If the foundations be destroyed, what shall the righteous do? –Psalm 11:3
I will be hosting the Carnival of Homeschooling on my blog on its new domain: http://principleddiscovery.com.
If you are unfamiliar with blog carnivals, I have a little information here.
If you know what this is about, you can go straight to the carnival submit form. Hope to see you there!
The Truth Laid Bear has just finished up another round of updates and tweaks. And finally granted an old request. We now have a community page just for homeschoolers!
I added a few people just because I didn’t want to be the only person in there. If you would like to join the little community over there, check out the site and see what you think. Read the following guidelines and make sure you are ok with them. Then send me an email and let me know. You cannot join through TTLB (people keep telling me they can’t figure it out, but it is because it isn’t possible. Just email me or leave a comment with your blog’s url, I’ll check it and get it added.)
1) I would like this community to be predominantly about homeschooling. If your blog isn’t really about homeschooling, even though you homeschool, perhaps you could start a community? I understand, however, that homeschooling covers vastly more than books and lesson plans. If you have any questions, ask!
2) I generally favor discourse over exclusion. I do not view a community such as this the same as I view a marriage or a business partnership or church attendance. Therefore, I do not feel “yoked” to other participants. Inclusion of a blog is not an endorsement of every view of the applicant on any issue whether it be religious, child rearing, political or otherwise, nor is it an endorsement of the views of their blogging hosts, their blogrolls, their advertisers or anything else. It only means I checked out their site and from what I could see, they talk about homeschooling.
3) If you notice something that is inappropriate or offensive, please direct it to me privately and not in a public comment.
4) I only ask that you put a link back to the community page so that others will know that it exists and benefit from the updates. It is like having the front page of a newspaper just for homeschoolers! Find a nice place in your sidebar…I can help you with the code if you need it.
5) Other than that, all I need to know is your blogsite. You can leave it in comments or email me. Whichever you prefer. I’ll let you know when I add it, but TTLB can take a few hours to update, so be patient!
I have an image there, but for some unknown reason it is all squished and does not look nice. If anyone out there with some artistic talent…or with children who need something to do…would like to make a neat little button, that would be really cool.
Hope you like it! And to view my home page, click here. (That’s my main blog, because I keep it up better than this one.)
I received this comment on my post about Andrea Clark and thought it odd:
I found your work a little stiff, you need to involve your acute artistic sensibilities, that you indeed have, and, your photos reflects, the dicipline of composicion, an important tool that will make you master of your skills. rosa maria
My first thought was, “That’s a touch off topic, isn’t it?” I then progressed to “Who are you?”
While pondering that, I couldn’t help but think, “my work?” I guess I don’t take myself quite that seriously. And I’m sorry, but I am yet to find any acute artistic sensibilities within myself. And what photos? WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?
Can I critique the comment? Starting at basic grammar? Moving on to spelling? I won’t bother with punctuation. And then perhaps to relevancy to the article? Now, I am quite open to constructive criticism. But I cannot deduce a single thing from this comment which would improve my writing.
It actually looks kind of like those randomly generated things I get in my email box. Hmm. Curiosity finally gets the better of me…and yes, it is spam. Unless you want diet pills (and is this stuff still legal?) don’t click on the link.
If any of you have an actual real criticisms of my writing, feel free. I take such things well. But I don’t think that little web-bots who string together some words to enter in a post have much to say about my “artistic sensibilities.”
Just click on the invitation. I hope you enjoy it! There are a lot of wonderful entries and even a few from here at homeschooljournal.net! If you would like to help spread the word, feel free to use this nifty invitation, made for the Carnival by Gates of Vienna.
I am hosting the Carnival of Homeschooling at my main blog next week and am looking for submissions. You can view the guidelines HERE. Thank you!
One of the common questions many homeschoolers are asked is, “What about socialization?” After muttering some things about how much more time homeschooled children have for such things in comparison to their desk-bound peers, I finally decided to look up the word to see what was really at stake. I looked it up in my Webster’s 1828 dictionary to find that it was not there. Hmm. New concept. So I searched online and found this definition:
the process by which culture is learned; also called enculturation.
During socialization individuals internalize a culture’s social
controls, along with values and norms about right and wrong.
My analysis of the definition:
Socialization means enculturation. I read there, ‘indoctrination.’
One “internalize[s] a culture’s social controls.” So, again, we are a product of our environment. Our ‘culture’ puts social controls on our behavior, implying that 1) the individual is subordinate to and inherently less valuable than the group and 2) the individual is not responsible for his own actions.
These ’social controls’ include “values and norms about right and wrong.” Whoa. Hold on a second. Norm-referenced testing is bad enough. As the population is dumbed down, it is easier to succeed. What ‘progress’ is that? And now the concept of right and wrong is norm-referenced? So the little ten year old girl I saw at the fair with the playboy bunny on her baseball cap was acting in what was good and right and wholesome because a significant portion of our society sees nothing wrong with that?
In most cases, when we speak of “socialization,” we are speaking of putting something under control of the state or group ownership. We speak of socialized medicine. Stalin socialized the means of distribution in the former USSR. To socialize our children, then, is to bring them under the control of the state and fit them for use by the state. It is not to teach them social skills, nor to make them sociable. Our public school system is actually very efficient at this…much more efficient than they are at teaching our children to read. According to Consideringhomeschooling, 85% of Christian children who attend public schools for 12 years will reject their faith. Our public schools only manage to graduate 70% of its students (manhattan institute).
Next time someone asks me, “What about socialization?” I am going to respond, “The process of socialization is the PRIMARY reason I choose to homeschool.” I will not have my children taught “values and norms about right and wrong.” They will be given a firm foundation, a solid rock, an absolute measure of right and wrong to stand on. They will be taught scriptural principles of right and wrong. They will be held accountable for their own actions. They will be encouraged to take dominion of their surroundings and use their firm stand to influence our ‘culture.’ I do not wish for them to be turned over to the control and use of the state. They will NOT be socialized, if there is anything I can do to prevent it.
edit: This isn’t over yet. St. Luke’s denied the transfer 20 minutes before the ambulance was to transport her to the airport. They said the facility had insufficient equipment to meet Andrea’s needs. I thought this a bit ironic considering they are about to pull the life support from her, anyway. But apparently the hospital in IL is not equipped to maintain ventilation. There will be a meeting Tuesday to decide her fate. Click here for more information, and contact info.
Thought I’d post an update on Andrea Clark, since I brought it up the other day. This is from her sister and is very encouraging.
My family has made the decision to move our sister to the hospital in Chicago. Thank God there is someone willing to take her. And, really, it is best to get her out of Texas, because of the futile care law here.
St. Luke’s played hardball with us on this issue. We were told that we could make the decision today and they would pay the entire amount of $14 thousand to move her, but if we made the decision tomorrow, they would only pay half of it, and if it were the day after tomorrow, they would pay nothing.
As you know, I’m a Democrat, but one that is against abortion. I agree with the Republicans on that issue, at least. After this experience, though, I have to tell you: I am in absolute awe of the power that the right to life people generate. I, of course, first posted on Democratic Underground, and I have to give them some credit: they let my post stand against the rules about posting something like this under the wrong topic. They also let it stand, even though it had people’s (my sister’s and mine) personal numbers in it. And, of course, some people there forwarded it to other blogs. And everyone there was very supportive in their comments, as well.
But the pro-life people stepped forward and just absolutely ground St. Luke’s into submission on this issue. You have, without a doubt, saved my sister’s life. I want you to know that. Without the pro-life/right to life people stepping in from the very first of this fight for Andrea, we would have lost. I have never in my life seen such a centered, focused and energized group of people.
You used that energy and focus to do some good in this world and you didn’t care whether you were fighting for a Democrat’s life or a Republican’s. Now, that’s conviction.
Praise the Lord!
from Texas Rainmaker
On the way to gymnastics this week, my Baby Bear shouted, “No! Stop!” as we were approaching the railroad tracks. I instinctively slowed down.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Railroad tracks,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Yes, dear. But there’s no train.”
“I know. Can we wait for one?”
Sometimes, I wonder if we don’t induce ADHD on some children. We are always rushing them about, pulling them along and hurrying them up. But my son is most content to poke a stick in the dirt, watch an ant scurry around its hill or wait for a train to cross the tracks. The only difficulty he has in focusing is when I interrupt these mind-consuming tasks to do something else. Because there’s a limit to how long I can poke a stick in the dirt, watch an ant, or wait for trains.
According to Jeremy Bentham, “nature has put man under the governance of two sovereign masters: pleasure and pain.” This is the guiding force behind utilitarianism, a philosophy of morality originally put forth by David Hume and further developed by John Stuart Mill. It is a central tenet to much of the moral relativism we see today. This from Texas A&M:
Morality, in this view, is not determined by a standard or anything absolute. It is determined by looking at the case, who it affects and determining the costs and benefits to the various parties. Whichever gives the greatest benefit to the most people is the morally correct choice.
For some application: Consider a woman with a chronic illness. There are a number of complications in her treatment and her life consists of daily medication regimens and trips to the hospital to monitor her condition. There are further complications and she needs a risky surgery. Against all odds, she survives, but there is some bleeding to the brain. She is conscious, able to communicate and in need of a ventilator. This all is very expensive. The insurance company is incurring a great deal of cost. The hospital begins to feel the pressure. An ethics committe is convened and it is determined that the ethical thing to do is to remove the ventilator. And let her die. She has lost the cost-benefit analysis.
Andrea Clark has been given a healthy dose of pain medication which has since rendered her unconscious (most of the time), but this is medication induced and is not a result of her condition. She is able to communicate. And she communicated clearly to family and doctors that she wished to fight for her life, not give up. That is why the ethics committee was convened. In order to usurp her and her family’s choice to hold on to life.
For more on this story, including contact information to the hospital involved (St. Luke’s) as well as the insurance company in question (Blue Cross Blue Shield):
WorldNetDaily
Texasrainmaker
Pursuing Holiness
Democratic Underground (a post from her sister)
My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy
Texas Advance Directives Blog (Ms. Clark’s attorney)
Andrea Clarke, Andrea Clark, Texas, Futile Care Law, futile care, right to life, medical ethics
In a binder in my file cabinet, I have a growing collection of rejection slips from publishing companies I have kept. My first one is obviously a copy of a copy of a copy…and by the grainy, thick, gray print, I wouldn’t be surprised if its earliest ancestor was one of those inky blue dittos. Whoever was responsible for running off copies did not even bother to be sure the “master” was on the copy machine straight. The one I received last week is quite a bit more professional. A postcard, neatly formatted, on which someone took the time to hand check the little box next to, “Does not meet our needs at this time.” I was honored. I am looking forward to be rejected by them again in the future.
This week, I received something new. My article, “Developing an Educational Philosophy” was accepted for publication by Homeschool Enrichment Magazine. Prior to this, they had accepted my query and given me a deadline, so I was hopeful that the article would not be rejected once it arrived. OK, I’m always “hopeful” but this time I actually had reason to be hopeful. At least I knew the editor was interested in the topic. It came with a surprise, however. An actual article assignment. It is rather in depth and I am quite excited as well a bit nervous. I know what to do with a rejection slip. It gets filed neatly with its companions in my folder. I’m not as sure what to do with this email. Print it? Frame it? Maybe I should just file it behind the rejection slips.
It isn’t exactly the only thing I have had published, but it was exciting to me. My first bit was a few captions in the magazine “HydroReview,” a magazine about hydroelectric power. No, it’s not an area of expertise for me. My mom met the editor waiting outside a doctor’s office and they also had a son with ADHD and I ended up with an internship out of the deal. And I’ve had two blog entries included in books: Shout to the Lord, in Juggling With Hamsters by Jane Bullivant and Building Childhood Memories in The Gift of Family Writing by Jill Novak. Does any of it get me anything but the excitement of seeing myself in print? No. But it is still exciting in my little area of the world.
Other tidbits:
1) I updated my post on my educational philosophy. I forgot part of it. If you are interested in reading it, you can just scroll down to the sub-heading, “The Nature of Knowledge.” The rest of it is the same.
2) If you haven’t checked out the homeschool blogwatch over at HomeschoolBuzz, you should. It is a great way to discover a few blogs and see what people are talking about. I was very excited to be included along with several blogs I already read regularly!
3) A little late due to Blogger issues, but the Carnival of Homeschooling is up. Enjoy the selection!
