Galileo Galilei, b. 1564.
Jeremy Bentham, b. 1748. Utilitarian, very odd, philosopher.
Susan Brownell Anthony, b. 1820. Did you know that Susan B. Anthony was a pro-life women’s rights advocate?
Norman Bridwell, b. 1928. Author and ilustrator of Clifford, the Big Red Dog. Z-baby loves Clifford. I wonder what it is about a big red dog with a normal-sized owner that’s so appealing?
I received the latest issue of The Old Schoolhouse in the mail a couple of weeks ago, but it’s taken me this long to read and absorb all the contents in this really full-of-information magazine. The magazine has articles by such homeschool luminaries as Susan Wise Bauer, Amelia Harper, Karen “Spunky” Braun, and Carolyn Hurst. Also included are interviews with Technorati founder David Sifrey, radio intern Elisha Blankenship, radio host Hugh Hewitt, blogger LaShawn Barber, artist Johannah Bluedorn, and authors David Kupelian (The Marketing of Evil) and Bruce Shortt (The Harsh Truth About Public Schools) The Winter, 2006 issue covers several themes, including blogging, homeschoolers relating to the media, homeschool conferences, teaching writing, classical learning, and nutrition, with anywhere from three to half a dozen articles on various aspects of each topic. As I said, there’s a lot of information here—for only $5.95 (US) per issue.
Then to round it all off, there are the contests and reviews. This issue features Veritas Press president Marlin Detweiler writing about their Omnibus curriculum. There are loads of product reviews and opportunities to win samples of various curricula in the Lab section at the back of the magazine. And you can enter the contests at their website even if you’re not a subscriber. However, I think you might want to consider subscribing to this FAT and FULL homeschool magazine. I’m impressed with the value that readers get from The Old Schoolhouse.
I’ve received three issues of The Old Schoolhouse under the auspices of Mind and Media for the purposes of review. As soon as I get my final free issue this spring, I’m going to buy my own subscription!
I will not play at tug o’ war.
I’d rather play at hug o’ war.
Where everyone hugs instead of tugs,
Where everyone giggles and rolls on the rug,
Where everyone kisses, and everyone grins,
and everyone cuddles,
and everyone wins.” –By Shel Silverstein
. . . men have died from time to
time and worms have eaten them, but not for love. (Rosalind, As You Like It)
Dear Darla,
I hate your stinking guts. You make me vomit. You’re scum between my toes!
Love,
Alfalfa. (Little Rascals)
Westley: Hear this now: I will always come for you.
Buttercup: But how can you be sure?
Westley: This is true love – you think this happens every day?
******
Westley: I told you I would always come for you. Why didn’t you wait for me?
Buttercup: Well… you were dead.
Westley: Death cannot stop true love. All it can do is delay it for a while.
Buttercup: I will never doubt again.
Westley: There will never be a need. (The Princess Bride)
“Our souls were near together, like two raindrops side by side, drawing irresistibly nearer: for now they had touched and were not two, but one inseparable drop, crystallised beyond change, not to be disintegrated by time, not shattered by death’s blow, nor resolved by any alchemy. (Green Mansions by W.H. Hudson)
“It may have been observed that there is no regular path for getting out of love as there is for getting in. Some people look upon marriage as a short cut, but it has been known to fail.” (Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy)
George Washington Gale Ferris, b. 1859. Mr. Ferris is remembered for his invention of the Ferris wheel. It was the main attraction for the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 (The World’s Fair). Read a fictional account of Ferris’s Folly, as it was called by many people, in Robert Lawson’s Newbery Honor book, The Great Wheel.
George Jean Nathan, b. 1882. Respected, and feared, American drama critic of the first half of the twentieth century. He was described as “savage” and “independent” in his criticism. Quotes:
“It is also said of me that I now and then contradict myself. Yes, I improve wonderfully as time goes on.” (May I always be unafraid to contradict myself when the I see that I’ve been mistaken.)
“Hollywood is ten million dollars worth of intricate and high ingenious machinery functioning elaborately to put skin on baloney.” (The price has gone up; the product is much the same.)
“He writes his plays for the ages – the ages between five and twelve.” (An example, I assume, of Nathan’s fearsome wit and what he called “destructive” criticism.)
Eleanor Farjeon, b. 1881. Click on her name to read a little more about her life and her poetry.
Grant Wood, b. 1892. American artist born near Anamosa, Iowa.
Georges Simenon,, b. 1903. He was a Belgian-born author of detective fiction. Many of his books feature the Parisian detective, Inspector Maigret. Has anyone read these books? I think I tried one a long time, and it lost something in the translation. But maybe not.
Betsy-Bee, b. 1999. She’s a joy and a wonder, Miss Fashion, full of life, our Funny Little Valentine.
The featured book for this week is an out of print title, One Is Good But Two Are Better by Louis Slobodkin. You might be able to find this older picture book, published in 1956, in your public library–if you have a discerning librarian. The text is a rhyming poem about the many situations in which it’s better to have a friend–or two. Example: “One may hide, or one may peek, but you need two for hide-and-seek.” The illustrations are simple line drawings with splashes of watercolor. The book ends with a whole group of friends, singing and playing and having a wonderful day together.
The theme in Picture Book Preschool for this week is friendship, so this book fits right in, especially as many of us think about Valentines Day and giving thanks for our friends and the many things they do for us and with us. One Is Good But Two Are Better, if you can find a used copy in good condition, would be a great gift for a big friend who appreciates picture books or for a little friend who enjoys snuggling up for a good read.
Louis Slobodkin, by the way, has a birthday this week. He was born February 19, 1903. He was originally a sculptor who became an illustrator. He illustrated books for other people as well as his own. He did the illustrations for many of Eleanor Estes’ books, including one of my favorites, The Hundred Dresses. He also won the Caldecott Medal for his illustrations of James Thurber’s Many Moons.
Picture Book Preschool is a preschool/kindergarten curriculum which consists of a list of picture books to read aloud for each week of the year and a character trait, a memory verse, and activities, all tied to the theme for the week. You can purchase a downloadable version (pdf file) of Picture Book Preschool by Sherry Early at Biblioguides.
Nature is an infinite sphere of which the center is everywhere and the circumference nowhere. Blaise Pascal
Over at Buried Teasure blog Carmon and the ladies are discussing women and college. To go or not to go, that is the question. I may add my two cents to the discussion in a post here soon. In the meantime, what do you think? Should young ladies go to college? If so, why? If not, why not?
Blest With Sons has turned off the TV; now they’re playing Scrabble–and other games—for school. Visit and find out how valuable games can be to your homeschooling efforts.
Submit your best post on children’s literature to Melissa Wiley at Here in the Bonnie Glen before 6:00 PM tomorrow evening (February 11th) to be included in the Children’s Literature Carnival on Monday.
In the meantime, you can read all about homeschooling at the Sixth Carnival of Homeschooling.
Carrie at Mommy Brain reviews The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio by Terry Ryan. I thought I had this book on The List; I remember seeing it at Barnes and Noble. Anyway, I’m adding it. I could use a story of courage and perseverance right about now.
Kathryn Judson, bookseller extraordinaire, recommends the out-of-print YA title, To Fight in Silence by Eva-Lis Wuorio. She says it’s set in Denmark during WW II, and it’s about two cousins who join the Danish underground.
Steven Riddle is writing about Erle Stanley Gardner’s The Case of the Sulky Girl. He says it’s the second in the series of Perry Mason novels; the first one, The Case of the Velvet Claws isn’t in print, according to Mr. Riddle. I wrote about Gardner here, but Mr. Riddle does a much more thorough review of this particular mystery and and a better introduction to the series.
SFP at pages turned is trying to entice (encourage?) other readers to revisit Moby Dick as she did. No, thanks, once is enough. After reading an entire chapter on “the whiteness of the whale” I remember to this day that the whale is very, very white. But I’m glad someone’s enjoying it. Melville as quoted at pages turned: “To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme. No great and enduring volume can ever be written on the flea, thought many there be who have tried it. So he chose the Great (Very) White Whale.
Cindy at Dominion Family has an overview of the latest in Christian fiction from a well-known-discounter-of-Christian-books-which-shall-remain-nameless, at least on my blog. The excerpts from someone’s most recent catalog will either make you laugh or cry or both.
A meme via Kimbofo at Reading Matters, originally from Shelly’s Book Shelf:
Name your 3 favourite children’s series.
The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis.
The Prydain series, starting with The Book of Three by Lloyd Alexander.
I really liked the Boxcar Children books when I was a child. The idea of four children living in an old boxcar on their own was intriguing to me. Such independence!
Name your 3 favourite non-series children’s books.
Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne
Eight Cousins by Louisa May Alcott. It does have a sequel, but it’s not a series.
A Ring of Endless Light by Madeline L’Engle Mrs. L’Engle also wrote other books about the characters in this book, but I wouldn’t call it a series either.
Name 3 favourite children’s book characters.
Anne Shirley of Anne of Green Gables
Bilbo Baggins of The Hobbit
Toad of Toad Hall
So what are your favorites?
A Voice in the Wind is the first book in The Mark of the Lion series by Christian author Francine Rivers. It’s a good story. Really, it is. Liz Curtis Higgs says (on the back of the book), “This series is without peer in Christian fiction!” Janet Parshall liked it, too. I enjoyed reading it. I’ll probably read the sequels. I couldn’t write anything half as good. Methinks I doth protest too much.
Let’s start over. A Voice in the Wind is the story of Hadassah, a young Jewish Christian who survives the fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD. She is taken to Rome as a slave where she becomes the personal servant of the daughter of the house of the patrician family Valerian. Hadassah’s mistress is Julia, a spoiled, willful brat who becomes worse in character as the story progresses. Julia has an older brother Marcus who is as spoiled and pleasure-loving as his baby sister. Only because of the old double standard, Marcus can indulge himself in living selfishly as a libertine with few consequences while Julia is expected to behave herself, do as she is told, and avoid scandal. Hadassah attempts to serve these people as Christ would have her serve them and to witness to the truth of the gospel in her life while keeping her Christian identity a secret. Then, Hadassah, the slave, and Marcus, the Roman master and heir to a fortune, realize that they are falling in love. Not only do their differing stations in life separate them, but Hadassah’s faith and Marcus’ lack of belief in anything make the consummation of their love impossible.
So it’s a good story. It’s not nearly as goopy as I may have made it sound, but there is a problem. I liked the characters in the novel. I want to read more about them. The author did her research and got the details of the time period, how gladiators were trained, how a Roman household was set up, how Christians met together in secret, all the historical setting, all right and well described. Marcus, Julia, Hadassah and the others are all interesting characters, people I want to know more about, but they’re not people of the first century. They’re more like twentieth or twenty-first century people plunked down in an authentic set of first century Rome. Their problems are modern day problems: homosexuality, abortion, materialism, young adult rebellion, lack of respect for tradition, divorce, mystical spirituality, radical feminism. I know, as I said in a picture book review just the other day, that people are much the same the world over and in every time period. But at the same time, they’re not. People in ancient Rome had different thought patterns, dealt differently with different issues than modern Americans. For example, in A Voice in the Wind Marcus, a wealthy Roman citizen, is actually thinking of taking his sister’s slave girl to be his wife, not a concubine or a mistress, but a wife. Would such a thing have occurred to a real Roman? If it did, would his family have put up with the idea for a minute? Julia, Marcus’ sister, has a friend who initiates her into a weird sort of cult of feminist spirituality and empowerment. Again, it sounds more like something from our times than something first century. Hadassah, the Jewish Christian, is really just an American evangelical worried about how to convert her employers to Christianity.
It’s hard to write historical fiction that is true to the time period in which it is set. I couldn’t do it. Writing a novel set in the first century involves thinking like a first century Roman or Jew. If you would enjoy reading a story about modern people with modern problems who happen to be dressed up in Roman togas and attending gladiatorial games and chariot races, A Voice in the Wind is a fine book. As I said, I’ll probably read the sequels. Just don’t expect to find out much about how people in Biblical times thought about their problems and issues. That’s not what this book is about.