Every day is complicated, messy, and full of friction. And every day has glorious or cozy moments worth celebrating. I seldom bother to chronicle the friction and the mess because writing time is fleeting and precious—and childhood even more so. I’d rather capture the small joys that I might forget—or take for granted—if I don’t take time to set them down in words.
(Excerpt from
this post about Real Life, quoted here because I don't want anyone to be under the impression that things are always perfect around here! Heaven knows we are anything but. Perfect, frictionless, orderly? Nope. Happy? Most of the time!)
- Kathy: Darling babes & halo hair. Worth the waddle!
- regan: my 14yo used to lock himself in the bathroom and paint indian “war paint” all over his face using...
- Activities Coordinator: My sister had that hair. My husband had that hair. Why, oh why didn’t my children get...
- Kathryn: Oh my! Rilla is a miniature Beanie!
- angela: A couple years ago, I spotted someone signing at a Living Stones retreat (back when K and I were newbies in...
Be like the bird
Who, pausing in flight
On limb too slight,
Feels it give way beneath her,
Yet sings,
Knowing she has wings.
—Victor Hugo
Six Things to Include in Your Child's Day:
meaningful work
imaginative play
good books
beauty (art, music, nature)
ideas to ponder and discuss
prayer
Whence It Came
Subscribe in a reader
Oh, funny — I just posted a link to the Basement article yesterday, too. Atticus had read it and sent it on to me. Great piece. But sad.
Posted on June 4th, 2008 at 5:22 amThat Baesement article is good. But I end up wondering if he is using the best methods of teaching writing to these folks. Clearly they need to start somewhere different than the younger students that attend in the daytime but he seems to not really know how to do that. Not that his points about the general characteristics of this group are not valid, but he seems to have decided that literature is inherently interesting and is then baffled with how to teach it to folks that don’t share that premise.
The economics of higher education is a whole other kettle of fish. Smelly fish.
Posted on June 4th, 2008 at 6:11 amJoVE, that thought struck me too. He wants to teach a straight-up Comp 101 course. Sounds like what most of those students need is a remedial English course. I respect that he’s trying not to strip the meaning from a passing grade, but I wonder if he could take a more proactive approach with his bosses (and why DON’T they care that more than half of his students are failing, anyhow??) to change a course track that clearly isn’t meeting the needs of the students.
Posted on June 4th, 2008 at 7:08 amI attended a community college in high school and was required to take Writing 101. However, at this college, you had to take placement tests for reading, writing, and mathematics. There were like five different test levels you could chose from for each area. You were given descriptions of the basic content and were told to choose appropriately. Then based on the results of your tests, you were sent on to Writing 101 or to remedial writing and/or reading classes, etc. There were even several classes (that did not count as college level transfer credits), depending on how much remediation the student needed. That way the student was actually PREPARED for Writing 101. I thought the article was interesting and well-written, but there definitely appears to be flaws in his college’s administration (and his lack of speaking out!).
Posted on June 6th, 2008 at 3:55 pmI read that article on an airplane this weekend.. and I was really angry at the professor for caring so little about teaching and teaching so poorly that people can take his course multiple times and fail. I won’t rehash all of the things that bothered me… but I wrote a rather long rant on my blog:
Posted on June 11th, 2008 at 5:34 amhttp://itinerant-oak.blogspot.com/2008/06/i-spout-off.html