My view of Norah as she practices reading her small books with small stories.

For all these smallnesses
I thank you, Lord:

small children,
and small needs;
small meals to cook,
small talk to heed,
and a small book
from which to read
small stories;
small hurts to heal,
small disappointments, too,
as real
as ours;
small glories
to discover
in bugs,
pebbles,
flowers.

When the day is through
my mind is small,
my strength is gone;
as I gather
each dear one
I pray "Bless each
for Jesus sake-
such angels sleeping,
imps awake!"
What wears me out
are little things:
angels minus
shining wings.
Forgive me, Lord,
if I have whined-
it takes so much
to keep them shined;
yet each small rub
has its reward,
for they have blessed me.

Thank you, Lord.

-Ruth Bell Graham

Friends, please bear with this post. It's for our interested family members.

Below are pictures of our newly (almost finished) basement. It has been two whole years since we started this project.

A view of the stairs with the carpet runner.

From the bottom of the stairs, looking right, into the family room. You can see the door leading to the laundry/storage room at the back right corner. Dwayne has to add baseboard, a few ceiling tiles and a door handle to finish this space.

Standing in the corner of the family room, looking toward the stairs. You can see Norah's Lego bucket for her entertainment while I do laundry. You can see part of the bathroom door on the left and the doors "hiding" the boiler/storage area behind the stairs. They will be painted the same color as the walls.

From the bottom of the stairs, now looking left. We think this will be a permanent guest/office space. You can see part of the door to the garage. Again, baseboard, a few ceiling tiles and outlet covers will make this space done.

Standing in the back corner of that room. You can see another view of the garage door.

Taken on a hike in April 2005. Somewhere in Connecticut.

The long, gray winter
now is past-
the coldest we
have ever seen-
and I am glad
to note at last
earth's first bright
touch of green.

-Ruth Bell Graham

I read an interesting NY Times article suggested to me by a local home school co-op. It explores why college students today are feeling more and more entitled to good grades just for the effort they put into their studies. They believe that going to class, paying attention, taking notes and doing their "best" should merit them, at the very least, a passing grade. A portion of the article reads,

"James Hogge, associate dean of the Peabody School of Education at Vanderbilt University, said: 'Students often confuse the level of effort with the quality of work. There is a mentality in students that ‘if I work hard, I deserve a high grade.’

... Nearly two-thirds of the students surveyed said that if they explained to a professor that they were trying hard, that should be taken into account in their grade.

Jason Greenwood, a senior kinesiology major at the University of Maryland echoed that view.

'I think putting in a lot of effort should merit a high grade,' Mr. Greenwood said. “What else is there really than the effort that you put in?”

I have an answer for Mr. Greenwood... "What else is there besides the effort he puts in?"

Well, I'd say the result is also pretty important.

Don't most people go to college to prepare for the workplace, at least, in theory? Is a boss supposed to keep Mr. Greenwood or anyone like him on staff, pay his salary and provide all the company benefits, after he has proven he isn't competent and simply because he tried really hard not to screw up?

My husband has a poster hanging in his office, as a joke. It's modeled after the kind you can find all over businesses, schools, and libraries that are supposed to motivate people, but his is a spoof on those. It reads:

Incompetence.
When you earnestly believe you can compensate for a lack of skill by doubling your efforts,
there is no end to what you can't do.

If you click on the link, you will see that the poster actually mentions college students and those who confuse effort with results as the most fitting people for this poster.

How do kids graduate thinking effort equals merit or participation entitles them to some reward? I went to public school, so I have a few ideas.

One of my teachers in middle school was educated and fully certified for her job as Language Arts Teacher, but she couldn't read the list of spelling words. Every Friday, she'd chose one student to read the list for the class and that student had to take the test later, from another student who then read the words for him or her. Even as kids, we wondered and gossiped in the halls between classes about how the school administration could ignore the fact that a Language teacher was functionally illiterate. But, we also noticed that our teacher never missed school, always did her job (or found ways to get it done), etc. That taught us something.

And, year after year, I had teacher after teacher who addressed their new classes with some variation of the following speech, "I know some of you are afraid of Algebra II. But, if you come to class, pay attention, do your best, you will pass." That taught us something, too.

Are home schoolers immune to this because their success in education is, more often, based on things like mastery of subject matter rather than perfect attendance?

While it may not be a popular stance, I, once again, want to assert that home schooling parents like me should come away from articles like the one above and discussions of this kind and be diligent rather than arrogant. In our own ways, we can actually make the same kind of mistakes the formal K-12 schools are making with their students.

I've heard things like "Abraham Lincoln was self educated" repeated again and again within this homeschooling community. Heck. I may even end up saying in defense of a point I want to make one day. But, let's be honest. Lincoln didn't spend much time in formal school, but that doesn't mean every home schooler will grow up to be as influential or successful as Lincoln. We shouldn't perpetuate that flimsy rational, particularly in front of our children.

We have the privilege of loving our children as our children, but the responsibility of evaluating our students as students. Otherwise, our kids may pick up on any of our subtle or even not-so-subtle references to their superiority, they may confuse our acceptance of them with their academic performance, and therefore, may enter the world as ill-equipped to handle or filter criticism, as incapable of respecting or submitting to their professors or bosses as their traditionally schooled peers seem to be these days.

T is for Thankful

I was doing laundry the other day and I looked up and saw this. The meter on the top of our oil tank was just a little below full. I started to cry right there over the towels I was folding.

The day before this happened we drove passed a man on our way home from the store who was standing on the corner, bundled up because of the cold, holding a cardboard sign that said "No oil. Kids are cold. Please help."

We couldn't help him. I was actually depressed and complaining outright on that ride home. We had just spent 17 of my last 20 dollars of cash on an economy sized bundle of toilet paper at the wholesale store that will last us for a few months, yes, but that had left me with only a dollar or two of spending money in my wallet until pay day.

But, there in my laundry room, it occurred to me that I had overlooked some of the most substantial blessings God had given me. While I may not have had any extra cash in my wallet to spend as I pleased, our bills were paid, our house was warm, our fridge was stocked, and our bellies would be full until I had grocery money again.

I was humbled and ashamed when I realized, once again, how greedy for gain I can be and how often I take for granted what I already have. And, for the first time since I read his sign, I was able to, at least, pray with a right heart that God would meet that man's needs like He has met ours.

S is for St. Patrick's Day, too.

We spent the day doing housework and regular schoolwork. But, tonight after dinner, we found a recipe online and made traditional Irish Soda Bread to celebrate the holiday.

Quick facts about St. Patrick's Day:

St. Patrick was English, born there in 385.

He was kidnapped as a teen.

He was kept as a shepherd-slave in Ireland for several years where the druid religion was popular.

He escaped back to England where he studied to become a minister of the Christian faith.

He returned to Ireland and began converting people to Christianity in 433.

It is said that he used the three leaf clover to teach people about the Trinity.

He was eventually made the Bishop of Ireland.

He died in Ireland on March 17, 461.

People remembered him on the day of his death year after year.

Before there was a more formal process like there is today, sainthood in the Catholic church was often based on popularity or general respect of the people.

On March 17 every year, Lent restrictions were suspended to celebrate the life and ministry of St. Patrick. People could drink alcohol and eat meat on that day, making St. Patrick even more popular among the common man, no doubt.

With the Great Potato Famine of 1845, almost a million Irish Catholics came to America so they wouldn't starve. Faced with severe prejudice, they found it hard to get good jobs, stayed poor and tended to settle in groups within cities.

Due to limited resources, Irish soda bread became a staple among the people since it can be made with only the most basic ingredients: flour, bread soda, soured milk and salt.

Immigrants decided to take to the streets of NYC to celebrate their heritage on St. Patrick's Day.

They were depicted as wild drunkards in reports, leading to some of the stereotypes Irish still face today.

But, the St. Patrick's Day parade is the oldest civilian parade in the world and the largest in the United States, even bigger than Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade.

Note to self: Maybe we should drive down to the city and see the parade in person some year. And, until now, I'd dismissed Norah and hadn't realized why she said "a man wearing a beard and a fuzzy green hat" delivered our mail this morning.

I guess the mail man was celebrating the holiday in his own way, too.

S is for Seed Art

Norah's final K4 lessons have a springtime theme. She used a handful of dried beans, lintels, corn and nearly all the Elmer's glue to make a picture. When I told her I didn't have any green split peas because I had used both bags for soup the other night, Norah said, "That's okay, Mom. I'll just make the grass dead."