Unfortunately I ended up with a migraine and went to bed for a couple of hours in the middle of the day.  I got up and made meatloaf for the crockpot, with a little help from Kerenza (4 1/2 years old).   Despite my migraine I'm not too displeased with how things have gone today, Benjamin fussed over his math assignment but got on and did it (I haven't graded it yet though) and he did his handwriting.   Just a few minutes ago I had him start reading Farmer Boy by L I Wilder and  thought he initially said it was hard when he looked at it, I told him just to read a couple of paragraphs if that is all he could manage.  He got through almost the whole chapter!  So I am quite pleased at what he accomplished.  On other days I plan to "tag read" (I read some, he reads some) with him, as well as having him read a bit by himself. 

The older kids have done some of their work - my 15 year old son did less than his younger sister as he daydreamed too much but I'm OK with that for today.  I'm not OK with the fact that he couldn't find his Apologia Biology CD Rom. 

The little children did some pages of their workbooks and have played with Geomag, which is quite educational.  I found some at less than half price on Saturday so after calling David to ask if he wanted me to get some (I was having a "Mom gets to be by herself" afternoon in Oxford) I bought a few boxes.

It's not been as productive a day as I'd hoped, but not too bad given the fact that I'm a bit out of commission.

I'd appreciate your prayers about my migraines.  They seem to be getting more frequent and/or harder to get rid of. 

Attention: those interested in the Charlotte Mason method.

I am thinking about approaching a missionary couple in my church who used the PNEU program (Parents' National Education Union, founded by Charlotte Mason) to home educate their two daughters while they lived in Africa to see if they will let me interview them.

If they are agreeable to an interview, what questions would you want to ask them, either about their use of the Charlotte Mason -based curriculum or about home education in general? (Or home educating as missionaries.) 

In fact, would anyone be interested in reading about such an interview?

another fun webcam site is Pete's Pond.  This features a man-made watering hole in Botswana.  They usually have visitors in the fall (northern hemisphere season) as during the rainy season the animals do not have to go to the pond to get water.

Last year we saw all sorts of animals, including elephants, giraffes, crocodiles or alligators, and a good number of other things. 

The web site is not well updated and the side bar says that the Pete's Pond camera is off  - but that is last year's news.  I hope they will update it soon. 

I've put the links for both the UK Hencam, and Pete's Pond in my sidebar so you can find the links when these posts are no longer on the front page.

Hencam.

If you are between chicken flocks, as we are, this makes a decent substitute.  What is really interesting is the night-time viewing, made possible by some infra-red dealy.  You can see that the hens do not just snore the night away, but rather have cycles of sleep and consciousness, perhaps sleeping more than being awake, but still there is more activity than I would have imagined.  By the way if you are viewing this cam from places other than the UK, be aware that the time difference will affect what you see.  So, if you are in my homestate of Oklahoma, if you check in at suppertime, you will see that the hens are in their beds.  (well, on their roosts, then).

And as a side thought, you can use this hencam for your lessons about latitude and seasons, etc.   If you check in in December, around 9:30 a.m. CST, you will see that it is nearly or completely dark already over here at 3:30 p.m.!  Conversely in June if you check in around 3:00 p.m. you will see that at 9:00 p.m. it is still quite light!

An article on the BBC website today states that according to a CBI survery, One in three employers have to give their staff remedial lessons in basic English and maths.   Schools minister Jim Knight said that extra lessons in literacy and numeracy have been in place in primary schools since the late 1990s and that "... GCSEs were being updated to include grammar tests and focus on the basics. "  

You may remember GCSEs from a previous post of mine.

I often find the comments relating to the articles more entertaining or informative than the articles themselves, and here are a couple of nuggets, good or otherwise, on the Have Your Say page entitled Should Managers Give Their Staff Remedial Lessons? 

If these people cannot read and write to a basic standard. How on earth did they fill in their application forms ? and secondly why did employers take them on   [sic]

When I was 3 I was very enthusiastic to learn to read and write so my mum taught me in her spare time. Throughout primary school and secondary school, I never really felt that correct spelling and grammar were high on the teachers list of concerns. I got an A in GCSE English and Maths 4 years ago, but even to this day nobody has taught me what an adverb or noun is! You just have to find out for yourself if you want to.

Speaking as a teacher in a 6th Form College, I think the root of the problem is the focus on student age as the sole benchmark of progression. A student ought to reach certain levels of attainment before moving on to the next stage, hence basic skills would have to be acquired before more advanced work could be done - pushing students into it before they are competent with basic skills means they do not get the chance to master them, and often fail at more advanced work too!

It is unfortunate that employers are picking up the pieces for our educational system's failure, it is not their responsibility whatsoever. I believe it goes further than this though. With the plethora of mindless media celebrity brain-rot content and the "It could be you!" culture, it is no surprise that many school children pay limited attention at school. Instead they dream of being the next overpaid footballer or annoying screeching waste of space of C4's next reality TV show.

Just proves what most of us have known for a long time. A year or two ago I saw a big sign in the window of a local estate agency proclaiming "Property's Wanted"; the agency closed down shortly afterwards, probably because no one wanted to trust a company that boasted the short comings of its staff. If employers only employed the numerate and literate then the government would have to take steps to produce such employable school leavers and "Propery's Wanted" signs would be a thing of the past [sic]