Open Up and Say "AH": Carnival of Homeschooling # 83

Tomorrow is the beginning of August, and many of us are thinking about the year in learning ahead. Over at Mom is Teaching, Summer has put to together a Doctor's Visit edition of the Carnival of Homeschooling to help us do a review of systems for the coming year of homeschooling.

It's hard to believe that we are more than half-way through summer! We have begun our planning and I will be posting about that soon!

Moral Courage and the Flawed Human Being

As I mentioned last week, one of the excellent keynotes at the New Mexico Summer Institute on Gifted Education, was the very last one: Elizabeth Nielsen and her husband, Dennis Higgins, who gave the presentation on Moral Courage.

Elizabeth is a professor of Special Education at UNM. She is my 'doc' advisor. Dennis is an adjunct professor at UNM, as well as the teacher of a twice-exceptional (gifted/with a disability) program in the Albuquerque Public Schools. They are both national speakers and experts on gifted education. Elizabeth coined the term "twice-exceptional" or 2X, as it is called around here. (My research interest for this doctorate in Special Ed/ Neurospychology is in the area of the neurospychology of visual-perceptual differences in gifted people and gifted people with Autism Spectrum Disorders).

As I said in my post Catching Up!, I saw the Moral Courage keynote before-- last year at the 2006 ALPS conference. But this is one of those rare presentations that is worth seeing several times because the issues it addresses are profound ones for those of us involved in any way with the education of children. At a time when moral relativism has become the norm in the secular education of children, Elizabeth Neilsen's insistence on the importance of teaching moral courage--what it is, how it is made manifest, and the cost to the individual--is an important contribution that, in itself, is a demonstration of moral courage. And more, it is a challenge to us, not only as educators of all sorts, but as human beings, to examine the example we set for each other and for children in our professional, social and personal lives.

The presentation itself consists of three parts:

• an analysis of morally courageous action based on the work of business ethicist, Dr. Rushworth Kidder (Wikipedia article here).
• methodologies for teaching moral courage through books, film and music
• live demonstrations of some of these lessons

But the power of the presentation is really the music and slide shows that are used throughout to engage the audience through real-life examples of moral courage. This is teaching that engages the intellect and the heart and (dare I say?) the soul.

Part of the power of this presentation for me is that it caused me to begin the examination of my own ethical behavior. According to Dr. Kidder, there are five universal core moral principles. They are:

• honesty (a.k.a. truthfulness, integrity)
• fairness (a.k.a. justice)
• respect (tolerance and respect for self, family, others, and respect for life itself)
• responsibility (a.k.a. self-discipline)
• compassion (a.k.a empathy, mercy, love, generosity)

In order to behave ethically, a person must demonstrate all five of these. If even one value is not being practiced, a person cannot be said to be ethical in practice. This certainly gives me room for pause. If even one of these is absent? Whoa! I can see that there is definitely room for continual self-examination. Complacency and moral courage appear to be mutually exclusive. And I expect I have some work to do within myself as the Jewish world enters into the month of Elul, a time for reflection and repentance.

Further, to demonstrate morally courageous action, a person must uphold these principles by taking action in the face of significant personal risk. Actions of moral courage, then, are not for the faint of heart. In fact, the very word "courage" comes from the French word "cour" which means "heart" and implies strength of heart.

As I was watching the presentation and thinking about the examples provided, I noticed that one discussion of importance was not made, using the very human examples provided. That discussion was that no person is perfectly ethical all the time. We are, all of us, flawed human beings. In the context of the presentation, this is understandable because the aim of the talk was to present the definition of moral courage most straight-forwardly and in a small period of time, and then to present ways to begin a discussion with children.

But, but, but...!

Popular culture has a really superficial way of dealing with moral absolutes. In the time of my public education, it had become fashionable to dismiss the moral dimension in the historical analysis of individual action because each exemplar was flawed in some way. In plain English, we were not allowed to have heroes. For example, if a student expressed admiration of Abraham Lincoln as 'the Great Emancipator', s/he was told that Lincoln expressed ambivalence about freeing the slaves. That Lincoln was actually discussing his primary responsibility as president to protect and preserve the Union was dismissed as too subtle for us. Or maybe it was too straight-forward?

We see the same kind of refusal to see moral exemplars anywhere in the way people are treated in the press. There seems to be an urge to bring a person down at any cost, almost as if to say that since every person is flawed, there can be no action at a higher moral level. In this way, we can evade our own moral responsibilities. This way of thinking brings the idea of moral relativism to an absolute low. (Sorry, I could not resist the oxymoron).

It is precisely because of this penchant that we should talk about the fact that flawed human beings can, with great effort and at great cost to themselves, face their flaws and become determined to act on their moral principles anyway in a situation in which they face considerable risk. In fact, one of these risks is of exposure of one's personal flaws by people who wish to discredit the act of moral courage. It seems to me that a significant part of moral courage is the ability to see oneself as flawed, the examination of one's own moral weaknesses, and the personal resolve to take a stand despite it all.

Certainly, when educating young children about moral courage, we must allow the children to have heroes. And we are likely to present the moral actor in a more unidimensional way e.g. Martin Luther King was a hero because he spoke up for justice in the face of oppression. Period. (He was a hero. He did stand up). But when we are educating older children, we can and should present exemplars with more complexity. This can be done using biography and literature both. For example, Oscar Schindler, who saved lives during the Shoah, had many flaws. He was a shady dealer in business, he was a womanizer, etc. And yet, he stood for the value of life itself at a time when many people who were less obviously flawed remained silent.

By having these kinds of discussions, we innoculate our children against the terrible cynicism out there. The cynicism that tells us not to stand out, not to act, because we are not perfect ourselves. And they give us a sense of hope that, despite our flaws--maybe even because of them--if we have the courage to face our own weaknesses, we can do something important in the world.

The New Camera

Most of the pictures I have been posting here on my blog in the past three and a half weeks have been taken on my new camera.

The whole process of actually getting the camera has been quite an adventure. I started on May 25th, believe it or not. I was looking for a Kodak Easy Share Camera with a 12X zoom. I found one for a good price ar Dell and ordered it. I thought it would come in 10 days.

By the end of June, it had been backordered 10X and I was becoming a disillusioned customer, especially after they cancelled the order finally, without one e-mail to let me know what was going on. Then there was the process of phoning them up! I had to talk to India. After several misunderstandings and getting hung-up on (accidentally? on purposely?), I finally talked to a real life person who seemed to understand what was going on.

Well, talked is not the word. I was so frustrated that I am afraid I screamed at "Patrick" (the name is in quotes because if he was Irish, I am from Mars). I threatened to never, ever do business with Dell again unless a camera was in my hands in 48 hours. So Patrick arranged to sell me a Sony Cyber-shot with a Zeiss lens and 15X zoom at a considerable discount and send it to me by overnight shipping for free. I took the deal. Then he even called to make sure I got the camera on time. I did. So here a some of the wonderful pictures I have been taking as I have played with the features of the new camera:






This was taken from the top of Via Sedillo, looking down into the Sedillo Spur development.
The horses in the foreground were at least a mile away.
I was playing with my new, powerful zoom!













This one was also taken from the top of Via Sedillo.

I was trying to catch the white and purple clouds, as well as the shadow in valley in the foreground and sunlight beyond. The shadow is of the very hill I was standing on.

There is a small "ghost" from a rain-drop on the bottom left, but otherwise, a nice picture. You can almost see the needles on the pinyon pine in the foreground.





This picture is of a very large butterfly that was feeding on the New Mexico Lilac in the door garden. I used the zoom to get up close and personal.

I was crouched down under the branch, aiming up to get the beautiful outstrethed wings.







This one is of misty sunlight in the meadow on the first morning I had the camera. You can see the mist hugging the Sandias in the background and there is also just a hint of mist over the trees across the meadow on the right side of the picture.





Finally, a sunset.

I was playing with the twilight feature on this new camera, and took a number of pictures of a spectacular sunset earlier this month.

I like the trees and hills sillouetted in the foreground, with the slightly lighter Sandia Mountains in the background, and the goldn, pink and purple clouds in the sky.

I guess it was worth the wait. And talking to India. It is a fine camera. And I will enjoy it more and more as I learn how to use all of its various and sundry features.

Catching Up! Gifted Institute and Floor Work

I spent the past three days at the New Mexico Summer Institute on Gifted Education. This was a Jacob Javitz Grant conference, sponsored by the fledgling New Mexico Association for the Gifted.



I was very fortunate to be asked to be a speaker for a break-out session about the Social and Emotional Needs of Gifted Kids with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs). It was a great experience to give a presentation and I was honored to do so, being a fairly new 'Doc' student. And on top of it, they gave me free admission to the conference. What a deal!


I gave two talks yesterday afternoon: The first was called Do You Have Spock in Your Classroom? Gifted Kids with Asperger Syndrome and Other ASDs: Characteristics and Theory. The second talk was called: Mr. Spock Goes to School: Dealing with the Social and Emotional Needs of Gifted Kids with AS. I was amazed at the attendance at my session because I was up against some other really good talks. But a lot of people came--mostly teachers, but some parents as well, which meant that I got to advocate for kids like N. who are in the school system. There were a lot of excellent questions and I could tell that a lot of people want to make a difference for these kids in school. We had a particularly good discussion about how certain AS characteristics can look like oppositionality when they are really about being overwhelmed, and how to help the general education teachers see the difference. We also had a great discussion about homework. I got a really good quote from one of the parents there. He said: "Homework for AS kids is cruel and unusual punishment for their parents." In the days to come I will discuss some of these issues more fully here, so stay tuned.







One of the benefits of being honored with an invitation to present, was that I got to hear three keynote presentations from nationally known leaders in our field. Joyce Van Tassel-Baska, who is well known for her Javitz Grant work on Curriculum. She spearheaded the development of the William and Mary Curricula for High-Ability Learners. She spoke about how the curriculum was developed. The William and Mary Curricula are integrated, thematic units that use concept development as the core of each unit. I have successfully used them in my elementary gifted classrooms and I liked them very much. Isn't she a warm looking woman? And she has an incredible intellect! Her keynote really had me thinking again about the William and Mary Curricula. The educational theory behind every element of these units is well thought out and its efficacy is documented by research. I am seriously thinking about how to adapt a social studies unit to N.'s homeschool curriculum this year.





Another keynoter, was Michael Clay Thompson, well known for his work on English Language and Literature for kids. He is known for his publications through Royal Fireworks Press. His work includes the Grammar Island, the Word Within a Word series, and (my favorite title) The Sesquipedalian Neologist's Lexicon. Anyone who can come up with a title like that is definitely a kindred spirit! He gave an absolutely riveting talk about Concept Development. I had done one of my Comprehensive Exam questions on this topic, where I discussed the work of Hilda Taba on concept development. I was absolutely delighted to be thinking about it again. Thompson discussed concerns he has about how concept development is used in the classroom. Unless it is thought out, there is a danger that the work of developing concepts could happen in the teacher's head rather than the student's. This means the student is not doing the learning and the teacher is getting all the fun. It was another one of those talks that makes one want more and more and more! The book pictured above is on my absolutely must have list!

The conference ended today with a keynote and keynoters near and dear to my heart. UNM's own Elizabeth Neilsen and Dennis Higgins. They did their wonderful presentation on moral courage. I have heard it before, but it is one of those that needs to be heard several times, I think, to sink in. My thoughts on this presentation, which brought me to tears for a second time, deserve and will get an entry of their own here in the very near future.


While I was away conferencing, N. was home. It seemed kind of strange. He got home on Tuesday and then I was gone all day Wednesday and Thursday and much of today! So we went to see Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix for the second time on Wednesday night. Last night, Bruce came to the NMAG reception at the conference, so we ended up staying until about 9 PM, talking with an old friend of mine from the MA program, and her new husband. I had not met him, and my friend and her husband had not met Bruce. They all hit it off famously, and we talked and talked and talked. It was a warm summer evening in the courtyard of the hotel. A good way to spend some time. I always forget how mu

ch being within the gifted community feels like coming home for me.


And of course, while I was conferencing, Bruce and N. worked on gluing down segments of the floor today.
N. watched for a while, I am told, and then jumped in to help. He was very interested in what the glue was (better living through chemistry) and how the glue worked. He was meticulous in the work--Bruce is his teacher, after all!--and Bruce says that the work went twice as fast, which is a cool thing.








When they were done, though, Bruce would not let N. use the chemical wipes to take the residual glue off the boards. That stuff is "too much better living through chemistry." So N. washed his hands off in mineral oil, and then supervised Bruce on the job.


They are both quite proud of their handiwork for the day!

Tomorrow afternoon, Bruce and N. will cut and lay new boards which they hope to glue down just as fast, and finish the hallway.

Last night, as we were talking at the hotel courtyard, we were lamenting the fact that many young people, even the really smart ones, don't know old aphorisms and figures of speech. We opined that maybe it's because they do not spend much time doing things with parents. So today we taught N. an aphorism from my midwestern childhood:

Many hands make light work.

Updates: 'Da Floorz' and 'Da Boyz'

Update: 'Da Floorz'

Bruce did work on putting in the wood floors again over the weekend. Although he had great intentions, he did not work on them in the evenings last week.

Monday he took a vacation day to work on the floors, so the week nights consisted of Tuesday through Thursday. Tuesday he was very tired from working late into the evening on Monday. Wednesday he had an astronomy phone/internet conference. Thursday...I can't remember why not on Thursday. And, of course, Friday was Shabbat.

Then came Saturday. He went into town with MLC and I in the morning. It's amazing how often you have to run to the hardware store when you are doing a major project. We dropped him off there on the way to pick up our Harry Potter pre-orders. Then he had to eat lunch. By then he was tired from the morning and took a nap, so he didn't really get started until about 3:30 in the afternoon.

I would have been getting upset--just a little, mind you--but I was deep into Harry Potter by then. Still, he got some of the pieces cut for dealing with doorways.

Sunday morning, Bruce was cutting and laying out pieces by 7:30 AM. But the doorway problem was taking a lot of time. Along the 51 foot hallway that runs across the house, there are five doorways. And for each one, the boards have to be cut so that theyfit under the doorframes. Also, the hallway expands to form a half-hexagon at the bedroom end. It something similar but wider where the living room meets the entryway. This means that boards must be cut at a 45 degree angle to fit the space.

The picture at the top shows how the boards had to be cut to form a point at the end of the hallway between the master bedroom door and my office door. From there, they run straight back for 51 feet to the guest bedroom door, just off the dining room. There are 4 boards, each 3 inches wide. That's about 64 square feet of floor laid.

The second picture is of the boards laid out into the area where the hall expands out toward the entryway. The first 5 boards from the left are continuous with the 5 shown in the first picture. The rest had to be cut at an angle to fit the expansion. The tools are laying right in front of Bruce's office door.

The third and last floor picture shows Lily standing right where the hall starts to expand to the left toward the entryway. I took the picture from Bruce's office door. Bruce is working at the bedroom end. All this work around the doors and in the half-hexagonal areas is taking longer than Bruce anticipated. But it is looking good!

Can you see the dust tracks? I can see I will have to use the dust mop frequently.

Update: 'Da Boyz'

N. called this evening and my sister 'Madge' sent me the last Illinois update yesterday. N. will be arriving home tomorrow around noon.

This past week has been very full. On Sunday, he went to Allerton Park. On Monday, it was Lincoln's home and the Illinois State Museum in Springfield. Tuesday it was the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. Wednesday, the Field Museum. They took Thursday off, but on Friday that went to Starved Rock and Buffalo Rock State Parks on the Illinois River. Saturday, they went fishing at Dawson Lake. Finally, yesterday and today, they did some "hanging out" which included a lot of skateboarding outside Madge's house in Bloomington.

An 'Aspie" moment occured when I asked N. if he was ready to come home. By tone, I implied 'ready' as in emotionally ready. But he did not hear that:


N: "Almost, but Aunt Madge is still washing some of my clothes."
Me: "But are you really ready for your trip to end?"
N: "Well. And I have to wait until I brush my teeth before I can pack my toothbrush."
Me: "But are you --you know--ready to come home. You know, get into the routine again."
N: "Almost. But I still have to put my little bottles into the zip-lock baggies."
Me: "Okay. Do you feel like you want to come home now?"
N: "Oh! That. Yeah. I want to see my room and my dog and hang out with you now."
Me: "So in that way you are ready to come home, then."
N: "Oh, YEAH! And I took lots of pictures. I even took one of us brushing our teeth. Aunt Madge is gonna burn 'em on a cd for you 'cause there's too many to e-mail. I even got a picture of Tyrannosaurus Sue! And of the U-boat at Science and Industry. And Lake Michigan, too! You'll like all the pictures I took."

Well that's the longest sentence he's said on the phone to me in the past three weeks.
I didn't tell him that Madge had sent a few pictures by e-mail. A very few.

I can hardly wait to pick him up tomorrow.
People said that I'd really enjoy the time alone. And I did. But there was an empty spot at the table.

And in my heart.

He's still my baby boy!

My Lips Are Sealed

I finished the book. I will not reveal the ending.

We did not end up going to the midnight release EVENT for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. MLC and I decided that we would have a nice quiet Shabbat dinner with Bruce and then retire early so that we could pick up the books in the morning for a full day of reading pleasure.

Above: D., T., and N. picking up their books at a bookstore in Illinois. The three cousins caused no mayhem yesterday. They were too busy reading.

We got our books about 9:30 AM MDT and were ensconced in "comfy" chairs near the Seattle's Best counter with lattes in hand by 10 AM. I even had them put carmel in my latte. We were making our own morning release party. We had dropped Bruce off at the Hardware store, so we figured we had about an hour's reading pleasure. I got four chapters read before Bruce called.

We came home, had some lunch, and I settled in my red leather chair in the sitting room with some chocolate and tea and propped my feet up on the hassock. And I did not move again for about four hours. By then I was half-way through the book. I knew I was not following my plan to read a few chapters at a time, but I could not help myself. I could not put the book down! It had a spell on me!

After a short break to walk the dogs, I was back in my chair and I finished the book at about 10 PM. And then I read the first chapter aloud to Bruce. It was that good!

Today I have been wandering about in that post-book mixture of euphoria and sadness. You know the feeling--you've been in an alternate reality, a different world and you have grown to know and love the characters. They have become real. And now you have to re-enter your own world. So you are stuck between worlds for a while. A really good book just does that to me. This morning I re-read different parts, looking closely for the foreshadowing and literary allusions that will allow me to discuss the book. But not here. Not yet. My lips are sealed.

I think I will go back and re-read this book. Soon. That is how powerful it is.

Tradition: Dithering Over the Midnight Hour

I refuse to read the pre-release reviews. But I am still on tenterhooks. How can one even think that Harry Potter might die? It destroys the whole hero's journey! But...I'm worried.


And I am dithering about tonight.

Months ago, I reserved three copies at a well known bookstore.
One for N. One for MLC. And one for me.

The plan was to go to the midnight release EVENT as we have since Goblet of Fire came out. I think that was the first release party--at least in our part of the world.
But then we made summer plans and now N. is going to the midnight EVENT at a different well known bookstore in Illinois. I arranged for his "Aunt Madge" (not her real name but everybody in the family calls her that) to pre-order a copy there for him.

So why go to the midnight party? As I told Bruce, who listened patiently and wisely did not tell me what to do, I would have to drive into town at about 9 PM. I'd have to sit around the bookstore until midnight. I would have to wait in line to get my copy. Then I'd have to drive home, arriving around 2 to 3 in the morning, depending on the lines. And by then, it is unlikely that I'd even be able to keep my eyes open to read the first chapter.

So it's probably more sensible to wait until 9 AM tomorrow morning and arrive at the bookstore and get my copy. It's only 6 or 7 hours later and then I'll be fresh for reading. They have coffee at the bookstore or I can go to our local coffee shop to read. Sounds like a plan.

BUT...we have not missed one of the parties. And this is the LAST one! You know what Garrison Keilor says: If you do it certain way twice, it becomes a TRADITION. And I love tradition.

Tradition. Tradition. Tra-DIT-ion! (Humming Fiddler on the Roof. Da-da-da-da! Da-da-DAH!).

"Why without our tradition, our lives would be..."

A lot less tiring.

Whatever I decide, I will not turn to the last chapter first. I would NEVER do that.
And I will not be on the internet again until I have finished the book.
I do not want my pleasure spoiled.