What Kind of Humanist Are You?

You can go see what they think at:
The New Humanist

Which ever way I waggle it, I still come out as a Handholder:

"You go out of your way to build bridges with people of different views and beliefs and have quite a few religious friends. You believe in the essential goodness of people , which means you’re always looking for common ground even if that entails compromises. You would defend Salman Rushdie’s right to criticise Islam but you’re sorry he attacked it so viciously, just as you feel uncomfortable with some of the more outspoken and unkind views of religion in the pages of this magazine.

"You prefer the inclusive approach of writers like Zadie Smith or the radical Christian values of Edward Said. Don’t fall into the same trap as super–naïve Lib Dem MP Jenny Tonge who declared it was okay for clerics like Yusuf al–Qaradawi to justify their monstrous prejudices as a legitimate interpretation of the Koran: a perfect example of how the will to understand can mean the sacrifice of fundamental principles. Sometimes, you just have to hold out for what you know is right even if it hurts someone’s feelings.

But like Norm, I have my reservations about the test: I cannot stand Zadie Smith novels, and a good few of the questions did not contain the option I would have chosen.

HT: Norm

Public Examinations a Waste of Time

The tale of duplicity, complicity, hypocricy and general woe over the issue of the education of teachers, which continues to spew forth from the good person who somehow manages to think clearly whilst undertaking a Post-Grad Cert. of Ed, might have me wondering whether this individual was suffering from some kind of mania, what with all that pressure of ideas. But it is quite clear the individual is more than all there, since the criticisms of schooling theory are all so cogent and usually devastating.

I wish I could keep up, but to pick but one example, pretty much at random: We all know that the GCSE examinations are corrupt in innumerable ways. For example, the fact that the government means that they will be voted in on better results means that they hand any reasonably sassy parent the means to inflate the grades by letting them assist with course work that then goes towards the final mark.

In addition, teachers are allowed to construct answers to exam questions to an almost unprecedented degree. This is apparently called "scaffolding", or some such euphemism for what used to be called cheating.

Despite Marlborough's experiment in the 70's, when the school got boys to sit two German exams set by two different examination boards, with the result that some boys got top marks with one board, and failed with another, there appears to be still no improvement in this area of consistency between boards. There is still widespread acceptance in the teaching profession at least, that boards differ hugely in their marking systems and give very different grades for the same piece of work.

Why then to we continue to take all this examination nonsense seriously? It shouldn't be so much more difficult for employers to find those who have a genuine interest and ability and it certainly would save them time later when they find they have employed an A grade dud.

Home Schooling Blog Awards

Nominations now needed for the various categories in Spunky's Homeschooling Bloggers Awards. Could be a chance to put more UK home ed blogs on the map?

The categories:

Best Homeschooling Mom Blog
Best Homeschooling Dad Blog
Best Homeschooling Family blog
Best Homeschooling Teen blog
Best Informational Homeschool blog
Best Inspirational Homeschool blog
Best Homeschooling Humor blog
Best Team / Group Homeschool Blog
Best Homeschool Curriculum / Business Blog
Best Homeschool Blog Design
Best Canadian Homeschool Blog
Best International Homeschool Blog
Best Current Events Homeschool Blog
Best Homeschool Arts Blog
Best Homeschool Photo Blog

The Duplicity of School Theory

It can't be much of a recommendation for school-based education, that the theories that supposedly inform it, do next to nothing to influence the actual practice and also that would-be teachers are supposed to swallow, without question, ideas that are clearly contradictory. There are numerous examples of these kinds of problems; eg: there is regular lip-service paid, at least at PGCE, to encouraging both intrinsic and personalised learning whilst all the while, other theories on the same course suggest that these kinds of learning cannot possibly be managed in a classroom situation.

With regard to this last kind of theory: from a chapter entitled 'Drop out from Language Study at age 16+, a Historical Perspective' by Eric Hawkins, in the book edited by Ann Swarbrick called "Teaching Modern Foreign Languages in Secondary Schools":

"Burstall et al., 1974 had already shown the extent to which girls outperformed boys in French... but Burstall's study also showed that 'both boys and girls did better in single-sex than in mixed schools'."

"A significant factor, he comments, on the reason for which girls outperform boys in foreign language and most subjects "must be the well-attested 'spurt' in development (including linguistic development) that girls go through several years earlier than boys at puberty. This must equip girls better to engage with the early stages of the secondary curriculum. The boys' corresponding 'spurt' at puberty comes several years later, by which time many choices of curriculum and career have begun to take shape...

" 'Girls' linguistic precocity in the secondary school is clearly linked to their earlier physical and emotional maturity. Paediatricians distinguish between 'chronological' and 'developmental' ages of children. By developmental age we simply mean the degree to which a child has advanced along the road to full maturity...The commonest measure (of developmental age) is the maturity of the skeleton ('bone age')...At birth the average girl is already some weeks ahead of the average boy in 'bone age' and she gradually comes to be more and more ahead until at puberty the difference is two years.' (Tanner 1967)

"J.M. Tanner was professor in Child Health and Growth at the University of London Institute of Child Health, and the chief consultant to the Plowden committee. His account goes on, 'Girls begin puberty on average two years earlier than boys...Eventually, as the girls' adolescent spurt (in development) is dying away, the boys' begins'.

"The tests used for selection for grammar school at 11+ by most LEAs (for instance the Murray House test papers) always carried an instruction to markers 'to add a prescribed percentage to all boys' scores to compensate for their lower marks in the 'verbal reasoning' exam which carried half the total mark'. (Otherwise most grammar school places would have gone disproportionately to girls.) The precocity of girls in English (as well as French) was amply confirmed in all the tests used in Burstall's detailed evaluation of the pilot scheme (see Burstall 1970, 1974). Since confident use of the language with which the curriculum is delivered (and examined) underlies the whole of learning in the secondary school, it is not surprising that girls outperform boys except in subjects such as mathematics which are less dependent on verbal conceptualising.

"That developmental and linguistic maturity are linked is also attested by boys' performance at A level. Their later spurt in 'developmental age', coinciding with later puberty, also coincides with a well-attested late spurt in linguistic performance. In 2000, at A level, 59.1 percent of boys scored a good pass (A to C) in English, against 59 per cent of girls. In French...boys, 67.8 per cent and girls 64 per cent. "

Errgh...the perfidious contortions that a corrupt system engenders. eg: because schoolies insist that boys and girls must be educated according to year group, despite their own evidence for difference, they must in underhand fashion, not take their own tests seriously, so that boys do not lose out . Schoolies must however, pretend to take these tests seriously, otherwise people will start to wonder as to the point of them and much of the justification for their existence will go down the tubes.

Also, by not taking the tests seriously, they would appear by their own standards of judgment at least, to risk putting together groups of children of such widely differing ability, that conducting any sort of whole class teaching is unlikely to address the needs of any but a tiny minority of the class.

School theorists also know that children perform better in single sex schools but they won't let that worry them too much, despite the fact that exam passes are all they care about....ho hummm....

No problem for home edders here though. HEors who practice facilitation of autonomous education make intrinsic, personalised learning actually happen. They don't need to fiddle test results because they don't need to slot a child into a particular level of learning. They also wouldn't bother fiddling tests since they don't take tests too seriously and don't mistake passing tests for genuine learning. They also don't have to worry about the mixed versus single sex issue, because learning is personalised, in whatever gender groups they may happen to find themselves and the gender mix in these groups is likely to vary considerably, because they aren't stuck with the same set of people day in, day out.

HT: The School Theory Whistle Blower.

Parents Wising Up to Needs of Infants

Following on with the theme from last post, Future Pundit also deals with the issues of the effect upon the brain of neglect in early infancy. The study he quotes leaves a couple of rather significant questions hanging, namely are there any other studies out there which look at vasopressin and oxytocin levels of young children in day care? Are the children's levels of these hormones lower and if so, do these have the long term consequences? These really do seem to pretty crucial questions, particularly with the government drive to get mothers of infants back to work.

Oliver James in the Guardian seems to think the question of whether there are long term consequences from early childhood experiences already answered. He writes that the years up to age three are "the crucial time for establishing mental health".

He is also of the opinion that the government agenda does not take this into account: "Sure Start has slithered away from an emphasis on meeting children's needs to getting mothers out to work".

This runs counter to the desires of most mothers of young children:
"Most mothers of under-threes either do not want to do paid work or only want to do a small amount. Despite being accorded a status lower than street-sweeper, only 13 per cent of mothers of under-threes work full-time (40 per cent work part-time, mostly less than 20 hours a week)."

It seems that the decades of believing that parents could have it all are properly on the way out now. We now know for certain how awful and stressful it is for us to leave young infants in the hands of strangers. We are beginning to listen to our instincts again, since these are, in all probability, telling us something pretty important: ie that neglect in one form or another, (and this includes leaving child in the hands of a less attentive carer), is damaging. We can see the immediate damage in the screams of the moment. Perhaps soon we will show that it has long term physiological consequences and whilst this last may be almost too painful to contemplate, it is better we know so that we can attempt to do something about it.

Vasopressin and oxytocin nasal sprays anyone?

HT for Oliver James: Alice (no longer a Libertarian) Bacchini

Yet More Confirmation of Attachment Parenting Hypotheses?

To be found at the The Daily Mail:

And the joy of the internet: HT: Andrea from the East Coast, Canada

Monkey Business

The following seems to suggest that there may be neurological evidence for attachment parenting theories and for John Bowlby's theories(check out Chapter 3 for brief synoposis), particularly with regards to all those cases of institutionalised orphans whose first years appeared to affect them in the long term.

From 19 November issue of The New Scientist, with last bit now under subscription, but don't worry, not too substantive:

"The richness of a primate's environment affects its brain structure, a new study with marmosets suggests"

"An examination of the monkeys' brains showed that those housed in the second two types of cage (which were larger and contained toys and structures that encouraged the monkeys to forage), developed denser neuron growth and almost double the amount of certain synaptic proteins that the brain uses to relay messages between neurons...(which) reflects not only how much a monkey has learned, but also its ability to learn".

Lest I Forget....Yet Again:(

Note to self: The next time child suddenly starts behaving strangely, not listening to what seems like reason, is generally unhappy with whatever situation is presented: DO NOT LOSE IT!!!!

He/she is COMING DOWN with a COLD (I must speak very slowly here to my idiot self). When WILL I learn???

The thing is that as soon as this becomes transparently obvious, the previous problem usually goes away completely.

Plus, we owe apologies to everyone we have come into contact with over the last couple of days. It doesn't look to be a terrible lurgy but then we have dosed up on fruit and omega 3 (the last of which apparently limits cytokine reactions that are thought to be the killer in bird flu, incidentally.)

De Facto Registration

Errgh, yet what else could we have expected from a government that set out to lock up terror suspects for 90 days without trial? The forthcoming de facto registration of the home educated, the databased micro-management of the whereabouts of all children and limits on their freedom with curfews outside school hours, well it all fits neatly with all the other limits to freedom and meddlesome intrusion for which this government is famed. You can't fault them for consistency at least.

At issue here: the current White Paper which outlines plans to introduce a new statutory duty on all local authorities to make arrangements to identify children missing from education. This should, of course, mean that home educators have nothing to fear, since they are absolutely not missing from education. However this system isn't able to make that distinction, which is as intended, we can be quite sure. Education Otherwise have been invited to consult on this issue, but it is impossible to see that any kind of protest will make any sort of difference at this stage.

It's kind of touching that most home educators still refuse to see all of this as an inevitable outcome of socialist inclinations, but that aside, almost all of them have been very clear that the level of state scrutiny to which we are going to be subjected, is completely disproportionate, an unnecessary waste of money, and likely to cause an enormous amount of almost completely unnecessary conflict and anxiety for home educating families.

A hopeless scream into the darkness: LEAVE US ALONE since by doing otherwise, YOU DO SIGNIFICANT HARM TO INNOCENT INDIVIDUALS FOR VERY QUESTIONABLE BENEFIT OF OTHERS.

Ignorance is Hell

Clare at Playing it by Ear rightfully gets on the case of the Norfolk policeman who intervened between mother and breastfeeding child.

The outpouring of irrational disgust at breastfeeding and in support of the officer's actions that can be found at Police Specials.com demonstrates a complete ignorance of the needs of breastfeeding mums and children on the part of substantial sections of the police. What would these officers rather have? A contented child and relaxed mum who are able to go about their business as normal citizens, or someone who forever stays indoors or runs furtively from backroom to backroom, forever terrified of being caught off-guard with a screaming child?

The comparison with urination is spurious. Just in case there are any uninformed PCs out there who happen to pass by: Humans normally get some notice that they need to wee. It only takes about a minute. They can probably go easily for about five hours without a wee. Wee would be left lying around if they didn't find a loo and would be a very good agent for bacterial growth if left untreated outside the body. Wee is a waste product that is not very valuable to anyone. There is never any suggestion that we should spend a considerable amount of time and effort storing it in little sterilised jars for later use.

In contrast: Despite the best ministrations of mums, infants are often highly unpredictable as to when they want to feed. They may want to feed at any time. Bfing can take some time. Some infants marathon feed. This can take up to four to five hours at a time. (Sitting alone in a backroom on our own for four hours? Really, thanks but no thanks). Breast milk doesn't get left lying around causing health risks for others. Breast milk, as a general rule, is very good for baby and shouldn't be with-held or wasted. Expressing milk is actually very hard. Many even experienced breast feeders cannot do it because the body responds to a suckling child, not suction from a vacuum machine. Producing enough milk for bottle feeding later all in one sitting is also very difficult since many women don't produce gallons all at once, but produce milk slowly at the pace an infant would take it.

The need to be able to breastfeed in public is not a trivial or unreasoned claim. It really is about women and children having freedom of movement.

Remembrance of Blogs Past

Despite the fact that Brian was convinced his blog was dull and his readers a trashy set of pajama people, I still mourn the passing of Brian's Education Blog . I also disagree with his assessment that he writes better for Samizdata. He was far less self-conscious here and it shows.

And although home educators are quite likely to be pajama people in some senses, (ie: not besuited), it's impossible to get too upset with him, since he also wrote:

"... any government which took on the home-schoolers of Britain would have got itself the Political Enemies from Hell. Think of all those terrifyingly bright children who'd overrun morning television. Consider the fact that many home-schoolers have considerable demonstrating experience. I may not hold with their political views about war, peace, etc., but these people do know how to lay on a good demo and to mobilise the media. And they must be, almost by definition, among the most intellectually self-confident people around."

Neurological Evidence For Problems with Day Care

This New Scientist article entitled "How the food you eat could change your genes for life", Nov 19th, 2005, doesn't sound as if it should be the nail in the coffin for day care, but somewhere in the article they make the following point:

"... last year, Moshe Szyf, Michael Meaney and colleagues at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, showed that mothers could influence the way a rat's genes are expressed after it has been born. If a rat is not licked, groomed and nursed enough by its mother, chemical tags known as methyl groups are added to the DNA of a particular gene.

"The affected gene codes for the glucocorticoid receptor gene, expressed in the hippocampus of the brain. The gene helps mediate the animal's response to stress, and in poorly raised rats, the methylation damped down the gene's activity. Such pups produced higher levels of stress hormones and were less confident exploring new environments. The effect lasted for life (Nature Neuroscience, vol 7, p 847)."

Ouch, ouch, ouch...from the mother who deeply regrets handing first child over to day care (which can never be as responsive as a good parent), and sees forever the effects.

The rest of the article on the effect of food supplements on genes and behaviour makes good reading.

Good Information but Will They Get It?

Although difficult to trace, and subscription for a thorough search for the article is complicated, we have it on good authority that the following piece was published in the November issue of "The Parliamentary Monitor" - a magazine written mainly by and for MPs and peers.

We do hope that this is indeed the case, since the article is a pretty good description of what most HEors in the UK actually do get up to, and it is nice to know that the ptb are being reliably informed for once. What they'll make of the information, goodness only knows. We would love to hear their comments!

"Home-based education, at its foundation, is about parents taking responsibility for the education of their children in a secure, relaxed, nurturing and learner-centered environment. It offers each child the opportunity to develop their own skills at their own speed within individualised learning programmes designed around their unique needs, interests and learning styles. This personalised approach effectively offers greater freedom and flexibility for each child to learn what they want, when they want and how they want to. Using their natural curiosity and the intrinsic motivation this creates, they can be supported to develop their own skills and increase their knowledge, understanding, creativity, talents and interests, in a way which suits them best.

"Research[1] shows that home-educated children outscore their school counterparts regardless of their parent's level of education. Furthermore regardless of the reasons families choose to home educate they very rarely have any regrets and find that this type of familial learning is more fun than they ever imagined.

"Within home-based education much of the learning takes place spontaneously through discussion and purposeful investigation. Contrary to popular myth, home - based education involves much more than being isolated or sitting around the kitchen table. In reality, Home is a base for planning and preparing a range of activities which are then carried out within a variety of different settings as individuals, pairs or groups of same or different ages, interests and abilities.

"Home educated children, more often than not, have very well developed social skills and belong to many varied and fulfilling social networks. With more and more families actively choosing home education as an option children are also more likely to feel confident in the company of adults and develop strong personal relationships with them.

"Home-based education changes the focus from "what we learn" to "how and why we learn". Home educating families observe their children asking questions, seeking answers and making personal discoveries in and around their home, community, and world. Technology also plays an important and ever-increasing role in bringing local and global learning communities together.

"Home education is also about learning with others using local resources and sharing real life experiences. Home education often involves a multi sensory approach. It can be a more hands on, thinking, feeling, doing, making, creating and exploring education. It's about preparing children for life by living and learning within it.

"Home-based education offers more than an academic education. It recognises that there are multi-intelligences and allows more space for each child to develop them. Home education also encourages the sharing of values such as empathy, acceptance, tolerance, understanding, compassion, confidence and self esteem. With the world at your door there are no limits and the learning possibilities are endless for both children and adults learning in tandem. Perhaps though, the greatest joy of all is for families to spend time with each other and enjoy learning together. Most importantly, to individual families developing a strong personal relationship with your children and engaging with them in this privileged way will ultimately brings the greatest rewards."

Once again it seems we have Dr. Paula Rothermel of the University of Durham, to thank for the research for this.

HT: Juliet

Gatto

There is much to absorb and digest at this site which is dedicated to the ideas of John Taylor Gatto and where, amongst other things, it is possible to get an inside look at his book "The Underground History of American Education". Shall be following this one up asap.

Am not quite sure how his film project is going though. It is billed as "a hard-hitting, humorous and compelling exploration of American compulsory schooling", so we rather hope it is progressing well.

HT: JFT

The Backlash and Solutions

We expected a backlash and I guess we also could have expected it to be as laughably misguided as this from CNN.com

Nancy Grace interviewed a clinical psychologist on the subject of the PA murders.

GRACE: Now, these two met at some home schooling event, apparently, both of them being home schooled.

SAUNDERS: Right. And even though kids who are home schooled do go out and have other relationships, they're really isolated from their peers, so relationships can take on an unusual intensity, kind of these hothouse relationships.

All of which is laughably wrong for the huge majority of HE kids. However, even though this so-called expert is completely misinformed in her characterisation of the general picture, I suppose we can't rule out the possibility of there being the odd isolated case out there.

Are there really homeschooling parents out there who do hothouse relationships for their children, and if so what to do about these odd isolated cases?

As already mentioned previously, state scrutiny in Pennsylvannia is one of the most rigorous anywhere in the US. The fact that the murders happened under their jurisdiction suggests that state scrutiny is not the answer.

Apart from the fact that the home schooling community as a general rule is very responsive to criticism and it is therefore very unlikely that there are any home schooling parents out there who have not (at least now) given serious consideration to helping their children mix widely, the other solutions consist of ensuring that there is a plentiful supply of home schooling support networks, coupled with ready access to facilities in the community. All of this could be managed very nicely by the homeschooling network itself as long as it is not legislated against in one way or another.

And that should just about do it, and without the need for any compulsion, intrusion and invasion of family privacy.

Bullying Charge

From the Beeb:

"Parents whose children attack or threaten classmates could be hauled before the courts and fined £1000 under government school reforms".

"Ms Smith (schools minister) said "Bullying should never be tolerated in our schools, no matter what the motivation".

Which should rightfully mean that an awful lot of probably pensionable-age parents of teachers will be having to dig very deep in the near future.

No Excuses

The Humble DevilDog takes no prisoners in his post about there being no genuine financial excuses for not home schooling. (Those of nervous disposition should be warned that he is not afraid to couch his argument forcefully.)

Given that we know of single parents finding ingenious ways to home educate, we have to agree with him.

William Pitt the Younger:"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."

HT:Chris O'Donnell

Checks and Balances

Further on the Pennsylvania homeschooling teen murderer: it's interesting to note that these murders happened in a state where homeschooling is as tightly controlled as anywhere in the US.

Apparently the law:

"enables everyone to homeschool if they could find an evaluator (a teacher, former teacher, or psychologist) who would certify that their children were receiving an appropriate education".

So presumably the family of the murderer had been so assessed, which would rather incline one to draw the conclusion that these checks are utterly spurious. It is sad to see that precisely the reverse conclusion is also drawn, and doubly sad that this comes from the pen of a supposed home-schooling advocate:

Self-appointed home schooling educrat: Howard Richman, again of Pa Homeschoolers.com:

"This message board recognizes that homeschoolers are not perfect and we like the fact that the homeschool law in Pennsylvania recognizes that that homeschool parents need accountability and checks and balances".

Hmmm. I am at a loss to understand precisely how he arrived at such a conclusion in the current circumstances. Is he actually calling for much more accountability and checks? Should he not really now be calling for checks and balances on the people doing the checks and balances, ad infinitum?

Just to make my own position clear on this. I am of the opinion that many minds may provide a substrate for better answers, but these answers are always formulated in the minds of one person, even in the situation of collating average information from large groups. There is often much benefit in seeking out others for help and criticism. However it is infinitely superior if this is achieved without coercion, so that criticism is freely sought and may be either acted on or rejected freely, whilst being subject to further critical thought.

By forcing people to accept unwanted intrusion into their private lives and by controlling them without their consent, we not only risk damage from inept or corrupt bureaucracies, but we also foreclose on the genuine possibility of autonomous rational thought and freely chosen responsible action.

Home Educators may easily be alerted to the usefulness of freely chosen and critiqued criticism through many channels, such as the support charities, the websites, the listservs, the on-line discussion groups, and the groups with whom they socialise. There is no need to force compliance to a prescribed rule upon people, since, to paraphrase Godwin: if something is good it can be shown to be good.

The PA murders seem to suggest that this would be the better way to go.

Implications for US Home Schoolers of PA Murders

This article on the issue of the press treatment of the Pennsylvania homeschooling teen murderer seems to get the situation about right, as far as it goes.

The question that of course will remain in the minds of many, but that would be almost impossible for anyone to address responsibly, is whether this particular enactment of homeschooling was significant in providing the impetus to murder, but even if a direct link is hypothesised, (say along the lines of the murders being an example of a teen rebelling against excessive coercion), the homeschooling community need not suffer as a whole, since the uniquely personalised nature of home education means that it would be ridiculous to extrapolate from this case to any other home schooling family.

General conclusions about the effects of home schooling, whether these be good or bad, are very difficult to draw, although it does seems reasonable to refute claims that home schooling necessarily compromises learning by pointing to individual cases, and quite permissable to make a very reasonable case for the superiority of certain theories of learning that do abound in the HE community.

HT for the first article: Daryl

Scottish Councils Blocking Parents from Home Educating

From The Herald

"The Rev Ewan Aitken, education spokesman for the local authority umbrella organisation Cosla, said it was "entirely appropriate" for councils to act with a degree of caution when sanctioning a parent's right to home educate."Councils have to be sure the education of children in their area is appropriate. "If something goes wrong, it would then be the authority that would take the wrath," he said.

Which induces the standard response here, that if you honestly believe it is your bounden duty to intervene, judge and dictate to parents when their child reaches the age of 5 with the argument that it is better for the child that this happen this way, why do you not consider such action your bounden duty prior to the conception of the child, since that way you could ensure much more easily that children will not suffer in some truly terrible ways? Surely you should be assessing parental educational levels, their degree of personal responsibility and the appropriateness of our homes when they decide to conceive a child. Surely, if we are to take your argument seriously, we should be outraged that you permit some clearly irresponsible parents from conceiving in the first place? Why haven't you forcibly sterilized all heroin addicts, all people with HIV or Heps B and C. What are you doing about smack addicts, cocaine abusers and anyone with an IQ of less than 90? Get on with it, really!