Archive for ‘Worthy Reads’

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March 11, 2012

Blog Business & Worthy Reads

Just a bit of blog business:

  • First, I’d like to say a big thank you to Simple Homeschool who included my post, In Response to a Teacher’s Questions About Homeschooling, in their weekend links.
  • Second, I’m happy to say that I finally bit the bullet and paid WordPress so that this can be an AD-FREE blog.  I knew those sneaky ads (which they cleverly never let me see) were there, and I despised them, but I have to watch the money I spend, and I appreciated the opportunity to get started with a free blog.  Perhaps someday I will research how to put ads of my own choosing that I can fully endorse, but for now Mama of Letters will be sans ads.

And here are my Worthy Reads in no particular order…

Education

Confessions of a ‘Bad’ Teacher by William Johnson in The New York Times Sunday Review.

Workforce Preparedness: Is Your Grad Ready for the Real World?  – Houston Chronicle Blog – A little dense and specific to Houston, but I thought it posed a good question.  Students need to think in terms of getting the skills they need to be prepared to compete in the workforce.

Myth Busting: How Reading is Taught in a Waldorf School – I love learning about different educational philosophies, so I was happy to come across this post on Moon Child.

UN Produced Atlas shows Girls Still Falling behind Boys in Education - SOS Children’s Villages: Canada – I talk a lot about boys and homeschooling, but this is a reminder that all children around the world are still struggling to get a decent education.

Afraid of Your Child’s Math Textbook? You Should Be. – by Annie Keeghan on her blog, Chronic Sense.

Educating  and Raising Boys (I will add the following to my page Worthy Reads About Raising and Educating Boys.)

A Huge Gender Gap Persists In College Degrees, Do We Need A White House Council On Boys And Men? by Mark Perry

Boys falling behind girls in education, experts look for solutions by Bruce Lindsay for KSL.com-Utah

All-boys’ classes grow confidence, leadership by Tamara Shephard on InsideToronto.com

Who says raising boys is easier?  by LZ Granderson, CNN Contributor

Learning to live with ‘boy energy’ by Stephen Bede Scharper

Homeschooling

The Moral Status of Homeschooling and Public Schooling Motivations by Pamela J. Stubbart, Huffington Post – another response to Dana Goldstein’s article in Slate.

In ‘Class’ – at Home – Ted Landphair’s AMERICA

The Best Homeschooling Resources Online – By Jamie Martin for Parents.com

Why I Could Never Have Homeschooled My Children – A Response - by Sharon Greethal for BlogHer.com – Scroll down to see a comment I left here.  I don’t believe homeschoolers should ever question a non-homeschooler’s parenting skills or commitment to their children.

I am too negative about homeschooling - From the blog, Skipping School, which is written by Kate Fridkis.  She was homeschooled Pre-K through 12th grade and then went on to college at Rutgers and Columbia.  Now she’s a freelance writer.  And obviously, I recommend her blog as well.

Should Home-schoolers Play for High School Teams? in Room for Debate on the The New York Times.

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January 24, 2012

Worthy Reads

I’m taking a break from my series about Homeschool Priorities to bring you an installment of Worthy Reads.  This is because my reader has been filling up with interesting articles, and I need to clean it out.

But first, I have to thank Simple Homeschool for including me on their Weekends Links.  What an honor!  I’m especially humbled because I’m so busy with my boys that I don’t get a chance to read other blogs as much as I like, so I really appreciate the shout out.  And for anyone who is a new subscriber, thanks so much for following me.  You really encourage me to keep going.

Here are some Worthy Reads I’ve come across in the last few weeks.  A few of them were passed on to me by my awesome Twitter friends.  Thanks, guys!

Homeschooling

In Praise of Homeschools - Excellent argument FOR homeschooling.

Why an innovative educator cares about homeschooling / unschooling and why you might too and

The Innovative Educator’s Guide to Getting Started with Unschooling - This whole blog looks like it’s worth following!

What the U.S. Census says about homeschool families - “A disportionate percentage of homeschooled students are boys — 58 percent, even though boys are a slight minority in the U.S. school population.”

Regarding Boys  (These will also be added to my post Worthy Reads for Raising and Educating Boys, which is my attempt to compile information on this subject.)

Teaching boys to be men – Interesting article about a boy’s school in Kenyan newspaper.  The quote I found most provocative in the article: “Why boys? Though she knows she might sound unpopular, Purity believes that the girl child has been empowered at the expense of the boy.”

Teacher and dad Michael Reist urges retooled approach to raising boys in new book

Anything Boys Can Do…Biology may play only a minor role in the math gender gap: Scientific American

Education

What Americans Keep Ignoring About Finland’s School Success - “Finland’s success is especially intriguing because Finnish schools assign less homework and engage children in more creative play.”

Why Schools Don’t Value Spatial Reasoning - Very interesting, and I agree with this.  My 2-year-old seems to excel in spatial reasoning, so this topic is of interest to me.

Why Don’t We Value Spatial Intelligence - After reading the article above, I had to go to the article he cited – another good read.

Storytelling

Your Storytelling Brain – a bit of neuroscience related to my favorite topic, storytelling.  My favorite quote: “What stories give us, in the end, is reassurance.”

Parenting

Why A Teen Who Talks Back May Have a Bright Future – “Effective arguing acted as something of an inoculation against negative peer pressure. Kids who felt confident to express themselves to their parents also felt confident being honest with their friends.”

If you’ve found any worthy reads lately, please leave a link in the comments!

Posted in Blog Business, Worthy Reads | 2 Comments »

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December 19, 2011

Worthy Reads about Raising and Educating Boys

Since I have two boys, I cannot help but be interested in information to help me understand the unique needs of boys.  Below is a list of books and online resources that I have found, and I plan to add to this list as I find more.  I hope you’ll contribute to this by leaving me your recommendations in the comments section!  I know there is a lot more out there, but I haven’t had much time to research it.

Books

The Wonder of Boys by Michael Gurian – I owned this book before I even got married!  I liked the first chapter, especially, because it describes the difference in brain development of boys and girls.  It’s fascinating.  At the time, I guess I needed some insight on understanding the opposite sex, but after I had two boys, I sat down and finished the whole book.  I highly recommend this to any parent who has a boy.

Raising Boys by Steve Biddulph – Recently I read Biddulph’s Secret of Happy Children, and now this book is sitting on my night stand ready to be opened.  I’ll be sure to review it once I’m finished.

Online Resources

Bloggin’ Bout Boys – Jennifer Fink’s blog has a treasure trove of information.  She should know since she has four boys.  And she has homeschooled them too!

Why Boys Fail – I haven’t read through Richard Whitmire’s blog yet, but it looks like a good source of information and I want to go back to it.

Interesting Articles

Schools “relearning” how to teach boys - recent article on king5.com

Why Boys Are Failing in an Educational System Stacked Against Them - by Lori Day of the Huffington Post – Very good article. I especially like this quote: “Particularly relevant to this discussion is the theory of “natural learning,” which takes for granted that a learner is a whole person — a living system — and that every aspect of a person, boy or girl, contributes to his or her learning.”

Our boys are falling behind in education – 2010 op-ed in Denver Post

New Studies highlights needs of boys in K-12, Higher Education - article in Science Daily

The Truth About Girls and Boys – a 2006 article that offers a different point of view

Teaching boys to be men - Interesting article about a boy’s school in Kenyan newspaper.  The quote I found most provocative in the article: “Why boys? Though she knows she might sound unpopular, Purity believes that the girl child has been empowered at the expense of the boy.”

Teacher and dad Michael Reist urges retooled approach to raising boys in new book

Anything Boys Can Do…Biology may play only a minor role in the math gender gap: Scientific American

A Huge Gender Gap Persists In College Degrees, Do We Need A White House Council On Boys And Men? by Mark Perry

Boys falling behind girls in education, experts look for solutions by Bruce Lindsay for KSL.com-Utah

All-boys’ classes grow confidence, leadership by Tamara Shephard on InsideToronto.com

Who says raising boys is easier?  by LZ Granderson, CNN Contributor

Learning to live with ‘boy energy’ by Stephen Bede Scharper

As I noted above, this is my attempt to start collecting resources on this topic.  I’ll be adding more as I find them, and I hope you’ll contribute by leaving your recommendations in the comments below.  Thank you!

Do you think there’s a difference between boys and girls and how they learn?  

Posted in Books, Worthy Reads | 4 Comments »

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November 29, 2011

Worthy Reads & Blog Update

BLOG UPDATE

  1. My first blog update is that I’m changing the title of “Good Reads” to “Worthy Reads.”  This is because I realized that sometimes I find articles or videos on homeschooling or other subjects that I don’t necessarily think are good, but perhaps they are worthy to share and discuss.
  2. My second update is that I’ve added a Table of Contents to my blog!  In my attempt to make my blog more user-friendly, I’ve listed my more popular posts by subject.  You can click on the tab at the top of the page to see it.  And if you have any thoughts on what I can add to my blog to make it better, please tell me!  I would love suggestions.

WORTHY READS

Homeschooling

  • Dr. Drew on Unschooling – a video from CNN.  Someone shared this on a homeschool list I’m on, and I have mixed feelings about it, but basically I think these short news clips do nothing more than stir up controversy.  They don’t give the interviewees enough time to discuss the issue, and it’s a shame.
  • A Case Against Homeschooling, Really by Homeschooling Atheist Momma offers an honest look at what anyone who is thinking about homeschooling needs to realize and be ready for, if they choose this lifestyle.

Teaching Aid

Getting Kids Into Nature

We love nature, and it doesn’t take much for us to get out into it, but I still enjoyed perusing these links, and there are some very interesting books on that book list I’d love to get!

Parenting

Recently I began to read a little bit about “Positive Parenting,” and I think there’s a lot of wisdom in it.  Here’s a couple of worthy articles I found:

Have you found any interesting or worthy links this lately?  Please share them with me in the comments section.

 

Posted in Blog Business, Homeschooling, Homeschooling in the Media, Worthy Reads | 4 Comments »

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November 12, 2011

Good Reads

For a while now I’ve been wanting to add “good reads” to my blog.  That is, sometimes I find interesting articles or tidbits around the web, and I want to be able to share them with you.  So occasionally when I collect a handful of interesting or thoughtful articles, I’ll share them here in “good reads.”  I hope you’ll come back and tell me what you think.

If you’re a Mama of young children, you might enjoy these:

Interesting Reads regarding homeschooling:

And, I loved this op-ed over at The New York Times, which I found while doing research for my latest column (and which I’ll share with you soon):

Have you found any good reads lately?  Please share them in the comments!

Posted in Homeschooling in the Media, Worthy Reads | 1 Comment »

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