What I Learned

I just finished a six-week stint directing a play at Crystal Sea Drama Company. This is a youth theater company, so it's supposed to be an educational experience for the young people involved. However, I find that it's just as much an educational experience for me.

What I Learned Directing This Play:

1. How limited my theater knowledge and experience is. I've done lots of drama . . . not as much actual theater. I can put people on a stage with a script and get a good performance out of them. Everything else that theater involves, I'm pretty clueless about.

My costumer asked me what period the costumes should be. Period? I dunno. It's the Clue game characters . . . they're in a castle . . .

My set designer asked what kind of castle. I dunno. German? Siekfurst is a German name . . . sure, it's German. I don't have a clue what a German castle looks like. What kind of kitchen table in the kitchen? I have no idea -- what can you give me?

He also asked if I wanted to keep the round proscenium platforms or take them out. I don't know -- what do you want to do? I'm not used to dictating what my stage looks like; I'm used to being given a stage and having to work with what I have.

My stage manager asked to use my script with the cues written in it. Cues? Umm . . . how exactly would you like those cues written? (She ended up writing cues in her own script.)

I think I should take the tech class at CSDC.

2. How little attention I pay to detail. Did I like the earrings Fillie was wearing in Act 2? Was she wearing earrings in Act 2?

Do I want the rafters painted to match the trim? Uh . . . rafters? Oh, those. Sure. Maybe. I can't even picture that in my head.

I work with people here who are the type who would notice that this suitcase is a completely different style than all the other suitcases and cringe at that through the whole show -- where I'm happy that we found a purple suitcase at all. I'm grateful to have people who pay attention to those things because I know there are audience members that pay attention to those things, and I just don't see any of it.

3. How little control I have over anything. Actually, this was not news to me -- I'm reminded of this every time I direct a play. I'm convinced this is why God has me doing this.

I have NO control over who auditions for my play. (And I didn't have enough people audition, but God brought us the people we needed.)

I have NO control over how hard my actors and crew work. (But my people worked very hard for me this time around -- even got their lines memorized in a week and two days.)

I have NO control over the health of my actors and crew, or their well-being and safety outside of my rehearsal time with them -- and sometimes not much DURING my rehearsal time with them. (And this was my first play where those things really became issues.)

I have NO control, once the symbolic curtain rises on opening night, over what ends up happening on that stage. There's a point where it's all out of my hands.

4. I love these kids. I can't tell you what a great group of actors and techies I had for this play. I enjoyed them thoroughly. They put on a great show. They reminded me why I do this . . . and made me want to do it again.

Sometime. After I get the house cleaned and get caught up on my sleep.

Story and Being Human: Imago Dei

In a quiet moment last night with my hubby and youngest, I sat looking at our bookshelves upstairs. We have bookshelves in many places in our house, but these particular shelves have my daughters' old books. Some that they read on their own after they became independent readers, but many that hubby and I read to them at bedtime over many, many years of their childhood.

Oh, the books. Oh, the memories!

Narnia and the Pevensies. Laura and Mary in their Little Houses with Ma and Pa. All the American Girls. Junie B. Jones (the B. stands for Beatrice, but she just likes B and that's all). Anne of Green Gables, the whole series. The Magic Tree House. The Babysitter's Club. All sorts of Dear America history books. Charlotte's Web. Stuart Little. The Mandie series they got from their older cousin.

Oh, I wanted to go back. For a moment, I wanted to be sitting on a bed with one of their heads lying on my chest reading about Aslan singing the world of Narnia into being. I'll be sharing that book with my 6th graders this fall, but no -- it's not the same standing at the front of a classroom as it is snuggling at the head of a bed.

One of the greatest blessings of homeschooling was all the reading I got to do with my daughters. They did read on their own, but I also read literature aloud to them, stuff that was a step above their independent reading level to move them forward. I remember reading Julius Caesar with my eldest when she studied the Roman Empire in fifth grade or so, skipping a few unimportant scenes, stopping to explain stuff as we went, but reveling in the language and reciting my favorite speech of Antony's with mucho gusto. To this day, she claims that Shakespeare is one of her favorite writers.

An article I just read yesterday reiterated what I have heard and known for many years: one of the best things we can do to help our children write better is spend years reading high quality literature aloud to them. Let them hear the rhythm of mature language so they can replicate it naturally.

But reading high quality literature to them is also one of the best things we can do just to help them live better -- to help them become truly Human. The root of the word "educate" means "to draw out." We often think of schooling as a matter of pouring information into someone's head, but no -- it's a matter of drawing out of them what is there so that they can use it well. Which means something has to be in there to be drawn out.

Now, I believe there is a core of "knowing" that God has already instilled in us. It's a part of our being made in God's image. What is lacking is a "language" to couch our knowing in. Does that make sense? There are a lot of things I know, in a sense, but until I draw it out, until I can explain it in words, it is of no use to me. Most of those are spiritual things; thus, they are the most critical things to be educated in.

And this is where stories come in. Stories are a vehicle of knowing. Ideas and concepts can be communicated through story sometimes far more effectively than through exposition. Those inner things we know from God but cannot yet use can become accessible to us through narrative.

When I read about Laura's relationship with her Pa, it rings true in my soul, because somewhere in my soul, I already know about the security of a father's love, whether I have a father or not.

When I read about Anne breaking her slate over Gilbert's head, it rings true in my soul, because somewhere in my soul, I already know the extent of humanity's foolish pride, whether I'm conscious of my own or not.

When I read of Aslan's death on the Stone Table, it rings true in my soul, because somewhere in my soul, I already know the nobility of and need for sacrifice, whether I recognize my personal need for it or not.

Man has always told stories -- around the campfire, in books, on screens, on stages, in poetry, in song, always and everywhere. Jesus himself told stories to communicate the truths he has to tell us. When I teach my students about the story elements and the plot chart and such, I emphasize to them that this isn't stuff that people made up. We write stories that way because that's how God created story to be. That's how He made our story run. When we tell a good story well, we're imitating God. Imago dei.

Read to your kids people. Read to yourselves now. Read. Read. Read.

The Value of Theater Education

Goodness, it's been a while since I posted. But with good reason. The last two or three weeks have been dominated by Crystal Sea Drama Company's production of Seussical, which my daughter was in and with which I assisted the director. As my involvement in CSDC increases, this may become the new pattern for my blog: two or three weeks of silence toward the end of every show.

It has been a crazy couple weeks. But wonderful, also. And watching all these students -- about sixty overall between the cast and all the tech crew -- reminds me of why theater is such a valuable thing for kids to be involved with.

- They learn to be comfortable with public speaking. And to be good at it: good volume, comfortable pacing, expressive delivery. I think public speaking still ranks high on the lists of people's greatest fears -- it may even be number one. But almost everyone will have some occasion to speak to a group sometime in their lives (best man toasts? praying at church?), and you may as well feel comfortable at it.

- They interact in an intimate way with art and literature. There's much to be said about exposing your kids to art: taking them to museums and shows and concerts. But there's much MORE to be said for their being actually involved in the creation of art. To let them see the whole thing from the inside out. To engage in the act of creation, one of the ways we are made in the image of God.

I think every kid in the country reads a Shakespeare play at some point in their education, but how much more impactful would that be if they were actually performing it? It is drama, after all; it's meant to be performed, not read.

- They learn empathy. When you are in a play, you become another person. You have to think what they would think, feel what they would feel, react as they would react. No better way to step into another person's shoes and see life from their perspective. Such skills transfer into the real world. And such skills are more important than I can even express here.

- They learn to accept criticism and feedback with grace. Part of the rehearsal process is having the director give you feedback on your performance and learning to apply it. Without taking it personally. Without feeling like a failure. Without copping an attitude. Without resenting the critic. And that's something they will need to do for the rest of their lives.

- They learn teamwork. Those sixty kids I mentioned earlier? Only a handful of them were lead roles on the stage. Some of them had a multitude of little roles. Some of them ran spotlights. Some of them helped actors with quick costume changes. Some of them opened curtains at critical moments to make set changes go quickly so the pace of the play wasn't disrupted. Every single person was critical to the production. And the run of the show was a success because every single person took their part seriously and did it with excellence.

- They make great friends. When you spend this much time with people, you get close. You become a family. It's wonderful.


There's so much more. I'm so grateful for the time I spent in theater when I was young, and I'm so grateful for the opportunities my own children have had. If you're a parent, I urge you to find a play for your kiddos to get involved in. At least once.

And if you're a San Antonio parent, may I recommend you look into Crystal Sea Drama Company? They have a couple summer camps coming up. Well worth it.

Lessons from 1912

I found a link the other day to an exam given to 8^th grade students in 1912. So, because the girls and I were sitting around bored, I started quizzing them.

Good heavens. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. So I laughed – a lot.

We laughed more and more as the night went on. The funniest moment for me was when I asked them who invented the cotton gin. "Martin Luther!" my eldest called. "Kabalevsky!" the youngest screamed. I decided to just content myself with the fact that a good number of kids their age don't know who Martin Luther is to even offer him as a joke answer, and even less have probably even HEARD of Kabalevsky.

But to be fair, I wouldn't have passed the test either. Not even the grammar section, and we all know what a grammar diva I am. "What properties have verbs?" Yeah, right. And I took some comfort in the fact that these 1912 kids had one hundred years less of history to learn than we did. So, I don't mourn my inability to "sketch briefly Peter Stuyvesant."

It also has occurred to me, when I've seen such items in the past, that we can't necessarily compare those kids to ours. While I would argue that we need to do a better job of educating our children these days, still, comparing public school results today to public school results in 1912 is like comparing apples and oranges.

In 1912, they did not have this lofty goal of "No Child Left Behind." America has decided that every single student in the country needs to be equally well-educated. That was not the goal in 1912. A much smaller percentage of students were attending school back then. Many did not have access to schools . . . many had to work to support their families and couldn't take the time for school . . . and many, frankly, just couldn't cut it in school, and they quit. And they were allowed to quit. It's much easier to hold your students to a higher standard when you don't have to worry about getting EVERY student to that standard.

That's the thing about high standards: they sometimes give the illusion of grand success, but they often reflect a reality of selective success.

My daughter had a different reaction to the test, however. In the car the next day (after finishing her history assignment for the morning over the second World War), she said, "You know, it's weird to think that those kids in 1912 knew nothing at all about either of the World Wars."

They didn't. They had no idea that these stunning, cataclysmic, world-changing events were just around the corner in their lives. Life probably seemed to them pretty calm, pretty smooth, pretty much like this is how it has always been and always will be.

Makes you wonder, doesn't it? In thirty years, what stunning, cataclysmic, world-changing events could disrupt the calm, smooth lives of MY teenagers?

I almost shudder to think.

English Teacher Musings

- I posted a meme on FB a while back that has a bunch of words misspelled -- errors like "could of" instead of "could've," that kind of thing. One of my friends LOL'd it and commented that for me to read that must be like someone with perfect pitch listening to a tone-deaf person sing. Oh, my goodness . . . nailed it.

- Speaking of memes, my husband and I were just commenting on that word yesterday: meme. What a weird word it is. Wondering where in the world it came from. Amazed that it has suddenly become such a commonly used term when it seemed to come out of nowhere a couple years ago.

- And not only is a texting term like "LOL" common in everyday usage anymore, but I just used it as a verb. Language evolution is fascinating.

- And speaking of language evolution, I'm going to go out on a limb and predict that the word "whom" is just going to fade away in the next hundred years or so. Someday, people will read literature and documents from our time and react to the word "whom" the way we react to the word "thou." What does that mean? Why did people talk so weird back then? Old English -- pah.

- I rarely get to choose the literature I teach in my English classes, and I've decided I don't really want that responsibility. Do you know how much literature there is out there? Good, meaningful, influential, classic literature? A whole heck of a lot. Even though I'm given the curriculum to teach at my school, I get to choose what my homeschooled daughter reads for English, and sometimes it's overwhelming. I want her to read everything.

- "Theme" is one of the story elements that I teach in my literature classes, and the definition we give for it is "the statement about life that an author wants to convey in his/her story." Only that's not entirely accurate . . . because sometimes the theme isn't necessarily a statement. It's just a topic. The story addresses the theme of "conformity," but the author may not be making a clear statement about that topic as much as just wanting us to think more about it. And sometimes an author writes something with no particular "theme" in mind at all -- just writing a good story. Nevertheless, if it is a good story, we readers find a theme. Because this is one of the aspects of our being made in the image of God -- this ability and need to search for meaning.

- I emphasized (with italics) the modifier good with regards to a story. Not all stories are good. And by that, I don't mean that not all stories are entertaining or enjoyable. Those factors are a matter of personal preference, really. But I think we can come up with criteria for what makes a story good, or at least better than another. I don't know what that definition is . . . but I heard one a while back that I thought was a good start to the conversation anyway: good stories, even if they are fictional stories, are TRUE. They express truth. They show us truth. Even if that truth is the ugliness of reality.

- Good stories must have some universal appeal about them, too. Something that rings true in all people, whatever culture they come from.

- An old friend once talked about a play (and therefore, a story) having value if there is a redemptive quality to it. I like that, too.

- When I taught public school twenty-some years ago, every year, I had some smart aleck kid who would declare that literature can mean anything you want it to mean. This declaration usually came sometime in January or February, which was handy because it would be cold enough for me to have my winter coat in the classroom. I would ask my students what color my coat was. Some would say green, some blue, some greenish-blue, some blueish-green, some teal, some aqua . . . we even sometimes discussed how next to a blue wall it would look more green and next to a green wall it would look more blue. I explained to them that any of those answers could be correct, depending on your perspective, your background, your prior knowledge and vocabulary . . .

But if anyone said my coat was hot pink, that was WRONG. Just because there may be more than one acceptable answer to a question doesn't mean any answer is acceptable.

And yes, that shut the smart alecks up, believe it or not. I should've kept that coat just for those purposes. Too many smart alecks in our world need shutting up.

Christmas and the Six C's of History

Mrs. A is the history teacher extraordinaire at our school, and last Friday, she had lunch with my daughter and her homeschool cohorts to discuss the six C's of history: change over time, causality, context, complexity, contingency, and connection. To think like a historian, you need to look for these things in the stories you study.

This conversation came back again in church yesterday as we talked about Joseph.

See, as much hullabaloo as Christmas gets, we need to remember that it is the lesser of the two primary Christian holidays. The Christmas story is only the prelude to the real story -- the one we celebrate on Easter.  But, of course, Easter wouldn't have happened without Christmas. Contingency.

And our view of the Christmas story is pretty sentimentalized. As Aaron, our Sunday School teacher pointed out, while Luke's presentation of the story could be almost lullaby-ish (and that's the one you hear the most), Matthew's brings out the brutality of the age. Herod the king was a genuine lunatic; that slaughter of hundreds of babies was bloody and unspeakable. Picture this happening in a middle eastern country today and the international outcry it would cause. But back then, the king was the king, and he did what he wanted. Change over time.

Joseph must have been a pretty resourceful man to pick up his wife and newborn at the drop of a hat, in response to a warning in a dream, and move them to Egypt (the closest place out of Herod's jurisdiction) and just live there for a couple years. Finding a way to make a living and a place to live among a people of a different language, culture, and religion. We have romantic images in our mind of them camping out or something down there for a couple weeks . . . no, it was years. Herod died and his son took over. They had started a new life. And then they picked up and came home again at another angel's instructions in a dream. Causality . . . complexity . . . and prophetic fulfillment thrown in there, to boot.

But a certain detail of the story stuck out to me yesterday. When Mary was found to be pregnant, this was scandalous. Actually, scandal is hardly the word for it. Extramarital sex is so commonplace anymore, a single woman getting pregnant is hardly news these days, unfortunately. But the Jewish law said that Mary could be stoned to death. Joseph had every right to call her out and have her executed. Context.

But he didn't. Even before the angel came to fill him in on what was going on with this baby, he had already made the decision to "put her away quietly." Just end the relationship. No public condemnation. Leaving her alone with a baby may sound cold-hearted to the modern ear, but folks, this was a tremendous act of mercy on his part. More context.

Fascinating to think: the whole story could have ended right there. She's my betrothed -- she's pregnant -- it's not mine -- hand her over to the authorities for punishment, which was death. Had that happened, of course, God would have found another way to save the world, but He chose these people for this task because he knew that wouldn't happen. He knew Joseph. He knew he was merciful. He knew he would hear God's voice and obey. And the Christmas story -- and therefore the Easter story -- depended on Joseph's mercy and obedience.

Contingency.

So much depends on mercy and obedience. So much that we are not even the least bit aware of. This small act of mercy . . . this seemingly insignificant act of obedience . . . could have monumental effects on your life, other lives, society, even history. I must never forget to be merciful and to obey.

And there, my friends, is connection.

Getting Rooted at the Right Now Conference

Last week, I had the privilege of attending the Right Now Conference in Dallas and hearing some amazing speakers (Francis Chan, Eric Metaxas, and others). I've been digesting what I heard for a couple days and want to summarize the most pertinent points here -- for your and my benefit.

- The parable of the mustard seed. Note that, when we plant a mustard seed, our end goal is . . . well, mustard. But in the parable, what God accomplishes is a huge plant in which birds build their nests. We have one goal -- God uses our work to accomplish another goal, often something that never even occurred to us. God's purposes are far beyond what we have in mind. Cool. (From Mark Batterson)

- If the Spirit lives in us -- if we really and truly believe that -- why don't we allow Him to live through us more often? Why do we insist on doing things on our own strength? (Pete Briscoe)

- We pray best when we're most aware of our sin . . . when we involve our bodies (knees, anyone?) . . . when we pray our gut-honest desires (which is risky and takes courage) . . . and when we remember God's grace. (Jen Pollack Michel)

- Plagiarism is taking credit for another person's work and words. How many of us commit spiritual plagiarism every day? Taking credit for work that was actually God's. ALL THE TIME . . . (Bryan Carter)

- Larry Osborne spoke about Daniel being a model for the Christian in this post-modern age. He teaches us how to live successfully in Babylon. So much to glean from that. Daniel had humility with the pagans around him. He never copped an attitude about how wrong they were; he spoke with respect and graciousness to them. He made Nebuchadnezzar a better king and a better person, just being with him. He had the wisdom to pick his battles rather than fighting everything wicked around him.

Something interesting he pointed out. Daniel and his friends were brought to be trained "in the language and literature of the Babylonians." That means, they were being taught Babylonian religion -- paganism and the occult. And not only did they not refuse to participate in that education, but God gave them "knowledge and understanding" of what they were learning and more, to the point that when their training was evaluated by the king, he found none equal to them. And this was the only reason that they were allowed to be in the service to the king, that they were put in places of such tremendous influence, that they had ANY credibility with the most powerful rulers of the world at that time, and that we even know their names today. A great argument against the "cocooning" so many Christians do today -- as if knowing the theory of evolution or the basic tenets of Islam will transfer heretical germs to the believer.

- When you accepted Jesus, you accepted the call to missions. Period. No further call is needed.

- Eric Metaxas talked about William Wilberforce. When Wilberforce was saved, he assumed he would need to give up politics (which at the time was an even dirtier profession that it is today). But his pastor, John Newton, told him to stay, to be a light in the place where God had put him and with the gifts God had given him. Again, no cocooning ourselves from the world's dirt and grime: go engage, and learn, and salt, and shine your light.

- God's desire is for us. (Francis Chan) Why do we need to be reminded of that? But we do. Often. God's greatest desire is not for a just society or sinless followers or miserable people or even happy people. God's desire is for a relationship with us. Everything else is either a means to that end or a result of that blessing.

Yep. A good week. Thanks, Paul and Jackie.

The Isms

I've been vacationing with the family, so I haven't written for a while. And what I'm going to write about today, I'm a little nervous about, because believe it or not, I don't like controversy. But it's been heavy on my heart, and I feel like I need to say it.

The shooting in Charleston. So terribly sad. But as I joined the online grieving, I was convicted by some of the comments I read. Sentiments along the lines of, "How could this still be happening in our country?" "I thought we had moved past this!" "When will we eradicate racism in our society?"

Sentiments I would have shared in the not-so-distant past, but I don't think I can share today. Because, friends, I don't think we will ever "move past this." I don't think we will ever "eradicate racism." Not really. And so, as much as we need to fight racism, we've really got to focus on a more important task.

I just re-read a book over vacation that I'll be assigning my daughter in English class this fall: The Deadliest Monster. It compares the worldviews of two classic monster stories (which she will also be reading). In Frankenstein, the doctor creates a being who is pure and innocent in its creation; it only becomes a monster when it is treated cruelly by society. In Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Dr. Jekyll recognizes within himself a virtuous self and an evil self and tries to isolate the evil self so as to be able to indulge it once in a while without damage to his reputation; however, the evil self, through the indulgence, becomes more and more powerful and eventually takes over.

The question in this book is, which monster do you believe in? Modern society believes in Frankenstein. We are born good -- the only reason we do bad things is because society messes us up. The solution then is to fix society (laws, education, etc.) so that people are never "trained" to do bad things. We need to pass strong hate crime laws, integrate our schools and neighborhoods, and teach our kids that we are all equal. Then we will get past racism. We will eradicate it.

But the reality is that we are not Frankensteins -- we are Jekyll/Hydes. We are not born good -- we are born with an evil self lurking within us. We are born selfish little snits that need to be "trained" to do good. Racism (at least the selfish, prideful seed that becomes racism) is within us from the womb.

There's an old saying that God doesn't have grandchildren, only children. Righteousness is not passed down from generation to generation. It is not a legacy we leave our offspring. Good manners, maybe. Religious traditions, certainly. Moral habits and desires, perhaps. But not righteousness. Righteousness must be re-born in every individual, one at a time. Who was it that said "We are always one generation away from apostasy"? This is truth. One generation.

I long for a day when our world is genuinely color-blind . . . and gender-blind, and class-blind, and blind to every difference between us that doesn't matter. When my friend's dark brown skin is of no more consequence than my other friend's bright red hair. When we stop celebrating women's history month because women's history is just American history.

But the truth is, IF that day were to ever come, there would still be those who find a reason to hate a group of other people and use guns or bombs to kill them. "Racism" may not be the cause, but there will always be an "ism". No matter what laws we pass . . . no matter how we educate . . . there will always be an "ism".

Because God doesn't have grandchildren. Racism is not a result of bad training; it is a result of an unrighteous heart. The re-birthing of righteous hearts: that's what will stop the isms.

Legal Homeschooling

Because I'm back to homeschooling in the fall, and because I don't feel I've got a complete grip on the ins and outs of homeschooling through high school, and because I haven't been to a homeschool convention in many years (and because I'm one of those weirdos that really enjoys things like homeschool conventions), I went to the FEAST homeschool convention this weekend here in San Antonio.

And because I'm new to Texas, one of the workshops I attended was the one about Homeschooling and the Law in Texas. I figure, I better be sure I'm legal.

This is the third state I've homeschooled in. New Jersey was amazingly hands-off about homeschooling -- there were really no regulations of any kind, essentially. I kept hearing about the overbearing, overwhelming regulations in next-door Pennsylvania and thanking my lucky stars I didn't live there.

Iowa was something in between. We had to "register" with the local school district every year, and we had to do something every year to give evidence that our students were progressing (standardized tests, portfolio . . . I paid a woman to come in and check on us once a quarter . . . she was nice and it was easy). The cool thing in Iowa was that, in our district anyway, we were able to participate in just about anything in the public schools we wanted to sign our kids up for. My youngest took violin lessons. My oldest was "dual enrolled" for eighth grade, going to the public middle school for science and the "exploratory" class with a quarter each of art, music, etc.

Texas seems to be about as free as New Jersey. The workshop speaker said the only requirements to homeschool in Texas (where a homeschool is considered the equivalent of a private school) is that you use a curriculum and that you are making "bona fide" progress in that curriculum. I asked him about that, because I am an English teacher and I don't purchase an English curriculum for my kids -- I know what they need to learn. He said that is fine. I just need to be able, if asked sometime, so produce something that shows what I'm covering and something that proves I've been covering it.

I'm not gonna lie: it is really nice to live in a state where you have so much freedom in your homeschool. But I'm also not gonna lie about this: I'm not completely comfortable with the idea of homeschoolers having such little oversight. I mean, I know I'm going to teach my children well -- and I know when I find I'm not doing a good job, I'm going to look for someone to do a better job (I've already hired a woman to do biology labs with my daughter next year because I know myself better than to believe I'm going to navigate that road successfully).

And the truth is, I have not personally known any homeschool parent who would ever have shirked their duty toward their children in homeschooling. This is a huge commitment; nobody is going to take it on who isn't going to take it seriously.

Except the really rare, really messed-up people out there. And there are a few. And a part of me still believes that the state has a stake in making sure children are protected from neglectful and abusive parents, whether they neglect to feed them or neglect to educate them.

Our workshop speaker gave a bit of the history of homeschooling in Texas. In the 80s, it was illegal to homeschool in the state, period (as it was in much of the country). He related stories of families at that time who did "CPS drills" in their school day. The kids knew when the doorbell rang, they had to pick up their books, go to mom and dad's closet, and sit in there quietly with the lights off and door shut until mom came to say the coast was clear.

Now, as grateful as I am for the pioneers of that period who went through great struggles to give me the freedom to educate my children that I enjoy today, I was uncomfortable with these stories. If it was illegal to homeschool, why were they homeschooling? I expect their answer was that they felt called of God to do it, and their obedience to God trumps their obedience to the state. And even though I don't see a biblical requirement to homeschool (certainly a case to be made for it, but not a requirement), I guess I'd have to accept that answer from those law-breaking pioneers.

Mainly because I anticipate situations coming up when Christians (maybe even I myself) will be called by God to obey in a way that the laws of the land forbid. And I anticipate there will be other Christians arguing with them (or me) that such a reading of the Bible is ridiculous. (I already get those comments now.)

And if obeying my God means breaking the law, paying fine, going to jail, or doing "CPS drills" to protect my kids, I guess that's what I will do. Just like marriage vows . . . the commitment I made many years ago to submit to my Lord doesn't get revoked when obedience gets hard.

History Objectives -- Because They MATTER

Next year, I'm in charge of my daughter's history instruction. I could just buy a curriculum, but I know myself: I would get annoyed at what I don't like about it and only end up using about half of it, doing the rest myself anyway. I'm too frugal to spend my money on something I'm not going to use well.

Thus, my inclination is to come up with something myself. Cuz I'm one of those arrogant teaching types who always thinks she can do it better and that's just what I do.

So, as I'm considering next year, I'm doing the Good Teacher thing and starting with my objectives. What are the specific things I want my daughter to come out of her history class knowing and doing? (And may I pause and mention that the Good Teacher thing of establishing and teaching to OBJECTIVES is something that more teachers need to do? But I digress.)

And this is the rub for history, because there is so darn much to know!! I mean, history, people. It's been going on for a long, long time. A lot of stuff has happened. I can't expect her to learn it all! So, how do I narrow down to what, specifically, she needs to know to get "credit" for a "World History II" class at a high school level?

Well, for me, one of the first objectives would be that she can place major historical events on a general timeline. The industrial revolution happened in the 19th century (not in the Middle Ages). The Civil War happened in the 1860s (not in the 1680s, before the U.S. was even a country). World War 2 happened after World War 1 and the Great Depression and before the Cold War, and they all happened in the 20th century. That right there would put her ahead of much of the general population.

Secondly, I want her to be able to give a good general description of what those major historical events were about. Not every detail -- not a bunch of names and dates, necessarily -- but a decent-sized essay's worth of information explaining the important things about that event. Enough that, if the topic were to come up in conversation, she would be able to follow what someone is saying. Or if a show comes on TV about the event, she knows enough to be able to understand what's going on and fit new information from the show into the paradigm she already has.

Third, I want her to know the relationships between events. What connections might there have been between the Industrial Revolution and the Great Depression? How were World War 1 and World War 2 similar and different? These discussions are important because this is where we learn the lessons from history that we need to apply to what's happening in the world today. (This is also where I feel the least knowledgeable, unfortunately . . . )

But the fourth goal is more elusive, at least for me. Actually, it's more time-consuming, mainly. You see, history is a story. When you read a good book about the real story of a historical event or historical figure -- or when you hear a great teacher who loves her subject telling the stories of a time period -- it comes ALIVE. It becomes fascinating! And I want my daughter to be fascinated by history. But as much as I enjoy history, I am not informed enough to be that great teacher, and while we will read books, I don't know if we will have time to read enough to really light that spark.

I'm thinking I will require her to pick at least two topics to really dig deep on. Get to know all the major characters. Look at all the details. She read Bill O'Reilly's Killing Lincoln this semester for her independent reading selection in English, and she said it was probably the best book she's ever read. I know that's because it met this fourth objective.

Is it weird that I love having these conversations with myself? What are my objectives . . . how will I meet them . . . man, I eat this stuff up.

My Grammar Curriculum . . . the One I Should Write

I shared a video on Facebook yesterday about a school in Atlanta called Ron Clark Academy. In the video, teachers are leading their students to sing and dance through their lessons . . . walking on the tables . . . stuff like that.

If I really felt the freedom to do it, that's how I would teach. Especially when I teach stuff I love, like grammar. I taught a K-2 grammar class in our co-op where we sang and did hand rhymes and played games. Those games and songs are why my daughters are grammar gurus like me -- why my eldest used to re-explain the grammar lessons to her classmates in high school who weren't getting it from the teachers' instruction.

I LOVE TEACHING GRAMMAR. That apparently makes me some kind of freak; it seems very few people like grammar. I love it. I love the labeling, the analyzing -- I love that there are right answers and I can figure it out. It appeals to many aspects of my personality as well as to my love of words.

I just recently had a conversation with our school's new principal and new academic dean about how I would change the teaching of grammar at my school. And it led me to come home and type up my ideas to give them. Because there are SO MANY THINGS I would change about how grammar is taught -- not just at our school, but pretty much everywhere.

Teach grammar through games. There are so many games -- like "The Minister's Cat" -- that are fun just in themselves but help a kid develop an inner sense of how language works. There are certain words you can use to describe the cat (those are adjectives), and there are other words that don't work. You have to understand in your gut the jobs that words are doing in a sentence before you can label them or analyze them.

Teach grammar through songs. And hand rhymes and chants. Anything rhythmic and easy to memorize. This year, I taught my 7th graders songs to remember the definitions of adjectives and adverbs ("Adverbs tell us how, where, when, or to what extent . . . "). When they needed to remember, I saw them mouthing the words to the song. If they had learned a song like that in 2nd grade, they wouldn't still be needing to mouth the words to themselves -- they would just know it.

Teach grammar through colors. In homeschool, we assigned certain marker colors to certain parts of speech and the girls wrote sentences on the whiteboard with different colors for every word. A visual aid to solidify in their minds what the words are doing in the sentence.

And teach grammar through other visual aids. I told my classes this year that modifiers (adjective, adverbs, prepositional phrases) are like sprinkles. Nouns and verbs are like ice cream and cones -- you have to have ice cream and a cone to make an ice cream cone. Sprinkles, on the other hand, are not required, but they add sparkle and flavor to the cone. You can sprinkle as many as you want on wherever you want them.

I want to write a grammar curriculum. Grammar is so easy to understand if it is taught well. Someday, when I have a reason to . . .

IMHO: The Biggest Fix for Education

My eldest just told me that on one of her college-associated tests (ACT? CLEP? She couldn’t remember which), she had to write on this question: should high school be extended to five years instead of four? Well, that led to a lively discussion on our part.

She could see pros and cons. On the one hand, some students need more time to learn what they need to learn in high school and to mature enough to be ready for what follows. On the other hand, she wasn’t confident that they would simply be allowed more time; she suspected the powers-that-be would just add more to the load of what they were expected to learn.

Here is the root of the problem with our society’s system of schooling, in my humble opinion: it is bound by time restraints. It is no secret to anyone – teachers, administrators, parents, students, psychologists, educational researchers and experts – that students learn at different rates. One student learns at a different rate than another student. A student learns one subject at a different rate than he learns a second subject. And a student may learn at one rate at one time of life or stage of development and at a very different rate at another time of life or stage of development.

The time involved to learn is a constantly changing variable. But our system of schooling does not allow for such a variable.

In order for a teacher to teach something to a group of students, all of the students have to be at about the same place academically, ready to absorb this particular new skill or information. If that teacher is going to teach that same group of students over a stretch of time, then over that stretch of time, the whole group of students needs to remain in about the same place academically.

So for one teacher to teach a class of twenty second graders seven hours a day for nine months, that means that all twenty of those students have to be at about the same place academically – in every subject – and progress at about the same pace – in every subject – for nine months.

What a ridiculous expectation! No wonder so many students struggle . . . and so many others are bored. And so many teachers burn out.

In a recent discussion about a math class at our school, I made the suggestion that the teacher could slow down the pace, since all the students are struggling at the moment. “But then they would be behind,” was the response I got.

Behind what, exactly? Behind the arbitrary point in the typical math curriculum that every student in the country of this age group is expected to be at by the middle of April? Should that really be our goal?

Maybe it's the homeschooler in me, but I so want to free all of our students from those time restraints. I want to tell them, "The goal is to learn Algebra -- the full content of it, and to learn it well. It isn't important how you learn it. It isn't important when you learn it. If you could do nothing but Algebra in an online course for six weeks and get it down pat, great. If you stretch it out over two years, sitting with a private tutor twice a week but get it down, awesome. The goal is mastery of the material, however and whenever that happens for you."

But people are so afraid of their kids being "behind" the rest of the kids their age. What if -- gasp! -- they don't finish high school in four years? Well, what if they don't? What if they are a year older and more mature when they start college? What if they actually have the skills and knowledge they need to succeed in college when they start rather than having to fake and float and eventually fail when you're paying thousands of dollars for the education? What if they come out of high school knowing that they know something and not just that they worked a system to get a signed document that everyone seems to think means something (but they know it doesn't)? 

What's wrong with taking more time in high school? 

Frankly, if we would have this mindset in the earlier years, it might prevent a lot of kids in high school from having to worry about "graduating late." I have all sorts of thoughts for how elementary school could be done differently. Not being an elementary teacher, I hesitate to promote my ideas much, but I still have them.

Can we just stop with the race to adulthood and give our kids some time? I'm sure they'd thank us for it, and I think we'd all enjoy life so much more.

Baltimore and Paris: A Tale of Two Cities

My 9th grade Bible class prayed for Baltimore yesterday morning. But I hadn't anticipated Baltimore coming up later in English when we discussed A Tale of Two Cities. The comparison was quite appropriate, however.

ToTC takes place during the French Revolution, and Dickens gives us powerful descriptions of the corruption of the French aristocracy and its oppression of the French people. Communities are taxed to the point of starvation. A child is run over and killed without even an apology. Hungry families are told to eat grass. The "Monseigneur" and his class were abominable.

But the uprising of the people becomes even more of an abomination. Thousands beheaded. Their tribunals a travesty of justice. Innocents sent to the guillotine themselves for merely expressing grief over the execution of a loved one. People coming to watch the daily beheadings as entertainment, reveling in the blood running in their streets. Women bringing their knitting to the daily show. A man hopes for a young girl to be named among those to die, because her pretty blond curls will look so nice on the Barber's blade.

Horrific.

By the point where we are in the novel right now, the evils of the aristocracy, unjust as they were, are almost forgotten. The evils done in answer are their equal, if not worse. Yet the Citizens of France claim them to be justified in answer to the injustice done to them.

Just as I heard a black commentator on CNN Monday night tell us that what was happening in Baltimore was not a riot -- this was an uprising, and one perfectly justified in light of the injustices done on the black community.

One good French aristocrat gave up his rights and inheritance, refusing to be a part of the corruption he was born into. He returned to France later during the Revolution, expecting to be accepted as one of the people and hoping to be a force for peace. Instead, he was jailed and sentenced to execution. Once a Marquis, always a Marquis.

I wonder how many of those injured police officers in Baltimore actually participated in the injustice their department is accused of. And if any of them might have tried to stop it. Yet they got a rock to the skull as well.

To me, the most fascinating character of the novel is Dr. Manette. A Bastille prisoner himself, falsely accused and almost destroyed by the evils of the French aristocracy. But he was saved by the love of his daughter, and he is now appalled by the evils of this Revolution. He is loved and admired by the French Citizenry, yet he can not stop the flood of hatred. He can only walk in the midst of it, speaking truth, saving a person here, a person there.

And I recall images of black ministers in suits walking the streets of Baltimore Monday night. Victims themselves, most likely. Saved by love. Speaking truth. Stopping one crime here, another there.

An exact analogy it is not, yet the comparison is valid. Unfortunately, Dickens offers no instructive solution for us. His novel ends with the good guys escaping Paris as it continues to self-destruct. This is not an option for Baltimore. I do find it interesting, however, that even Dickens, who was not a believer, instinctively seemed to understand something about the only real answer to such injustice and hatred. The hero at the end of his novel is a man who voluntarily steps in to be executed in place of another.

There is a reason why the Classics have become Classics. They speak timelessly to the condition of humanity's soul.

Stop Riding on a Flat Tire

We had a speaker at our teacher meeting yesterday who talked about helping students with "learning difficulties": ADD, dyslexia, sensory processing problems, etc. It was a VERY valuable in-service.

One of the points he made that really stuck with me: those of us who are good teachers tend to find ways to accommodate these difficulties. Like . . . we allow a student extra time to take a test . . . or to have the test read aloud to them . . . or to type an assignment instead of hand-writing it. Ways to help their learning continue despite the problem. All well and good. Except that when they're in the real world, college professors and employers don't make such accommodations. You can't just "accommodate" these learning difficulties for the rest of your life, and why would you if there's a way to fix them?

He equated it to pushing a child on a bicycle that has a flat tire. They may ride that bike like a boss, but once you let go, they will crash. You  push them for a while so they get their bike-riding skills down, but at some point, you also have to stop and fix that flat tire, or your efforts are a waste.

I've realized this for a while in my homeschooling. When my youngest was in kindergarten or so, I subbed in her Sunday School class one week and was able to observe her in a "school" setting. It was fascinating. She knew she had to sit still and be quiet -- and the energy it took for her to do that left her with nothing to absorb anything that the teacher said. It was one or the other: sit quietly or understand the lesson. There was no hope of doing both.

So when we homeschooled, I recognized that I had to work on those two tasks separately. When I had content to teach her (2 + 2 = 4), I let her be up and moving and loud and whatever she needed to do or be. But then we worked on her ability to sit quietly when necessary as a separate skill. I didn't make her do both at once until she was better at both of them.

And by the grace of God, my now almost-fifteen-year-old is quite capable of sitting quietly and learning at the same time. Praise Jesus.

So last night and this morning, I found myself struggling with my own "mental difficulties": I can't control the thoughts that roam through my brain. I want to turn them off to go to sleep . . . and they come back. I want to pray about something specific . . . and other thoughts invade my prayers. I need to think about a lesson I'm writing . . . and thoughts about a different problem disrupt me.

And I remembered that speaker yesterday and considered, maybe instead of just getting annoyed with myself that this keeps happening, and letting my sleep be interrupted, and letting my prayers be disturbed, and letting my work be prolonged and weakened . . . maybe I need to fix that flat tire and teach myself the skill of controlling my thoughts.

I mean, I keep telling my daughter with the anxiety problems that it really is possible to do control one's thoughts. Just because my own uncontrolled mind doesn't dramatically debilitate me as it does others like her doesn't mean it's not worth the effort to fill that gap in my cognitive functioning. Right?

Right. Yeah, I need to look into that seriously. Why keep making accommodations if there is a solution to the problem?

Lessons Learned from the Director's Chair

Last Friday was Summit Christian Academy's performance of  Pilgrim's Progress -- the second play I wrote, my tenth play I've directed, and my third time directing this particular play. I have to say . . . this show probably gave me more gray hairs than any yet. A bunch of new actors in their first full-length play who didn't understand the importance of memorizing lines early. The week of the performance is not the time to get your lines down! And now they know this. :) Yet they still pulled off two great performances on Friday. The power of prayer, people.

The stress I felt this last week sent me back to the very first play we did in Sioux City: "The King and His Dancing Princesses." About fifteen 3rd-5th graders, in their very first play, with a newbie director and newbie producer . . . wow. I distinctly remember about half-way through thinking, "What made me think I could do this?"

I've always loved acting, but now I think I love writing and directing more -- and this was a surprise to me. I never thought I'd be willing to give up the spotlight, but here I am enjoying the behind-the-scenes much more. God has used this "hobby" to teach me so many things. Like . . .

. . . that I'm not really in control of anything. That was a huge adjustment during that first play I directed: realizing that I could only do so much. At some point, the kids themselves had to step up and make this happen, and I couldn't make them do it. All I can do is try to make them want to do it, and give them the tools to do it. In the end, it's all out of my hands.

. . . that my precious words I've written are not as important as I think. I remember a drama performed at our church in Sioux City that got particularly butchered in content as the actors struggled through. The worship leader announced to the congregation at the end of the service that the piece had been written by me. I muttered under my breath, "Well, that somewhat resembled something I wrote . . ."  I've had to learn over and over to let go of my script; it's not going to come out as I planned it. And that's okay.

. . . that learning a new skill comes from imitation. With my beginning student actors, I usually have to show them exactly how I want them to deliver a line, how I want them to stand or move, how loud and slow they need to speak, everything. They mimic me. And eventually, after two or three plays, they start to feel in their own bodies what it feels like when it's done right and they then internalize the skill. It was an awesome thing to direct my last play with my high schoolers in Sioux City and see just how far they'd come. I've applied these lessons to teaching writing as well. We learn a new skill through imitation and repetition.

. . . that the personal growth of my students trumps a good show. Never have we put on a show that I couldn't find some aspect of the performance I wished we'd done better. But in every show, the students have learned something important. They learned how to project their voice. Or they learned how to focus and pay attention. Or they learned how to sympathize with a character-type very different from themselves. And those things are far more important than whether the final performance was stellar quality or not.

So, what did this last group of students learn? The group that didn't get their lines memorized until the final week? Well, not only did they learn that Mrs. K knows what she's talking about when she sets deadlines . . . but I suspect they've learned something about learning. My suspicions are that they were "going over" their lines all that time; they just didn't do what it took to actually learn them. And I have suspicions that similar things are happening with their schoolwork. They "go over" a grammar worksheet enough to get enough right answers to get enough points to satisfy their parents. But they don't do what it takes to learn the grammar concept.

And now I'm excited at the prospect of watching my students learn how to learn in the last couple months of school. If that actually happens, the new gray hairs from the last week will have been well worth it.

My Crowded Mind

I'll be blunt: I have nothing profound to say today. If it weren't for the fact that I try to make writing a discipline and I've been lax on that discipline in the last couple weeks, I wouldn't even attempt a blog post today at all.

One reason I have nothing profound to say is because I have so many different strands of thought going in my mind right now that none of them can dip very far beneath the surface to find deep connections in my psyche. Wanna hear about all those strands? Sure you do.

- The Film Festival -- which I wrote about last post. Still going through tomorrow. The director of a local homeschool theater company jokingly suggested that I should teach a film-making class this summer since I'm all excited about the concept now. Which really was a joke. Until I thought about it more. And now I'm actually stupid enough to be considering the idea seriously. (Just what makes me think I can teach a film-making class? I have no idea. But, you know, I asked myself the same question in the middle of directing my first play . . . "What made you think you could do this??" And yet I did it.)

- The School Play -- which I am directing. This project has been a challenge on many levels. Many beginner actors. Very little rehearsal time. Limited storage for props and costumes. Little to no access to our actual performance space until the final dress rehearsal. So many details . . . it seems like this play is on my mind at some level 24/7. Two weeks from today is performance day . . .

- School Next Year -- I wrote earlier about how my daughter's high school is not continuing and we're trying to start a homeschool co-op. Lots of research and thought and planning going into that. Plus, I'm teaching the English for that co-op . . . even more research and thought and planning. And I'm starting to wonder if I just want to do the history myself, also. (Believe it or not, I may prefer that to hunting down and paying for a curriculum that I may not end up liking.) Always on the brain . . .

- Grammar -- I offered to help the school come up with a new grammar curriculum for the whole school -- because what they do now isn't working well. And because I love grammar. So, I will find myself at times just thinking through grammar concepts, and ways to teach them, and what needs to be taught before what, and on and on . . .

- Launching the Eldest -- My older daughter has a lot of significant things happening in her life right now. She's doing a College Plus program called Navigate that is supposed to help her find focus and direction for her life. She's getting ready to start classes at St. Philip's College in the fall. She's buying a car (well, we will own it, but we're walking her through the gruntwork of the purchase). She's looking for a job. She's getting ready for her boyfriend to possibly move to San Antonio in a couple months. And in all of this, she needs our support and guidance.

- Curriculum Writing -- The company for whom I write Bible study guides just sent me transcripts of the DVDs for my next assignment, a Bible study over the Song of Solomon. I have five weeks to write leader guides for six sessions. Scripture about loving God, His loving us, etc. etc. . . .

- Summer Drama Camps -- The afore-mentioned homeschool theater director asked if I'd be willing to teach any other drama camps this summer. So, the idea of a two-week performance camp for elementary kids is also shaping in my mind . . .

- Junior High English Classes Next Year -- I will still be teaching junior high literature at Summit Christian Academy next year, and occasionally thoughts about those classes start floating through my head . . .

- English Classes THIS Year -- And this school year isn't over yet: Don Quixote and Tale of Two Cities are still on my plate before summer break, among other things.

- Driver's Ed -- for the younger daughter -- she's itching to start.

- Bible Study Fellowship -- still have to keep up with this. (And I'm bracing myself to be asked to be a group leader in the fall . . . can I really add that to the pile?)

- Prayer List -- there are several people I've felt strongly convicted to pray for that God keeps bringing up at random moments . . . Now -- they need you to lift them up right now . . . 

- Birthdays -- both of my daughters have theirs at the end of April. Which I just remembered the other day.

AND HANGING OVER IT ALL . . .

- Tan pants. My daughter needs them. For the play. I hate clothes shopping so much, this may be the item on the list that weighs on me the most.

So there. A tour of the innards of my mind this Spring Break week. Aren't you glad you're just visiting and not living here for the duration? :)

The Case For -- and Against -- Science Fairs

It's Science Fair week. Oh, joy. I have very mixed feelings about the Science Fair thing.

On the one hand, I understand that it is very valuable for students to go through the process of the scientific method -- generating a question and hypothesis, designing a study to test it, testing it, analyzing the results. It's one thing to understand the method in your brain; it's another thing to actually put it to use. It's a thing to be used, not merely understood.

On the other hand, the scientific method is a laborious, meticulous process, and for those who are not naturally so inclined, it is exhausting. I suppose once a year isn't too much to ask of a teenage student, but . . . sigh!

On the one hand, I realize that coming up with your own original question that you want answered should make the project more interesting and more practical.

On the other hand, "original" and "practical" hypotheses are challenging to come up with -- and often end up being very challenging and difficult to test, which only serves to make the whole experience a negative one for the student.

On the one hand, I understand that science teachers and science fair judges get very tired of seeing the same "old reliable" projects year after year, to the point of wanting to puke.

On the other hand, there's a reason that those old reliable projects are old and reliable -- THEY WORK. And they are doable for the less scientifically inclined. It is better for such students to have a successful project from which they learn the necessary skills and concepts than that they have a flop of an experiment that only teaches them that they hate science.

On the one hand, I realize that knowing how to present your information creatively is a valuable skill in itself, one that will serve our students well in the marketplace. And I know of students who live for the making of their presentation board -- that's their reward for trudging through the actual experiment.

On the other hand, the time and energy and money and stress that goes into some of these tri-fold boards -- and the parental one-upmanship they put on display -- is unnecessary and unbeneficial. Maybe even harmful.

My girl's experiment is done. Her lab report is written. She just has the presentation board left, but that's the part we both hate. I figure, we'll print up stuff and tape it to the board and leave it at that. Her best friend is the Pintarest-type who will have the tri-fold that blows everyone away, and we'll step back and give her that glory. It's not worth that much stress to us.

And then next week is Spring Break. Whew! Summer will be here before we know it.

"It Must Be By His Death . . . " -- Must It?

Rome is Brutus' first love. We read paragraph after paragraph of student writing supporting this thesis in my honors sophomore English class with Mr. Umansky. Frankly, writing and evaluating those paragraphs is all I remember about our Julius Caesar unit that year -- in fact, I wouldn't even remember that we read it except that thesis statement is seared into my brain: Rome is Brutus' first love.

But I've taught Julius Caesar several times since then, and I'm teaching it now, and I LO-O-OVE this play! And I am LOVING the discussions I'm having with this class.

The big debate yesterday: did Brutus have good reasons for joining the conspiracy to kill Caesar? Well, his reasons seem more noble than the others'. He loves Caesar, but he is afraid of what will happen to Rome if Caesar gains too much power, because he predicts power will corrupt him.

But how does he know power will corrupt him? He also predicts that Antony is but a limb of Caesar and won't be any danger. He predicts that the people will rule by their reason and appreciate what the conspirators have done for them. He predicts that letting Antony speak at Caesar's funeral will be to their advantage more than otherwise. And he was dead wrong about it all.

And is there ever a good reason, a noble reason to take a life? (Insert "American Sniper" discussion here.)

And what about Antony? He's noble for standing by Caesar . . . we think . . . but what are his motives? And what a two-faced sneak that man is! Making his peace with the conspirators, shaking their bloody hands, and then turning around and swearing vengeance. Is that noble or not?

How about that funeral oration of his? It's positively masterful. "Brutus is an honorable man" he tells them over and over, all the while proving definitively what a traitor Brutus is. Riling up the crowd with passion, denigrating himself humbly as "a plain, blunt man," -- "no orator, as Brutus is" -- oh, the irony!

And the crowd! The mob! It's laughable how changeable they are! "This Caesar was a tyrant!" One minute, and weeping for him the next. "Caesar's better parts shall be crowned in Brutus!" at one point, and then "Burn! Fire! Kill! Slay! Let not a traitor live!" just a few minutes later. So easily swayed by pretty words. (And when have we heard pretty words sway a changeable crowd into action unwise for the course of a country . . . ?)

Why, that mob actually murdered an innocent man in the streets just because he was unfortunate enough to have the same name as one of the conspirators. "I am Cinna, the poet!" he cried. "I am Cinna, the poet!!"

"Tear him for his bad verses!" the mob growls. Insert images of the Ferguson, Missouri, madness here.

Don't ever tell me that Shakespeare is not relevant to the modern reader. And don't ever tell me it isn't interesting to the modern teenager. They just need to know how to read it -- and to read it like it was meant to be read: with PASSION. Because as Antony tells us (long before Elizabeth Taylor did), "Passion, I see, is catching."

Watching With Your Brain On

The eldest's boyfriend was with us over the holidays and my girls introduced him to "Once Upon a Time" -- and got him properly addicted, like the rest of us are. Thanks to Hulu, as of yesterday, our family is caught up with the rest of the world and ready for new episodes to begin airing March 1st. Counting the days.

My 9th grade Bible class had an interesting discussion last week about entertainment and how we decide what is okay for us to watch as believers and what is not. An important verse we focused on was 1 Corinthians 10:31: So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. Whatever we do must glorify God -- that is, it must proclaim who He is and the greatness of who He is. 

So, can we glorify God by watching a TV show that was not made to glorify God? Well, maybe.

The key point in our lesson was the need to be an active viewer and not a passive one. Most people (believers and nonbelievers) seem to use TV and movies to veg out to -- they just sit and absorb mindlessly, not thinking much about what is entering their minds. This is a problem. Because even shows that ARE made to glorify God will be imperfect and may have content that we should not be absorbing mindlessly. (There are even stories in the Bible that would be dangerous to absorb mindlessly.) We must engage our brains at all times when they are being influenced by narrative and images.

For example, I've talked with one of my daughters about some of the recurring themes in "Once Upon a Time," such as I will always find you. This is a motto for Snow White and Prince Charming, two of the main characters, who throughout their adventurous relationship are always being torn apart and seeking each other again. Doesn't this phrase bring to mind Jesus' parable of the lost sheep? God never abandons His own, never lets them stay lost; He will always find you. These two very imperfect characters are exemplifying one of God's most glorious attributes: his unconditional, never-failing love.

Another recurring theme: Magic always has a price. (Although I think I've only heard this phrase applied to what the show refers to as "black magic" -- "white magic" or good magic never seems to be as costly. Nevertheless . . . ) Whenever someone seeks out a magical solution to a problem, a solution that involves disrupting the natural order of things, they are always warned that it will cost them something. And yes, looking for answers outside of God's order and will . . . this would be sin. And yes, it always has a price.

But the prominent theme right now in the series seems to be the question of a person's nature. Evil is not born -- it's made, we have been told throughout the series. And we are always treated to the back story in every evil character's life, the things that happened that turned them bad. They weren't always this way; something or someone messed them up. And this is something I appreciate in the show. I have always taught my daughters to remember when they are wronged by somebody that this person is probably acting out the wrongs that have been done to them over the years. Sinners need our compassion more than our condemnation.

But the reason for this is because "there but for the grace of God go I." We are ALL sinners; we are all wrongdoers; we all have the capacity for great evil within us. Even the good guys in the show have done some terrible things. Snow White, the ultimate goody-two-shoes, murdered the Queen of Hearts. Even she has darkness in her heart. 

The big question now is can they change? Regina, the evil queen, is trying desperately to be a better person. Mr. Gold is trying desperately to appear to be a better person while still hanging on to his power. Can they actually change? Or are they doomed to the fate written for them by the Author of the storybook? 

It remains to be seen how Kitsis and Horowitz, the show's creators, will answer that question. But while watching, we remember that we already have the answer to the question. We know how people can change. We know the Author and the means he provided to rescue His fallen people. When we engage our minds and "have a conversation" with the show as we watch it (as opposed to mindlessly absorbing), we remind ourselves, and anyone listening, of what the truth really is, of who God really is and who we really are. We are making God known -- glorifying God. 

There's a fine line, of course, but I don't think I'm rationalizing my addiction here. I genuinely do find that watching this show helps me clarify truth in my mind. I find this with some other shows that fellow Christians object to, as well -- Harry Potter, for example. Paul points out in one of his letters that we cannot separate ourselves entirely from godlessness as long as we are living in the world. We must learn how to engage with it in a godly way. 

I hope I'm teaching my girls that. Turning off the TV is easy (and at times necessary), but turning on your brain is much more difficult -- and much more important a skill to learn, I think. The world we live in doesn't have an "off" button. It requires us to engage our brains.

Educating My Weird Girl

"Oh, my gosh! I LOVE standardized tests! They're, just, not like other tests. They're all multiple choice . . . and you get to fill in the answers in the little bubbles . . . and you use number two pencils . . . and they always have all these things to read, these short articles and stories, and they're so INTERESTING . . . oh, my gosh . . . I'm just, like, "OH, yeah -- I SO want to take this test!"

Believe it or not, there was not a hint of sarcasm in my daughter's voice when she said that yesterday. Just unbridled enthusiasm. Sometimes that girl is so fabulously weird, I can hardly stand it.

I may be enjoying her wonderful weirdness all the more next year. She won't be going back to her school. The board announced to the ninth grade parents that, financially, it is just not feasible for them to continue to offer high school classes right now. They're going to work on building up the student body K-8 until the numbers can support a high school.

For the school, I suppose it was the right decision. For our kids in the first SCA high school class, it means some decision-making. This group of five kids is such an amazing group -- I know because I get to teach them. We parents would love to find a way to keep them together next year.

We've talked some about doing our own little homeschool co-op . . . but only casually, we haven't had a time since the announcement to get together and talk about it officially . . . but I'm getting vibes that other families are unsure about that option . . . who knows what will happen at this point . . .

But my daughter, for her part, is ready to teach herself.

Seriously. She wants me to give her the curriculum and let her run. She was even asking the other day about the possibility of graduating early and going on to college.

And she's getting me excited about all this, too.

This is surprising to me, because I never intended to homeschool either of my girls through high school. I just didn't want to deal with the transcripts and official stuff. It all seemed too complicated and not worth my effort when there are good options out there for people who will take care of that for me.

I'm not exactly sure why my mind has changed. Maybe it's because I've been so involved in the planning for this high school program at SCA and thinking through what the students will need to do in the next four years. Now that I've done that thinking, my brain is also cranking with ways my fabulously weird daughter can do all this -- ways that take advantage of her fabulous weirdness. She's unique; I'd love for her educational experience to match her uniqueness. And figuring out how to do that suddenly sounds SO exciting.

Although not as exciting as standardized tests are to her, apparently. What a wonderful weirdo. Love this kid.