“San Francisco Bay-area Alameda Unified School District has approved a “lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgender” (LGBT) curriculum for use with kindergarten through fifth-grade students. The curriculum is intended to deal with issues such as bullying and harassment.”

“Kevin Snider with the Pacific Justice Institute (PJI) says the board passed the curriculum despite the objection of 73 percent of the speakers from the community who attended the board meeting”.

“Alameda Unified School District is not allowing parents to opt their children out of the curriculum. PJI is sending opt-out letters to the district on behalf of parents. If the district rejects those letters, Snider says PJI will take the issue to court”.  (LINK)

Is this the kind of thing you want your elementary-age child to learn at school? Even kindergarten? Even when 73% opposed it? Disgusting. Or how about this one:

“The NEA (National Education Association) is currently holding its annual convention in San Diego, California. Educator and conservative activist Jeralee Smith called OneNewsNow from the convention to report that the executive council has approved language that will throw the full support of the NEA behind same-gender marriage, homosexual adoption, and other issues surrounding the homosexual agenda”.

“Smith says the resolution could be voted on as early as midday Friday or as late as Tuesday of next week. She points out this is not the first political issue the NEA has undertaken. The NEA gave $50 million to help elect President Obama in 2008″.
(LINK)

Again, is this the kind of trash you want your kids exposed to? Didn’t think so. Frankly, you ought to be appalled at the kinds of things that are being forced on our children in the public schools,  displacing the teaching the 3 R’s and other constructive subjects.

And I haven’t even mentioned the public school’s indoctrination of anti-Biblical ideas like evolution and humanism, or the phony “science” of global warming hysteria that has been creeping in as well. So this is actually only a small sample of the direction that public schools are increasingly taking.

If there is ANY possible way you can homeschool your kids, if you’re not already, find a way AND DO IT NOW. We are in grave danger of losing an entire generation of youth to the corrupting, anti-biblical views of the public school establishment. Nuff said.

We won’t try to answer those questions ourselves, but we found a very easy-to-understand video explanation of the mess, and wanted to share it with you. Even if economics or finance are Greek to you, you’ll find this enlightening. And get them thar homeschooled kids of your’n gathered ’round the monitor for this as well. They need to understand what’s happening too.

Don usually writes on investment matters, but this time he hit the nail on the head when he included his perspective on education in America. Here is the excerpt:

“Originally, there were no public schools.  Everyone taught their kids at home.  Literally, or in a private or religious school. Caring, smart parents taught them well, and the kids succeeded. 

America, a hundred years ago was far more educated and cultured than now.  By knowledge and skills of reading, math and other subjects, the eighth grader of a hundred years ago compares equally with today’s college student or maybe even graduate. This was without any public schools.  The stupid parents who didn’t teach or show caring, demonstrated it in their kids who failed in life, probably died early, and didn’t become a burden on the rest of society. 

Next, there were thousands of one room schoolhouses, paid for by the local populace, and these schools did very well, but it was the beginning of large public schools, which seem to be not much more than baby sitters.  Home schooling has once again become the smart thing to do by caring parents, because they realize that government schools are a disaster, like every other government scheme and “program.” 

Public schools, now consume three quarters of all property taxes, and do a lousy, expensive job.  Catholic parents usually send their kids to parochial schools, which are in no way “public,” and not paid for by taxpayers.  Wealthy parents may have sent, and still do, send their kids to private schools, not paid for by taxes, and they always did, and still do a fine job.

Government schools had to fail, like all “programs” fail, because of inefficiency and cost.  The failure and cost of public schools is partially responsible for populating the streets of America with thugs, criminals, druggies, shoplifters, burglars, rapists, and all sorts of riff-raff, which should be dead, and maybe not have been born in the first place, probably. 

Trash, uneducated, uncaring people, seem to multiply at enormous rates and cause a lot of crime, don’t they?  Cruel, ungodly, and coarse?  Maybe, but picture America if there had never been a public school, and every child had been home schooled or sent to a private school, paid for by its parents, with little or no property taxes, and no terrible, microscopic educating in failing public schools. 

There would be thousands and thousands of private schools operating for profit, and competing with each other for achievement, being used by parents who chose not to home school.  No teachers unions, and inept teachers.  There couldn’t be, because competition in the market wouldn’t allow for it. 

There would be schools specializing in cooking, engineering, language, math, or whatever the parents chose for their kids.  There would be an abundance of religious schools, paid for by churches and parents of pupils, but no drain on taxpayers of any kind, and superb education.

The public school system, even in small towns like the one I live in, have proved to be expensive disasters.  Homeowners are being taxed severely to pay for these incompetent, inefficient, poorly educating, sinkholes of fading dollars. 

So ingrained have public schools and Social Security become in the American mind, that most will disagree with my thesis.  They will moan and groan about how, “We have to care for old people and educate the children,” even though facts and logic prove that the opposite has happened, and cost a fortune in dollars and crime.  America has inflicted wounds on itself over the last hundred years, because the general public opinion is that, “People need to be helped and taught,” regardless of the cost or lack of success at either. 

Perhaps 1% of America will agree with me on this first part, because they are so mind numbed by government propaganda, the media, and the garbage they themselves have learned in classrooms of public schools. 

Government and “programs” always come out ahead, and are painted as glorious and wonderful by the media, schools, and bureaucrats.  They are the opposite, and are partly responsible for the killing of America. 

Once something gets started, regardless of the total illogic of it, such as public schools and Social Security, there is a zero chance of obliterating it, because so many have become dependent, and thereby weak.  How can a nation survive if it is weak?”

Source: Don Stott

Whoa, we can hear the paint blistering on the public school walls and Capitol Hill as well after that one, LOL. Hope you were sitting down when you read it…

Hopefully, you’ve long since jumped into teaching/learning mode, and have settled into your home schooling routine without too many problems. Of course, the nice thing about homeschooling is there IS no set routine–you can make mid-voyage adjustments as needed and keep the HMS Homeschool ship on course.

We’d like to share with you some links we think you’ll find helpful as you guide your children. Here goes nuttin’:

http://www.tslbooks/. (Worksheets)

http://www.math-drills.com/  (Worksheets)

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/print/us.html  (Data on USA)

http://www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/revolution/ (American Revolution)

http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/today/today.html  (Today in history)

http://www.101science.com/HomeSchooling.htm (Homeschool/Science)

http://www.101science.com/ (Science)

 http://www.waterfordpress.com/entergame.html (Games/Activities)

http://www.superkids.com (Educational software/tools)

http://www.science-teachers.com/ (Science worksheets/lesson plan)

http://www.homeschoolhelperonline.com/worksheets.htm (Homeschool worksheets)

Leave your comments and let us know your favorites! We’re sure there are a ton more.

So we decided to do something about it. We’ve started our own political party, the Homeschool Republicrats, and Brian has quietly (until now) been campaigning for Prez along with Lisa.

Yep, that’s right. Now you’ll have the chance to vote for a REAL pro-homeschool candidate. Next stop: The White House.

Just check out this latest news video  from iNews 3 now:

(hee, hee, hee!)

She was apparently referring to our comment we made that the liberal social indoctrination of the public schools was a detrimental waste of time, and that the Biblical worldview had been replaced by the Humanist worldview. She didn’t specify exactly what it was that offended her, other than the fact that we hold opposing viewpoints.

Our response: We don’t write with the intent to offend, but since we are both unabashedly Christian and conservative, we will neither hide nor deny our Christian conservative viewpoint. However, we’re puzzled as to why this individual was offended, as we’re not offended by those who hold a liberal viewpoint, even though we strongly disagree with them.

We don’t feel the need to apologize for our views, nor do we feel that it’s necessary to ‘warn’ our readers that we are conservative Christians. This would imply that the ‘default’ position is liberal and secular, which we don’t believe is correct. 

Homeschooling is what YOU make it. If you’re a liberal and you firmly believe that’s the correct viewpoint, then your home school program will likely reflect that, and vice versa for conservatives or Christians or whoever.

This former subscriber apparently is either home schooling already or considering it, and we’re sure there are many reasons why someone would choose to homeschool rather than send their children to public schools. But for us, one of the main reasons for our decision to homeschool was for the above-mentioned liberal, anti-Christian indoctrination that is occurring in the public schools.

It becomes more shocking by the day, as grade-school children are taught the ‘virtues’ of the homosexual lifestyle as early as kindergarten, and evolution is presented as ’settled science’ even thought this is far from the truth.

We doubt that even liberals would deny that this is indeed occurring. So we have a question for anyone of the liberal persuasion: Do you believe these changes have IMPROVED public schools? If so, could you please provide some proof?

Actually, we see just the opposite from our perspective. Test scores have fallen precipitiously over the years since these changes started, and morality among public school-educated children has taken a serious dive as well.

So if this person is offended because she thinks that the introduction of these liberal ideas was a POSITIVE move for the public schools, she has a long, uphill battle to convince us that it’s so.

This also brings up another interesting question: Is there such thing as a ‘neutral’ position that public schools, or homeschoolers, or anyone for that matter, should follow?

Think about this before you answer. Every person has a ‘worldview’ whether they realize it or not. If you believe that God created the universe and everything in it, then your perspective and mindset will be much different than someone who believes that everything in the universe is the result of a ‘big bang’ and that there is no God and no purpose to life.

Since the public schools have discarded the idea that God is the supreme being in control of the universe, they have (perhaps) unwittingly adopted the tenents of Humanism. Humanism rejects anything supernatural and places man in the position of  determining what is right or wrong by his own volition.

But wait. Isn’t Humanism religiously neutral? No, Humanism functions as a religion. “As Humanism encompasses intellectual currents running through a wide variety of philosophical and religious thought, several strains of Humanism allow it to fulfill, supplement or supplant the role of religions, and in particular, to be embraced as a complete life stance”. (Wikipedia).

Evolutionists, for example, believe that you cannot understand biology unless you embrace the evolutionary doctrines, and this has been firmly engrained into the public school curriculum.

So there is no such thing as a ‘neutral’ position, contrary to what some may want us to believe. Your own worldview has a Christian, Buddhist, Muslim, Atheist, Humanist, Evolutionist, etc. foundation and ultimately affects how you interpret information and the decisions you make.  EVERYONE, regardless of how unbiased they may see themselves, has a set of beliefs that determines how they interact with the world around them.

We don’t expect all homeschoolers to totally agree with our worldview, and we’re not offended if they happen to hold a slightly, or vastly, different view. However, as conservative Christians, we firmly believe that the Bible is the infallible Word of God and that the ideas of men that run counter to the Bible are bankrupt. 

Our goal isn’t to “alienate” other home schoolers, and we’re sorry that someone would feel alienated simply because of opposing viewpoints. But we will continue to proclaim what we believe to be true regardless of whether anyone feels ‘offended’ or not.

“Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you!” (Luke 6:26).

This was an opinion piece by well-known columnist Thomas Sowell, one of our favorite conservative authors, called “Amateurs Outdoing Professionals“. Here’s the excerpt. It might not seem relevant at first, but follow it through:

“When amateurs outperform professionals, there is something wrong with that profession”.

“If ordinary people, with no medical training, could perform surgery in their kitchens with steak knives, and get results that were better than those of surgeons in hospital operating rooms, the whole medical profession would be discredited”.

“Yet it is common for ordinary parents, with no training in education, to homeschool their children and consistently produce better academic results than those of children educated by teachers with master’s degrees and in schools spending upwards of $10,000 a year per student”.

“Nevertheless, we continue to take seriously the pretensions of educators who fail to educate, but who put on airs of having “professional” expertise beyond the understanding of mere parents”.

(End of excerpt)

Hmmm, could it be all the time wasted in the public schools on liberal social indoctrination, plus their zeal in getting rid of the Bible and replacing it with the tenets of humanism? Nahhh!

Plus Brian is trying to learn all he can about investing, as our investments we had trusted to a mutual fund advisor have taken a sizeable hit what with the wacky market conditions. It’s a steep learning curve, and we’re now making some moves ourselves that are starting to pay off after getting off to a shaky start.

Brian can tell you first-hand that it’s a brave new world out there in the financial markets… Not like the past few years where you could just about invest in any stock or fund imaginable and the darn thing would go up–not now. Takes a ton of research these days, and constant vigilance.

We managed to squeeze in a trip to Lisa’s parents home (about 200 miles away), and since we’ve finally joined the modern age and are now using a digital camera, thought we’d share a few pics with you for now until we can think of something intelligent to write about, LOL.

The highlight of our trip was a housewarming for a family friend, which included our boy’s first wiener roast. May not sound very exciting to you, but hey, when you’re a kid, it doesn’t take much. Believe it or not, there was an educational aspect to the weenie roast as the housewarming festivities were very close to a cattle feeding operation (as you’ll see in the pics). As you can imagine, when the wind blows the right (wrong?) way, there’s a certain, ah, fragrance, if you know what we mean. But we digress… So here’s the pics (mouse over for caption):

Think we’re kidding? Well, the retailers don’t, because many stores are already gearing up for the back-to-school crowd. The July 4 through Labor Day period is actually the  second-biggest selling period after Christmas, we were surprised to learn. The competition is expected to be fierce this year.

So this is kind of a transitional period for many of us homeschoolers. You may still be homeschooling at a slower summer mode (or maybe not). For our part, we’re trying to squeeze as much fun into the schedule as we can, because we know full well that the warm weather will be gone before we know it, at least here in northern Ohio.

But this is also a good time to consider the benefits and goals of home schooling if you’re not already home schooling, or reviewing the same benefits and goals if you are. We were going to write a post on this topic, but our friends at The Teaching Home, Cindy Short and Sue Welch, beat us to the punch. So here’s their excellent article. Wish we could have said it this well:

Consider the Benefits and Goals of Home Schooling

The Benefits

     Whether you are reaffirming or reevaluating your decision to educate your children at home or are considering this option for the first time, reviewing the unique benefits of home education will provide the conviction, confidence, and commitment that you will need in order to persevere.

     For a Christian, the decision to home school should be based on a determination that this is how you can best fulfill God’s mandate to teach and train your children.

     Teaching and training your children at home can provide the optimum environment for your children’s spiritual training and character development as well as their social and academic welfare.  (Read more specifics of the benefits of home schooling in Newsletter #122.)

Your Goals

     It is easy to get caught up in the nitty-gritty of homeschooling and lose sight of what is most important.

     One way to focus on your family’s goals is to consider the question:  When our children leave our home to begin their own families:

 •   What kind of people do we want them to be?
 •   What values do we want them to embrace?
 •   What knowledge and skills do we want them to possess?
 •   How do we want them to behave?

     As you prayerfully consider all aspects of your children’s teaching and training, write out a family mission statement and long-range goals for your children.  This will give purpose, direction, and balance to your efforts.  (For more information on writing your family mission statement and goals, see Newsletters #80 and #81.)

     Your goals may include the following:

 •   Spiritual:  Know God’s Word, come to salvation, grow spiritually in faith and obedience to God’s Word, minister to others, and spread the Gospel.

 •   Character:  Development of characteristics of love, integrity, responsibility, and joy; manners; and discipline.  (See more information on character development in Newsletters #87 and #88.)

 •   Social:  Family unity and social skills.

 •   Academic:  A Christian worldview in all areas, a solid foundation in basic skills (reading, writing, math), an excellent, well-rounded education, and the ability to find information and keep learning throughout life.

 •   Life Skills:  Practical preparation for adult life.

     As you plan for the next school year, you can use these life goals to schedule specific goals and objectives for each of your children.

By Cindy Short and Sue Welch
Copyright 2007 by www.TeachingHome.com. Reprinted by permission.