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A hypothesis tested: homeschooling brings real gains
A friend asked me recently about homeschooling in those areas in which I don’t have noteworthy expertise — like chemistry, which my younger daughter has been taking this year, or pre-calculus, which she…
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“Reimagining Education”
I’ve been wanting to write a post to organize my thoughts about online teaching. Yesterday the governor’s announcement that he’s teaming up with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to “reimagine” education “in…
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A fate worse than death?
The doctrine that war is always a greater evil seems to imply a materialist ethic, a belief that death and pain are the greatest evils. But I do not think they are. I…
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Hogwarts, Cathedrals, and Antarctica
I’ve polished off several novels lately. Our library’s digital download page — which of course I’ve visited in lieu of going to the (closed) physical library — has been really promoting Harry Potter.…
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Precision of language, please.
So Jonas’s father says to him when he asks whether his parents love him in Lois Lowry’s The Giver. They come to mind as a good title for this post because I’m thinking…
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In crisis, we crave the humanities
This article in Inside HigherEd makes the point that even in the midst of a crisis, the humanities — fields of study that explore human history, society, art and language and literature, spiritual…
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Is there a crisis of expertise?
When should we trust the experts? For that matter, who counts as an expert, and on what is this based? Expertise is by nature narrow and specialized; at what point does someone’s expertise…
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Knee-Jerk Reactions to Homeschooling: Child Advocacy — or Totalitarianism?
Though I dispute the term “homeschooling” to describe the COVID-19-inspired shift to distance learning in public education, it is clearly causing discomfort not just for those directly involved, but for theorists and policy-makers.…
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The Power of Stories
I read this story on the NPR site last week, and it reinforces how transformative stories can be, whether heard or read. This is not likely to be news to anyone who reads…
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Wendell Berry on science worship
Listening to our leaders reassuring us that all public health and political action is being directed by science and expert advice reminds me of this passage from Wendell Berry’s “Letter to a Scientific…