Links! - Las Posadas, writing, Tolkien, and more!

A Las Posadas Activity for a Homeschool Group - so cool!

Okay, ignore the graphic at this link. It's the conversation below it that exactly describes how I feel about writing.

Auden and Elvish:

Auden repeatedly challenged the idea that Tolkien’s work was only suitable for children. Tolkien’s world may not be the same as our own, Auden wrote in a 1956 review of the author’s work for the New York Times, but it’s a world “of intelligible law, not mere wish,” that represents our own reality. Moreover, Auden wrote, Tolkien’s moral sensibility was profoundly grownup, especially when it came to theological questions. “The Lord of the Rings,” he wrote, aimed to reconcile “two incompatible notions” we have about God. On the one hand, we envision “a God of Love who creates free beings who can reject his love”; on the other, we picture “a God of absolute Power whom none can withstand.” It’s a story about how, as we gain power, we lose freedom. “Mr. Tolkien is not as great a writer as Milton,” Auden conceded, “but in this matter he has succeeded where Milton failed.”

This decluttering calendar for 2013 looks interesting - and maybe even doable!

I Stand Relieved

We've decided to send our kids to our little local elementary school next year.

I spent several months this spring holding the options - homeschooling and public schooling - in either hand, weighing one and then the other, and finding nothing to tip the scales in either direction. We've never felt either the obligation to homeschool or the obligation to public school. I think it's largely like being an omnivore vs. being a vegetarian: you can do both well and you can do both badly. There's no moral imperative either way, at least not for us.

So I spent a long time undecided, just because neither the advantages nor the disadvantages of either side were compelling to me. Eventually I started feeling more frustrated at my indecision than anything else.

But my mom pointed me towards the Ignatian discernment process: basically, a way of praying for guidance when you're faced with two licit options, i.e., how to pray for wisdom when it isn't a moral issue, when you're really free to follow either course. And my husband gave me a few hours by myself to quietly pray through the decision. And I came out of that feeling very free to send our kids to school next year; indeed, it seemed best.

So, we're starting something new in the fall, and we're all looking forward to it. I think, given how I was raised (public school and loved it), I'm better equipped naturally to be a public schooling mom than a homeschooling mom.

A big part of the reason we started homeschooling was because I didn't think I could be a good public school mom with twin infants. I still think that was true, and I don't regret these past two years. But now that Anna and Lucy are so much older, and I'm not nursing two babies and not getting enough sleep, I think I can be the sort of public school mom I'd want to be: involved and available to help.

The thing that really made me feel okay with the decision was when I realized what my real question was. It was: is it okay to delegate my children's education?

When I put it that way, and then thought of the homeschooling mothers I most admire in real life - the ones that are doing a really awesome job - I realized that all of them delegated parts of their children's educations. The music lessons, the co-ops, the online classes, the charter schools, the clubs, the P. E. lessons, Classical Conversations, the play dates . . .

And the second thing I realized that it was exactly these areas of delegation that were the parts of homeschooling that drove me nuts. The unstructured social interaction, the something-different-every-day, the money, the spotty scheduling . . . basically, it's the frugal introvert's nightmare.

So, the question wasn't, is it okay to delegate? - all the parents I admire do - it was, is it okay to delegate to our local elementary? So I toured our local elementary again, and was really happy with what I saw. Instead of listening to the hyper principal give a sales speech (the hyper principal is gone now), I talked to a kindergarten teacher who's been there for almost twenty years, and I feel like I got a much better picture of day-to-day life in the classrooms, and what I saw looked good. Not perfect, but pretty good.

And as someone who went to pretty good public schools and is pretty happy with her education, I'm okay with that.

But we have the good luck to live in a nice city that is, frankly, full of 1) young Christian families and 2) retirees. Which makes for a public school environment that beats most.

So . . . we'll see how it goes. And if it goes badly, well I know now that I can homeschool, and so we'll just pull them out if it goes badly.

But I think it'll go well.

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

Book Review: Write These Laws on Your Children: Inside the World of Conservative Christian Homeschooling

This book, by Robert Kunzman, is a survey of six conservative Christian homeschooling families, scattered across the country. Kunzman visits them each twice and interviews them and gives them all a survey, trying to discern their attitudes about education, democracy and the intersection of freedom and tolerance in a diverse society.

Kunzman's primary concern about homeschooling is whether such indoctrination in the Christian religion can result in citizens capable of considering the points of view of their fellow countrymen, even when those points of view are vastly different than their own. Can a homeschooled child listen to ideas and values that are foreign to his with any kind of fairness?

To his credit, Kunzman embodies his own values. The portraits he draws of these six families are fair and kind, and while he highlights the problems each family has, he goes to great trouble to highlight their virtues even more. He disagrees with them in several areas, but he does them the honor of disagreeing with their best arguments, not their weakest ones, which makes him a better author than almost any other I've read on the subject.

As in most books like this, some of the families come across much better than others. And unlike most authors, who would put the scary families first in order to draw you in with sensationalism, Kunzman opens and closes his book with the two best families, which is more than fair, it is kind.

I don't agree with Kunzman on every issue, but I really enjoyed reading this book. The family portraits are fascinating - and alternately encouraging and disturbing - and the issues he raises are certainly worth thinking through.

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

Daybook

outside my window . . . a lovely day. Cool and sunny and the air still smells fresh from the rain earlier in the week.

I am listening to . . . More Mumford and Sons. How can I not love a song that starts "Serve God, love me, and mend"? That quotation from Much Ado is one of my life's mottos . . .

I am wearing . . . a long-sleeved, forest green shirt with a cowl neck. I'm enjoying my long-sleeved shirts while I can, because pretty soon the weather will take its summer turn downhill into the 90s and stay there for months, and all I'll be able to stand wearing will be sundresses and tank tops with shorts.

I am so grateful for . . . Lapsang Souchong tea. Smoky goodness. Also something that needs to be enjoyed before the summer weather begins in earnest.

I'm pondering . . . prayer and obedience.

I am reading . . . The Way of Kings, Hearing God, the Purgatorio, Acedia & Me.

I am creating . . . My eldest daughter's Easter dress. I'm on the yoke, which is the last bit to do, save pressing and lining it.

around the house . . . I have an amaryllis blooming above my kitchen sink. I picked up several flower kits (pot, dirt and bulbs) on sale for $1 after Christmas, and am planting them one at a time, spacing them out so that I always have flowers.

from the kitchen . . . I made black bean pizza last night. It's definitely our favorite new vegetarian recipe discovered this Lent.

real education in our home . . . We're getting ready for my daughter's first science fair. I'm so proud of her, because instead of just a project, she's decided to do a real experiment. She's making three different varieties of paper airplanes and testing them to see which will fly the farthest.

the church year in our home . . . Lenten cooking. Crocheting the kids' special Easter outfits. Having some serious theological conversations with our son, who is getting baptized at Easter vigil. I'm so excited for him.

recent milestones . . . I've got both of the main characters of my novel back to England (most of the novel takes place in France, but the dénouement takes place in England). Getting them back onto their native shores feels like an accomplishment to me!

the week ahead. . . We've got the science fair coming up and I've got a doctor's appointment, but other than that, it's a refreshingly normal week. I hope. :)

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

links! - trusting God, playing the violin, and much, much more

These Little Pieces is posting regularly to her blog again, and she's started with a bang. Check out this post on how to celebrate the Annunciation with your children (I love the idea of supporting a crisis pregnancy center in honor of the occasion) and also check out her giveaway from her Etsy shop!

Conversion Diary's post Trust School is excellent, and, for me at least, came right when I needed to hear the message it offers.

And on the funny/awesome side, I love, love, love my friend Katie's post about her New Trick. :D

Bethany writes about what keeps us from being happy, and about her need (and many of ours, I think) for time alone. This line especially makes me think: "Just because we need something doesn't mean that we demand it from others." Go read the whole thing here.

Jen left me a comment today on my post about how hard it is to find sympathy cards that are neither sticky-sweet nor theologically bad, pointing me towards these beautiful, serene, appropriate cards from Conciliar Press. I don't think I've ever seen anything better.

I always have trouble summarizing Anne Kennedy's posts, but read this one and you'll understand why I read her blog. Let's just say that she has read, marked, and inwardly digested everything that P. G. Wodehouse had to teach her.

I have not read much of this blog yet. I just found it. But it's called "Shrinking Violets: Marketing Promotions for Introverts". That's enough for me to keep the tab open for quite awhile.

Rachelle Gardner has a thorough, helpful post on what fiction editors are looking for when it comes to a novel's characters.

Smithical does a great job of collecting quotations pertinent to the big creation/evolution/homeschool conference kerfluffle.

"A Neutral Education?" by Susan Wise Bauer helped me find a missing piece in my continual ponderings about homeschooling and the nature of education. She writes:

The church of Christ, not textbook writers, should be responsible for providing the central Christian story that must inform all true education. When I wrote in Chapter Twenty of The Well-Trained Mind, “When you’re instructing your own child, you have two tasks with regard to religion: to teach your own convictions with honesty and diligence, and to study the ways in which other faiths have changed the human landscape. Only you and your religious community can do the first,” I was not attempting to maintain neutrality. Rather, I was asserting that a Christian education can only be provided by a Christian community — parents, in obedience to and in faithful relationship with their local church.

Now I am trying to figure out how that fits in with what has bothered me so frequently about Christian homeschooling organizations, i.e. that they frequently put character above academics when they are ostensibly academic organizations. I thought it bothered me because they were trying to make ordinary Christian parenting the end-all and be-all of education. But maybe part of it is that they are trying to take the place of the church? (Still just thinking out loud here, folks - not coming to any conclusions yet. Feel free to join in conversation in the comment section!)

Finally, what's a link post without some music? Probably most of you have heard this, but whether you have or not, it's still a nice evening treat. Enjoy!

links!

First up, James M. Kushiner's post "Discretionary Saving" is about what it means to be a saint, and it's good reading for Lent. He says,
Since holy means “set apart” for God, it follows that our thoughts and actions that are negotiable, or what we describe in monetary terms as “discretionary spending,” should be given over to divine things. You could say that our discretionary time should be spent “laying up treasures in heaven,” or what we might call “discretionary saving.”
He goes on to talk about what those "divine things" are: not just prayer and Bible study (though certainly those), but also "corporeal works of mercy", like feeding the poor, and he talks about why those acts of mercy are part of becoming a saint.

It's a very good and challenging post.

And then, more on holiness, is Quotidian Moments' post "Duties of My State in Life". After pointing out that introverts might be tempted to escape their duties not by doing a million outside activities but rather by reading and writing and praying too much (ouch!), she says,
Every once in a while, I used to search online to find exactly WHAT were the duties of my state in life. But the answer is simple -- it is my husband and children, my parents, and more generally, the practice of a Christian married life. I think I was probably searching to find the minimum so I could check off "duties done for the day." I suppose I was also looking for a way to feel good about myself -- sort of a grading scale. I did that and that and that, which adds up to holiness! But it's not so easy, when St Augustin says quite clearly the Church's teaching that we don't "earn" God's help nor can we expect to please Him by trying to get by with a passing grade.
The rest of the post can be found here.

Speaking of daily duties, one of the ways I find good books to read to the kids is by haunting the blogs of children's book authors, because they're always one top of the latest buzz in what is, after all, their own business. My favorite for this purpose is Melissa Wiley. She writes posts like this and all of the sudden we have our library list for the week. (I keep her post open in one tab and my library's website open in the other and flip back and forth, requesting, requesting, requesting.) From that specific post, I can definitely vouch for "Chalk", "Shark Vs. Train", and "Flora's Very Windy Day".
And, speaking of books, Semicolon's weekly book review linky is up, and it's a great way to find many, many things to add to your own TBR pile.
And through Semicolon's link, I found this excellent post, "The Truth About Homeschooling, Part I". An excerpt:
Socialization is probably the most hot button word in the homeschooling world. Just mention the word and homeschoolers immediately become defensive. First you’ll hear the argument that socialization and socializing are different. That is true. It’s also true that most people who bring up socialization really mean socializing but we know what they mean and we don’t win any points by splitting hairs over definitions. Then you’ll hear homeschoolers categorically deny that either of these is an issue. Type in “socialization and homeschoolers” on Google and you’ll get a bunch of articles and blogs and reports that all spout statistics showing that neither socialization or socializing or anything of the sort is, has ever been, or ever will be an issue for homeschooled kids.

The truth?

Socialization and socializing are issues for homeschoolers.
Reading something like that makes me give a slight sigh, Ah, and go on to read the rest, relieved to know I'm hearing a truth deeper than the party line, and yet something that's not depressed, but just clear-headed. Instead of saying, "This isn't an issue," this post says, "this is an issue, but if you don't ignore it, it's not an issue that lacks a satisfactory solution." Very helpful, to me at least.

links: nursing twins, Harry Potter, Advent and more!

Shannon Hale wins at the internet. This may be the best blog post I've ever read.
Next, christianaudio.com is having their biannual sale, and all of their books on mp3 are $7.50. Our family got a bunch of great mp3s the last time they did this, including this awesome recording of The Count of Monte Cristo (47 hours for less than 8 bucks! that's a lot of dish-washing time well spent!) and this of Perelandra by C. S. Lewis, both produced by Blackstone (Blackstone's work is consistently excellent). They also have Peter Dennis' recording of Winnie-the-Pooh, and I can't tell you how many times over my kids have listed to that. (Be sure to check out his readings of the Milne's poetry too, which my husband and I both love.)
Okay. I don't usually link to sales, but my family has benefited so much from their last audiobook sale that I just had to pass it on. Now, to other things!
Starting with the terrifying and infuriating: Courts Helping Banks Screw Over Homeowners.  This is one amazing piece of journalism. Not just a copy of something from the AP wire (not to diss the AP), but some real anecdotal-yes-yet-compelling journalism. Pretty amazing stuff, and not in a good way. Also, a very lucid explanation of the foreclosure mess.
Even though it looks like (looks like!) Advent's going to be celebrated more faithfully in our house this year than it's been the last couple of years, I still was really encouraged by And Sometimes Tea's post "Confessions of a Domestic Church Slacker".
Check out this cool and easy pajama pants tutorial over at Learning As We Go. Great for Christmas gifts for the kids.

If you go read this day-in-the-life post by Susan Wise Bauer from 10 years ago, you are going to want to retroactively buy the excellent woman a drink. And then you're going to feel like falling onto the couch in sympathetic exhaustion - until you realize you are already on the couch due to your own real exhaustion and that, unlike her, your four children under the age of nine are still four children under the age of nine.
I thought this post positing the question: "what if an unschooler's parents found out their child was accepted to Hogwarts?" was hilarious.
That's it for tonight - enjoy!

Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

homeschooling is school . . . but maybe school gets in the way, sometimes

So, I've been thinking more about the women I've met this fall, the ones who take care to repeat at every meeting that "character is more important than academics," as if the two were in opposition. I've been trying to understand not just what makes them say that, but what makes them say it so many times over.

It's a warning. It took me awhile to figure that out. It's also an educational philosophy, and that's where I get hung up, because as an educational philosophy I disagree with it, even though as a statement by itself I think it's true. So I get tangled up in the educational philosophy side and spit out lots and lots of words trying to cut myself clear of the brambles.

But lately I've been thinking, Okay, I disagree with their methods. I get disturbed when I see veteran homeschoolers advise new ones "not to worry about academics" and "academics will come; don't worry about them" and "put away the books till after Christmas and concentrate on deschooling your child" and "cooking and playing is school" when the child is old enough to read and figure. But . . . what makes them do that? What makes them so scared? What am I missing?

And I don't have a firm answer. But I'm beginning to have a theory. And it goes back to the point where I agree with them: character is more important than academics. And these women - who have more experience than I do - consistently act like academics are an enemy to character, or at least, a potential one. I don't see it that way, and that's where I start getting riled up. All my life, academics has led me closer to God, has made me see new ways to live my life well, has introduced new beauties and truths to my eyes . . . it's never been in opposition to character or Christianity - even when I was taking classes from professors and teachers who were opposed to Christianity. I still dove into the new knowledge, certain that all truth was God's truth. The academics, the intellectual life, always led me closer to God and not away. So I've been having trouble understanding these women.

But, I remembered something important: my experience isn't everyone's experience. And if these women are so set on seeing academics in conflict with character, that must have been their experience at some point. My impression, also, is that it's not academics itself that's the problem, but that, at some point, their zeal for academics led them to neglect some other part of parenting.

And that, finally, strikes me as a problem that could be particular to homeschooling. If you are playing this dual role in your child's life, if you are both Mother and Teacher, well, then it's possible to get those two roles out of balance, and I'm beginning to think that that is what they're trying to say when they keep urging me "not to get hung up on the academics". I think that they're talking about a focus on schooling that eclipses our duties as Christian parents.

And I can see how that would happen. It's easier to check academic skills off of a list than to pay attention to all the multitudes of little moments that form a child's character. I can see how you could get lost in the one to the detriment of the other, simply because it's less daunting to attempt to teach a child algebra than it is to teach that child to love Christ. 

(Not to mention - and I keep coming back to this - that you have more control as a teacher than you do as a disciple-maker. You can probably force someone to learn math; you can't force anyone to become a Christian. And that powerlessness is scary. It could make you run in the other direction, in fact, towards something that you can control.)

And if it's a warning not to let a secondary duty distract me from a main duty, then I welcome the warning.

I still have trouble saying that it's okay for your child not to learn, when you have taken responsibility for seeing that she does. I still think that putting academics in opposition to character-building is making the apples to fight the oranges. I wish that they didn't see it that way; I think it leads to academic laxity that is irresponsible.

But I am glad for the warning against distraction, against substituting one good (academic achievement) for a better good (Christian character). That's something I can understand. 

And I'm glad to understand these women better . . . if I finally am understanding them.

So, what do you think? Am I closer to understanding what they mean by it, do you think?

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

At least she knows there was such a place . . .

I'm beginning to see that, when homeschooling, a plethora of subjects can lead to a bit of confusion on the part of the student, as the student's head is filled with stories and facts from history, from art, from literature and from science. Today, when I asked my first-grader to tell me something that she remembered from the story we just read, she told me: "I remember that Davy Crockett's mother was from Assyria*."

Whoops. 

At least she knew that Tennessee was in the United States. :)

Peace of Christ to you, 

Jessica Snell

*Davy Crockett's mother was from Maryland, if you were curious.

a bit more on education . . . or, Homeschooling is School, Part III

First though, for all my friends who have read The Republic, a question: would you characterize it as a treatise on education? And, to follow up: would you take Plato's recommendations about education within his thought-experiment republic literally, i.e., do you think that that is how he actually thought children should be educated?  

My memory of the book has me answering "no" to both questions, but that memory is also fuzzy enough that I'm realizing I really ought to just go and read the book again. Still. A lecture I attended tonight made me curious (okay, riled up) about the subject, and I'd love to have an answer in a shorter time than it will take me to reread the masterpiece. (Patience, thy name is . . . well, not me.)

(Also, would you say that the man who came up with the theory of recollection considered children to be a tabula rasa, as Locke did? That seems inconsistent to me, but I'm probably missing something.)

Right, that done, a bit more on education and academics.  

I really appreciated all the comments on my last post. I was especially grateful to Stephanie for suggesting the distinction between education and schooling. She said:

Eighteenth-century Americans from various denominations often used the term "education" to mean Christian/religious training and "schooling" to mean learning to read, write, and do math.

This, I think, encapsulates exactly what was bothering me about the educational philosophies I've been running into, the ones that imply (and sometimes explicitly state) that if a homeschooling parent raises a child who loves God and loves others - but is not academically excellent or competent - than that homeschooling parent has still succeeded.

To which I would answer: Well, she has mostly succeeded as a parent. She has failed as a teacher. (Or, I suppose, her children have failed as students. It's a two-player game, after all.)

And I'm not arguing that the latter is more important than the former. I don't think it is. I would rather my children loved God and their neighbor than that they were academically successful. 

But, if I am incompetent to lead them to academic success, I don't have any business homeschooling them. 

I suppose I should modify that slightly. I suppose that there could be circumstances where it was homeschool or end up with a child who didn't love God and his neighbor, in which case it would be an either/or choice: homeschool and be an academic failure or public school and be a moral failure. But I really don't think that choice happens very often, if at all, and it bothers me when it's framed as an either/or, as if all public school students were automatically destined for hell.

So, back to education and schooling. I think that children should, ideally, have both. Education is more important to the whole person, especially if we take Gabe's definition. He says: 

To answer my own question - education is for developing whole, virtuous, well-balanced people. It's not primarily for learning a trade or accumulating facts or getting a piece of paper. That can be said of all the subjects, and if you approach them from a utilitarian perspective I think you miss the point. For example: we don't learn Geometry because it will be useful at our job, we learn it because mathematics trains our minds and teaches us discipline and gives us insight into the ordered mind of God.

So, in his view (correct me if I'm getting it wrong, Gabe), education would tend to lead to schooling (e.g., the desire to train the mind and gain insight into the ordered mind of God would lead us to study Geometry). But, presumably, you could be educated without being schooled in the manner required by modern American law: say you're a member of a non-literate society who is nonetheless raised in the church, aurally receives the Word of God and meditates on it, is apprenticed to a trade, etc. It wouldn't pass muster legally here, but you're educated - you've been given the tools for becoming a whole, virtuous, well-balanced individual.

But also, this view leads me to say that whatever schooling your education does lead you to ought to be good schooling. If you really want to study Geometry because you want insight into the mind of God, doing a bad job at Geometry is unacceptable. Attacking it lazily, without care for the right answer, is not going to lead the results you want.

So, in this view, academic excellence should be considered important, right? And, if you slack on your academics because "character is what matters" aren't you, ironically, developing bad (slothful) character? In our Geometry example, if you are slack, sloppy and lazy in your endeavor, aren't you failing to bow your neck beneath the yoke of immutable mathematical law? Aren't you missing the chance to learn humility when you finally (as you will) come to the branches of math high enough to defeat your intellect? Aren't you failing to learn the virtue that comes when you have to do something that not only bores you, but that you are bad at?

And yes, in every subject save the few (or one) that become your specialty, there comes a point where you admit defeat, and you can quit. But unless there's a developmental disability, that point is not in the first grade! And I think it does a disservice to the homeschooling parent to constantly imply that the academics are not important. The academics are a legal requirement, and not an unreasonable one, in the culture we live in. In taking over your child's schooling (given the definitions above, you are already primarily responsible for her education), you have in effect promised that you will see that she is academically competent. And, given what you believe about education and virtue, why wouldn't you see that she was, as far as her abilities allow, academically excellent?

So, to conclude, I think the emphasis on character bothers me for two reasons: 

1) It seems to say that a rigorous education somehow excludes the possibility of being a person of excellent character. This is seen in the many, "If only they're good people who love Jesus, their SAT scores don't matter" talk. Well, yes. Of course. But why are you linking those two things together anyway? Because you're scared you're going to make a hash of the academics, that's why, and you want to point to the part you did well.*

(But if we're going there, I'd actually much rather think I was responsible for my child's poor SAT score than her damnation. Doesn't taking credit for your child's good character scare anyone else? Doesn't taking credit for it also mean you have to take the blame? Oh dear, that could be an whole other post . . . the idea that homeschooling = salvation . . . so I have two, no, Three! reasons for disliking the emphasis on character. No one expects the Spanish Inquisition . . .)

2) It assumes that character training is only done by homeschooling parents, that education is only done by homeschooling parents.

That second one might be another subject for another post. This one is already too long, I know. Thanks for listening to me think this out, friends. If you've got a corrective line of reasoning for me to follow, a helpful definition, or anything else, please chime in. I'm new to thinking hard about this, so I'd love to have help.**

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

*See Jess. See Jess assume. Assume, Jess, assume.

**Among other things, this is code for, "I'm aware of the fact that a few more years of growth and maturity might have me eating my words." :D

links: heresy vs. schism, what you can fit in the day, simplicity and more

First off, a short little meditation by David Mills, blogging over at First Things. Here's an excerpt:

Back when I was an Episcopal activist, both liberals who were busy gutting the Episcopal Church of its traditional beliefs and conservatives who didn’t want to challenge them were fond of intoning “Schism is worse than heresy.” It was a little odd to hear this from members of a tradition that began in a break with the Church of which it had been a part over what its leaders thought to be heresies.

But the real problem with the claim was theological: that heresy is itself an act of schism. It is a break with the tradition, a rejection of what had been the shared and official belief, a willful refusal to remain in unity with one’s brothers, a transfer of allegiance and obedience to a new and alien ideology.

I'd've copied more, but it's only about four paragraphs long anyway; I encourage you to follow the link and read the second half. It's brilliant. And sad.

Then, more brilliance from Patricia Wrede. You may have heard the rocks-sand-water-in-a-jar parable before, but I, at least, have never heard it told with this ending. If you ever feel like you're doing too much, or not getting done the things you think are most important, you'll want to go and read this.

Next, Auntie Leila on how we need to be less patient with our children. And . . . in the way she means it, I absolutely agree. Go read this wise woman's words.

Quotidian Moments has a short, simple post about, well, simplicity. I really liked this part, where she's talking about why she doesn't use Tapestry of Grace, even though it's a good program:

This is why I need simplicity, and it's why I have to define simplicity as what is simple for me. When I find some things overwhelming, I don't always know why. I have no idea why I can work with K12 fairly easily while TOG makes me feel jittery just looking at it. I just know I have to respect that. If I absolutely HAD to work with TOG, say, my husband really wanted me to or something, I'm sure I could make it work. But then, that would be different. Making things work is something different.

There's a sort of freedom in not needing to be involved with something that would be a burden, even if it is good in itself.

You've probably heard that muscle weighs less than fat, which isn't true, but here's a nifty photo showing what is true: that muscles takes up a lot less space than fat. I just think it's a neat visual.

This post on Conversion Diary offers a striking new perspective on the people who just happen to be in our lives (or, in other words, nothing's that random). In all honesty, this post has helped me even this week. 

This might be a bit connected to my current series (is it a series? It might be a series) on education and character . . . at least a bit. Anyway, go read about how "Christian faith is essentially thinking".

And, on that point, I'll leave off. I'll have a new post on homeschooling and character growth up soon, because I don't think I"ve changed my mind completely, but your comments and points are certainly refining my thinking on the subject, and helping me see what the ladies I met might have been getting at. I'm still mulling it all over, and I'm very grateful for the help you've contributed to that mulling-over process. Thank you!

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

Homeschooling is School, II

Thanks so much for all the comments, ladies!

Here's some further information on the trend I'm noticing: it is specifically that character training is a subject, like math or reading, and that it is the most important subject. That is what I'm disagreeing with, because I don't think character can be taught as a subject. At least, I can see that it can, and maybe that should be a minor part of forming a child's character (after all, it's easier to try to be patient if you've been given a definition of "patience"), but I don't think it fits under the umbrella of "school" nearly as well as under "parenting" for the simple reason that most of our character development comes from what we see, do, and imitate.

School will be part of that, just because it's part of our day, but I don't think that character development is more particular to school than it is to, say, chores.

I suppose, when I look at school, I would say that the primary duty of a Christian teacher is good academics, just as the primary duty of a Christian carpenter is producing a good table (thank you Miss Sayers!).  In other words, if you let the academics slack because you're more concerned about a nebulous "character issue", you're actually having the opposite of your intended effect: you're producing a lazy, ignorant student.

But . . . I can certainly see viewing homeschooling as a weapon in your parenting arsenal. Much as you might use a chore chart to help produce diligence, you can use your schooling method to produce, well, diligence. :) And family closeness, and opportunities for Bible study, and on and on. That does make a lot of sense to me. What doesn't make sense to me is seeing the primary purpose of homeschooling as character development. I should think that the primary purpose of homeschooling is education - the primary purpose of any form of schooling is education. Now, the reason you most value education could well be character development. And you could certainly think that homeschooling, properly pursued, is more conducive to good character development than other forms of education. But I think if your schooling aims at a good character, you're not going to get it. But if your schooling aims at a good education, you will get that, and likely get a good character thrown in (if all the other necessities are in place, of course).

That said, as Kelly and Elena both pointed out, you can homeschool for developmental reasons, especially in the early years. I'd put my family in this group; we first started looking into homeschooling when we realized that public school would mean our five-year old would be out of the house for about the same amount of time my husband was at work! We honestly think homeschooling is better for our family dynamics (less stressed mom and kids!) right now. And that is connected to character - stress can lead to growth, but too much stress can stunt growth. But again, I would say that was a parenting decision . . . homeschooling was the right tool for the job (sometimes you want a Phillips screwdriver instead of a flat head screwdriver). 

But it was also what you might call an economic decision: I didn't think what we'd be getting would be worth what we'd be paying for it. I don't think that eight hours a day of my child's life is worth the return of an education that lacks history, foreign language and religion.  So the fact that my child would be unduly stressed was part of it, but also that she'd be unduly stressed and uneducated. Not worth it. Because, again, school should produced educated children.

Amie, I appreciate your point too, that Christians can educate better because we have the truth. I agree, actually. But I don't think that this is something that's impossible for Christian public school parents to do (I don't assume you do either!); there can be a lot of benefit from having teachers who disagree with you and then coming home and discussing it all with your parents, and having them help you form good arguments to support your own beliefs. Those parents are also educating Christianly, they're just doing it in a different manner.

So, in this particular case, it was literally the idea that the character issues I'm working on with my child (honesty, kindness, etc.) should be written down in my lesson plan book along with her math assignments. I just think it's miscategorization. I think those things exist alongside schooling, but if I had to categorize them, I'd certainly put them under parenting, and not schooling. I think that including them in schooling (perhaps unknowingly) assumes that public school parents couldn't possibly be discipling their children too, because it assumes that school is primarily about character growth, and not about education. (Again, if I'm cooking, I should be a good person while I'm cooking, sure, but when it comes to the job itself, what matters is not my character but how the chicken tastes!)

So, education certainly impacts character, and visa versa. But nothing in life is really unconnected to anything else, and just the fact that they're connected doesn't mean that they're in the same category. Huh. I suppose when it comes down to it, my frustration is really that I'm using the Dewey decimal system and they're using Library of Congress! 

(I.e., you're right, Amie, I should just ask more questions.)

Thanks again for the discussion; I'm very open to hearing yet more thoughts on the subject.

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

Homeschooling is School

Wow. So I lasted a whole year in homeschooling without acquiring my very own Homeschooling Pet Peeve. 

No longer! I now have one. And here it is: Homeschooling is School. 

At least, it is for our family. And I'm writing this partly so that I can understand the opposite point of view, because, well, it's always good to understand folks you disagree with, especially when they're obviously well-intentioned.

So, here it is: I've run into some other homeschooling moms whose big reason for homeschooling is so that they can develop the Christian character of their children. And here's my problem with that: that's not school; that's just parenting.

Character issues are not school. School is academic. I am not homeschooling in order to make my first-grader a Christian. By God’s grace, she is, and Adam and I are working hard to teach her and disciple her. But that’s PARENTING. That is not SCHOOLING.

Am I just compartmentalizing more than most people do? That's entirely possible. It's not that I see character growth and academics as totally divorced. Rather the opposite. First, what you study and learn can (and should) directly impact your actions. That's why Christians study the Bible and meditate on it. Secondly, all of our life - schooling included - can be dedicated to the Lord's service. All of it can be undertaken in such a way that it makes us more (or less) like Christ. In those two ways, I can clearly see how schooling and character issues are connected.

But neither of those are things that I'd write down in our lesson plan book, other than to mark off which chapters and verses of the Bible we've been studying. (The Bible is certainly a valid academic subject, and we study it more than secular folks would because we believe it's more important than they do. Fair enough.)  And I certainly wouldn't mark down character issues I'm working on with my daughter. Why? Because that's not schooling. That's parenting.  It's what we'd be doing if we were public schooling. 

I suppose that's part of the problem: framing character issues as part of homeschooling seems to imply that raising Christian children is the job of homeschooling mothers. But it's not. It's the job of Christian parents (and note the plural*).

I just . . . I just clearly have all kinds of problems with this. I think it’s silly. Moreover, I think it’s mistaken. I agree with the basic premise that Character Is More Important Than Academics. Sure. Who would disagree with that? But school IS about academics. Character Is Also More Important Than Cooking Skills. But when I’m making dinner I should focus a little more on the rice and a little less on my honesty, yes? My honesty will bide while I make the curry. I don’t get points off my Good Christian Chart for thinking a bit more about the garam masala than about the gospels during the short time I’m toasting the spices. Same with school. During science, I don’t want my daughter pondering the Golden Rule. I want her thinking about the characteristics of a cat.

 

I just . . . I just . . . I just am discovering that this issue makes me stutter "I just" a lot. Heh. I just have huge issues with this. Workable issues, because I can just not pick that fight. (And in real life - not blog life, I'm not arguing.**) But issues. Huge.

Anyone else? Or am I missing something huge here? Is this one I can simply look at from another point of view and understand? Or am I just going to get a swollen tongue from all the biting it I'm going to have to do? ;)

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

*This is not to say single Christian parents have not the same vocation. Just that if both parents are present, it is then a shared responsibility.

**Explaining my POV, maybe, but not arguing. :D 

on inspiration, maturity and work

A friend sent me this post, about a mom who let her kid just quit doing math for a few months, to look at and asked me what I think. I don't know what she thinks yet, so I don't know whether we agree or not, but it was certainly thought-provoking. Here's my immediate response, though I imagine yours will be different because what you think will probably depend on your experience of trying things that are too hard for you to do, and also on your kids' experiences when they try to do things that are beyond them.  Anyway, here's my not-very-reflective reflection on the post:

That it sounds like summer vacation. :)

My other thoughts are:
-yes, you take un-intentioned breaks sometimes (hmm, let me talk about my last year . . .)
-yes, sometimes there's growth that has to happen before mastery can be achieved, but . . .
-as Picasso said, "There is such a thing as inspiration, but it must find you working." I think that's so, so true. And I think not making the kid work is a disservice to the kid. Now, adjusting the work to fit the child's level . . . i.e., maybe switching to a different program, or playing math games instead of worksheets, or some such, till the necessary maturation occurs and the child gets it? Yeah, absolutely. But I think just letting the child stop working is a bad idea. (Unless, of course, it is summer vacation.)

Mostly because I think letting myself stop working is a bad idea. And I'd hate to be less fair to my child than I am to myself.

So, yeah, I think the back-burner idea is true. At least, I find it true in myself. But I also find it true that I: 1) get the concept faster if I'm still working in the area and 2) learn other good things in the meantime if I keep working in the area. Back-burner break-throughs seem to happen best when you ignore the exact problem area itself "(I can't seeeeeeee you" <-- is the dialogue in my head at those times) but still stick really close to the area around it. Otherwise you can waste days and days and days because you're not aware and alert and present when the readiness kicks in.

Also, we can be very, very wrong about whether or not we're able to do things. I'm always amazed at how much more I can do when I make myself work versus when I think about working. Again, I think the same is true of kids. (Minus the fact that they have a much lower tolerance of frustration. That's where we need to be careful, I think. Hitting frustration is something you don't want to do very often or very long with children. I'm finding. Hence the switching it up, but keeping close to the subject.)

There. I've blathered. What do you think?

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

I've been working towards this for a YEAR

Tonight my six-year-old read me "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie". And she read it happily.

For the first time, I saw it make sense in her eyes. I saw her realize that if she was willing to read, she could experience a story she loved entirely under her own power. Not a phonics-graded reader, but a story familiar and beloved. The familiarity lowered the bar enough that she saw she could get over it, and the belovedness made her willing for the climb.

This is a book she knows well, but doesn't have memorized. So it was real reading, not just recollection. But she knew enough that she was able to use her memory of the story to help her take the right course when she got to words that were hard to sound out.

I think up till now, reading has been drudge work for her - remember this rule, solve this puzzle, shoulder through it. There would be times a sentence here or there would make her laugh, and those were the best times (this is my girl who will learn anything if it can make her laugh - for some reason, btw, math has largely fitted in this category), but this time, she saw the whole story, and persevered through words whose rules she knew, words whose rules she didn't and words of impossible length. The way her eyes lit up when she read "refrigerator" and realized she'd got it right! I want to bottle up that astonishment and delight and hold high for a light on a dark day.

Just glorious. I'm so happy for her. It's so exciting. After a year of work, we have a reader! She gets it!  :D

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

links! Dr. Seuss, P. G. Wodehouse and religion in sci fi

Here's a good reflection on religion in science fiction: how it can be done badly, how it can be done well, and why it isn't done as much as it should be.
Ooooh . . . Peace Hill Press, the folks who brought you The Well-Trained Mind and The Story of the World, is releasing a Bible curriculum next year. Want!
This analysis of Dr. Seuss' great work Green Eggs and Ham is funny in its own right, but I have to admit that I like it most because it assures me that I am not the only person who has to restrain her snickers when reading the line, "I would not, could not, with a goat."
See, this is why Chip MacGregor's blog is so worth reading. (Link includes discussion of P. G. Wodehouse, so you know it's good.)
Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

Homeschooling Year One

We are close to finished with our first year of homeschooling, and we are planning to continue next year. I thought I’d do a little post about what we did, what worked and what didn’t, and what we’re planning on doing next year.

What Worked

Not having to get all the kids out of the house by seven! :)  I kid, but with four kids five and under, this is not an insignificant consideration!

 The Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading. I’m very impressed with this book. We’re about halfway through it. It’s very easy to use and very, very thorough. My daughter’s learning to read well, and I’m learning things I never knew about my own language!

            For handwriting practice, I have my daughter choose a sentence from her reading lesson every day and copy it.

Math U See, Primer. This book makes me unafraid to teach math. I love how the concepts are illustrated visually and in a tactile manner with the manipulative blocks. For example, in teaching time, the book has you make a clock out of the five-unit blocks, one block between each number on the clock, so that the student has a visual illustration of the number of minutes between each number on the clock. It then uses the skill of skip-counting-by-five (taught in an earlier lesson) to teach the child how to read what is indicated by minute hand. Very clever, very effective.

More Mudpies to Magnets. We’ve been doing experiments out of this book, and every one of them has been a huge hit.

Bible story narration. We’re slowly reading through a Bible story book. I read Bess a story, and then she narrates back a two-to-three sentence version to me, which I copy down for her. Then she illustrates it. Thus, she’s slowly making her very own Bible story book. I got this idea from Berquist’s Designing Your Own Classical Curriculum, and I’m very happy with it.

Scripture memorization. We’re using Well-Versed Kids, and we got a fair way through it this year. (I'm lucky, and my mom is lending me the copy she used with us when we were kids. It's pretty hard to find now.) We’re also memorizing the verses off of the fliers the kids bring home from Sunday school.

Poetry memorization. Bess has memorized several poems this year. She gets to pick them. Once she’s memorized them, we copy them down into her poetry journal. This is another idea from Berquist’s book.

Art lessons with Grandpa. My dad’s been coming over to do art with Bess. She’s learned some basic drawing skills, and been introduced to tools like charcoal, and done lots of other fun projects, like using construction paper cut-outs to make a big scene on poster board and like lighting candles and then drawing the flames. This has been very cool. 

Spanish Lessons with Aunt L. My sister has come and done Spanish with the kids (Bess and her little brother). These have been really neat too, and have included writing her own stories in Spanish and illustrating them, and having snacks and talking about them in Spanish, and even visiting with my sister's classroom hamster and talking about it in Spanish.

Lots and lots and lots of read-alouds. We’ve read a lot of age-appropriate science books and history books and fairy tales and Spanish children’s books.

Homeschooling P. E. class. Our local university offers a P. E. class for homeschoolers – it’s how they give their elementary ed. students a practicum in how to each P. E. This was a blast – Bess got to do all the fun P. E. stuff like playing with parachutes and running relay races and bean bag tosses and all that jazz.

What Didn’t Work

A formal Spanish program. I’ve got one I want to use next year, but this year we ended up doing conversation days with my sister (as mentioned above) and lots and lots of Spanish picture books and some Spanish music.  It was informal, which I didn’t expect, but it was good. My kids were really resistant to speaking something other than English at the beginning of this year, but now they’re getting used to it. They’re even excited about it (when it involves music they like or stories they like). My daughter’s even tried using Spanish when the occasion called for it, and that’s a huge step forward!

A science experiment a week. It just didn’t happen that way. They were there, but less frequent than I hoped.

What We’re Doing Next Year

Friday school. This is the biggest change. Next year the plan is to enroll Bess in a private school satellite program. This means that technically, Bess will be enrolled in private school (which, among other things, simplifies our paperwork), though she will only have school on campus once a week. The rest of her lessons will be at home, taught by me. The bigger benefits are that she gets to go to classes once a week, and will get music lessons (they do choir and a musical every semester) and P. E. and some extra history and science classes and FIELD TRIPS. Basically, it fills in all the gaps – all the stuff that’s hard to do on our own. And it lets her continue to get used to classes with other kids and to other people teaching her, but without the uber-long public school day.

I’m glad we did the first year on our own, because I got to find my feet without anyone looking over my shoulder. But for this next year, now that I know what I want and need, I’m excited to have a bit of support and a little more structure.

First Language Lessons and Writing with Ease. This is what we’re moving to for Language Arts once we finish OPGTTR (which should be within the first month or so of school, as it’s the one thing we’re planning to keep up with over the summer). I don’t think I’d be homeschooling if I hadn’t read The Well-Trained Mind, and so I’m cheerfully going ahead and following most of Bauer’s suggestions, including using her curricula where they exist. We’ll also be using Spelling Workout A.

 Bible stories and Scripture memorization. Just continuing with what we did this year.

 Handwriting . . . um. Of some kind. I’m leaning Zaner-Bloser, but I’m also thinking about Handwriting Without Tears.

El Espanol Facil (forgive the lack of accent). It was hard to find a Spanish curriculum that wasn’t aimed at high-schoolers, and that also wasn’t crafts-based, and that also wasn't just memorizing odd bits of vocabulary, but this one looks good. I'll try to report back. :)

       In addition, I’m hoping to have at least one time a day (probably a meal) where we only speak Spanish. I’m working really hard to get my Spanish to the place where I can facilitate this!

Biology WTM-style. We’ll be using the suggestions in WTM, and studying plant life, animal life and the human body.

Story of the World I: Ancient Times. I’m looking forward to this!

 

I think that’s the bulk of it. There are a few things I still need to figure out, but this is the plan going forward. Of course, the very fact that I’m homeschooling – when I never ever expected to do that – makes me know that I can’t count on everything working out just as I plan!

 

Anyone else more-or-less know what you're doing next year?

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

Getting Better, Loving Books

After a week of being very out of the loop due to head injury + flu, it felt really good today to start getting back into normal routines. Sure, I didn’t do everything today I normally do, because my head still aches (a bit) and I'm still sniffly (a bit), but we did some homeschooling, and a lot of cleaning up, and the kids made masterpieces out of playdough and right now there is a double batch of corn-sausage chowder bubbling in the cast-iron Dutch oven on the stovetop. Yum. All is not right with the world, but it's getting closer.

            I’ve been thinking a lot about books recently. I’ve been thinking about what I want to read next, now that the 15 books in 15 days challenge has convinced me that I really can be more ambitious about what I tackle. I now have de Tocqueville and Boethius downstairs, and I think I'll actually get through them. And I’ve been thinking about next year’s curriculum, because Bess is going into first grade, and we’re going to keep homeschooling.

            The more I think about it, the more I wonder whether or not the real reason I was able to be convinced that homeschooling was the right fit for our family was because I knew if we homeschooled I’d have the excuse to acquire and read many, many more books. I am just a bit of a bibliophile. This past weekend was our library’s used book sale, and to my amazement, even though I got there three hours after it opened, they still had two whole tables full of kids’ books. I got a copy of Peter Spier’s Jonah and James Thurber’s Many Moons and several easy readers and a picture book copy of Robert Frost’s Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening, along with many other wonderful things.  And I have more wonderful things on the way from that online used book sale. (Thanks, Mom!)

            And my husband’s been building bookshelves. A month or two ago he found a great deal on a saw he wanted, and I opined that getting a new saw was a fine thing if that saw meant that I could get new bookshelves. I mean, a new saw should equal that new saw getting used, right? Adam thought that made sense, and he got his saw. And now, he has used that saw to make me some new bookshelves. The odd, unusable spaces in the corners of our home are now filled with books, and we both think it makes it look more like our own home than it ever has before.

       He made a narrow little shelf that fits between the loveseat and the corner cupboard. He made a wide shelf that fits between the other side of the corner cupboard and the sofa. There’s now a tall shelf dwarfing our television set and now all our children’s chapter books are on it instead of taking up space on the giant bookshelf upstairs where the grownup’s books are supposed to reign. Ah. The giant bookshelf upstairs looks much neater now that it's a bit emptier, but I don't imagine it'll stay that way long. And – wonder of wonders! – Adam also made a shelf to replace the dingy, falling-apart, particle-board monstrosity that was holding our homeschooling curricula. The new shelf fits in the same space, but it’s bigger and sturdier, and the shelves are more sensibly spaced.

            So I’ve been thinking a lot about books. I’ve been thinking about my books too, the ones I’m writing. I found out this weekend that I didn’t final in the latest contest I entered, but I’m finding that I’m okay with that, especially as I can already find in the manuscript I sent in at least two things any competent judge would mark me down for. I’m waiting to get my critiques back. If they marked me down for the same mistakes I can see myself, I think I’ll actually be encouraged, because it’ll mean I’m on the right track in learning to see my own weaknesses. And learning to see my weaknesses is a great step in learning to fix them.

            And I’m wondering how much I’m going to learn about writing as I start teaching my children how to write, and how much I’m going to learn about story-telling as I read all these good books to them. I do think homeschooling, at least right now, is the best educational path my kids can take. But it’s also beginning to look awfully self-serving. It’s really a second education for me.

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

Links! Dueling, homemaking, homeschooling, but most especially, Terrible Poetry

If you go to no other link on this list, you have to go here, and check out Chip MacGregor's Bad Poetry Contest.  Here's his description of the annual event:

For those not in the know, we deal with books and publishing 51 weeks out of the year, answering questions and offering insights to writers and those interested in the world of publishing. But one week out of the year (my birthday week), we set aside the topic of publishing in order to share something much deeper... much more meaningful... and very stupid. In the old British tradition of offering something falsely deep yet with a veneer of thoughtfulness, we hold a Bad Poetry Contest. Each year the readers send in truly horrible poetry, then a team of experts (me...and sometimes Mike, if he's sober and I can convince him to help) offers a thorough evaluation of each piece ("That sucks... but this sucks worse."). Eventually we come up with a winner, who is presented with a truly fabulous Grand Prize. One year it was a 45 record of Neil Diamond singing "I Am, I Said" (which contains these deep thoughts: "I am, i said, to no one there, and no one heard at all not even the chair." Wow. Sing to me, Neil.) Another year it was a very special book that had been sent to me in hopes of finding representation: Does God Speak Through Cats? You see the theme here? We go for a mood of deepfulness and reflectivosity. And YOU need to participate. 

Moving on to real reflection: free advice may be worth what you pay for it, but this seems to be an exception to the rule.

And here is more in that sensible, gracious vein.

Finally, Lars Walker has a post on dueling as an economic phenomenon:

". . . imagine you're a gentleman who sometimes needs a short-term loan, and your only source of credit is to borrow from another gentleman. 

Now, imagine that someone publicly calls you a liar.

He is attacking your trustworthiness, the only collateral you possess. If word gets around that you're not a man of your word, who will lend you ten pounds, when you need to buy seed in the spring?

We still use the saying, “His word is his bond.” In this situation, that's more than a metaphor. It's quite literally true."

Happy Mother's Day to all you moms out there!

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell

Links!

Hmm, haven't done a links post for awhile. Here you go!

My husband has a post about Lenten fasting and what we do with the time our fasting frees up.

Amy has a free e-book on homeschooling with Down Syndrome.

The Murrays share about artificial surfectant, and how it means breath and life for babies born prematurely. This invention saved the lives of two of my own children, and I appreciated knowing that it was money from the March of Dimes that allowed for the research that discovered it. Artificial surfectant is the reasons early babies routinely survive now - babies who would have died in years past.

Tienne's post about her Lenten internet fast is well-worth reading.

I thought this New York Times article about exercise was worth reading too. It summarizes the findings of a bunch of different studies. The conclusion is that exercise is important to health, and even to weight loss, but in the latter case, it might be important in different ways than we previously thought. It's a nice rejoinder for all those recent articles that claim that exercise doesn't help you get in shape at all.