teachers' credentials do not correlate with tested outcomes. In the U.S. in 1999, homeschoolers scored about 27 percent higher than public-schooled children on refereed nationally-normed tests. Research in the UK from Durham University by Paula Rothermel also shows that the parent's own education level did not correlate with outcomes for their home educated children.

Gifted children often stand a very good chance of being enriched through a home-education program. In the atmosphere without as much pressure, the child will often pursue their own academic studies, in their free time. their encouraged interest may lead them to surpass their parent's knowledge of the subject by the time they are 11 or 12. While clubs and other groups for homeschooled students are often difficult to find, they may talk to others with similar interests through the internet, homeschooling groups and even public-school clubs and groups.

In the U.S., opponents to homeschooling must overcome a basic legal problem. The U.S. Supreme Court (Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205 (1972)) placed the responsibility for this education on parents, and further defined the proper governmental goal for education as "literacy and self-sufficiency," that is, an educated, not a socialized child was recognized as the essential goal for the U.S.'s democratic government. This official decision removed the responsibility for children's educations from public officials, and placed it with the children's guardians. This crucial legal test occurred during an attempt to sue public school officials for malpractice, in a case in which illiterates graduated from a public high school. The decision was seen to favor the defendants, the public officials accused of malpractice, but necessarily gives parents broad rights to choose their children's educations.

This is the first UK study involving home-educated children and their families, using diverse methodologies, broad aims and large sample. The results show that 64% of the home-educated Reception (aka kindergarten)-aged children scored over 75% on their PIPS Baseline Assessments as opposed to 5.1% of children nationally. The National Literacy Project assessment results reveal that 80.4% of the home-educated children scored within the top 16% band (of a normal distribution bell curve), whilst 77.4% of the PIPS Year 2 home-educated cohort scored similarly. Results from the psychosocial instruments confirm the home-educated children were socially adept and without behavioural problems.

The home-educated children demonstrated high levels of attainment and good social skills.

Financial Bailout and How a Bill Becomes a Law

2008-10-06T08:43:00.003-05:00

From a fellow homeschooler on the Homeschool Diner Conversations List:
I read this this morning and noted a few things. Off the wall things are buried throughout this. (see below)

This is LOADED with info for a Civics class!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Beware! It's 451 pages, double spaced and line numbered, it's in PDF form:

http://senateconservatives.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/ayo08c32_xml.pdf

You may want to scroll to the following pages:

1. Definition of Senior Executive Officer and the term golden parachute - page 32-33 start with line 12 on.

2. de minimis - I had to look that up. It means so small or minimal in difference that it does not matter or the law does not take it into consideration. That's on page 39 starting on line 4. Interesting.

4. Page 40 starts with the $$ talk, specifically how much, who and how often.

5. Treatment of Homeowners' Rights - page 60 starting line 22

6. Increase in Statutory limit on the public debt - page 68 line 9..........WOW what a number!!!!!!

7. A study on finding out how this happened - page 89 line 10

8. Golden Parachute Rule - page 109 line 3

9. Energy Improvement and Extension Act - page 113 line 11

10. Credit for residential energy efficient property - page 133 line 10 (in the 190 they start talking about new electric cars)

11. Bike commuters - page 205 line 1

12. Energy Efficient Home Credit - page 218 line 5

13. 7 year cost recovery period for motorsports racing track facility page 290 line 1

14. Perm. authority disclosure of info relating to terrorist activities page 297 line 1

15. Child Tax Credit - page 297 line 14

16. Provisions related to film and tv productions - page 298 line 6

17. Wooden Arrows - page 300 line 20

18. Farming business machinery & equipment treated as 5 yr. property -page 307 line 4

19. Mental health and substance abuse - Begins on page 310 line 8 ........this ends at the top of page 344

20. Rural schools and community self-determination program - page 344 line 5

There are other earmarks such as; mine rescue, Indian employment credit, RR track maintenance, tax incentives for investments in D.C., wool, Exxon Valdez litigation, states and counties with federal land, disaster properties from Katrina and Ike.

Please remember this still has to pass in the House.

Feel free to share with others.

Bev
mazurowski@yahoo. com

Tomorrow is National Talk Like a Pirate Day!

2008-09-18T13:20:00.003-05:00

Aye, Mateys, it's that time of year again! Here are some Pirate Myths from Wired Magazine to peruse while you're quaffin' yer grog!

What's So Great About Preschool?

2008-09-10T01:37:00.002-05:00

Well, for one thing, Mom has a chance to run errands or take a nap without being interrupted (assuming there are no younger siblings). On the other hand, there are those that suggest that for our children's (particularly our sons') best intellectual, physical and social development, they should stay home and play with Mom as long as possible.

Newsweek: "Why Are School-Aged Boys Struggling?"

WSJ: "Protect Our Kids From Preschool"

I generally think the anti-intellectual kindergarten movement is one that doesn't necessarily apply to gifted kids--like the milestones lists don't apply--but I just thought I'd throw it out there...

Is Your Child Gifted?

2008-08-29T17:07:00.002-05:00

Parenting Magazine is running a cover article this month called Is Your Child Gifted? Author Paula Spencer dispels the myth that all kids are gifted and even that all kids who walk and talk early are gifted.

""Gifted" has become one of the most tossed-about words in the parenting lexicon. Unfortunately -- sorry, but let's get this out of the way right up front -- it's also one of the most misused. The vast majority of children are not gifted. Only 2 to 5 percent of kids fit the bill, by various estimates. Of those, only one in 100 is considered highly gifted. Prodigies (those wunderkinds who read at 2 and go to college at 10) are rarer still -- like one to two in a million. And despite the boom in infant-stimulation techniques, educational DVDs, learning toys, and enrichment classes, those numbers haven't been increasing. You can't build giftedness; it's mostly built in. ..."

Their Ask Dr. Sears column also touches on gifted toddlers. Although he begins by writing "all kids are gifted," he writes: "...Homeschooling a preschooler can actually be better for a gifted child for a few reasons: First, you know your child. You are the perfect student-teacher match. You know what holds her attention and what doesn't. Second, for toddlers and preschoolers, learning is mood-dependent. There are times they need to rest, and times they need to be stimulated. At home, you can follow your child's natural rhythms instead of requiring her to stick to a pre-set schedule.

In her excellent book, Top of the Class, author Arline Bronzaft discusses research on academic high achievers (AHAs), gifted children who went on to achieve academic success. The number one key to nurturing an AHA is to instill a love of learning early on, and you can do that better at home. Since you can easily match your teaching skills with your child's learning skills, you are more likely to instill a love of learning in her, and you're more likely to focus on the journey rather than the outcome. Homeschooling moms are also apt to place more emphasis on creativity and enjoying learning than on a grade. ..."

They're great articles. I highly recommend you check them out, print them out, pass them out, etc. etc. ;-)

Fantastic Fysics Fun

2008-08-26T21:47:00.002-05:00

Just wanted to share this online game/puzzle with you since Wolfie has been playing it non-stop for the last five hours (seriously). Fantastic Contraption asks players to build a machine that will move a red ball from the left side of the screen to the goal on the right using directional wheels, wooden poles and caterpillar tracks, among other things. You can save your contraptions and look at others' contraptions for ideas. Way cool!

Leveling the Playing Field

2008-08-26T12:42:00.003-05:00

Lest there be any confusion, my thesis is this: There is no level playing field. And their shouldn't be.

This is America. We're a meritocracy, a land of individuals governed by capitalism. All this means that to the victor go the spoils. We're workers, not "wait for someone to level the playing field for me" victims. At least we shouldn't be. But I'm afraid that we're raising a generation of "nobody tries hard, everybody wins" couch potatoes.

It is not okay to hold a competition in which everybody wins. What is the point of that? "The people who don't win might get their feelings hurt," some say. And they're right. And getting their feelings hurt might spur them to try harder next time. If everybody wins, what's the point of trying? Where's the incentive to spend three weeks (or months!) collecting data for the science fair, when the kid who put his display together two hours ahead of time gets the same recognition? What's the point of judging said science fair and awarding scores but not telling anyone who got the best score? Why bother holding a science fair at all?

It is not okay to brand entire groups of people as "physically-challenged." If a kid has cerebral palsy, he has cerebral palsy. Big deal. He may also speak fluent French, love baseball and kick ass at Halo III. Does this mean physically-challenged kids speak French and love baseball, etc.? No. John has that constellation of traits. Fred may be an above-the-knee amputee, a competitive swimmer and collect rocks. Nothing in common with John but his gender. So where do we get off calling them both "physically-challenged?" It's completely meaningless in terms of describing anyone but the people it does not describe, that is, those of us who are able-bodied. But then again, I have about as much in common with the able-bodied teenaged girl next door as John and Fred do. "Gets around on two legs vs gets around on less than two legs" Now there's a useful distinction!

Here's another Newspeak distinction for you: "African-American." Surprising enough, Barack Obama, with his African father and American mother, does not call himself "African-American." According to the Wall Street Journal, American citizens born in Africa do not refer to themselves as "African-American." Actress Gloria Reubens once corrected a reporter who referred to her as "African-American." Apparently Ms. Reubens' heritage is actually Jamaican-Canadian.

I understand the reasons behind the change from Black to African-American. Black was considered a perjorative. Surprisingly enough, after twenty years, African-American seems to have become a perjorative, too, at least for more recent immigrants. (ref: WSJ) But this is not my point. My point is, that the term African-American is meaningless. I had a reading group of fifth-grade boys several years ago, which included one African-American boy. We were reading a story about prejudice against Americans of Japanese descent in Hawaii at the time of Pearl Harbor, so we got into a discussion about heritage. Every single white boy at that table knew which Western European country or countries his ancestors had come from, some of them down to the 1/8 and 1/16th.

When I asked my Black student (who had an Arab first name and a Scottish last name) where his family was from, he said, puzzled, "I'm African-American." I nodded and asked him if he knew where his last name had come from, if he had a Scottish grandfather or great-grandfather or if he knew how long his family had been in the country. He repeated, "I'm African-American" as if that was all that was worth knowing. Sure his heritage has got to be an intriguing a puzzle as everyone else's, even if it only goes back to slavery times. Why should he be robbed of his individual heritage by being lumped in with all the other African-Americans?

Here's my point--lumping people into giant PC categories robs them of their individuality for the sake of "not hurting anyone's feelings." For the last twenty years, schools have been "celebrating diversity" by refusing to treat people as individuals, with their own strengths and weaknesses, likes and dislikes. What they should be doing is celebrating individuals, and teaching them according to their needs. Instead of leveling the playing field, we need to change it altogether. I'm imagining a Venn diagram where playing fields called "math," "science," "World of Warcraft," "literature" and "football" can all stretch out from a center called "Pam." To really do this, we need to be open-minded and flexible in terms of time and space.

Yes, when there is competition, some will do better than others. The others might get their feelings hurt. Those hurt feelings might spur them on to greatness, or it might encourage them to find something else they love enough to work on. Our kids will not learn the value of hard work unless we let them find something worth working hard on. And that's should be our schools' mission.

If You're Planning to Leave the House, Vaccinate!

2008-08-21T23:41:00.003-05:00

From Yahoo Health via AP: Jump in US Measles Cases Linked to Vaccine Fears

"ATLANTA - Measles cases in the U.S. are at the highest level in more than a decade, with nearly half of those involving children whose parents rejected vaccination, health officials reported Thursday.

Worried doctors are troubled by the trend fueled by unfounded fears that vaccines may cause autism. The number of cases is still small, just 131, but that's only for the first seven months of the year. There were only 42 cases for all of last year. ... {Ed note: That's more than three times the number of cases in only seven months]

"In Washington state, an outbreak was traced to a church conference, including 16 school-aged children who were not vaccinated. Eleven of those kids were home schooled and not subject to vaccination rules in public schools. It's unclear why the parents rejected the vaccine.

The Illinois outbreak — triggered by a teenager who had traveled to Italy — included 25 home-schooled children, according to the CDC report.

The nation once routinely saw hundreds of thousands of measles cases each year, and hundreds of deaths. But immunization campaigns were credited with dramatically reducing the numbers. The last time health officials saw this many cases was 1997, when 138 were reported."

I've said it before and I'll say it again: vaccinate your children! Mine have all their shots, not because they attended school but because we value their lives. These diseases kill children--the vaccinations keep children alive. They do not cause autism and they really work. Measles is no longer endemic to the US because we Gen-Xers were thoroughly vaccinated.

But clearly measles has not disappeared from the face of the planet. Foreigners immigrate or just come for vacation from places where measles (or mumps or diphtheria or polio or TB) is still a threat. US tourists visit these areas and return home unknowingly infected. Then they handle produce at your local grocery store and you or your child is the next one to pick up that piece of fruit. Or a family comes home from a mission trip and the 6yo comes to church with what they think is a little cold. Either one of these innocent scenarios could lead to serious illness or death for your child if you allow rumor and well-meaning ignorance to keep them unprotected. Get the info. After all, what's a little jab between friends, eh?

The Homeschooling Memorial

2008-08-18T22:08:00.003-05:00

Quote posted on New Mexico Homeschool Community (NMHSC) website:

Did you know that we have our own homeschooling memorial???- ---

Mount Rushmore, the world's largest stone monument, is a tribute to four Presidents - George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt - who stood for the most honorable principles and highest ideals of America. Besides being great Presidents, what does each of these men have in common? As children, none of them had any regular, formal schooling. They were all self-educated and learned at home! ~Unknown

Here's another one (that isn't exactly true):

"Home schooling is a very old way of doing things. If you look at any of the bills in your wallet or the coins in your pocket, they all have a picture of a homeschooler on them." ~William Lloyd

While I think it's true all the bills have homeschoolers on them, FDR was only homeschooled through the age of 14, and Eisenhower and JFK were not homeschooled at all. In the scheme of things, though, these three are very recent presidents, so I think the argument remains valid.

Ed Week Profiles a Homeschooling Gamer--Positively!

2008-08-04T23:28:00.002-05:00

I don't know if this is a sign of the apocalypse or not, but Education Week, which bills itself as the "American Education News Site of Record," has just published an article about Blake Peebles, a 16yo homeschooler who left high school to become a professional gamer. Although they referred to him as "home tutored" rather than home schooled, the article actually pays little attention to his education:

"Mike and Hunter [Blake's parents] do not believe in one-size-fits-all parenting.

That is not to say that it was an easy decision for them to let Blake leave school last September. They would have preferred that he stay in high school with his brother. But he bugged them until they let him quit.

"We couldn't take the complaining anymore," says Hunter. "He always told me that he thought school was a waste of time."

Blake never gravitated toward sports or drama or any of the other traditional school-based activities. Just gaming.

So they made a deal. Blake could leave school but would have to be tutored at home. In one respect, the arrangement is similar to what parents of gifted child athletes and actors have done for years."

I'm not sure how this fits into Education Week's mandate as "education news site of record" but I think it's a breath of fresh air.

A Guy Walks into a Bar and Says, "Ouch!"

2008-08-04T23:23:00.003-05:00

Stop me if you've heard this one: the world's oldest recorded joke has been traced back to 1900 BC, ...and it's a fart joke. I know, I know, the last time you heard that one, you laughed so hard you fell off your dinosaur.

The Last Lecture

2008-07-25T12:49:00.002-05:00

Many of you have probably already heard or read The Last Lecture, given by Carnegie Mellon University professor Randy Pausch. Dr. Pausch gave this lecture last September shortly after being given 3-6 months to live due to incurable pancreatic cancer. Randy Pausch died this morning, but not before leaving the world with some of the best advice you'll ever hear. Our hearts go out to Dr. Pausch's family, friends and colleagues on this difficult morning.

Some Bona Fide Wisdom from the Voice of Ratatouille

2008-07-22T20:45:00.003-05:00

You may only know him as the voice of a French rat or as Randy Daytona's first comeback opponent in Balls of Fury, but Patton Oswalt gave the commencement speech at his alma mater this last June and really told it like it is.

"And I remember, so clearly, driving home from that dinner, how lucky I felt to have met someone who affirmed what I was already planning to do after high school. I was going to roam and blitz and blaze my way all over the planet.

Anywhere but here. Anywhere but Northern Virginia. NoVa. You know what a “nova” is? It’s when a white dwarf star gobbles up so much hydrogen from a neighboring star it causes a cataclysmic nuclear explosion. A cosmic event.

Well, I was a white dwarf and I was definitely doing my share of gobbling up material. But I didn’t feel like any events in my life were cosmic. The “nova” I lived in was a rural coma sprinkled with chunks of strip mall numbness. I had two stable, loving parents, a sane and wise little brother and I was living in Sugarland Run, whose motto is, “Ooooh! A bee! Shut the door!”

I wanted to explode. I devoured books and movies and music and anything that would kick open windows to other worlds real or imagined. Sugarland Run, and Sterling and Ashburn and Northern Virginia were, for me, a sprawling batter’s box before real experience began."

Now I doubt the high schoolers get how true this is of them and how much their lives and outlooks will change in the next 15 years. I remember spending my entire senior year wanting to stand in the backyard and scream as loud as I could. Klaus is grumbling about feeling trapped, which I can certainly understand. I wish there was a way I could download this speech into his brain without his knowing I put it there. If he thought they were his own ideas, it would be great. Oh well. Make sure you click the link above to read the speech and find the advice Patton got and the lesson he learned about it.

Carnival of Homeschooling by Tiffany Blitz

2008-07-22T20:01:00.002-05:00

Just wanted to mention that this week's Carnival of Homeschooling is live at Life on the Road. Stop by to learn about homeschooling, Treasure Island and the Twelve Labors of Hercules!

Asynchrony: The Teacher's Bane

2008-07-22T14:31:00.003-05:00

Wouldn't it be nice if kids really did mature in lockstep with each other? Then all those graded curricula and "What your Nth Grader Needs to Know" would make sense. Unfortunately, kids, particularly gifted kids, don't even mature evenly within themselves, much less in step with their peers. This is true for neuro-typical (NT) kids, too, but I think gifted kids have it particularly bad.

Maybe I just feel this way because I've got two who are twice-exceptional (2e). Klaus is going in for another round of neuropsychological testing tomorrow morning because we (his grownups) all agree there's something wrong with him, but nobody seems to know what it is. ADD, anxiety, depression, bipolar, perfectionism, OCD, eye-teaming issues, all or some combination of the above? Who knows?

Xavier is probably back at or slightly above grade-level on math and writing, but I'm still hesitant to plunge him into a high school class for fear of setting him up to fail. Even Wolfie can comprehend and write at an upper high school/early college level but the upper high school work requirements, in terms of what is due on a weekly basis, are a huge burden for him.

So, what to do when the ability to comprehend far outstrips the ability to produce? If we pour as much into the little brain as it can hold but don't expect commensurate product, is that not training them to do as little as necessary to get by? Just what is the cosmic point of being able to learn more and faster than you can produce?

Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog

2008-07-16T12:04:00.002-05:00

So, something good came out of the writer's strike. While waiting for the contract to be settled, writer Joss Whedon (of Buffy the Vampire Slayer fame) decided to work on a side project that would both keep him busy and show that there is money to be made off original internet content. (The writer's strike was about appropriate compensation for original internet content. The bosses swore there was no way to determine how money was to be made on the internet, citing YouTube as an example.)

Anyway, Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog is a three act, fully produced half hour show starring Neil Patrick Harris as Dr. Evil. The songs are singable, the acting and directing is professional and the writing is clever--just as we'd expect from Joss and his Mutant Enemy crew. The show is being uploaded in three acts over the course of this week. Eventually it will be available for purchase through iTunes and direct-to-DVD. Click on the link to check it out!

Xavier's Invention

2008-07-15T22:43:00.003-05:00

This is Xavier modelling his Happy Place, the final project for his invention unit for science this year. Fully padded and reinforced to protect from those annoying blows to the head, "My Happy Place" allows younger siblings to finally live and play video games in peace by broadcasting the teen-annoying "Mosquito noise". The photo shows how effective "My Happy Place" is against both young and old teens!

Too bad it doesn't really work.

Just Wanted to Share

2008-07-15T22:34:00.003-05:00

Klaus on the cover of "International Pirate"
Okay, not really. But if there was an International Pirate magazine, he'd be a great cover model, no?

Klaus Has a Very High Pain Tolerance

2008-07-15T21:13:00.003-05:00

Klaus has managed to cause a large bruise and microfractures of the left femur doing 360s on the trampoline. He's been limping for the last month and finally got an MRI last week. Oy. Seems he should have been taken to the ER and been on crutches since he fell. Unfortunately, he's just gotten a job for next summer doing Medieval combat demonstrations (an extension of the boffing he's been doing all year) at the Renaissance Faire here and starts combat training in October. If he's messed up his knee, his career as a knight will be short-lived.

Advice for Newbie Gifted Homeschoolers

2008-07-10T23:01:00.004-05:00

In a comment on yesterday's post, Angela wrote "I've done lots of surfing today in my gifted education research. I have a five year old son I plan on homeschool fulltime this fall--reluctantly. I am still in the mourning-the-death-of-my-career stage right now. :) But he has made it clear that traditional education is not for him. I am just overwhelmed at how to construct a gifted curriculum for him. If you have any words of wisdom you would like to bestow on a newbie, I would be so happy and grateful. Thank you!"

So here's my best advice for gifted homeschoolers:

1. Realize you're not perfect. Neither are "trained" teachers.

I've got a degree in elementary education, which has helped me hardly at all in homeschooling my kids. You are your children's first and best teacher. You've already taught him how to talk, how to walk, how to read and how to multiply. You can do the rest of it, too, or find someone who can. Educators know that "best practices" include reaching the child at his own level and moving at his own pace. Homeschoolers do this automatically.

2. Curriculum is over-rated

You don't need to spend loads of money on prepackaged curriculum and you don't need to replicate school at home. Especially with little kids, a library card and museum membership is really all you need. A Netflix membership is also helpful--we've used lots of videos and recorded History Channel and Discover Channel shows to follow our interests.

If you follow your child's interests--reading books and watching shows and maybe visiting a local museum exhibit--you will find yourself teaching "classes" in very unusual things. For example, Wolfie spent more than 60 hours his 7th grade year reading books about falconry, watching "Combat" and documentaries about the Crusades on the History Channel and researching catapults and trebuchets. As a homeschooler, we can put that together as a semester of "Medieval Weapons and Warfare," a class you would never find in a regular middle school.

Some beginning homeschoolers prefer to start with prepackaged curriculum. I'd suggest that you get a copy of E. D. Hirsch's "What Your 1st Grader Needs to Know". It will give you an idea what an excellent first grade would cover and I promise it will put your mind at rest about him missing out on anything. These books are available for each grade from preschool through 6th.

3. Nothing is Set in Stone

Deciding to homeschool this year does not mean you have to homeschool forever. Gifted kids and their asynchronies need different kinds of learning at different points in their lives. There may come a time when he wants to go to school to see what it's like. You may find a homeschool co-op that offers group activities one day a week--a day when you can concentrate on painting. I know I got a lot more writing done when I had only the three hours of preschool to myself. The short duration concentrates the mind wonderfully. ;-)

There are still days when I have to remind myself that the boys will only be middle schoolers once. They need me now and I can finish my novel once they're out of the house. But please keep in mind that homeschooling does not take as long as public schooling. You don't need to sit at a table for six hours a day. (In fact, please don't!) You can cover the K-2 curriculum in about 90 minutes a day of direct teaching. If he's got Legos to play or a backyard to explore or videos to watch, that can be your painting time.

4. Homeschooling is a lifestyle, not an educational choice

You can't only homeschool the oldest child. The others are watching. I tried this for a year with Klaus. By the end of that year, we were planning homeschool for all three of them. Wolfie and Xavier insisted. Now I have the two younger ones at home and we all have school together, for the most part. We also have the most fun when we have school together, whether that's reading aloud, which we do every morning, or doing vocabulary workbooks. You will never do a science experiment with only one of them. You will never do an art project with only one of them. Gardening and taking vacations and housekeeping and cooking and playing with the baby (remember home ec?) are all educational.

Keep in mind that if your oldest is gifted, the other two probably are, too. Maybe not to the same extent--Klaus is at a higher level of giftedness than his brothers--but they're just as poor a fit for a conventional classroom. Adaptations you make for your oldest will probably fit the others, too.

5. Find a support group

The internet is great for this. I suggest Mensa's Bright Kids for general questions about raising gifted children and the Homeschooling Mensans Yahoo group for questions specific to homeschooling gifted kids. Neither list requires you to be a member of Mensa. It's great to have a group of other parents in the same situation to ask questions of, particularly when you need a resource in marine biology for a 6yo or want to talk about early college options. ;-)

I Am What I Am

2008-07-10T12:03:00.000-05:00

Here is a great article about homeschooling a twice exceptional child:

I Am What I Am by Anne Ohman

"His note is taped to my mirror as a daily reminder of his unique contribution to our lives, to our universe. In handwriting and spelling that a teacher would surely frown upon, it reads, “I AM WAHT I AM.” Five words. Five short, simple words. But what a message. What a huge, wonderful, powerful concept for an eight-year-old boy to possess..."

The Homeschool Survey

2008-06-25T10:42:00.002-05:00

Cherish over at Faraday's Cage is where you put Schrödinger's Cat is taking an informal survey of homeschoolers and the stereotypes that don't fit them. Here are my answers, for the record:

Why do you homeschool?
I'd been threatening to homeschool Klaus since he was a toddler, but with the Irish twins (Wolfie and Xavier) in diapers, DH in residency and my own lack of self-confidence, I sent him to school. I spent ten years trying to get adequate accomodations for Klaus and for his brothers and finally I was mad as hell and I just couldn't take it anymore!

What technique or curriculum do you use? Do your kids work above or below grade level (or both!)?
We use a virtual charter school because DH like the objective accountability. He thinks I'm too laissez-faire (and he's mostly right). Two of the boys are two or more years above grade level and always have been. Xavier is below, at and above level, depending on the subject. He's catching up to grade level now that we've been homeschooling for two years. I think by the end of next year, he should be advanced in all subjects.

What is your educational level? Do you feel this has an effect on your teaching (both limits and abilities)?
I have a Bachelor's in Elementary Education. I think it has helped me quite a bit in terms of dealing with their learning differences and in realizing there are other ways to teach. I didn't have any training in gifted, though, and I really needed that!

What does your daily schedule look like?
Um, schedule.... What's that again? Oh, right. We get up at nine and I read outloud for an hour. Reading books are a mixture of classics and young adult. (For example, our last two books this year were Swine Not? by Jimmy Buffet and Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck.) Then Xavier goes for a 30 minute walk and Wolfie sits down to work on something. They chose what they want to work on (and DON'T want to work on). Around 1:30 we watch an hour of educational TV, then we're done for the day. Wednesdays they take music lessons.

Are your kids always polite and ready to learn? (*snicker*) Do the kids (or you!) get frustrated?
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! You mean like the conversation I had at 9:30 this morning? "I'm done with geometry!"
"Great! That leaves you time to work on some German or social studies."
Sigh. "I was going to..." Motions toward World of Warcraft computer.
"You can do that for awhile if you want to take a break. But you need to finish social studies in order to be finished with this school year. And you have to finish German 1 before you can take German 2 at the high school in the fall."
Glare.
"Once you finish this stuff you're done with school for the rest of the summer."
Glare. Gets up from the table.
"And Dad said someone needs to mow the lawn today!"

How has this affected your parenting?
I spend a lot less time grilling them about what happened in school that day, what their grades are, and who their friends are. I spend much less time chasing down teachers to find out what's going on in the classroom. And, best of all, we're free to take days off when we need them, not when the school district says we can. So we're able to take advantage of quality time and quantity time.

How much free time do they have? What do they do during their free time? What hobbies do they have?
They have a lot of free time. Most of it is spent playing video games or boffing (it doesn't mean what you think it means). They're also active in 4H and take music lessons. This summer Wolfie's going to video game camp for a week and Xavier is spending a week at a science and technology day camp (through 4H) and spending another week at overnight band camp.

What difficulties and challenges do you have with homeschooling? What makes homeschooling enjoyable?
I think the biggest challenge is that my kids and I are process- rather than product-oriented. We learn stuff, but we don't particularly enjoy proving it through testing, writing reports or making projects. What makes homeschooling enjoyable is doing all the stuff we love to do--take field trips, watch documentaries, read together, try experiments--and count it as learning (because it is). When the boys were in public school, we were all too exhausted to try this kind of after-schooling.

How do you get involved in the community? When do you have opportunities to interact with public or privately schooled children? Would you like more of these opportunities? How can they be created?
We’re very active in 4H. Both Wolfie and Xavier are club officers and I’m the music and drama director for the club. We participate in community service through 4H. Xavier plays in a middle school band for private and homeschoolers. This will be his third year in band. Wolfie participated in the homeschool Track and Field Day this spring. The boys are planning to create a city-wide boffing league or club (haven’t nailed down the particulars for that yet). We also participate in the Western Wisconsin Young Mensa Club outings.

Personally, I’d rather be a little less active outside the house and a little more productive on the academic side of things. We’ve had to nix Scouts and Parks and Rec classes and limit summer camps to one a piece (Xavier’s 4H camp is free, so he got around that rule). I don’t think we’ll be participating in the homeschool classes that take place during the school year, either. We’d lose a whole school day to extracurriculars (choir, handbell choir and gym).

What is your least favorite homeschool stereotype? :-)
Let’s see, “All homeschoolers are fundamentalist Christian.” No, we don’t go to church and we don't homeschool out of fear of corruption, school violence, peer pressure, drugs and alcohol, take your pick. We don’t homeschool out of fear, period.

“Homeschooled kids are locked in the house all day memorizing facts for (insert your favorite National Bee here).” If only they knew. Homeschooled kids are kids first (maybe more kid-like than the public school kids). Some people seem to think they’re robots.

My most recent question was “If your kids are homeschooled, will they go to … college?” Duh. Makes me wonder what “they” think happens to homeschooled kids once they graduate from high school. Do they disappear? Maybe we just leave them in the basement until they’re ready to reproduce?

But my least favorite homeschool stereotype is: “I could never do that.” I work with gifted kids, kids who clearly could soar with the one-on-one attention that homeschoolers get. But the parents are so worn out with their preschoolers’ questions, they assume they couldn’t possibly homeschool. (BTDT) Not true!

Or they assume the teachers at school know more about gifted kids than they do. (BTDT, too) Double not true! Most classroom teachers have had zero training in gifted. The “gifted teacher” may or may not be able to directly supervise your child’s education.

You (yes, you!) know your child best. Hook up with some homeschooling support groups, find the resources (there are thousands), let your child lead the way. Your brilliant child did not spring fully formed from the head of Zeus. He got his smarts from you. You can figure this out, I promise!

Why We Hate Homeschoolers

2008-06-18T19:35:00.004-05:00

Here's the latest article to be making the round of the homeschool boards: SONNY SCOTT:Home-schoolers threaten our cultural comfort from the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal. While I don't usually see this amount of Bible quoting in a newspaper article, otherwise I think Mr. Scott makes an interesting point.

He writes: "Why do we hate (or at least distrust) these people so much?

Methinks American middle-class people are uncomfortable around the home schooled for the same reason the alcoholic is uneasy around the teetotaler.

Their very existence represents a rejection of our values, and an indictment of our lifestyles. Those families are willing to render unto Caesar the things that Caesar’s be, but they draw the line at their children. Those of us who have put our trust in the secular state (and effectively surrendered our children to it) recognize this act of defiance as a rejection of our values, and we reject them in return. "

This is absolutely true. The biggest supporters and the most defensive reactions to our decision to pull our kids out of public school came from public school teachers. The defensive ones (and the ones in the minority) were the one who had their own kids in public school. That was one of the reasons I began to rethink our school--I found out most of the teachers with school-aged kids did not send them to public school. (Things that makes you go, "HMMMMM".)

But Scott's article touches on another point that I happened to be musing about today. "Young families must make the decision: Will junior go to day care and day school, or will mom stay home and raise him? The rationalizations begin. "A family just can't make it on one income." (Our parents did.) "It just costs so much to raise a child nowadays." (Yeah, if you buy brand-name clothing, pre-prepared food, join every club and activity, and spend half the cost of a house on the daughter’s wedding, it does.) And so, the decision is made. We give up the bulk of our waking hours with our children, as well as the formation of their minds, philosophies, and attitudes, to strangers. We compensate by getting a boat to take them to the river, a van to carry them to Little League, a 2,800-square-foot house, an ATV, a zero-turn Cub Cadet, and a fund to finance a brand-name college education. And most significantly, we claim “our right” to pursue a career for our own "self-fulfillment."

Many people (including my mother) thinks I have the "luxury" to stay home because DH is a physician. And that's true. I can't tell you how grateful I am that I don't have to worry (anymore) about where my next meal is coming from and whether the child support check will come in time to pay the mortgage. I've been poor and it sucks.

But we also have made conscious decisions throughout our married life to live below our means. At the end of medical school, DH was torn between being a dermatologist and being a surgeon. As a surgeon, he would have had job satisfaction and more money. And, mostly likely, a divorce, like most surgeons have. Even the minor uptick in the number of hours he worked this spring has caused a major increase in marital tension. (Luckily it's temporary.)

When we moved to our small city ten years ago, I gave up the idea of fixing up a grand Victorian house because the chaos and continuing expense would have given me satisfaction and a beautiful home and, most likely, a divorce. DH doesn't do well with chaos, although luckily for me, he's grown more tolerant over the years. I'm also in the process of choosing not to pursue every opportunity offered to me as a gifted advocate right now because I've made a commitment to DH and to the boys to be here to school them until they're ready to leave, not until *I'm* bored with it and ready to move on. That's one of the reasons this blog has become so erratic.

Yes, I have to keep repeating to myself, "They're only 13/14/17 once. There's time later for globe-trotting travel on behalf of gifted children everywhere." The idea appeals. But there will still be gifted kids in need of an advocate in five years. I hope. ;-)

Online Civics Curriculum for Middle Schoolers

2008-06-10T22:15:00.002-05:00

From today's NYT:

"...In cooperation with Georgetown University Law Center and Arizona State University, Justice O’Connor is helping develop a Web site and interactive civics curriculum for seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade students called Our Courts (www.ourcourts.org). The initial major elements of the site are scheduled to become available this fall.

Since retiring from the bench in 2006, Justice O’Connor, 78, has spoken forcefully and often about the dangers posed by efforts to politicize the judiciary. Her thoughts are well known to legal scholars. With Our Courts she hopes to foster a deeper understanding of American government among schoolchildren. The site will have two parts, an explicitly educational component for use in schools and a more entertainment-oriented module that will more closely resemble games. ..."

Ten Myths About Autism

2008-05-23T23:28:00.002-05:00

I was pointed to this link by a friend on the Bright Kids list:

"There are a lot of misconceptions about Autism floating around. Consequently, many people with Autism remain undiagnosed, countless autistics are misunderstood, and millions of dollars are donated to nonprofits who don't speak for those with Autism.

This is a troubling time for people with Autism (and I speak as one of those Autistics) because the media focuses a considerably large percentage of their Autism coverage on stories told by those who do not even have the condition. I've put together a list of only ten misconceptions that have been born out of the lack of an autistic voice in the media."

Butterfly Update

2008-05-04T15:31:00.004-05:00

We brought Laurel and Hardy in from the garage about two weeks ago (when it finally looked like spring). Laurel, who had pupated earlier, hatched on May 1, but apparently crawled out onto the mesh roof of the terrarium and fell before his wings were dry. He was still alive, but stuck on his back like a turtle with part of one wing folded behind his back. We brought him outside and sprayed him with water hoping a little moisture and a larger environment might help him. He survived until today, but now we can't find him and since he couldn't fly, we're assuming one of our neighbor birds got him. RIP Laurel.

Hardy, on the other hand, (that's him in the picture) had the good sense to pupate on an actual stick he could crawl onto to sit while his wings were drying. We left him water and half an orange and he hatched (emerged?) yesterday. Interesting because he pupated exactly two days after Laurel did and then hatched two days after Laurel did. Nice timing!

Anyway, it got down to freezing last night so we though we'd wait a day for the weather to warm up before Hardy's release. Hardy was very eager to leave the terrarium today, so we brought him outside this afternoon, let him crawl onto a stick and watched him fly away. We'll be planting more parsley when the garden goes in, so maybe we can raise some more butterflies next year!

Why School is Not Real Life, Part 3

2008-04-30T14:34:00.002-05:00

Boys in Primary Grade Classrooms
By Deborah L. Ruf, Ph.D.

A client couple recently asked me to observe their nearly five-year-old son in his small private school K-1 classroom (that's kindergarten through 1st grade). Their little boy was already tested and found to be exceptionally gifted, so the school was willing to accept him into their program before he was five years old. But he hated school and wasn't making the progress that anyone had envisioned. They told me that the teacher, a young woman in her first year of teaching, was interested in whatever recommendations I might make to "engage" this child in learning at school.

First, I watched the eight little girls vie for top spot by finishing all they were asked to do quickly and perfectly. The girls set to work immediately when the teacher told them what they were to do. I watched the four little boys slide around in their seats-or fall off completely-or get up and walk around, ask to go to the bathroom, rip holes in the paper with pencil and scissors, put their heads on their desks, and otherwise not even begin to do what they were asked to do. The boy I was asked to watch behaved in all the "wrong" ways just as his parents had been told, but absolutely the same way as the other boys in the class.

Is sitting still and doing exactly what the teacher tells you to do a prerequisite for a good life? Is there something wrong with the boys or with the schools for expecting all children to sit still and be quiet? When schools tout their "developmentally appropriate" curriculums, do they talk about allowing active young boys to explore, handle objects, run around, and use their kinesthetic, visual and spatial abilities, the primary learning modes of males? We need to ask ourselves, what is "developmentally appropriate"-and in what ways-for whom?

I am a high intelligence specialist, but when the parents of a bright boy come to me because they are considering early entrance to kindergarten (starting school before the usual age five), I almost always discourage it. The home, preschool, and kindergarten environments are almost always more boy-friendly than grade school because they are more flexible and allow more free choice for the children, much like a good Montessori school. It makes so much more sense to experience one more year at home or in preschool, go to kindergarten for another year of flexibility and playtime, and then skip 1st grade. This way, the child still goes through school somewhat faster, but needs to spend less time in the more structured grade school environment. The problem with this boy's school placement is that it was more like a 1st grade than a kindergarten classroom, and he really didn't need to be there yet.

What did I recommend? I told them he shouldn't even be in school yet. A good daycare would fit his current needs better at this point. At the most, he should go half days or only two to three days a week at this age regardless of his intellectual abilities. In another article I will tell you how much bright kids really learn-or don't learn-in school.

What to Do with the Know-It-All Kid

2008-04-30T13:13:00.000-05:00

Having had three boys and been a Webelos den mother for three years, I can tell you that *all* 9-10 year old boys think they know everything. "I know" is the standard response, even when they clearly don't and/or couldn't have known. "We're going to start work on the new X badge today." "I know."

Aargghhhh.

I can tell you that they do outgrow it, eventually. (With twelve-year-olds, the verbal tic is "Guess how awesome I am!")

It is more complicated with gifted kids who really do know more than the average 4th grader. I think starting a new activity with "What do you already know about this?" and proceeding from there is good for gifted kids. When I teach Junior Great Books, we're supposed to only ask questions that we as adults don't know the answer to. It helps to keep from steering the conversation to a foregone conclusion (which is what many classroom conversations are). Ask "Why?" and "How?" questions more often than the who/what/where variety. That way your son has to use all his prior knowledge and reasoning skills to answer the question. Making up facts can be fun (try the game Balderdash!), but they don't answer non-fact-based questions.

Also, if you're trying to teach him something (say, sewing for example) and he claims he already knows how to do something, ask him to show you. He may have actually figured out how to do smocking or hemming or something. And his way may work or it may not, but there's nothing hurt by trying it his way first.

I have a son who always thinks his way is best. He's particularly good at math and frequently has figured out his own ways to do the math problems. If his way always works, I let him do it his way. If it only works on some of the problems, some of the time, he needs to learn both ways to do the problem. We also try to analyze his method vs. the approved method to find out why one works all the time and his "easier" method is less reliable.

There's nothing wrong with telling him, "No, you don't" when he says he knows something. But if he does know it and you just teach it to him anyway, he may lose faith in your reliability. Let him try things his way first and eventually, he'll come to realize that you both value his intelligence and creativity and that it's okay for him to be wrong, which is a very important lesson, particularly for gifted kids.

On Giftedness and Sensitivity

2008-04-21T16:52:00.003-05:00

A letter from Jenna Forrest:

Dear Gifted Friends and Colleagues,

There's a one in five chance that the people we come in contact with are highly sensitive to smells, noise, vibrations and moods of others. Nobody really knows it but them, because many learn to hide their sensitivity. Or they just never bother to talk about it, because few people seem to understand what it's truly like.

But WE understand.

On April 23rd, we have a chance to get the media buzzing about giftedness and high sensitivity.-- to bring thousands more sensitive, gifted people out of the woodworks so they can begin celebrating themselves and their gifts. If a large number of copies of Help Is On Its Way - A Memoir About Growing Up Sensitive are sold on Wednesday, April 23rd national news media will be triggered that the topic of childhood sensitivity is relevant to national audiences. If you know anyone who has been waiting for the right time to buy this story of a challenging sensitive childhood, this Wednesday April 23rd, is a helpful day to do it.

To reward April 23rd book buyers, the following savings and rewards on will be offered (April 23rd only):

* a low price on Amazon.com -- $13.49
* a free registration to the OGTOC May 24th tele-seminar where the author will answer questions about the book
* a free sensitive friend match through the Find A Friend service at www.JennaForrest.com

This is the Amazon order link. http://www.shortenurl.com/1qvdj.
(Buyers will forward their April 23rd Amazon receipts to bonus@jennaforrest.com) to receive the teleconference dial in number and Find A Friend access code by email.

On Wednesday April 23rd, we can bring more sensitive, gifted kids, teens and adults out of hiding so they can awaken to their most empowered potential.

Thank you for being part of this awareness campaign!

Please help by forwarding this email to those who might be interested.

Feel free to email me if you have any questions.
jen@jennaforrest.com

With Sincere Thanks,
Jenna Forrest
Author, Help Is On Its Way - A Memoir About Growing Up Sensitive
www.jennaforrest.com
Durham, NC
919-341-7723

Here's a Fun Resource: Fact Monster

2008-04-17T14:19:00.004-05:00

A new resource from Infoplease directed at kids, Fact Monster.com is interesting, easily navigable and full of information from the presidential elections to Project Runway. A preliminary search on "dolphin" (because Xavier was blathering about how he wants a pet dolphin instead of doing his science assignment) brought up not just definitions but links about the Miami Dolphins and literary allusions to dolphins in verse (from Byron's Childe Harold), so there is enough meat there for any kid to spend time hunting down tangential alleyways, plus trivia, games and quizzes and homework help.

Ability Grouping Redux, Why It Works for ALL Kids

2008-04-16T14:25:00.003-05:00

Recent studies have shown that teaching all children at their own pace (clustering at all ability levels) was the most beneficial, not just for gifted kids. An NT kid is going to learn less if there some smartypants with his hand always up and the right answer before he/she has time to think, or there's some gifted kid in his project group that just takes over and does the project.

"According to the NAGC, the idea that keeping gifted children in the heterogeneous classroom raises all boats, so to speak, is a myth.

"Myth: Gifted Students Make Everyone Else In The Class Smarter By Providing A Role Model Or A Challenge.

Truth: Actually, average or below-average students do not look to the gifted students in the class as role models. They are more likely to model their behavior on those who have similar capabilities and are coping well in school. Seeing a student at a similar performance level succeed motivates students because it adds to their own sense of ability; watching or relying on someone who is expected to succeed does little to increase a struggling student’s sense of self- confidence. [2]Similarly, gifted students benefit from interactions with peers at similar performance levels."

For a summary of research on the topic of ability grouping, please see http://madisonunited.org/grouping.html

Some of the main points from this literature:

• Academically, high achieving or gifted and talented students achieve more and learn more when they are grouped with other high achieving students, homogeneous grouping, as opposed to placed in mixed ability groups, heterogeneous grouping, (e.g., Cornell, Delcourt, Goldberg, & Bland, 1992; Gamoran & Berends, 1987; Gentry & Owens, 1999; Gossen, 1996; Goldring, 1990; Kerckhoff, 1986; Kulik & Kulik, 1991, 1992; Rogers, 1991, 1993; Shields, 1995; Slavin, 1987).

• Ability grouping has even stronger positive effects on achievement for high-ability black and Hispanic youth (Page & Keith, 1996).

• The performance of the remaining students in heterogeneous classes does not suffer when gifted students are removed from the classroom (e.g., Kulik & Kulik, 1982; 1987; Page & Keith, 1996; Shields, 1995). In fact, some research suggests that lower achieving students actually have increased achievement when gifted students are removed from the regular classroom (e.g., Gentry & Owen; 1999; Kennedy, 1992; Natriello, Pallas, & Alexander, 1989)"

Also, check out this fascinating blog entry from Laura Vanderkam's Gifted Exchange", where she writes: "... I'm always interested to see studies that examine whether tracking has a negative effect on children assigned to the "slower" track. The answer, according to one recent study of Kenyan school children, is a resounding no. In fact, not only do students in both higher and lower tracks do better on tests than their peers in heterogeneous classrooms, the teachers are actually more likely to show up for class."

Why Isn't Gifted Considered Special Education?

2008-04-16T14:19:00.002-05:00

An email from my friend, Wanda:

"I'd like to chime in about special education. When PL 94-142 or the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (EHA) was first passed back in 1975, the discussion included the entire spectrum of exceptionalities from the profoundly disabled to the profoundly gifted. As disability advocates and Congressional members discussed the bill, they had to compromise in order to get it passed. This type of give and take occurs even today from the local level up through the federal level. You know the saying...you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.

The key Congressional players back in 1975 knew that if they included programming and funding for gifted students, the bill would have likely failed because it was too comprehensive. Opponents didn't think schools could appropriately serve both ends of the spectrum with IEPs and all the requirements, plus everyone in between.

Disability advocates were very persuasive. Vietnam had been winding down and veterans were returning home with physical disabilities like multiple amputations and were going out in public. People had to look at them. This gave the disability community, especially parents, the courage to pursue public school education for their children, since vets with disabilities were beginning to be out in public. The children didn't have to remain at home any longer.

So, Congress passed the EHA without including the gifted at the high end of the spectrum. The original intent was to go back the following year, at the least, or when the bill was up for reauthorization and include the high end of the exceptionality spectrum. As we know now, this never happened. When I worked on Capitol Hill, I was involved with writing language for the reauthorization of IDEA in 1994 (EHA is now called IDEA-Individuals with Disabilities Education Act). I worked with the offices of Senator Kennedy, Senator Harkin, and many others. We worked for years on the reauthorization language. Not once was there any request to add language which extended the range of exceptionalities to the gifted. I was not working with gifted kids back then, so I didn't bring it up either. There was not much noise made to include the high end of the exceptionality spectrum, when compared to the advocacy the disabled community was involved with.

Some states have, by choice, included GT kids in their exceptionality continuum and provide IEPs, and other individualized plans to ensure that gifted kids get their needs met. Unfortunately Wisconsin is not one of them. Adding the high end of the exceptionality spectrum to IDEA is not likely because of tight budgets at this point in time.

It is not difficult to educate all students at their level. It is not difficult to find materials or teaching strategies that work for our gifted kids. I have found that there is either ignorance that these kids even need anything more (the myths about gifted kids), or teachers simply don't want to bother. There is no excuse to not meet the needs of gifted kids. There is so much high end free materials on the internet that teachers should be able to find appropriate materials. Or, better yet, give the kids some guidance and let them find their own materials. You'd be amazed at what they find, and I don't mean inappropriate stuff.

We do have a stake in educating our most able students. We need to keep working in order to achieve it."

Even Mozart Wasn't Good at Everything

2008-04-12T11:37:00.003-05:00

I read an interesting article on the WSJ Leisure & Arts page (I won't be able to post a link for awhile, sorry.) In the article, writer Terry Teachout discusses the recently authenticated 1783 Mozart portrait by Joseph Hickel called "Man in a Red Coat". In the article, called "Who Cares What Mozart Looked Like?," Teachout argues that Shakespeare--another master we know little about--has had a much greater influence on Western culture simply because he is a phantom. We have to imagine what kind of a man he is and thus "Might the near anonymity of the genius ... make it easier for us to apply them to ourselves?"

He continues: "Alas, that doesn't work so well with Mozart. Not only do we have a pretty good idea of what he looked like, but we can read hundreds of his letters, and it is hard to square their youthful naîveté with the uncanny power of his music. One of Mozart's friends described him as a man 'in whose personal intercourse there was absolutely no other sign of unusual power of intellect and almost no trace of intellectual culture, nor of any scholarly or other higher interests.'"

This last bit is why I'm writing. Would young Mozart be considered gifted in today's culture? Perhaps--we do like our Suzuki prodigies. But what if his one uncanny power was language? What if it was the ability to trace patterns in human behavior over the course of history or to understand complicated scientific concepts in a short amount of time? Would that child be recognized as gifted? What if the child was gifted in language and history but not in anything else?

The problem is that although students are supposed to be recognized as gifted for excelling in a single subject area, most people seem to believe that in order to merit special programming a child has to be globally gifted. This is simply not true. Most gifted kids, like Mozart, are not gifted in every area of endeavor. Most are not even geniuses in one area of endeavor. However, they do have learning differences that need to be recognized and addressed.

School is Not Real Life, Part I

2008-04-09T21:36:00.000-05:00

Same-Aged Classrooms
by Deborah L. Ruf, PhD

Everyone knows that the reason we put children in school by age for their instruction is that there are centuries of excellent research that proves this is the most effective way for children to learn, right? Well, no, actually, there is no such research at all. I think it had something to do with following the Henry Ford factory efficiency model and no one ever seemed to think of questioning its validity for the schooling of generations of children around the world.

In the "olden days" of mass public education, we had the one room schoolhouse. It worked quite well. Students proceeded through the curriculum at their own pace and worked with anyone else, of any age, who was ready for the same material and production. My goal is not to give a history lesson here but to point out that we no longer do this in schools. Whether you are ready for more or not, it is not allowed because the student will get ahead and, "What will we do with her next year?"

Here is a little IQ lesson, though. Whether or not you approve of the concept of IQs or IQ testing, the research shows that IQ results correlate with all kinds of real-life outcomes. The average IQ in the US is 100 and regular standardized tests that most people take in school (or when they enter the military) all start as low as around 50 IQ and as high as about 150 IQ. Yes, there are some other kinds of tests that have different scales, but that's not what I'm talking about now.

The average IQ difference between people who choose to marry each other is 12 points. Basically, they get each other's jokes. That old magic feeling of someone thinking we're amusing! The genetic mingling of the parents genes gives them children who will usually be within 15 points higher or lower to their parental average. Same with siblings—only 15 points between them on average. Most people know that there is a bell curve shape for most human qualities, and IQ is no exception. There are more average people than there are very low or very high IQ people.

American school classrooms are set up by age. Kindergarten screening tells the schools which children are most ahead and most behind others their age. The principal stacks the kids by ability and then considers gender, behavior, ethnicity, and socio-economic background, and then deals the kids out to the four different kindergarten classrooms so that every class has the same number of each kind of kid. This means that the four most advanced children will all be in different classrooms. No one will get their jokes except maybe the teacher! The typical IQ range in such a classroom is 70 to 80 IQ points, but we are generally comfortable with and drawn to people who are within about 12 points of us. Then we tell the kids that they need to learn to get along with their "peers." But peers might not be age-mates unless they—by some stroke of luck—are fairly close to us in intellect and get our jokes, get us.

School is not a very happy time or place for many, many bright children.

School is Not Real Life, Part II

2008-04-09T19:48:00.001-05:00

Teaching to the Average in Same-Aged Classrooms
By Deborah L. Ruf, Ph.D.

Remember how I said that the average IQ difference between people who get our jokes-people most likely to become our friends-is 12 points (on a 100 point scale with a 100 IQ being average)? And remember I told you that the typical same- aged elementary classroom has a 70 to 80 IQ range in it? You probably have been told by others-not me-that this is good for children because it teaches them about the real world. Well, in the real world we choose our friends and our activities by how comfortable we are in that environment and by who else we get to spend time with. Also, although it may be nice to have a mix of abilities in the office, we pretty much want all CPAs or medical doctors to have a certain high ability, no lower than what is required to get the job done, right? That's why we have examinations at the end of such training to guarantee that everyone who earns the title actually can do the job.

Did you know that every job or career actually has its own IQ average and its own proven necessary minimum? Google Linda Gottfredson and Frank Schmidt to get you started. They are among those who have shown that people in the professions or other very complex careers need a minimum IQ of about 120 in order to both learn what they need to learn and perform it well. Like IQs or not, these numbers keep correlating with real life outcomes. Oh, and in case you are assuming that you can change somebody's IQ, there are no replicated studies that show any more than an average 6 point temporary increase in testable IQ with even the most intrusive interventional approach, adoption. So, the way I look at it, we need to start educating and training people for what they can do and for what will give them satisfaction, pride, and the ability to take care of themselves.

Most people think that teachers teach to the average. Well, no, they don't. They can't! If they taught to the average, too many of the slower learners simply wouldn't catch on to most of what was happening in the classroom. Teachers teach to the top of the bottom third once they know their class. This way, they reach the slower learners fairly well and the majority of the kids in the middle get lots of encouragement and opportunity to manage their time, learn study skills, and how to handle a certain amount of intellectual struggle and feel success when they finally "get it." The sad truth, though, is that the brightest students end up spending a lot of time waiting for something new to happen. Depending on a number of other factors, like whether they are male or female and their personality profiles, they learn a lot that ends up not being helpful to real life. They learn that if you are smart, you don't need to study or work hard. They learn that their parents and teachers don't know what they are talking about if they think this assignment matters. They learn that they are smarter than everyone else in the class and are in for a shock when they actually do get out into the real world.

David Lohman says that by 1st grade the typical same-aged mixed-ability classroom already has 12 grade equivalencies of achievement in it. Brighter children absorb more from their environments than lower ability children, so regardless of their preschool environment, brighter kids will know a great deal more than low ability children by the time they reach 1st grade. Environment is an extremely important factor in someone's development, but it does not change whether or not someone is very bright or very slow. A child whose IQ is 120 could finish the typical elementary curriculum in about 4½ years, not six. A child whose IQ is 130 could finish it in less than three years. Above 140 needs only one year, but they are required to stay all six and go at the pace of everyone else their age. What a waste of time and talent. Folks, there has got to be a better way.

The Teacher Told Me to Stop "Teaching" my DS6 at Home

2008-03-07T13:11:00.001-06:00

I wish I could say I had not heard this line of reasoning before, but it was exactly the reason I was told by my supervising teacher to not allow the gifted boys in my fifth grade class to experiment with the materials for the science unit we were learning at the time. "If they learn everything in fifth grade, what is their next teacher going to do?" It's very similar to the "if they test out of the entire spelling list by January, then they'll be bored until the end of the year." (Like they wouldn't be bored if you hold them back?)

Both are stupid arguments. Educational "best practices" say schools should be child-centered, not teacher-centered. *No child will learn at the teacher's convenience every day.* Some will learn "too quickly" all the time, some will learn "too slowly" all the time, most will learn either too quickly or too slowly depending on the day, the subject and the way the subject matter is presented. Most will figure it out if she goes over and over the material in different ways over the course of many days. This is the basic premise behind classroom teaching.

I'll save my rant about how completely arbitrary school procedures are for another day, except to say this: There is no magic age at which a child "should know" a particular concept in any subject, no matter what E. D. Hirsch's books say. State educational standards are usually written to require mastery of a subject several years/grades after the subject is first introduced. This is why we have consolidation years in which little or no new information is taught. (The consolidation grades are generally 2nd, 4th, 5th, 7th, 8th, 10th and 12th. Yes, this is half the usual 14 year school career--including pre-K and K.)

This is one reason why gifted kids present a "problem" for schools. Many have no idea what to do with kids who hit state mastery standards the first time around and want to keep learning. The schools are set up for that. They're set up for "normal" kids who need 15-18 repetitions for mastery of a concept. Gifted kids who get the concept after 1-3 repetitions spend a lot of classroom time being bored, even if you don't "teach ahead," which does make the boredom problem worse. (In case anyone is wondering, "bright" but not gifted children usually need between 6-10 repetitions for mastery.)

This is why we left the public schools. Kids only learn when they're ready and willing to learn, not when some textbook publisher or state standard says they're supposed to.

I had to cry "Fowl"!

2008-02-13T18:43:00.002-06:00

I mentioned that I'm directing the two plays our 4H club is working on for the Drama Fest. I'm trying to incorporate drama games to teach them a little about the theatre, in addition to running lines, etc. So at last night's rehearsal, we played "Nuclear Chicken."

The story goes that this game was developed in the great Stanislavsky school for method acting. The set up is that everyone in the game is a chicken in a hen yard, 30 seconds before a nuclear bomb hits the farm. When the instructor says, "Go!" everyone behaves as they believe chickens would just before the bomb falls.

This is an exercise is getting completely into your character's head. A chicken doesn't know anything from bombs, so would go along just as he or she normally would, until BOOM! As the story goes, in the Stanislavsky class, most of the class was running around squawking and panicking because of the bomb. Only Marlon Brando kept pecking and hunting food, deeply enough into his character to let it over-ride his human knowledge of nuclear blasts.

So either I'm directing a bunch of little Brandos or Nuclear Chicken just doesn't work with homeschoolers. As one of my kids told me, "We have chickens, and they are so stupid, they'd probably think the bomb was food." So much for not letting previous knowledge interfere with your character. They had too much previous knowledge!

The Starfish

2008-01-22T21:57:00.000-06:00

My blog is coming up on three years old (as of March 20). I'd love to continue but find I'm unable to promise I can find keep posting on a regular basis. By way of explanation, I'll post The Starfish Story:

"The Starfish Story
Original Story by: Loren Eisley

One day a man was walking along the beach when he noticed
a boy picking something up and gently throwing it into the ocean.
Approaching the boy, he asked, “What are you doing?”
The youth replied, “Throwing starfish back into the ocean.
The surf is up and the tide is going out. If I don’t throw them back, they’ll die.”
“Son,” the man said, “don’t you realize there are miles and miles of beach and hundreds of starfish?
You can’t make a difference!”
After listening politely, the boy bent down, picked up another starfish,
and threw it back into the surf. Then, smiling at the man, he said…”
I made a difference for that one.”

I'm not only homeschooling Xavier and Wolfie, but also volunteered to be Adult Leader of the drama project for our 4H club (2 plays), active in trying to save our virtual school, and am shortly to be named Mensa's Gifted Children's Coordinator for the western part of our state. In short, I need to spend my time making a difference for my boys, for our 4H club and for gifted kids in our region. I will continue to post links to really cool resources as I happen across them, but I can't promise when. Thanks, everyone. It's been fun.

Start the New Year Smarter with Online College

2007-12-30T12:10:00.000-06:00

Here are a couple articles about online courses available for free on the web. You get lectures, homework and tests, but no interaction with the professors and no college credit. They're great for homeschoolers, lifelong learners or students at other college who want the information. High schoolers can verify learning and possibly earn credit with CLEP, AP or SAT subject tests (although these classes are not specifically keyed to these tests, so reviewing specific study guides would also be necessary).

Internet Opens Elite College to All by AP Education writer Justin Pope

Education-Portal.com

And Bah Humbug to You, Too, Hubble!

2007-12-24T10:25:00.000-06:00

Apparently, Mars is going to be shining so brightly tonight, that Santa won't need him to guide the sleigh. Check out this story (and a very funny revision of Rudolph's song) from AP science writer Seth Borenstein: Mars glows, no need for Rudolph's nose

Hardware for the Holidays

2007-11-28T19:09:00.000-06:00

A great gifts for the gifted idea from Elaine Seid Marshall on the Homeschooling Mensans list:

"A gift certificate to a hardware store is an invitaion to her to make a project. Before you give her something like this, you should be sure it is really OK with you for her to do this. Meaning, you realize it will be messy, there is a place where it's OK for her to spread out and work, you realize she will need close supervision to remain safe, and, you realize this will be time consuming for *you*.

That's the important part. Because without that, the gift is just mean. Like a dad who gets his kid a ball for christmas, but never finds the time to actually *play* ball with the kid. It would have been kinder not to give it to him in the first place. So, if you're clear and OK with what you're getting into, this is an empowering gift. It's empowering, because you are letting her have the tools, parts, and materials that grown-ups have: REAL stuff, of HER choosing.

Also, she has to realize that you have to approve her choices; there are things in the store which you will not let her choose. My son always wanted several feet of big heavy metal chain. The answer was ,"No." I shudder to think what he would have done (and wrecked) with it.

With her tweny dollars or whatever, she is empowered to **chose** -- she can look at everything in the store before deciding. And she might, literally. So, it might be good to go when they are not very busy, and be sure to eat and all that, first.

The hardware section alone will yield many treasures. She could choose some simple tool - say a screwdriver. Then she could get some screws. At home, you can help her screw them into a piece of wood, forming patterns. She can draw a picture first, then screw them in where she wants them.

Or, the same thing with her own little hammer, and different kinds of nails.

She could wind string around the screws she put in.

She could get hinges and screw those to things. She could make little doors.

She could get plastic-covered electrical wire and wire things together.

She could make a mobile out of her finds. She could chose ceramic tiles from the scrap bin and make a mosaic in the garden with them.

She could raid the color sample card rack in the paint department. Those are free. Then at home, she can cut those apart and rearrange them any way she likes. And do things with them that involve **glue**. Oooh!

The clerk in the wallpaper section will sometimes give you a book of discontinued wallpaper samples. You could get a piece of masonite, and she could cut those and you could help her wet and mount them - a giant collage.

She could get duct tape. .

She could get rolls of contact paper and cut it into shapes and stick it on things.

The sky is the limit! I bet if you do this, that she'll surprise you with what she thinks up to make.

Elaine Seid Marshall"

Thanks for letting me share this, Elaine!

January 12th Event at Davidson Academy

2007-11-27T19:14:00.000-06:00

The Davidson Academy of Nevada

January 12 Event for Prospective Students

On Saturday, January 12, 2008, The Davidson Academy will be hosting a special information session and campus tour for prospective students and their families. For details, please visit www.DavidsonAcademy.UNR.edu/Explore
or email explore@davidsonacademy.unr.edu

A free, public school for profoundly gifted pupils on the University of Nevada, Reno campus, The Davidson Academy of Nevada is seeking qualified students to apply for the 2008-2009 school year. The mission of The Davidson Academy is to provide profoundly gifted young people an advanced educational opportunity matched to their abilities, strengths and interests. The Academy is a non-residential, full-time day school and many families have relocated to Reno in order for their student(s) to attend.

To be eligible to attend The Davidson Academy, students must be at the middle or high school level across all subject areas and score in the 99.9^th percentile on IQ or college entrance tests, such as the SAT or ACT. The Academy is specifically designed to meet the needs of profoundly gifted middle and high school students, starting at the sixth grade level and beyond. For admission details, please visit
www.DavidsonAcademy.UNR.edu/Admissions.

What Do You Need to Know Pre-AP English?

2007-11-27T19:05:00.000-06:00

Fabulous, very detailed chart listing the skills that are needed prior to taking an AP English class. Covers 7th through 10th grade but can be adapted for any grade.

Pre-AP Skills Progression Chart

New Homeschool Forum

2007-11-27T18:54:00.000-06:00

You are invited to join a new homeschooling forum.

Please feel free to browse and join the topics or conversations. This homeschooling forum is not location oriented. It is worldwide. We are not putting up a boundary, we want people from around the globe to participate and share their knowledge. This can be a great tool for learning cultural differences as well as every day lifestyles from
county to country to continent.

We welcome everyone and hope you will share you thoughts and ideas.

The Homeschooler Resource

What Do You Need to Learn Geometry?

2007-11-27T18:46:00.000-06:00

Thanks to my friend Julie Knapp at the Homeschool Diner for this:

Here's an interesting look at the skills and level of understanding needed to learn formal highschool geometry.

High School Geometry: Why Is It So Difficult?

Note that Singapore Math DOES foster the higher-level geometric thinking they're talking about (I remember such lessons in level 5).

Christmas is Coming...

2007-11-27T18:07:00.000-06:00

Believe it or not, I haven't even unpacked from the NAGC yet (yes, I know it's been three weeks, I've been busy!) so I have much more to tell you all from there. However, 'tis the season for gifts and December waits for no man (or woman)! From the Wisconsin Gifted Education e-list, plus some of our favorites, a list of websites and vendors you might check for gifts:

Lots of toys for good girls and boys
Mindware 800-999-0398
Bright Minds 800-641-6555
Learning Resources 888-489-9388
Live Science 800-951-0632
Young Explorers 800-866-3235
Hearth Song 800-533-4397
Edmund Scientific 800-728-6999
American Science & Surplus 888-724-7587
Discovery Channel Store 800-889-9950
For Small Hands 888-513-3998

Books for the gifted and about the gifted
Prufrock Press 800-998-2208
Cobblestone Press 800-821-0115
Free Spirit Press 800-735-7323

Curricula and Learning Resources
The Zephyr Catalog 800-232-2187
Really Good Stuff 800-366-1920
Classroom Direct 800-248-9171
Pieces of Learning 800-844-0455
Engine-uity 800-877-8718
Creative Learning Press 888-518-8004
A W Peller 800-451-7450
Teacher Created Resources 800-662-4321

You should also check out Hoagies. Carolyn K. has lots of links to cool websites on the left hand side of the page and if you link through her site, Hoagies gets a little toward keeping that fabulous resource alive! Merry Christmas to all!

How Vouchers Work in Sweden

2007-11-20T13:48:00.000-06:00

John Crace of the Education Guardian visited Sweden recently to study their school system and find out why it's so much better than the British model.

"...Compulsory education starts at seven - though almost all parents send their kids to kindergarten or make other childcare provision before that age - and runs through to 16. There are no standard schools. Some take students the whole way through their compulsory education, others for only a part of it. Neither is there a fixed syllabus or curriculum; instead, the state sets out various goals in 19 different subjects that students are expected to reach within a fixed number of hours and it's up to each school how they go about teaching the material....

"...[T]he main reason Sweden has come to people's notice is the way it's funded. Each student comes with his or her own price tag and the state - or rather the municipality (ie the local education authority) has to pay. Within a few practical parameters, students may choose which school they want to go to and what programme they want to study, and the municipality has to oblige....

"...And it is this that has skewed the system. When the new funding model was introduced in 1994, the idea was to rebalance the system by opening up competition and choice. Schools that were oversubscribed must be doing something right, so they were free to expand; those that found they were losing numbers had to sharpen up or shrink. What no one anticipated, though, was just how much competition there would be. Thirteen years ago, independent schools were rare. Now they are everywhere. In Stockholm, there are 29 municipal higher secondary schools and 54 independents, and while the ratio isn't quite what it may seem as the independents tend to be a lot smaller, nearly half the city's 16- to 19-year-olds are educated in private schools. And the percentage is growing year on year as more and more independent schools open." ...

Watch the Sky, My Dear Watson

2007-11-16T10:33:00.000-06:00

Comet Holmes, which mysteriously exploded three weeks ago, can still be seen without a telescope, according to Senior Science Writer Roy Britt at Space.com

"Holmes is still visible to the naked eye as a fuzzy star anytime after dark, high in the northeast sky. You can find it by using this sky map. It is faintly visible from cities, and from dark country locations is truly remarkable.

"Right now, in a dark sky it appears as a very noticeable circular cloud," said Joe Rao, SPACE.com's Skywatching Columnist. Rao advises looking for the comet this weekend, before the moon becomes more of a factor. The comet will likely diminish in brightness yet remain visible for the next two to three weeks, he said.

"Over the next few weeks and months, the coma and tail are expected to expand even more while the comet will fade as the dust disperses," Stevenson and her colleagues write.

On Monday, Nov. 19, the comet will create a unique skywatching event with its see-through coma, according to the Web site Spaceweather.com: "The comet will glide by the star Mirfak [also called Alpha Persei] and appear to swallow it—a sight not to be missed."

Check out the whole article for more info, links and graphics.

Apparently the Answer is E8, not 42

2007-11-15T20:29:00.000-06:00

Sounds like a game of Battleship, but an umemployed theoretical physics Ph.D. has come up with a simple yet profound unifying Theory of Everything, succeeding where both Einstein, Stephen Hawking and Douglas Adams had failed. I don't pretend to understand either subatomic particles or the mathematics behind the E8 design (see article for a picture) but apparently his idea is elegant and testable, in ways in which many grand physics theories are not.

"Lisi's breakthrough came when he noticed that some of the equations describing E8's structure matched his own. "My brain exploded with the implications and the beauty of the thing," he tells New Scientist. "I thought: 'Holy crap, that's it!'"

Btw, "Holy Crap!" translated into Ancient Greek is "Eureka!" ;-)

Free Subscription to Gifted Education Quarterly

2007-10-29T22:21:00.000-05:00

We are offering a complimentary copy of Gifted Education Press Quarterly Online. They would need to email me directly to receive our Twentieth Anniversary FALL 2007 Online issue. My email address is:

gifted@giftededpress.com

Thank you for your help!

Sincerely,

Maurice

Maurice Fisher, Ph.D.
Publisher, Gifted Education Press

Laptops Lead to Higher Writing Test Scores

2007-10-25T23:23:00.000-05:00

From the Boston Globe:

"Maine's program to give every middle school student a laptop computer is leading to better writing. 4real!

Despite creating a language all their own using e-mail and text messages, students are still learning standard English and their writing scores have improved on a standardized test since laptop computers were distributed, according to a new study.

And the students' writing skills improved even when they were using pen and paper, not just a computer keyboard, the study says." ...

You can read the entire article by clicking on the link above or see the raw data and study report from the University of Southern Maine by clicking here.

Perhaps handwriting really does get in the way of developing higher level writing skills.

Jack Versus the Possum

2007-10-22T21:57:00.000-05:00

I don’t write much about another member of the family, Jack the Wonder Dog (as in “I wonder where that squirrel went?”). He’s a 7yo black lab, border collie mix. People say, “Oh, border collie. He must be pretty smart!” Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), Jack’s not much in the brains department. However, he is very earnest and very tolerant of being spun around on the linoleum and being chased by the hamster.

So, the other night, we pulled into the garage after taking the dog for a ride in the car to find an opossum on the handlebars of Xavier’s bike. It was the first time I’d ever seen a possum anywhere other than the side of the road. The animal froze—apparently the possum mothers tell their babies our vision is based on movement—and we tried to scare him away with the car horn and shouting at him out the window. No soap.

So we let the dog out of the car. Did he go directly to the possum? No, he went directly to the door into the house. DH and I start yelling, “Jack! Get the possum!” so Jack dutifully runs to the other side of the garage, sniffs the ground underneath the bike and runs out into the yard. The more we repeat, “Get the possum!” the more frantically Jack runs back and forth between the bike and the driveway. He looked like he might have actually scented something but his actions displayed a certain amount of two-dimensional thinking, as Spock would say.

Finally, Jack looks up, sees the possum and starts to bark. I start to wonder why all this yelling and barking hasn’t brought any boys to the door. We decide this is a teachable moment and get ready to go in to get the boys. As I look away, out of the corner of my eye, I see Jack take off toward the yard. The possum is gone, so fast I never saw him move.

Jack catches him in the front yard and the possum flops over “dead.” I call him off, as DH calls the boys to come see. He really looks dead. His back is contorted, his neck is at an odd angle and his mouth is open. We weren’t sure whether Jack had really hurt him or not. We wait, deciding what we should do next. Eventually, the possum literally lifts his head briefly to see if the coast is clear! Just like in Bugs Bunny!

Yet Another Reason Not to Send Your Kids to School

2007-10-20T12:19:00.000-05:00

From the New York Times:

"Schools in Several States Report Staph Infections, and Deaths Raise the Alarm

By IAN URBINA
SANDY SPRING, Md., Oct. 18 — When the football players here at Sherwood High School were not getting the message about washing their uniforms and using only their own jerseys, the school nurse paid a surprise visit to the locker room. She brought along a baseball bat.

“Don’t make me use this,” the nurse, Jenny Jones, said, pointing out that seven players on the team had already contracted a deadly drug-resistant strain of bacteria this year. “Start washing your hands,” she said. “I mean it.”

School officials around the country have been scrambling this week to scrub locker rooms, reassure parents and impress upon students the importance of good hygiene. The heightened alarm comes in response to a federal report indicating that the bacteria, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, are responsible for more deaths in the United States each year than AIDS.

MRSA (pronounced MEER-suh) is a strain of staph bacteria that does not respond to penicillin or related antibiotics, though it can be treated with other drugs. The infection can be spread by sharing items, like a towel or a piece of sports equipment that has been used by an infected person, or through skin-to-skin contact with an open wound.

On Wednesday and Thursday, scores of schools were closed and events were canceled in Connecticut, Maryland, North Carolina, Ohio and Virginia as cleaning crews disinfected buses, lockers and classrooms. More closings are planned on Friday.

School officials in Mississippi, New Hampshire and Virginia reported student deaths within the past two weeks from the bacteria, while officials in at least four other states reported cases of students being infected. ..."

I know about MRSA. DH is a dermatologist after all, MRSA is a skin thing, and Klaus actually had a MRSA scalp infection of unknown origin when he was in 4th or 5th grade. Luckily, DH looked into it (or at it) and treated it, because I was not even considering taking Klaus to the doctor for it. I thought it was just a scratch.

The NYT article points out that 85% of MRSA cases are in health care settings, meaning you catch it when you're in the hospital spending large amounts of time around other sick people where the building hygiene is difficult to control...am I the only one who thinks this description also sounds like a school? Anyone who has walked by a high school weight room knows the heat and humidity (not to mention the stench!) in there is an ideal breeding ground for bacteria. And teenaged boys are not the most hygienic of creatures. Trust me on this, those of you with 5 hours a day showering daughters.

Now, I'm not in the habit of using scare tactics to encourage people to homeschool. Homeschooling isn't the best choice for every family. And MRSA can be transmitted by family members. But I am alarmed at the idea of putting my kids' health in the hands of other kids (like with MRSA) or other parents (like the large numbers of parents who are refusing to vaccinate their children. We actually had a whooping cough outbreak in our city two years ago. If everyone had been appropriately vaccinated, pertussis would be a non-issue, like smallpox.)

So if your child is in a public school or daycare setting, keep an eye on any open wounds, make sure they're treated with antibiotic ointment and keep them covered. If you see any cuts that aren't healing like they should (within a week), please, see a doctor. That goes for everybody.

Books for Breakfast

2007-10-16T23:15:00.000-05:00

When I was first beginning to plan homeschooling for the boys, I read a lot of "this is our typical day" articles and blog entries. Several of them included, "Well, I read to the children during breakfast." Sounds great, I thought, but morning is not my friend and breakfast for me has always been something to skip or scrounge for before doing something else. Now I was going to have to not only provide breakfast, but make it a learning opportunity, too? I don't think so.

That was last year, when it took at least several pokes to get Wolfie out of bed and Xavier had no interest in books at all. This year, I wanted to broaden Xavier's horizons. He was reading books of his choice on his own but they were mostly for kids a grade or two younger than he is. He's always up bright and early (gets that from DH) so I thought I'd get a book he'd like written at a higher level as we could read some in the mornings while waiting for Wolfie to get out of bed.

I bought What-The-Dickens: The Story of a Rogue Tooth Fairy by Gregory Maguire. I'd read Wicked a couple years ago and thought this might be up Xavier's alley, and it was written as commercial fiction for adults, so at about an 8th-grade level.

An amazing thing happened. Not only did Xavier enjoy the book and being read to, but Wolfie started getting out of bed the first time I called so he could hear the story, too! Don't get me wrong, he still stumbles downstairs and curls up in a fetal position on the couch, but he also listens to the story and eats some breakfast and is ready to work when we're done reading. It's a miracle! LOL

We're currently reading The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, a young adult novel by Sherman Alexie. I think Xavier could probably have read this on his own but I'm enjoying sharing it with the both of them. Coming up are probably The Hobbit and Book 1 of the Fire Thief series, a "hilarious reimagining of the myth of Prometheus" by Terry Deary, creator of the Horrible Histories Books.

Romanes Eunt Domus

2007-10-09T17:31:00.000-05:00

Finally, a Wiki for the Romans. Yes, Wikipedia comes in many, many languages, including a couple of dead ones. For the Latin speakers and Centurion-wannabes, Vicipaedia covers topics from architecture to beer pong. Editor Josh Rocchio explained to Lee Gomes, journalist for the Wall Street Journal: "Latin isn't dead, it just smells funny." SPQR!

Knit Your Own Bacteria

2007-10-09T17:19:00.000-05:00

How's this for a great geeky project? For knitters young and old, loxosceles.org has published directions to Knit Your Own Bacteria. I don't know anything about knitting but the project doesn't look too difficult even for younger crafty bio-fans. The non-crafty can always buy their favorite plush Giant Microbes from ThinkGeek or various other places on the web. Google is practically infected with them! (And all the readers groan and remove this link from their favorite bookmarks)

Thanks to Julie Knapp at the Homeschool Diner (see link at left) for turning me on to this one!

I Learned How to Pronounce Words in Jamaica, Mon!

2007-10-04T15:42:00.000-05:00

I found this kids website from the BBC the other day. It has educational games for English and Maths (which is British for math) for early elementary students. I tried several of the games and found them quite fun. The most fun part for me was called Space Spins. When you pull a virtual lever, a sentence appears on the screen and is read aloud to you, in a very strong West Indies accent! Wha? The idea is to learn to read, I believe, but the story reader is the only voice on the program that speaks anything other than Received Pronunciation. So why is the vocabulary program speaking like Miss Cleo? Who knows, but it's hilarious!

Just What is Standards-Based Learning?

2007-10-04T15:19:00.000-05:00

And can it be implemented in the public schools? The answer to the second question is yes, according to Alaska's Chugach School District. As you can see in the Edutopia article, rather than grades, Chugach students have "tote around report cards as thick as history texts. Each packet details the individual student's progress through the district's more than 1,000 learning standards as they move from kindergarten to high school graduation." Once students have mastered all the concepts in the standards, they graduate, whether they're 16 or 22.

Answering the first question second, standards-based education is when individual student's achievement is measured against a standard (duh), usually set by the state or local board of education. The most familiar instance for most people would be high school graduation requirements--4 years of English, three years of math, etc. etc. But even those "standards," measured in years, are rewards for seat time rather than learning.

This is an issue for all kids, not just the gifted. Anyone can do the bare minimum amount of homework, score averagely on tests and mostly sit in the back of the classroom doodling or passing notes and accumulate three years of seat time in math classes (BTDT). Allowing children to do that (or, in the case of gifted children, expecting them to do that) is a great disservice.

Some of the greatest thinkers of our time, like Tom Magliozzi from Car Talk, are starting to realize that the way we teach needs to change. Read his New Theory of Education rant. He actually goes a step further than external standards/benchmarks and suggests that learning should be tailored to every learner, as the best way to make people want to learn is for them to be interested in the subject they're learning in the first place. Though he's still speaking in terms of school, his ideas are edging perilously (some might say) close to the unschooling philosophy, where all learning is interest-based.

It would be difficult to turn all public schools into tailored-learning centers. However, there are current standards that teachers have to address in their lessons. I think if the school boards were more upfront about what the standards are, the kids would be able to decide how to meet them while pursuing their own interests, guided by the teacher, rather than being led by the nose or, worse, ignoring him/her altogether.

Balderdash & Blokus on the Block

2007-09-30T21:44:00.000-05:00

Many thanks to B&B for leading me to her blog Balderdash & Blokus (two of my favorite games, btw). She's got great resources for projects and info in many subject areas, like this groovy site for making Chocolate Asphalt and using it to study civil engineering. I'll be checking there often. :D

Turning Halo 3 into School

2007-09-25T15:09:00.000-05:00

I have been accused of turning everything into school. That is part of my job as a homeschooling mom--interpreting what the boys do in terms of school so Dad and the virtual charter we work with understand it. Halo 3 was released today, so the boys finished their lessons early enough to get busy with the other 118,000 people currently online.

On one of the screens, there was a global map light up to show where everyone was playing. The half the US from the Central Time Zone east was completely lit. So I asked the boys why there was relatively little activity west of here. It didn't take them long to figure out school is still in session in the Mountain and Pacific time zones.

We saw few players in continental Europe (where it's getting pretty late) but three hot spots right in the Baghdad/Kuwait area. Our men and women in uniform working out with Master Chief? That's my guess, although I haven't found any news reports about it. Our soldiers in Iraq did get to try out the Halo 3 Beta last Christmas, so I wouldn't be surprised if they got their own shipments of the game.

It just goes to show that even a video game like Halo can become a lesson in map-reading, and the boys didn't even notice! LOL

Sandhill Crane Family from Florida, Great Pictures!

2007-09-23T20:37:00.000-05:00

"One of our Sand Hill Crane couples recently had an exciting addition to their family. When they built their nest near the water's edge it immediately drew attention of passers by. Soon there were two eggs sitting on top of the nest and the mother on top of them.

Those of us who were really curious passed by the site every morning and we would stop our cars to get out and see if there were any new cranes yet. Many brought cameras of all shapes and sizes and would stand near the water for long periods of time hoping to catch a photo of the hatching.

Robert Grover, a dentist, didn't actually catch the birth but, he sure did capture some fabulous shots of the Momma, Papa and baby (the second egg never hatched). Then he put together a slide show with music that is just too good to not share it.

Click on the link below and then "start slide show"; enjoy!! Nice music too!

http://groverphoto.phanfare.com/album/304621#imageID=18463143"

Can You Crawl through an Index Card?

2007-09-23T20:19:00.001-05:00

This guy can! Watch how he does it at Krampf.com

I'm Calling Them Laurel and Hardy

2007-09-23T19:50:00.000-05:00

DH found a couple of parsley worms/black swallowtail butterfly caterpillars on his parsley yesterday. He brought them in intending to experiment on them (!) or at least observe them for a bit and let them go, but I decided we're going to raise them. So now they're sitting in our 2.5 gal aquarium with a couple of sticks and several stalks of parsley. You would not believe how much these things eat! I mean, I understand they're fattening up to overwinter in hibernation and all, but the amount of poop (called "frass") they produced in the fifteen minutes it took me to find an appropriate home for them was prodigious.

They were pretty much identical yesterday but today one is fatter than the other, so I've named them Laurel and Hardy. Hardy does nothing but eat. Laurel's been climbing the tacky glue at the corners of the aquarium to the mesh roof (very handy to have an aquarium with a top!) and now crawling across it. I'm not sure if he's trying to get out, thinks DH's nearby orchids look tasty or if he's looking for a place to pupate, but they're pretty funny to watch. Caterpillars eat leaves one row at a time, like an ear of corn, or a weed-whacker.

For info on how to raise black swallowtail or monarch butterflies, check out Glorious-Butterfly.com

Tomorrow is National Talk Like a Pirate Day!

2007-09-18T12:51:00.000-05:00

And we almost forgot! ARRGGGHHHH! Luckily we were doing some pirate madlibs today and I suddenly realized it was nearing the 19th... Nonetheless, we will be flying our pirate flag (which happens to be the colors of Calico Jack Rackham according to the Dangerous Book for Boys) and wearing our pirate kit tomorrow. I expect all ye scallywags'll be doin' likewise!

Gifted Kids' Bill of Rights

2007-09-13T11:07:00.000-05:00

Incoming president of the NAGC, Dr. Del Siegle, has written a Gifted Children's Bill of Rights as his introductory president's column in this month's Parenting for High Potential. My favorite part is the first one:

"Gifted children have a right to know about their giftedness

Parents and teachers are often reluctant to talk with children about their giftedness for a variety of reasons. Parents may not be sure what it means to be gifted or how their children became gifted. They may worry that giving children information about their identifications as gifted causes them to feel superior or elitest. How we talk with children about their giftedness can have a dramatic impact on the way they view themselves and the daily challenges they face. Children need to understand that giftedness is not something that was bestowed upon them. While it is true the gifted students often acquire skills more quickly and easily than their peers, gifted children do learn these skills over time. They may have taught themselves to read, or learned to read esaily at an early age, but they still learned to read. It is important for gifted children to recognize that the talents they possess are acquired, they had something to do with acquiring them, and they are capable of further devloping these talents and even acquiring new ones. They need to learn to take responsibility for developing their gifts. They need to understand that having to work hard does not mean they are not gifted and that working hard can even make them more gifted."

All you parents and teachers of gifted kids out there, embroider this into samplers and post it on the schoolhouse door. You can't be gifted in math until someone teaches you how to count. You can't be verbally gifted, unless someone, probably a lot of people, talk to you and read to you and answer your questions. I encourage everyone to find a copy of Dr. Siegle's complete essay. It's fabulous.

Trevor Wins Hamster Ball Derby!

2007-09-09T16:28:00.000-05:00

Xavier's hamster, otherwise known as Magical Trevor, won the Hamster Ball Derby at our local Petco yesterday. We were very excited because at the time of the last derby, held last March, Trevor wouldn't go anywhere near humans. Everytime we tried to pick him up or move him to clean his cage, he'd dive down a tube and stay there until we left. And he didn't get any exercise either, because he kept nesting in his wheel.

Then Dad got the brilliant idea to move him into a smaller cage with no access to the "Petting Zone" up top or tubes to hide in. Quickly he got bored of 1.5 sq. ft of living space and we introduced him to the hamster ball concept. Now he runs for 2-3 hours a night, goes down stairs on purpose, including all the way down to the basement if someone leaves the door open. (Don't worry, people. He's heavy and skilled enough that it's a controlled one-stair-at-a-time descent. We've watched him.) If you try to take him out of the ball before he's tired, he refuses to leave. And he loves to chase the dog.

Given that he's more of a marathoner (the Derby training info said to get him to practice every other day for fifteen whole minutes), we weren't sure how he'd do at the Derby, which is more of a sprint. We practiced a little bit in the aquarium aisle to get him used to running away from Sam and toward me. I think he was the only hamster in a field of 14 who consistently ran in the right direction. (So heartbreaking when they'd get halfway down the track, stop and turn back!)

So he won an oval-shaped HamTrac, a blue ribbon, some coupons and bragging rights as the fastest hamster in town, at least for another six months. Xavier is going to enter him in the county fair through 4H next year, so I think this project is off to a good start.

What's in a Name?

2007-08-30T10:09:00.000-05:00

There's been a lot of beginning of the school year buzz about the term "gifted" and whether we should use it, use a euphemism like "high ability," or whether we should be labeling our children at all. In my experience as a gifted child and as parent of gifted children, "labeling" a child gifted is not the problem. The problem is acknowledging that the child has special needs by naming those needs, and then ignoring the special needs the name implies. Gifted kids know they're different, just like kids with Down syndrome, dyslexia or cerebral palsy know they're different. The label is a short hand way to acknowledge which differences affect them. For further discussion of which label to use, check out Tamara Fisher's new blog for Teacher Magazine Unwrapping the Gifted. (registration may be required but it's free.)

I'd also like to point out that while chldren on the special ed end of the learning spectrum do not have to continually prove that they still deserve accomodation, gifted kids are constantly having their eligibility for gifted status threatened. That is not fair. Mensa accepts new members based on one qualifying test score at any time in the applicant's life. Hit that 98%ile just once and you're eligible for life, whether you're 7, 17 or 77.

In contrast, my oldest son scored in the 99.9%ile in second grade, but received few gifted services in elementary school and no gifted services in middle school because his grades weren't high enough. (He was re-tested on different instruments at 12 and 15 and while his scores did drop a bit, he's still 98%ile, so his aptitude has been stable over time.) Turns out he's also ADD and had been using his giftedness to compensate like mad all this time. I can't tell you how relieved we were to get that label! Finally we had an explanation for his apparent inability to keep track of a band practice sheet for an entire week and his other academic quirks. And because of the label, we could get some accomodation from the schools to help him perform to the best of his ability. This is why I think labeling is a good thing.

Same Train, Different Track

2007-08-27T08:19:00.000-05:00

An op-ed in today's EducationGuardian suggests that "Employers' attitudes towards today's teenagers mean that the mature, conscientious and smart are held back." I had hoped this would be a story supporting Robert Epstein's thesis that we are babying our teens too much.

Sixteen-year-old author Charlotte Lytton writes: "It seems that nothing is ever good enough in today's society; we're a nation obsessed by perfection and not even the best seems acceptable anymore. GCSEs are an example of this fixation. Not only are there news reports seemingly daily about how easy they are, but it seems they count for nothing when 16-year-olds decide to venture out into the working world." (links are mine)

But apparently Charlotte thinks we're not babying our teens enough. Colin Willman of the Federation of Small Business (FSB) says in the article on behalf of employers that "The skills that businesses need from school leavers are literacy, numeracy, punctuality, communication skills and an ability to be well-presented."

Charlotte fires back, "But when are we supposed to learn all of these additional skills for the world of work? From reading the papers, it seems pupils are working their socks off at school to be met with disgruntled employers who sack them because they turn up for work five minutes late or their shirt isn't tucked in. After a six-hour school day that can sometimes include double history and mathematics, when do they expect kids to learn the protocol of the work place?"

As much as I sympathize with her schedule, if she's taking double history and mathematics, she should already have the literacy and numeracy skills necessary to babysit or flip burgers. Showing up to work on time with your shirt tucked in should be common sense, something you learn at home, not an additional class. While I agree that many, if not most, teens are much more capable than we let them be, I don't agree that we should lower our expectations of teenaged workers.

Then Why Call Them "Young Adults?"

2007-08-22T12:01:00.000-05:00

And I thought reading diaries and secretly drug-testing your own teen was bad. A couple of articles about the infantilization of human children crossed my desk yesterday. On the one hand, in the Mar/Apr 2007 issue of Psychology Today, psychologist Robert Epstein says, "Imagine what it would feel like—or think back to what it felt like—when your body and mind are telling you you're an adult while the adults around you keep insisting you're a child. This infantilization makes many young people angry or depressed, with their distress carrying over into their families and contributing to our high divorce rate. It's hard to keep a marriage together when there is constant conflict with teens.

We have completely isolated young people from adults and created a peer culture. We stick them in school and keep them from working in any meaningful way, and if they do something wrong we put them in a pen with other "children." In most nonindustrialized societies, young people are integrated into adult society as soon as they are capable, and there is no sign of teen turmoil. Many cultures do not even have a term for adolescence. But we not only created this stage of life: We declared it inevitable. In 1904, American psychologist G. Stanley Hall said it was programmed by evolution. He was wrong."

On the same day, I read this in London's EducationGuardian: "A school uniform maker said yesterday it was "seriously considering" adding tracking devices to its clothes after a survey found many parents would be interested in knowing where their offspring were. ...

Clare Rix, the marketing director, said: "As well as being a safety net for parents, there could be real benefits for schools who could keep a closer track on the whereabouts of their pupils, potentially reducing truancy levels."

No comments on whether this would increase adolescent anger toward the parents, but common sense says it will. And I'm not sure I agree that teen angest is the cause of the high divorce rate, but are there really parents out there who have no idea who (yes, I mean "who") their "young adults" are and what they are doing? I suppose I may have been blessed with hyper-responsible teens, but it would never occur to me to put a tracking device in my child's clothing, nor would I allow the school to do it for help with "truancy issues." If we want children to grow up to be responsible adults, we need to give them responsibility (appropriate to their age, of course) and treat them with respect, not do everything for them until they're 30, then push them out the window into adulthood.

DH and I were just discussing this with regard to Klaus' first week at college. DH has emailed him half a dozen times and then got mad when he didn't get an instant answer. I reminded him we need to stop micromanaging the boy (although the boy does need more micromanaging than some because of the ADD). Then I told him there is nothing more demoralizing than being about to take some initiative or to handle something on your own, and then your parent tells you to do that very thing.

For example, "Hm, I think I'll take the dog for a walk to get some exercise," thinks Wolfie, feeling very grownup and responsible. "Why don't you take the dog for a walk?" yells Mom as he's hooking up the dog's collar in the other room. Now walking the dog is a chore and Wolfie doesn't want to do it anymore. The passive-aggressive thing to do is to pretend you didn't hear, walk into the room where Mom is and announce you're taking the dog for a walk and what did she say? But that just leaves you feeling bitter and untrusted. Better for Mom and Dad to follow up sparingly, if at all, and let the kids surprise us with their ability to be responsible.

Klaus' First Day at College

2007-08-20T17:37:00.001-05:00

DSC01590
Originally uploaded by Jessica_Mah

We dropped the boy off last Saturday with much wailing, moaning and gnashing of teeth (on the parents' part, not his). He was so excited he woke up at 4am. He sounds like he really likes it, at least he did the last time I talked to him.

Klaus, if you read this, call your mother!

Current History

2007-08-15T14:32:00.000-05:00

Many people believe that history only happens to dead people--it's all dusty books and talking heads from long, long ago, too long ago to be relevant to what is happening today. Not true.

No, this isn't going to be a "those who do not learn from history" speech. I just want to point out, as a recent AP article has done, that every big news story is our history. The 35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis is just as much a part of our history as 9/11 and World War II.

So, in the spirit of saving first person accounts of current history, this is the email I got from the Goddess of Asphalt in Minneapolis on August 8, 2007, with her take on the bridge collapse:

"This is a link to a livejournal page. It has some of the most heart stopping photos of our crumbled bridge. It also shows how many ordinary citizens came to help. It makes me sad that the press is looking for a scapegoat and calling us Minnesotans that go to places like the Stone Arch Bridge "Gawkers". I was there yesterday and it had the air of a funeral. Some people cried, some prayed and many just stood in disbelief. There were flowers, messages and a solitary American Flag.

I think Minnesotans need a place to mourn and take in the enormity of what has happened. It is really hard to get your mind around. I work in the construction industry and it is hard for me to comprehend. This bridge was 2000 ft long, 6 lanes wide, not including the breakdown lanes. The World Trade center towers were each about 1,368 ft tall, so this is a LOT of concrete, steel and rebar.

We have confirmation that there are 80 vehicles in the water, on the crumpled decks and on the parts that have not completely fallen. Considering that our injured topped 100 and the fatalities will probably be under 20, we were very very lucky.

Thanks to all of you for your calls and emails seeing if I was ok and if my friends were ok. It made a horrible situation easier to take knowing I had all of you there.

The commentary [on the linked page] is in Russian, but I went to freetranslation.com and got a rough translation:

"On August, 1st at 18:10 on local time (03:00 Moscow time) in Minneapolis the bridge through Mississipi has fallen. On preliminary data were lost 9 person (on specified on today's evening - 4 persons), 20 are considered gone. In the river have appeared about 50 cars. The governor of state Tim ïîëåíòè has told, that in the school bus which went at this time on the bridge, there were 60 children, some of them are wounded.

On the bridge constructed in 1967, repair work were spent. The length of a design made 160 meters, height above water - about 20 meters. In day the bridge served up to 2000 thousand cars."

A Note From Horrible Ray

2007-08-15T10:48:00.000-05:00

"If you're interested in more Horrible Books or Galore Park Books, I'll be doing another Galore Park / Horrible Books Order on September 9, 2007, with all the gory details at : www.horriblebooks.com

Thanks, and all the best,

Ray"

For those of you unfamiliar with Horrible Books, my review is here. Galore Park is another UK series aimed at the middle school set, which covers foreign language (including Latin and Greek), history (not US, of course), geography and other subject British children are expected to learn. I have not see the Galore Park books, but if Ray think they're good enough to import with the Horribles, that's good enough for me.

Can Kids Run the World Better Than Adults?

2007-08-15T10:42:00.000-05:00

That's the question behind Kid Nation, a new reality show where 40 kids, aged 8-15, try their hands at running a New Mexican ghost town "with no parents or teachers" (although I presume the cameramen and producers are all adults). Click the link above to see the promo and learn more about the kids. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that most of the kids want to be actors--why else put yourself through a New Mexico summer with no indoor plumbing? The show airs beginning September 19.

August is the Cruellest Month

2007-08-13T17:47:00.000-05:00

I beg to differ with T.S. Eliot, but August is much more cruel than April. We are now at the point where we've bought everything we can carry for Klaus' dorm room. He's registered for classes, had his physical and paid (at least part) of his tuition. So all we have to do is wait.

And wait.
It's too early to pack.

And wait.
It's too early to say goodbyes.

And wait.
But it's too late to change your mind.

Hold That Thought!

2007-08-10T12:04:00.000-05:00

Does talking with your hands reflect mastery of a concept, or help students gain mastery of a concept? According to the Washington Post: "Teachers who use gestures as they explain a concept -- such as the hand sweeps that [grad student Susan] Cook uses to emphasize an equation's symmetry -- are more successful at getting their ideas across, research has shown. And students who spontaneously gesture as they work through new ideas tend to remember them longer than those who do not move their hands.

Now Cook's work with elementary schoolchildren is helping to find out whether the gesturing done spontaneously by many quick learners is simply a reflection of the fact that they are "getting it" or is actively helping them learn. ...

"Everyone gestures," said Cook, a postdoctoral student at the University of Rochester, deferring at first on the Italian question. "People start gesturing before they can talk, and they keep gesturing for their entire lives."

Even blind people gesture when they talk, as do people chatting on telephones -- proof that gesturing is not necessarily for the person who is listening."

I find this interesting not only because I constantly talk with my hands, but also because of a recent article I've read regarding study of Al Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language, a sophisticated gesture language created by and used only in the town of Al Sayyid in Israel's Negev desert, a town with a large percentage of congenitally deaf inhabitants. The language seems to have developed on it's own in the last 70 years, presumably when the number of deaf people reached some sort of critical mass, and is quickly being replaced by official Israeli Sign Language as the Al Sayyid children go to school outside the village.

It makes intuitive sense to me that gesturing is a vital component of learning and communicating. That's really the point of taking lecture notes, isn't it? Using the physical movement of the writing hand to help cement the concept you're already getting by ear and, hopefully, eye? And what a boon for the VSL student if all teachers are trained to use appropriate gesture along with their lessons!

Oceans of Fun

2007-08-09T13:45:00.000-05:00

Have a budding marine biologist? Are your earth science students tired of building baking soda volcanoes? Have I got a deal for you! OceansLive, a collaboration between the National Geographic Society and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) has a series of twelve lesson plans and accompanying short videos free for the download.

From the site: "The 12 lesson plans and complimentary short videos were developed in collaboration with National Geographic Society's Oceans for Life program. All of the lesson plans are directly aligned with National Science Education Standards, National Geography Standards and the Ocean Literacy Essential Principles and Fundamental Concepts. Through a multi-media approach, Oceans for Life inspires ocean literacy and conservation through national marine sanctuaries and promotes bringing the ocean and environment into America's classrooms."

How cool is that? :D

Ocean literacy is at least as important (and spectacular) as volcanos, considering 2/3rds of the Earth is covered in water and we are just beginning to find out what we don't know about the seas. Plus it's a natural link to the study of history (pirates, anyone?) and literature (Two Years Before the Mast, Moby Dick, etc.) I have been looking for oceanography resources and haven't found much, so you can be sure we'll be using these at my house.

New "Our Gifted" Online Conference August 10-12

2007-08-08T11:10:00.000-05:00

Our Gifted & Talented Online Conferences (OGTC) is proud to present the following free online conference:

Lynne Kelly Aug 10-12, 2007

"Practical Curriculum Extension for Gifted Students"

Well designed extension material can offer qualitatively different learning experiences which address the unique abilities of gifted students. By being available through the school network or on local computers in every classroom, any time a student has demonstrated mastery of the class work, the teacher can offer them the enrichment material then and there. No student should ever be bored! By compacting the class work, students find they can tune in and out of what is happening in the classroom, thus maximizing their learning in the given time. A flexible compaction/extension model enables schools and home schools to implement a wide-ranging gifted program in a practical format.

Lynne Kelly has worked with gifted students for over 25 years specialising in curriculum development for mathematics, science and cross curricular themes. The author of 13 books and the Enrichment Units for the Middle Years (EUMY) suite, she has established online enrichment programs used in six countries.

http://www.lynnekelly.com.au/

To join OGTOC and participate in this conference, simply go to our Yahoo! Group Homepage, click on "Join this group" and follow the instructions to obtain a free Yahoo! ID and join the group. Hope to see you there!

This information can be forwarded to anyone to invite them to become a member :)

300: Boys and Ancient History

2007-08-08T10:04:00.000-05:00

Last week marked the long awaited (at least at my house) release of the DVD version of 300, the Frank-Miller-based epic about the Greek stand against the Persians at Thermopylae. This is one I previewed before deciding whether Wolfie and Xavier could see it (see my previous post about Movie Mom) because the other Frank-Miller-based movie I saw Sin City gave me nightmares. One look at the naked, writhing and historically inaccurate "Delphic oracle" was enough to make them wait for the DVD. (We just skip the naughty bits.)

Why am I telling you this? Two reasons: first, because the release of 300 on DVD seemed to be kind of underplayed and second, because I think there is some value to using this noninteractive video game to hook middle school boys on ancient history. Victor David Hanson writes in History and the Movie "300":

"Recently, a variety of Hollywood films — from Troy to Alexander the Great — has treated a variety of themes from classical Greek literature and theater. But 300 is unique, a sui generis in both spirit and methodology. The script is not an attempt in typical Hollywood fashion to recreate the past as a costume drama. Instead it is based on Frank Miller’s (of Sin City fame) comic book graphics and captions. Miller’s illustrated novelette of the battle adapts themes loosely from the well-known story of the Greek defense, but with deference made to the tastes of contemporary popular culture.

So the film is indeed inspired by the comic book; and in some sense its muscular warriors, virtual reality sets, and computer-generated landscapes recall the look and feel of Robert Rodriquez’s screen version of Sin City. Yet the collaboration of Director Zack Snyder and screenwriters Kurt Johnstad and Michael Gordon is much more of a hybrid, since the script, dialogue, cinematography, and acting all recall scenes of the battle right from Herodotus’s account."

These swords-and-sandals epics can be useful to bring middle and high school boys into the world of history. The History Channel often has "the real story" documentaries that air about the time the movie debuts, like "The Last Stand of the 300", which will be on again on August 12. There is also a critical analysis component if you read and watch various accounts of these ancient battles. History is a slippery thing, often written by the victors to show a particular point of view, resurrected in times of crisis to reflect ourselves. (In Iraq, are we the Spartans or the Persians?) History and historical epics allow us to identify and wrestle with these ideas.

Just When You Think Your Gifted Child Might Not Be So Gifted

2007-08-08T09:52:00.001-05:00

The new list of Davidson Fellows is published. Damn. My kids haven't used traditional Indian medicine to clear Pseudomonas infections or performed at Carnegie Hall or nuthin'. These kids are making the rest of us look bad!

As Xavier would say, "Jealous much?"

Seriously, though. Congratulations to all of the 2007 Davidson Fellows. Your accomplishments take my breath away.

Facts on Fiction

2007-08-07T22:01:00.000-05:00

Picking books for young gifted kids can be difficult. Just because a child can read at a high school level doesn't mean he or she is ready for "edgy" young adult books. So gifted parents have to either read everything before giving it to their children (Ha! Try keeping up with them!), or trust someone else--the librarian, the Caldecott committee or some other book reviewer--to determine what is or is not too frightening for your child.

Movie review sites like Movie Mom.com break down questionable movies by counting profanities, incidents of violence (cartoonish or otherwise), nudity/sex, use of alcohol or drugs. When my kids were in 4th and 5th grade and wanted to go to a PG-13 movie, I used Movie Mom frequently to make those decisions. Books did not have a similar resource until now.

Facts on Fiction is a nonprofit book review database that does for chapter books what Movie Mom does for movies. Take Dickens' A Christmas Carol, for instance. If you click here you can find FoF's evaluation of the mature subject matter in the story.

What I like best is that if you click Click Here for More Details at the bottom of the screen, it shows you exactly what the reviewer considered a reference to death, with page number and citation. That's true transparency. This is not an attempt at censorship. It's really a way for parents to search by title or reading level and then honestly evaluate if that reference to "suicide" is going to be too much for Junior or if it's just Tom Sawyer pretending he drowned so Aunt Polly won't punish him.

Fruit Flies Like a Banana

2007-07-28T18:11:00.001-05:00

The summer is two-thirds over already. (As Groucho Marx once observed, "Times flies like an arrow, fruit flies..." Well, I already gave that one away in the title, didn't I?) And it's about this time that a young teacher's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of school. Except for those unschoolers and year-round schoolers out there, in which case, Carry on!

But I wanted to offer some support for the public school refugees, myself included, who may be wondering if they did the right thing pulling their child out of school because all he did was lay on the couch and whine. Surely things would be better if they went to school at least part of the day so someone else had to listen to the whining? Take heart, my friends. You are still on the right path.

Here's the thing: there is a concept called "deschooling". Generally it means that you need to get the schoolish thinking out of your head before you can relearn how to learn or how to teach or how to behave. The rule of thumb is that it takes one month for every year of public school to learn the difference between school and learning.

It's kind of like your kids are public school junkies. Deschooling is the withdrawal period and like drug withdrawal it can be painful for the junkie and painful to watch. Your kids lie around and whine because they are used to someone telling them what to do, what to learn and how to behave. Without that constant supervision, they don't know what to do with themselves. You can see this over summer vacation, sometimes, too. Along about August there is much whining about how bored they are. They can't think of anything to do because they're used to being told what to do, but they don't want to do anything you suggest because they resent being told what to do.

So what to do? Plug your ears with cotton balls and wait them out. Seriously. Support any reasonable request for an activity (boy, have I been playing a lot of board games lately!). Do an art or craft project by yourself in full view. Read in full view. Not "Oh hey, look what I'm doing!" manipulative, but because you genuinely want to learn something. The kids will come around.

An example: we signed up for 4H last winter as a way to get out the house, do some service learning and other enrichment kinds of things. The boys refused to sign up for any project other than archery and they refused to participate in the county fair. I thought the prize money might entice Xavier, but he was adamant. So, they didn't submit anything for the fair. Wolfie took part in the dog project training but didn't take Jack the Wonder Dog to the dog show.

I didn't push them to do anything and at this point, Wolfie is really digging on the 4H thing. He's got a number of projects he is thinking about taking next year. And this is the boy who told me last fall that "project" was a four-letter word. Coincidentally, this change in thinking happened about seven months after we started homeschooling. So even though we didn't technically deschool, he still came around. Xavier's still somewhat truculent, but then again, he's a twelve-year-old boy.

So unless your whiny student is twelve, have faith that your homeschooling decision is still the right one and your student will come around (even the 12-year-olds eventually get older). If you're getting a lot of resistance, just lay back and deschool completely for awhile. Whatever you do, don't let the kid con you into creating school at home. Homeschooling is better because it's different than school, remember? So put away the school bell and the ruler and pull out the Mentos and Diet Coke!

Just Where Are Those Wild Things?

2007-07-20T14:18:00.000-05:00

There's an interesting essay at Education World called One Teacher's Pitch to Be Emperor of Education. Chemistry teacher Dr. Richard Chempleau's "first two imperial acts would be to fire one-third of American teachers and then to give every parent a one-question quiz."

"Next, every parent of a 2-year old would have a one-question quiz, and they'd all have to take it at the same instant. I know too much about cheating, of course. The question would be "One Fish, Two Fish"? Any parent who didn't write "Red Fish, Blue Fish" would be required to sign a Universal Release of Liability and Parental Promise Not to Whine Statement. Parents who can't spout Dr. Seuss or Mother Goose, but who can name ten movie stars, professional sports players, or rock idols, are ruining their child's future.

They can't give their children the first four years of life in an impoverished educational environment, then expect the schools to fix all of their mistakes. A parent is the first and most important teacher their children will ever know, but most parents never spend that magical time with their child on the sofa. The TV should be off, the book is open, and their child is captured for life by the rhythm of a nursery rhyme. Four years watching reruns or ball games hardwires the future student to expect entertainment, not education, from 12 years of school."

Read to your kids, folks. From the day you bring them home from the hospital to the day they ask you to stop. It doesn't matter if you think they're too young to understand the words. You're building a bond between you that will last a lifetime and starting their education out on the right foot, too.

Chess Programs for Kids

2007-07-19T21:48:00.000-05:00

From the Educational Options newsletter:

"Online chess academy for kids:
We have noticed locally there is quite a bit of interest in chess, with clubs, open game nights at bookstores, summer camps and tournaments. Now we have recently found an interesting website, chessKIDS Academy. Webmaster Richard James, of the United Kingdom, has written and co-written several books and magazine columns about the subject, and he has taught children how to play chess since the 1970s.

This website is packed with free online interactive lessons, quizzes and games for kids, computers to play against, and more."

Other options are online: FICS The Free Internet Chess Server and ChessBase
Software: Fritz and Chesster CD

It's Official!

2007-07-19T21:40:00.001-05:00

Klaus admitted today that he does want to go to Simon's Rock, so we've sent in his deposit and begun the process of figuring out how we're going to pay for this, cancelling fall classes we'd already signed him up for, scheduling a physical, etc. etc. etc. before August 17th.

Getting college plans finalized in April is much easier than July. Of course, Klaus has a history of drastically changing his schooling plans at the last minute, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I rather feel like we've not only changed horses midstream but changed from a horse to a horseless carriage. Let's hope the engine isn't flooded!