Archive for the ‘School’ Category

Book review: Cheaper By the Dozen

Monday, July 2nd, 2007

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Author:Frank B. Gilbreth
Reading Level (Conceptual):Children 8 and up
Reading Level (Vocabulary):Children 8 and up
Genre:non-fiction
Year of publication:1948

Skipping grades in school was part of Dad's master plan. There was no need, he said, for his children to be held back by a school system geared for children of simply average parents.

Dad made periodic surprise visits to our schools to find out if and when we were ready to skip. Because of his home-training program -- spelling games, geography quizzes, and the arithmetic and languages -- we sometimes were prepared to skip.

... The standard reward for skipping was a new bicycle.
My 12 year old loved almost everything about this true story about how a couple of pioneering efficiency experts raised their 12 children. Except the ending.

Although I tried to warn her about the ending by pointing out some of the foreshadowing and emphasizing that this is a true story, she was pretty much devastated by it.


Homeschooling parents and those seeking ideas for enriching their children's learning opportunities will re-read this humorous collection of family anecdotes, written by two of the children themselves, often. Mr. and Mrs. Gilbreth, efficiency experts that they were, strove to ensure that even times of "unavoidable delay", such as when their children used the bathroom, were used for learning. For example, the father painted the constellations on the bathroom ceilings, hid messages in Morse Code throughout their vacation home, insisted that the children listen to phonograph records in French and German for the entire time they spent in bathrooms, etc., etc.

The story of the mother of the twelve children, Lillian Moller Gilbreth, is told in the biography, Making Time: Lillian Moller Gilbreth -- A Life Beyond "Cheaper by the Dozen".



-- Emily Berk

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Book review: Witch Week

Monday, December 18th, 2006

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Author:Diana Wynne Jones
Reading Level (Conceptual):Children 8 and up
Reading Level (Vocabulary):Children 8 and up
Genre:fiction
Year of publication:2001

Many of the stories in Wynne Jone's Chrestomanci series explore the problems of gifted children who are made to feel inferior or taken advantage of because they are special. This happens to the protagonists of The Lives of Christopher Chant and Charmed Life, for example.

But in the society evoked in Witch Week, anyone identified as a witch is burned at the stake. Which puts the students at the Larwood House School, all of whom are orphaned because of a family connection to witchcraft, in a desperate position. Many of them know they are witches. And although it's exhiliarating to know that one has great power, they know from experience that the penalty for getting caught, or worse, being turned in by one's peers, is death by fire.

Spoilers below...












If my daughter and I had not already read several of the earlier Chrestomanci books, I don't know that we'd have enjoyed this Lord of the Flies meets The Fountainhead for the younger set as much as we did.

When Chrestomanci, he of the perfectly-creased gray suit and impeccable hair, finally makes his appearance, our horror and dread turned to giggles, even while the poor, witchy students retained their mortal fear for quite a few more pages.

But then, once again, there's that ending. In this case, the remedy is to make the gifted students accept that they need to make themselves just slightly less gifted, at witchcraft at least. So they do. Kind of like the protagonist in the movie, Pi, albeit not quite as bloody. Sigh. I'd vote for The Fountainhead instead, but that is more difficult to read.
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Book review: Teaching Gifted Kids in the Regular Classroom – Strategies and Techniques Every Teacher Can Use to Meet the Academic Needs of the Gifted and Talented

Wednesday, October 25th, 2006

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Author:Susan Winebrenner
Reading Level (Conceptual):For grown-ups
Reading Level (Vocabulary):For grown-ups
Genre:Non-fiction; education
Year of publication:1992

If you're going to get one book and your child is in school, get this one.
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Review: The Well-Trained Mind

Thursday, October 19th, 2006

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a review by the mother of a gifted homeschooler

I’ve now read TWTM twice and have had time to think about it a bit. I like SOME things about classical education in general and TWTM in particular, but others, I’m not too keen on.

First of all, Piaget’s stages of development have been known to be incorrect for years (even though they’re often taught in psych 101). They just aren’t true.

Having a true \”grammar stage\” would be acceptable to some students but just plain painful to most gifted ones–and beyond that, for math, at least, it is simply counter-productive. For example, TWTM predictably likes Saxon math, with its emphasis on rote memorization and the execution of algorthims as a substitute for actual mathematical thinking. While many gifted children will accept this, it is not a good idea. There is, quite frankly, a very good reason that Susan Wise Bauer did not major in science, mathematics, or engineering. Most classical education curricula provide a very poor background for these things. The prediction in TWTM that students will find upper level math and science \”hard\” is not representative of the difficulty of the subject so much as the completely lack of decent preparation.

Memorization of facts, which is an emphasis of a classical education, provides a framework around which everything else you learn can be hung. Whether it’s dates or mathematical facts (and this from someone who HATED memorizing math facts), there are certain tools that are important to build a body of knowledge upon.

Also, many schools now completely neglect all language arts, and classical programs usually offer a very good program for those. History is often dreadfully dull and incoherent as presented in schools, and most classical plans make it important, relevent, coherent, and at least fairly interesting. Primary sources are important, but they are not the be-all and end-all of math or science or history studies for very important reasons.

For a subject-by-subject critique of TWTM from my point of view, since it’s the most popular book on classical education, click here.

— Sophia

www.notadestination.com

Movie review: An Inconvenient Truth

Sunday, October 8th, 2006

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Inspired by the thought that \”People of most faith traditions are called to love one another and to be responsible stewards of God’s creation. … Global warming is not a political issue; it is a moral issue.\”, a local church group has blitzed our community with multiple showings of Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. They presented it on several school days right after school at a church just down the block from the middle school, and on several nights as well. They made An Inconvenient Truth convenient to get to at least.

And yet, as someone who is capable of transitioning from \”denial to depression\” (as Al Gore calls it) in hyperspeed, I was reluctant to go. After all, if I was ever in denial about global warming, I can’t recall it. But as just one person in a pretty overwhelming world, I am (still) not certain what I can/should do.

But just look at this invitation:

Students, parents and teachers are especially invited to attend. We need to give our kids the training they will need to deal with the broken earth we are leaving them. \”Imagine we are 17 years into the future and share a brief conversation with our children and grandchildren as they are living their lives in the year 2023. Imagine now that they are asking us: ‘What were you thinking? Didn’t you care about our future? Were you really so self-absorbed that you couldn’t – or wouldn’t—stop the destruction of Earth’s environment?’ What would our answer be? We can answer their questions now by our actions, not merely with our promises. In the process, we can choose a future for which our children will thank us.\” An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore, 2006.

How could I not go, and how could I not take my 11 year old daughter?

Well, my daughter was not enthusiastic. It’s going to be DEPRESSING, her friend told her. And I thought that might be true.

But it wasn’t. Al Gore narrates the film and he speaks from his experience. The anecdote he started with totally captivated my daughter. Gore shows a flat map of the earth, with South America and Africa in the center. And describes how when he was in grade school, a classmate commented that those two continents looked like puzzle pieces, as if they once fit together. The professor responded that this was a stupid idea. The continents are too large to have ever moved. And that student went on to become a ne’er-do-well and drug addict, and the professor went on to a high-ranking position in setting environmental policy in our current administration.

My husband could not attend — he is buried in the proofs of his upcoming book. And when we returned home, dear daughter was just plain exhausted (we went to the last, evening performance). And he said to her, \”Al Gore has the reputation of being a wooden speaker; what did you think of the movie?\” Dear daughter replied, \”I thought he was wonderful. I thought the movie was wonderful. I was afraid that the movie would be too depressing. But he presented the facts so clearly. And at the end, he does provide a long list of actions we can take. I want to do all of them, and when I’m older, I want to vote for people who won’t lie to us about climate change.\”

Yes, we did learn about the very depressing plight of the polar bear. And, yes, it is amazing how many glaciers and permafrost have already been lost and are continuing to be lost. And those in our government are still actively engaged in deceiving us about the science and scope of this impending disaster. And yet, it is still possible that we can slow these changes and possibly reverse them. If we try.

I’m thinking that maybe this Christmas, all anyone gets is a CD of An Inconvenient Truth.

Please make sure you and your children see this movie. We need great minds, in addition to Al Gore’s, to get involved with this.

Book review: Freak the Mighty

Saturday, September 16th, 2006

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Author:Rodman Philbrick
Reading Level (Conceptual):Children 8 and up
Reading Level (Vocabulary):Children 8 and up
Genre:fiction
Year of publication:1993

When I was young and feeling lonely, isolated, ridiculed by my fellow students, my father, one of those hugely gifted people who thrives with little interaction with other people because he is constantly obsessed by projects of his own, would suggest that I reach out to "other lonely children" and make friends with them. I never really found that forging alliances with other "outcasts" made me feel better when those in the "In Group" made fun of my clothes, hair, etc. Freak the Mighty is one of those novels in which the alliance of the weak prevails.

And, Sad Ending Alert. The foreshadowing is quite subtle, so it might come as a shock to young readers.


In Freak the Mighty, the physically imposing narrator is living with his grandparents who fear that he has inherited the evil nature of his father, who is in prison. The narrator befriends an intellectually gifted but physically frail neighbor. By combining their gifts, they can travel far and not get lost; they can find proper placement in the school's advanced classes. And together, they triumph over bullies adolescent and grown, the narrator's learning disability is diagnosed, and he learns to appreciate dictionaries, reading, and learning.

As with Hoot, the plot is involving, but, as with Hoot, I felt as if the novel's promise that adults and peers will eventually come to their senses and recognize/honor the child's worth and Do the Right Thing(s) may not jibe with how the world usually works. (For example, even if their test scores don't reflect it, let them participate in the gifted program even though that might "not be fair" to other students.)

-- Emily Berk

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Book review: A Hat Full of Sky

Tuesday, September 12th, 2006

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Author:Terry Pratchett
Reading Level (Conceptual):Children 8 and up
Reading Level (Vocabulary):Children 8 and up
Genre:fiction
Year of publication:2005

A Hat Full of Sky is the sequel to the Wee Free Men. It is about an eleven-year old girl named Tiffany Aching, who is training to be a witch, and the Nac-Mac-Feegle (Wee Free Men), who are fairies (but do NOT call them that unless you want to be seriously injured).

Tiffany is a very unusual witch, because she's from the Chalk Land. In fact, Tiffany is actually the ONLY official witch of the Chalk. She is also the Hag of the Chalk Land, which means that it is her job to protect the Chalk. (She tells it what it is; it tells her what she is.)

When something evil comes to the Chalk, Tiffany has to make it go away.

-- Fizzy, age 11


An adult's view...

The Hat Full of Sky of the title is Tiffany's witch's hat. For services rendered in the first book in this series (The Wee Free Men), Tiffany is anointed with the invisible but meaningful hat of the Head Witch. And throughout the book, Tiffany wrestles with whether to proclaim to the world that she is indeed a witch (by putting on a hat that everyone can actually see), with whether to accept the responsibilities as well as the honors accorded to witches, and with whether she is qualified to succeed her illustrious grandmother and talented enough to conquer the evil and the self-doubt that threaten her land and herself.

Pratchett seems to think that, yes, Tiffany is indeed talented enough, and she needs to know that, but no need to admit to the rest of the world that she really is magical. So, here's a child allowed to be special enough to save her Land, but she's not to be too special. And Tiffany is not the only one who is pressured to conform. Her Teacher is another special one. As the plot progresses, the feature that makes her special is mitigated so -- no more problem -- the specialness is gone.

My daughter really enjoyed reading this series, as did I. But as the end of this book approached, I came to realize that if one wears an invisible witch's hat, one does not have to admit to oneself or to anyone else that one is special/magical. Kind of like the Rainbow Fish, who gives away all his colorfulness, so that he can be just like all his new friends, who were not very accepting of his uniqueness. Is this the message we want to convey to the heroes in our society? (It's fine to sacrifice your all for our good, but please don't admit that you have qualities that we do not have.) Just asking.

So, anyway, both my daughter and I also enjoyed reading Stargirl, which weighed much less on my mind than Hat Full.  

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Book review: The View From Saturday

Friday, July 21st, 2006

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Author:E.L. Konigsburg
Reading Level (Conceptual):Children 8 and up
Reading Level (Vocabulary):Children 8 and up
Genre:fiction
Year of publication:1996

Motley group of gifted kids learn about each other and to work together to win a contest, aided by an inspiring teacher.

Newbery Medal winner.

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Book review: Understood Betsy

Monday, March 13th, 2006

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Book review: Gifted Children and the Law — Meditation, Due Process, and Court Cases

Saturday, November 2nd, 2002

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Author:Frances A. Karnes
Reading Level (Conceptual):For grown-ups
Reading Level (Vocabulary):For grown-ups
Genre:Non-fiction
Year of publication:1991
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