Posted on 11/27/2006 7:04:44 AM PST by meandog
Dear 2nd amendment mama,
Congratulations on the wonderful way in which you fulfilled your vocation as a mother! I'm sorry for the difficulties you encountered, but it seems that they made you and your son better folks.
"And, oh yeah, I was told by the school psychologist who had to evaluate him that she'd never met a more well-adjusted boy that age, especially since he'd lost his father in the previous year!"
Having met a couple of hundred homeschoolers so far in the last seven or eight years since we began to research the idea, I can say that your son was just a typical homeschooler.
Homeschooled children are almost invariably a joy to be around. Not segregated off with 20 or 30 or 40 kids of precisely the same age, they get along well with folks of any age. They're helpful and kind to younger children, enjoy their peers, mix easily with older children, and are respectful of adults and obedient to proper authority.
In our circle, it's a real joy when a few homeschool families get together, and you see six or ten of twenty children or mixed ages all having a great time together. I'm the "chess coach," and today was chess club. We had eight children (it varies from about six to 20), ages 7 to 14. A very good, happy, trouble-free, raucous time was had by all (yes, our chess club gatherings can get a little... boisterous, LOL).
"Fortunately, my son NEVER had a teacher with the arrogance/attitude of meandog."
Fortunately, I think that total misanthropes like meandog are rare, even among public school teachers. I spent three years in public schools as a child, and only remember two teachers as mean and abusive as meandog. Most of the rest were lazy, stupid, jaded, condescending, ill-educated, fearful of intelligent students, burned-out, or otherwise wrecked, but only two where truly abusive. And I had two teachers who were genuinely good teachers.
I really think that meandog is the exception.
sitetest
bump
You'll enjoy this....a couple of years ago I applied for a part-time "instructor" position at the local technical college. The position was teaching adult-ed/corporate customers computer programs. Although I don't have a Master's Degree and never took any "teacher prep education courses", I was hired because.......I homeschooled my son and was also totally self-taught in the computer programs they wanted me to teach. I'm still teaching there and have also been picked-up to teach at the local university in their adult-ed program. They wanted someone who could be a self-starter in creating curriculm and could answer questions "on the fly" not just follow a book or lesson plan. Adults ask questions and don't want to hear that it's not in the chapter or some such. They need real world answers to their questions.
Just pimping for the union...
Dear 2nd amendment mama,
LOL! That's a great story!
We're thinking that for high school, we might send our guys to the Catholic high school from which I graduated. To help with the tuition and related costs (for both, it would be over $25,000 per year), my wife was thinking that in a few years, she might go back to work, at least to get the guys through high school.
She was fretting about this with her friend, who is the head of the art department at another local Catholic school. My wife's degree is in art, and the friend said, oh, you can come work with me, teaching here at the school.
My wife protested that how could she be qualified to teach, she didn't have any sort of education credentials.
My wife's friend laughed hysterically, "First, CATHOLIC SCHOOLS DON'T CARE ABOUT EDUCATION CREDENTIALS!! If you know you're field, we'd be inclined to give you a job. Second, as to your teaching credentials, JUST WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN DOING THE LAST SIX AND A HALF YEARS??? You have more teaching experience then LOTS of our faculty had when they first started, and they did just fine, too!"
Personally, having taught at the high school level, the college level, and to professionals in corporate settings, I can vouch for my wife's teaching abilities. Like most moms, she's made an outstanding teacher.
sitetest
Oh yes!!! You're wife should definitely apply to the school then. I'm sure she'd be a great asset and I'll just bet that the student's would love her. People who have homeschooled tend to make classes more exciting - they actually research the subjects themselves rather than just relying on printed books. Let your wife know that this "mama" says....go for it!!!
I have to raise my hand and offer some information. I am a single parent, homeschooling on a single salary. And, although I have a nice income, it does not reach $100k per year.
After the kids are grown and on their own, I will seek out that salary. But currently, I will not neglect them, nor miss one second more than I have to, to pursue what is required for that goal.
Eleven to 16 hours DAILY for the last 26 years. The last time I had an 8 hour work day with designated breaks, a lunch hour and nothing further to do was April 1980. My vacation accrual has been maxed at the company limit of 480 hours for the last 6 years. From 1980 to 1983 I was teaching at Southwestern College on top of my job as a toll central office equipment engineer at Pacific Telephone.
Yeah, I got busy and started to look for my $100K, haven't seen it yet.
The ironic thing is that few home schooling families are two income. It is a huge sacrifice, but one parents make willingly, because the schools are harmful at this point. My children deserve the best, and while that won't involve designer clothes, I will give them that which can never be taken away, education.
My husband heads into work at 3am, returns about 7pm. He hasn't taken a vacation in over three years. He works seven days a week, and we alone are responsible for our retirement.
He does this all so I can be home fulltime with our daughters. They're not yet school age, but I am still teaching them now. And when school starts, I will have two full time jobs, mother and teacher. It's a harder way of life, but you do what's best for your children.
Oh my gosh, you must love your job.
I do. Computer science. Electrical engineering. Contributing to national security. Travel. Decent pay.
I typically work 9 AM to 3 AM. Same arrangement on the retirement. My last vacation was April 1999. I have a couple "breaks" to run one of my sons off to work at 8 AM. The other one goes to work at 11 PM. That nips 30 minutes out of my work day. My wife works from 9 PM to 7 AM. I take a late "lunch" at 3 PM with my wife.
Someone posted recently that an American 6th-grade education circa 1902 was equivalent -- in terms of reading, writing, speaking, math, history (U.S. and worldwide), and overall accomplishment as a civilized young person -- to a typical undergraduate degree from about 1996 onward, Ivies included.
From what I've seen of the latest crop, the statistic is far too charitable.
Last year, my 8 year old daughter got to hear all about sex at lunch time from little boys sitting next to her.
I started pulling her out at lunch time. I knew her teacher, and I knew that crap wasn't being tolerated in the classroom.
Now my daughters are in a private school. We looked into homeschooling, but decided on private school. One of my daughters is special needs, and she's the one that I may need to homeschool. She needs more sleep than other kids, and it makes it very hard for her to go to school early in the morning. A flexible schedule would be great for her.
When my son was in the first grade, one day he said, "I be gone, Dad." I said, "Wait a minute. Who taught you to talk like that?" "My teacher." 'Nuf said.
Roman Catholicism is submissive to the Teaching Magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church and to Scripture as seen through the prism of the Teaching Magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church (aka Tradition). It is not the whim of the week club. It is not a religion of sexual libertinism. It is not a democracy. It is not an anarchy. It is not characterized by "slain in the spirit" experiences as are "reformed" pentecostal churches. It is not characterized by one shot deal guaranteed salvation in the form of "accepting" Jesus Christ as one's personal Savior. After all, if He isn't, who could possibly be???
The Roman Catholic Church was funded personally and guaranteed personally by Jesus Christ upon Peter who was given the "Keys of the Kingdom" which were passed by Peter to his successor Linus and by Linus to Cletus, etc. down to Benedict XVI through each of Cletus's successor popes. It is a specifically apostolic Church with the authority of each and every legitimate bishop traceable to the authority of an apostle.
The Roman Catholic Church has the Mass in which the one-time historical sacrifice of Jesus Christ upon the Cross is made immanent upon the altar at each Mass and in which ordinary bread and wine (subject to requirements of Canon Law) are transubstantiated into the actual Body and Blood of Christ under the continued appearance of bread and wine at the Consecration of the Mass as the Holy Eucharist.
The Roman Catholic Church recognizes seven sacraments (outward signs instituted by Jesus Christ to give grace). They are: Baptism, Penance, Holy Eucharist, Confirmation, Holy Orders, Matrimony and Extreme Unction. Penance is nowadays known as "the sacrament of Reconciliation" and Extreme Unction as "Final Annointing."
The Roman Catholic Church is a quite rigidly dogmatic church and not a venue for rank spiritual speculation (See Fr. Hesburgh and his execrable subordinate in theology department: Fr. Richard McBrien and so very many others of their ilk). One believes or one does not believe. The eccentric in the middle pew is not on a par with Thomas Aquinas's Summa Theolgica. A vote of eccentrics in the pews is not to be equated with dogma.
Fr. Hesburgh enjoyed high standing in academia as a result of his anti-Catholicism. Before Land o' Lakes in 1967, dissenting theology professors at Catholic schools were fired, tenured or not. They were CATHOLIC schools and submission to Church teaching was a condition of continued employment. We were not under the idiot impression that great-great-great (times several hundred) granddad was an ape. Nor were we taught that the "reformation" was a debatable proposition. Instead we were taught Roman catholicism. Fr. Hesburgh and his ilk lusted for academic "respectability" and knew that to get it they would have to suck up to the agnostics, atheists and other antiCatholics in academia by expelling Catholicism from their schools.
That you do not see much difference between Evangelical Protestantism and Roman Catholicism is one more reason why you or public school teachers like you or "Catholic" school teachers who resemble you will NOT be teaching my kids. This is not a personal insult any more than I would be insulted if you were to post that you want for your kids a more "open-minded" education than people like me would be likely to offer them. We simply differ in very important ways on what is important in education.
Now, ponder this. We have witnessed the decline of seemingly invincible American industries in our time: steel, automobiles, electronics, almost any sort of hands-on industrial processes. As these industries reached their apex of power and market penetration, all that was left was outsourcing of the jobs to places like Bangladesh where people would work for a nickel an hour and no benefits at age 10. Those big industries may still, for a time, belong to American investors but they no longer provide good jobs at good wages within our borders. It was also observed that productivity and quality of work force had declined even here.
In about 1958, the AFL-CIO was still refusing to enroll most government workers, especially public school teachers. My mother-in-law was one as were a number of my friends' parents. They were uniformly proud to be "professionals" and not union members. Nonetheless, from bank presidents to janitors, the AFL-CIO enrolled 58% of the American work force Today, the enrollment in the AFL-CIO is 11% and dropping like a lead sinker even though gummint workers like teachers are included.
We have certainly witnessed a major change in American morals and manners in our lifetimes (at least in mine since the 1950s) and not for the better.
Eventually sustained and permanent decline through mediocrity and beyond is fatal to any establishment. The Catholic elementary and secondary schools were generally destroyed when liberal demons were set loose in the Roman Catholic Church not by Vatican II itself but by the phony "spirit" of Vatican II which was more akin to the "spirit" and reality of the French or soviet revolutions (See Crane Brinton's book comparing them with ours and the British). The goddess of "wisdom" portrayed by a nude French prostitute dancing obscenely upon the altars of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris was NOT Catholicism as public education and what mostly passes for diocesan and parish education are NOT education in anything that parents who are responsible should seek for their children and we don't.
If you and I are still available to converse candidly twenty years from now, you will recognize today's primitive exercises in homeschooling and parent-controlled small schools as the harbingers of the future that they are. Without them, civilization will be dead in the USA and in the West generally.
If you are deep into a public school career, it is understandable that you will want to preserve the institution so that your pay and perks continue and your pension well-padded. My wife and I are likely to live in poverty as we age because that is the price paid by the first generation of any social revolution but we will know that our pain is worth it if we succeed in playing even a small role in replacing the evils of public education and even the mediocrity and some evil in parochial education with moral and academic education that actually educates.
Just what was Fr. Hesburgh's academic expertise (a scholar???)(sociology???? heresy???? Academic logrolling? Leftist organizing? Running the US Civil Rights Commission during the height of its reverse racism? Being a Roman-collared mountebank and sockpuppet of the radical secularist left)?
As is my custom, I will refrain from characterizing "fundamentalist" Protestant churches further lest I offend these fine folks who are political allies but differ in aspects of faith.
Vatican II dictated nothing and is no excuse for Hesburgh. I was flaming Hesburgh not you.
Is this an actual statistic?
I applaud parents who are this involved with their children!!! I wonder if this kind of parental involvement with publically-educated students might help to correct the sway toward which the system might be heading.
Too often public school teachers hear the likes of, "I take care of them at home, you take care of them at school. Don't bother me with your part of it."
Parental involvement is essential in any good education!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.