I’ve had several open tabs in my browser window for the past week or so, of things that I wanted to link to on the blog. Now that I have enough tabs I can’t figure out which one I am working from, I thought it might be time to post them.
First, an article from the San Jose Mercury News on a new species of mushroom discovered. It looks, surprisingly, exciting excited.
Here’s an article I found really interesting about White House press conferences. As a former journalist, it drives me insane to see the traditional media fight against new forms of journalism. This is not a Good Ol’ Boys Club, people. Adapt or die. Were you upset that it was an online news source, or just the Huffington Post? Or upset because you weren’t consulted before they let “those people” in here? Get over it.
The news world was atwitter yesterday due to federal advisory panel recommendations to limit the daily allowable dosage of acetaminophen products. They are also recommending a ban on Percocet and Vicodin, due to effects on the liver. Now, I have a friend who nearly died this year from liver failure. And she’s 30. So I get it. OK. But I’m also on Vicodin. What am I supposed to take for pain? Am I going to have to choose between possible liver failure or living with wearing-down-my-teeth-from-gritting pain? Surely there are other options, but what’s with all the pain relievers having issues? If it’s not liver failure, it’s heart complications or stomach problems.
Speaking of health-related items, health insurance in this country is a total scam. I’m not even going to comment.
In education news, congratulations on teaching your kid how to get ahead in life. This is either, “if you don’t like your place in life, just do something illegal,” or “if you don’t like your place in life, have your mom bail you out.” I can’t decide.
Also, it’s a good thing that this didn’t happen to my kid, or I might have done something illegal! I’m glad to see justice was served here. Well. Kind of.
I also found this yesterday about the homeschool situation in the UK. I don’t know much about the blog, but some of the things that were written here make so much sense. This is the quote that resonated the most with me:
That’s the biggest problem—government officials who use their power to regulate and control people who have done nothing wrong, and who are simply being singled out because of prejudice. And then, they make it look like what they are doing is for the “good” of the children, when it fact they are stripping rights away from everyone, even the children they are claiming to protect.
Any call to monitor homeschoolers because of possible abuse or lack of sufficient education, without any evidence to the contrary, is a form of discrimination. Just substitute any other group - African-Americans, Muslims - into that and tell me it’s not. Saying people homeschool their kids so they don’t have to educate them, or so they can abuse them, or to insert-the-pejorative-of-the-day, is like saying that people who send their kids off to public or private school only do so so they don’t have to actually parent their kids. Painting an entire (and incredibly diverse) movement with accusations that just aren’t true and don’t hold an ounce of water is no way to enact policy.
Sure, there are people who use “homeschooling” as a cover to abuse or neglect their kids. The problem here is that they are not “homeschoolers,” but that they are child-abusers. Monitoring homeschoolers, or demanding that all children go to “traditional” schools is not the answer. We already have laws in place to deal with people who mistreat their children. And let’s be honest, the public school and foster systems in this country aren’t exactly doing the best job there.
Anything in the news strike you this week?
Hear, hear! I spent 14 years defending homeschoolers in legal trouble, and although there were a handful of actual abuse situations, far and away the large majority of people who raise concerns about homeschooling were fake homeschoolers and real truants. The most extreme situation was a couple who kept their fully enrolled public school child out of school for months in the spring (without any visit from the authorities), killed him during the summer, hid his body in a freezer, and told the school they were “homeschooling” when September came around.
That case stirred up all sorts of demands for more regulation of homeschooling–yet the authorities did nothing when he was absent, day after day, and he was murdered during the summer. Yet homeschooling took the blame for that crime.
Child abuse is a crime, and should be punished. Homeschooling is NOT a crime, and should not be regulated!
i’m definitely supportive of alternative methods - my brother went to a very small montessori junior high and had a much better experience than the mostly numbing boredom and taunting i endured in mine, and a friend of ours home schooled because she was far more gifted than any schools around could handle.
but i wonder what you would think of attainment goals, along the lines of how traditional schools are meant to (ostensibly) be reaching similar comprehension standards? i’m pretty ignorant on this subject so it’s highly possible such things already are in place.
thanks for the news feed!
The problem with comprehension standards is that they vary widely by state. Some states use the same standards and curriculum across the board, and some leave choices up to the school districts, at least as far as I understand it. Different states are known for having the best standards in different areas.
My issue right now (at least with standards), at this point in our homeschooling journey, is that I think they demand too much of young kids. Kids have an innate ability to learn and a huge desire to do so, and the system as it is now has the ability to completely suck the life out of that and push too hard too early.
I want my kids to have time to be kids, to play, to create, to imagine, to pretend, to make art, to sleep in, to hike and to explore. I’ve really come to believe that we start “formal” education way too early. That was one of my mistakes this first past year of this - trying to bring school home. Mostly I was afraid she wouldn’t measure up to the other kids her age. I had to be reminded that I am rejecting what public schools have to offer, so why would I hold myself and my child to their standards? Very freeing.
But really, one of the problems I see is that while the state has standards - attainment goals - they seem completely unable to get their students to meet them. And yes, I recognize the complicated things that go into play in that, and that we don’t live in an ideal world.
I think I can do better by my kids. I don’t know if that answers your question. Let me know.