Saturday, November 22, 2008
Educating Your Children XII: The Beginning and the End and Three Rs
This will be my last post in the series. I thought it would be about a dozen posts, and it is.
The most important thing you need to teach your children is reading, writing, and arithmetic. From that trilogy, all else will be possible.
I’ve harped about prerequisites in this series and that point cannot be made too many times. You can’t run until you can walk… and it is teaching your children to walk that is the fundamental portion of their K through 12 education. They must know HOW to learn and if you have that as your primary goal, they will fill in the gaps.
We focus a lot on statistics, about how Americans aren’t keeping up with the world in math and science. Our math scores are compared to others in the world, and we look miserable by comparison.
The reality, however, is that only about 5% of the population will go into the fields of math and science. Beyond understanding basic mathematics, sufficient to balance your checkbook, prepare a budget, forecast income, calculate a tip, measure lumber to build a fence, do your taxes, figure out the net price of a sale item, we don’t need much more math than that. Those who do will figure it out.
Intelligence will not be denied. Curiosity will never be sated.
If a child is predisposed to science, you’ll know that, and respond accordingly. If a child is a wizard at math, they’ll practically teach it to themselves. You need only leave the books around for them to find, and respond to their questions if they have them.
What is important, however, is not to teach in generalities--to present a topic that cannot be tested and proved by some other means.
Except for those who are savant-like in their development, a child should not be taught physics until they can perform the mathematics calculations to prove it. You can’t play the piano until you understand the notes, recognize the black keys from the white, and have mastered the scales. All of these are fundamentals, and the heavy lifting done, the sonatas and application of the formulas become the reward for learning the foundation.
All parents, including those who do not home-school, are responsible for their child’s education. Every parent is responsible for teaching their child how to function in the world--to speak, to show good manners, to be able to be self-sufficient, to have the skills to perform a job. That is not education. That is parenting.
As home-educators we have double-duty. We have to fulfill all our obligations as parents, providing our children with basic life-on-earth skills and the proper use of tools in our environments, but we also take on the responsibility of their educations, and that is the Three Rs.
The difference seemed to be that while education was still spoken of as a “preparation for life,” the preparation was of a kind which bore less directly on intellect and character than in former times, and more directly on proficiency. It aimed at what we used to call training rather than education; and it not only did very little with education, but seemed to assume that training was education, thus overriding a distinction that formerly was quite clear. Forty years ago a man trained to proficiency in anything was respected accordingly, but was not regarded as an educated man, or “just as good,” on the strength of it. A trained mechanic, banker, dentist or man of business got all due credit for his proficiency, but his education, if he had any, lay behind that and was not confused with it. His training, in a word, bore directly upon what he could do or get, while his education bore directly on neither; it bore upon what he could become and be.
--Albert Jay Nock, The Disadvantages of Being Educated
An education has nothing to do with what we do to make a living, but is who we are, what we believe, and how we approach the world. We are educated in what is known, what man has done, what he has achieved, and what (in various times and places) he has believed to be his origins and purpose.
There is no way to learn any of that, to be educated, without reading.
If your home-schooled child does nothing besides a half-hour of arithmetic practice and the rest of his day reading, you will be providing to him an education. Everything else is superfluous to that end.
We test his understanding through writing and speaking--to be able to express his ideas in the written form, and to present to the world what he has learned through reading.
There is no right way, but there are better ways--ways that have been shown through the miracle of hindsight to be the most advantageous, long lasting, and with better outcome. And that better way is through the reading of Western Civilization’s gift to each generation: The Western Canon.
The Western Canon is huge. A person can spend their entire life reading from it, and never finish it. At some point we have to specialize, but we can sample sections from it, finding authors and subjects in each category.
If a child can read, truly read (not just recite or recognize the words), but understand the meaning and intent, then they can learn anything, be anything, and do anything.
You have to begin at that beginning, with understanding how to read, beyond the mechanics of alphabet, sentence structure, and form.
I can recommend no better way to start than with Mortimer J. Adler’s How to Read a Book Book, first mastered by the parents, and then conveyed in drips and drabs to the student, until they can read and understand it on their own. If that needs support then add Harold Bloom’s, How to Read and Why.
The second is The Great Conversation, which is the primer to the Western Canon and the Socratic tradition.
At a time when the West is most often represented by its friends as the source of that technology for which the whole world yearns and by its enemies as the fountainhead of selfishness and greed, it is worth remarking that, though both elements can be found in the great conversation, the Western ideal is not one or the other strand in the conversation, but the conversation itself. It would be an exaggeration to say that Western civilization means these books. The exaggeration would lie in the omission of the plastic arts and music, which have quite as important a part in Western civilization as the great productions included in this set. But to the extent to which books can present the idea of a civilization, the idea of Western civilization is here presented.
These books are the means of understanding our society and ourselves. They contain the great ideas that dominate us without our knowing it. There is no comparable repository of our tradition. To put an end to the spirit of inquiry that has characterized the West it is not necessary to burn the books. All we have to do is to leave them unread for a few generations. On the other hand, the revival of interest in these books from time to time throughout history has provided the West with new drive and creativeness. Great Books have salvaged, preserved, and transmitted the tradition on many occasions similar to our own.
The books contain not merely the tradition, but also the great exponents of the tradition. Their writings are models of the fine and liberal arts. They hold before us what Whitehead called “‘the habitual vision of greatness.” These books have endured because men in every era have been lifted beyond themselves by the inspiration of their example, Sir Richard Livingstone said: “We are tied down, all our days and for the greater part of our days, to the commonplace. That is where contact with great thinkers, great literature helps. In their company we are still in the ordinary world, but it is the ordinary world transfigured and seen through the eyes of wisdom and genius. And some of their vision becomes our own.”
Anthologies and abridged versions of the Canon’s contents are available for children of all ages, until they have mastered the language and the art of the Conversation to read the originals, in their unabridged forms.
These include (but only as a sampler):
- Stories and Poems for Extremely Intelligent Children of All Ages, by Harold Bloom
- The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages, by Harold Bloom
- A Treasury of Children’s Literature, by Armand Eisen
- The Golden Book of Fairy Tales, by Adrienne Segur
- A Child’s Book of Stories, Rh Value Publishing
- Classics to Read Aloud to Your Children, by William F. Russell
- Great Illustrated Classics for Girls
- Great Illustrated Classics for Boys
Continue your search with:
Choose a mathematics curriculum and STICK with it, such as:
Supplement with Logic and Socratic Discussion, and seek out discussion groups and Socratic society resources.
Pay attention to your child and revise, expand, or remodel your home-school to tailor it to your child’s learning style, intelligence, and passions. You don’t have to do everything at the same grade level, as your child will be ahead in some areas and behind in others. More than anything, set rules and codes of conduct early, allowing your child to model the behavior at younger ages, so it won’t come as a huge shock to them as they get older. Discipline is not something to be taught and instilled later.
Don’t be afraid of TV, pop culture, or peer groups. Your child has YOU as their grounding rod, and while peer activities should ALWAYS be supervised, a child has to learn to cope and get along with other people in the world. Your child should not be cut off from other people completely, nor should they be alienated from TV or popular culture that will provide a kind of common-currency with which to engage others. Public school settings, where your child cannot be supervised by you (or protected) are to be avoided, but not because there are other people there, but because they are unnatural settings, with too small a ratio of adults to children.
Children don’t have to be taught how to be children, or ridiculous assertions of “socialization” with children, because we’re not preparing our children to be children--we’re preparing them to be adults. We’re only children for the first 16 years of our lives, and our ability to socialize with adults, to carry on conversations with adults and inquire with respect and deference, are life-lasting accomplishments. The family is a “social network” so your children will not be denied “socialization” by refusing to put them in “day prisons” (which is what public schools are).
Throughout your child’s adult life they will be able to make choices--to choose to drink or not, to choose to work for a particular employer or not, or to choose their friends and mates. That does not occur in a public school setting. A child is denied the opportunity to practice making GOOD choices, because all choices are denied to them. They cannot “quit” a class if the teacher is incompetent or the peer group hostile. They cannot decide to “work from home” or refuse to continue to take abuse from authoritarian figures, as we would quit a hostile job. They cannot choose an alternate curriculum, course of study, or determine the amount of time they spend on a subject before switching topics, because all of that is denied to them.
The public education system was designed, LITERALLY, to turn out factory worker drones. It was an unHoly alliance between communists and Capitalist manufacturers to subdue the spirit, to tame the individual, so he would conform to assembly line work. They’re taught not to speak, not to ask questions, not to have interests, not to have passions, and to eat, sleep, and move at the sound of bells and whistles.
If you were a product of the public school system, you need to educate yourself on the history, and break the bad habits that were instilled in you. Read the authors who understand the history of education:
- Sol Stern (various)
- Thomas Sowell (Inside American Education: The Decline, The Deception, The Dogmas)
- Martin Anderson (The Decline of the American University)
- Allan Bloom (The Closing of the American Mind
- Dinesh D’Souza, (Illiberal Education)
- John Taylor Gatto (various)
- Heather MacDonald (various)
If you have young children or have not yet had children, you’re lucky. You get a few extra years to prepare yourself, to educate yourself, so you can be worthwhile to your children as their educator.
But you better get busy. There’s a lot for you to read, know, and master before you join the ranks of the rest of us home-educators.
And I am always an email away… for as long as I live, I extend an open invitation to everyone who takes on this crazy, impossible, Herculean effort: the mrs -at- mrsdutoit -dot- com. I may not always be able to answer your specific question, respond in a timely manner, or have “all” the answers… but I’m willing to give it a try, and be the cheerleader in your corner.
My home-schooling days are temporarily over, at least the full burden. Our children are now adults, in college, and were released into the world with the skills and sufficient foundations to be BS proof, but with open minds to consider good ideas, and to be able to recognize the difference. We are and will continue to be their guides and mentors, and look forward to the day when we have grandchildren, and can begin from the beginning.
(The entire series may be viewed on a single page here.)
Friday, November 21, 2008
Educating Your Children XI: Gatekeepers
“The price of greatness is responsibility” were the words used by Winston Churchill, at a speech at Harvard University, September 6, 1943, where he plead the British case to the American people, in hopes of getting Americans into the war effort.
It is those same words that I begin this post, with an appeal to parents who home-school their children.
Here now, today, I am once again in academic groves - groves is, I believe, the right word - where knowledge is garnered, where learning is stimulated, where virtues are inculcated and thought encouraged. Here, in the broad United States, with a respectable ocean on either side of us, we can look out upon the world in all its wonder and in all its woe. But what is this that I discern as I pass through your streets, as I look round this great company?
I see uniforms on every side. I understand that nearly the whole energies of the University have been drawn into the preparation of American youth for the battlefield. For this purpose all classes and courses have been transformed, and even the most sacred vacations have been swept away in a round-the-year and almost round-the-clock drive to make warriors and technicians for the fighting fronts.
Twice in my lifetime the long arm of destiny has reached across the oceans and involved the entire life and manhood of the United States in a deadly struggle.
There was no use in saying “We don’t want it; we won’t have it; our forebears left Europe to avoid these quarrels; we have founded a new world which has no contact with the old. “There was no use in that. The long arm reaches out remorselessly, and every one’s existence, environment, and outlook undergo a swift and irresistible change. What is the explanation, Mr. President, of these strange facts, and what are the deep laws to which they respond? I will offer you one explanation - there are others, but one will suffice.
The price of greatness is responsibility. If the people of the United States had continued in a mediocre station, struggling with the wilderness, absorbed in their own affairs, and a factor of no consequence in the movement of the world, they might have remained forgotten and undisturbed beyond their protecting oceans: but one cannot rise to be in many ways the leading community in the civilised world without being involved in its problems, without being convulsed by its agonies and inspired by its causes.
If this has been proved in the past, as it has been, it will become indisputable in the future. The people of the United States cannot escape world responsibility. Although we live in a period so tumultuous that little can be predicted, we may be quite sure that this process will be intensified with every forward step the United States make in wealth and in power. Not only are the responsibilities of this great Republic growing, but the world over which they range is itself contracting in relation to our powers of locomotion at a positively alarming rate.
We have learned to fly. What prodigious changes are involved in that new accomplishment! Man has parted company with his trusty friend the horse and has sailed into the azure with the eagles, eagles being represented by the infernal (loud laughter) - I mean internal -combustion engine. Where, then, are those broad oceans, those vast staring deserts? They are shrinking beneath our very eyes. Even elderly Parliamentarians like myself are forced to acquire a high degree of mobility.
But to the youth of America, as to the youth of all the Britains, I say “You cannot stop.” There is no halting-place at this point. We have now reached a stage in the journey where there can be no pause. We must go on. It must be world anarchy or world order.
Parents who decide to accept the task of educating their children have taken on a great responsibility. The importance and significance of that decision cannot be described too gently, nor can the weight of it be made lighter by speaking of it only in details rather than the big picture. Whether in one-room schoolhouses, classrooms overflowing with 40 students, at kitchen tables, or in virtual Internet classrooms, the importance and enormity of the task cannot be understated, nor its purpose.
The fundamental purpose of education is to pass the wisdom of one generation to the next, to inculcate the next generation from the mistakes of the previous, and to prepare them to be the gatekeepers of all the world has learned, and all that we have become.
The Churchill quote from that speech is often misquoted and misstated. “With greatness comes responsibility” is often how it is phrased, but that is not what he said. He said the price of greatness is responsibility. No more fine a point can be made than that. It is not an option nor a choice, as if we’re selecting the vegetable dish from a price-fixed menu. One cannot separate the price of greatness from its responsibility, nor the price of liberty from its duties.
Either we believe that this great experiment that began with the Enlightenment is the right direction, or we do not. Either we believe that man is capable of managing his destiny, or he is not. Either we believe that capitalism is better than socialism or we do not. Either we believe that man is capable of living an ordered, honest and productive life, or he is not.
We have to take a position.
In the last 80 years we have become fuzzy in our positions, allowing, under the guise of “openness,” for every idea, however failed it might be, to be examined and presented with equal merit.
Do we present “murder” as a viable alternative to respecting life? We do not, because we are certain that murder is wrong. It is not a debatable topic. If someone suggested that we should consider alternatives to having prohibitions on murder, or take statements such as “being closed minded and unwilling to hear alternative points of view” to deter us from teaching what is true, it would not be given a platform. That is because we are certain that our convictions are correct. It is only when people are desirous of undermining the Great Experiment, of altering the history and changing our direction, that they wish to have us be open about it, clear in their intention of inserting their authority over us.
It does not matter what your positions are, but be certain of them. If you believe in creationism, then teach it as the one true answer. If you do not believe it, allow your passions and convictions to come through as you explain what it is.
If you believe that America is evil or that Capitalism is cruel, then teach that, but back it up with facts and evidence so that your children are protected from those who wish to undermine them.
Be honest with your children. Be aggressive in your passions, not wishy-washy and passive.
History, literature, the sciences and the arts are imbued with passion, conflict, blood, war, and folly. They’re three dimensional, complicated, and controversial. A child needs to know that the world and all that man has done and achieved, tried and failed, had costs, consequences, nuances, supporters and detractors. It cannot be distilled in one paragraph, or revised so as not to offend one’s sensibilities, or become politically correct.
Man’s history IS offensive, but it is also kind, considerate, mistake-prone, and forgivable.
It is through the passion of your convictions that the world will come alive to your children, and this thing we call “education” will become their lifelong pursuit.
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Educating Your Children X: Ethos
What is interesting about discussions, especially ones that occur with the same people over a long period of time, is that we can have a disconnect in our use of language, but we don’t know it. I will often chain several (synonymous) words together to encapsulate a concept I’m trying to address. Even with that, another person’s understanding of those words will lead them to conclude I mean something else. It can be quite shocking when you discover it.
In this series I have strung together the words character, morals, and integrity (and have included honor). In a comment to a previous post in the series, someone used the word “ethics” to describe what I was trying to convey.
Wrong. The concept I’m trying to address has nothing to do with ethics.
Ethics is to morality as logic is to thinking.
Ethics relates to how one behaves in a business or professional context, and from a scientific standpoint. It is the heady version of thought, and the development of the mind in the intellectual realm, using the head as the device one reasons with to determine right from wrong. Morality and character come from the heart.
Character/morals/integrity are the way one feels, not the way one behaves. While there is some overlap and it can get confusing, the distinction is an important one.
There are a set of behaviors that relate to codes of conduct which I’ll refer to as E1. If we present ourselves as in compliance with E1, it allows us to commune with our fellows in a manner that is perceived to be beneficial to ourselves. It is similar to how one behaves at the workplace, doing one’s job well, so we will continue to be compensated for our efforts.
There are another set of behaviors that relate to how we reconcile our inner worth that I’ll refer to as M1. If we behave in a manner that is consistent with M1, we feel good about ourselves, even if we derive no “worldly” benefit (and might experience a negative consequence).
I’ll attempt to illustrate with a few examples.
- If we’re walking down the street and see that a parking meter has expired, with a meter-maid writing tickets to other cars on the street, do we drop a coin in the expired meter of the stranger?
There is no benefit to ourselves in the category of E1, unless we are in the company of friends, who would see us perform the act. If we do it alone, with no one but ourselves bearing witness, it is in the realm of M1. Further, the person who is determining to act based on M1 will seek to perform the act in secret, to guarantee that no worldly benefit will be derived from it; whereas, the person who is performing the act motivated by E1, will attempt to grandstand the action, even if the grandstand is full of strangers. - If a person finds a crying child in a store, a person motivated by M1 or E1 will attempt to find the lost child’s guardians. A person motivated by E1 will ask the child if they’ve lost their parents and seek the assistance of others to help locate the child’s parents. The E1 motivated individual may take the child to a store manager, handing the responsibility over to someone else. A person motivated by M1 may take similar actions, seeking out others to help the lost child. How the individual relates to the child and whether or not they stay with the child until the lost parents are found, determine if the person is acting from E1 or M1.
In the latter example, the person driven by E1 is using a derivative of logic, ie, a lost child needs to find its parents. The person driven by M1 is feeling/sharing the child’s angst, not simply relating to it. The M1 motivated person has assumed the child’s feelings as their own. They will not be satisfied, relieved of those feelings of angst, until the child has, and will remain with that child, until the parents are found. The M1 motivated person has become the child’s angst, and has become in an emotional sense, in one with the child. The E1 motivated person has recognized the child’s plight as a distinct and separate person, and assumed their social responsibility to respond.
The E1 behaving individual is showing compassion (and demonstrates a socially responsible response, but has the choice to stay or leave, once the duty has been passed to someone else). The M1 motivated person is feeling compassion (and has no thought of what is socially responsible [even if their actions are also], because they have no option to stay or leave).
It is also possible (and this is why examples of these differences can be complicated) that a person motivated by E1 will wait until the parent is found so that they can be thanked and acknowledged by the parents. The person motivated by M1 is not desirous of thanks, and would be quite shocked (and humbled/embarrassed) if the parents offered it.
There are many examples of people motivated by E1. Studies of bathroom behavior is one. It was found that people washed their hands after using the toilet, in a much higher percentage, when someone else was in the bathroom. Only a small percentage of people washed their hands when they were in the restroom alone. The latter were acting from M1 motivations.
From a religious sense, it is common for people who are psychically-religious to behave as if someone is always watching, ie, God is always watching us. Their reward (or punishment) for their behavior is not based on the judgment of their peers, but a higher authority to which they have an intimate relationship, awareness, and bond.
The words we can use to differentiate E1 from M1 are physically versus psychically, respectively.
A person behaving from E1 motivations knows what is socially acceptable, and responds accordingly. The M1 motivated person has no ability to respond in any other way.
A person who is motivated by M1 will run into the street to prevent a stranger’s child from being hit by a car, giving no consideration (or a moment’s thought) for their own safety/risk. An E1 motivated person may demonstrate the same “self-less” act, but only when it is their own child.
He who made us would have been a pitiful bungler, if he had made the rules of our moral conduct a matter of science. For one man of science, there are thousands who are not. What would have become of them? Man was destined for society. His morality, therefore, was to be formed to this object. He was endowed with a sense of right and wrong merely relative to this. This sense is as much a part of his nature, as the sense of hearing, seeing, feeling; it is the true foundation of morality… The moral sense, or conscience, is as much a part of man as his leg or arm. It is given to all human beings in a stronger or weaker degree, as force of members is given them in a greater or less degree. It may be strengthened by exercise, as may any particular limb of the body. This sense is submitted indeed in some degree to the guidance of reason; but it is a small stock which is required for this: even a less one than what we call Common sense. State a moral case to a ploughman and a professor. The former will decide it as well, and often better than the latter, because he has not been led astray by artificial rules.
--Thomas Jefferson, 1787
Exercising The Moral Sense
When I describe morality, character, integrity (and honor), I am referring to the classification of things as M1. When I am referring to manners and social rules (duties and obligations), I am referring to E1.
Both can be taught or exercised. Some will take to M1 without motivation (without implications of a negative consequence). Those who are lacking in the moral sense have to be dealt with, and educated, differently.
When [the moral sense] is wanting, we endeavor to supply the defect by education, by appeals to reason and calculation, by presenting to the being so unhappily conformed, other motives to do good and to eschew evil, such as the love, or the hatred, or the rejection of those among whom he lives, and whose society is necessary to his happiness and even existence; demonstrations by sound calculation that honesty promotes interest in the long run; the rewards and penalties established by the laws; and ultimately the prospects of a future state of retribution for the evil as well as the good done while here. These are the correctives which are supplied by education, and which exercise the functions of the moralist, the preacher, and legislator; and they lead into a course of correct action all those whose depravity is not too profound to be eradicated.
--Thomas Jefferson, 1814
A Man For All Seasons
In the history of Sir Thomas More we find a classic dichotomy of ethics and morals.
Sir Thomas More was a consummate politician--the right arm of Henry VIII. As the King’s Ambassador, Sir Thomas spoke before the Church of Rome on behalf of the King in his desire to divorce his wife--properly (and ethically) performed his duties as Chancellor. When King Henry decided to break his bonds with Rome, after the Pope refused to grant his divorce, Sir Thomas resigned his position, and took no actions (nor spoke of his reasons) against the King. He could no longer perform his duties morally. His ethics were trumped by his morality.
I think that when statesmen forsake their own private conscience for the sake of their public duties, they lead their country by a short route to chaos.
In this wee bit of history, we find the penultimate discussion of morals and ethics. It is difficult to find anyone acting immorally or unethically. The Church of Rome was (at least partially) basing their decision not to grant King Henry a divorce based on the politics of Spain. In that sense, the Church was behaving ethically, basing their decision on what was right and proper treatment for the Prince of Spain. King Henry, a ruler by divine-right had an ethical obligation to provide England an heir and believed (rightly or wrongly) that he was being denied an heir because there was something immoral about his marriage to his brother’s (the former King’s) wife.
Now whether or not King Henry was motivated by lust, and used the argument of incest simply to justify his immoral motivation to himself or to others, there should be no question that his desire for an heir (regardless of motivation) was an ethical one.
The question of the Church of Rome’s motivations are another facet to our discussion. When the Church of Rome was faced with a choice between ethics or morality, which does it choose? This would depend, of course, on how much value (or weight) they gave to the argument of Henry’s marriage to Katherine of being moral or immoral.
Was Henry’s marriage to Katherine incestuous?
If you decide that their relationship was incestuous, then the Pope’s decision not to grant Henry a divorce was an immoral act, with the outcome that the Church of Rome had lost its moral compass.
If you decide that their relationship was not incestuous, then the Pope’s decision not to grant the divorce was moral, and the Church of Rome maintained its function as an arbiter of moral actions.
Clearly, God was denying King Henry (and England) an heir, but was it because of incest or not? Was there incest?
Was the Church of Rome the Moral Center of Europe or was it the Ethical Center of Europe?
These are heady and heartfelt discussions, of which Europe was engaged during the duration of the event (and for many decades following).
King Henry, a King by divine right, was the leader and ruler of his people. With that came duties and responsibilities, ie, ethics. If the Church of Rome’s actions prevented King Henry to properly discharge his ethical duties, and based their decision on one of ethics, rather than morality, Henry had a right to trump.
There could be only one ethical leader of England. It would either be the King or Rome, but not both. If, as many believed, the Church based its decision on ethics (and not morality), then the Church was trying to assert its authority over England, and be its ruler from afar.
From this we derive the ultimate discussion between the moral church and ethical state:
“Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s.”
--Matthew 22:21
God had made Henry King, and the Pope was defying God by not allowing him to discharge his duties.
Sir Thomas did not share that opinion. He believed that the Church of Rome had properly discharged its moral duties, leaving the Church as the sole arbiter on the question of incest. Therefore, King Henry’s actions to break with Rome were seen to Sir Thomas as an immoral act, and because of that he could no longer perform his ethical duties. If you can no longer perform your ethical duties, your morals compel you to resign.
Oh confound all this. I’m not a scholar, I don’t know whether the marriage was lawful or not but dammit, Thomas, look at these names! Why can’t you do as I did and come with us, for fellowship!
Sir Thomas More
And when we die, and you are sent to heaven for doing your conscience, and I am sent to hell for not doing mine, will you come with me, for fellowship?
Henry and Thomas were friends and allies and neither could be accused of not having England’s interests in mind, nor any question of their recognition and thoughtful execution of their respective duties. They had “agreed to disagree” on the issue of the motivations behind the Church’s decisions. Both were fully cognizant of their relationship and duty to God. They were at an impasse… and so was the rest of England and Europe.
Oh, Thomas, Thomas, Thomas! Does a man need a Pope to tell him where he’s sinned? It was a sin. God’s punished me. I have no son. Son after son she’s borne me - all dead at birth or dead within the month. Never saw the hand of God so clear in anything. It’s my bounden duty to put away the Queen and all the popes back to Peter shall not come between me and my duty! How is it that you cannot see? Everyone else does.
Sir Thomas More
Then why does your Grace need my poor support?
King Henry VIII
Because you’re honest… and what is more to the purpose, you’re KNOWN to be honest. There are those like Norfolk who follow me because I wear the crown; and those like Master Cromwell who follow me because they are jackals with sharp teeth and I’m their tiger; there’s a mass that follows me because it follows anything that moves. And then there’s you…
Sir Thomas More
I am sick to think how much I must displease your Grace.
King Henry VIII
No, Thomas, I respect your sincerity. But respect… man, that’s water in the desert.
Because politics were involved, and there was a division among the Court on the matter, Henry had to solidify his base, by identifying those who were loyal to him (agreeing with his take on the matter) versus those who were siding with Rome.
Every man had to sign a document declaring that they were loyal to Henry and agreed that the Church of Rome was no longer a moral body. Essentially, the document required that each man declare that the Church of Rome was no longer the spokesman for God on earth.
Would you have signed that document?
Sir Thomas More could not and did not. He was executed July 6, 1535.
I am commanded by the king to be brief, and since I am the king’s obedient subject, brief I will be. I die His Majesty’s good servant, but God’s first.
[to executioner, handing him his wages]
I forgive you, right readily. Be not afraid of your office: you send me to God.
Archbishop Cranmer
You’re very sure of that, Sir Thomas?
Sir Thomas More
He will not refuse one who is so blithe to go to Him.
More was beatified by Pope Leo XIII in 1886.
* * *
Les Miserables
The story of Les Miserables is fiction, written by Victor Hugo in the 19th Century. It chronicles the story of Jean Valjean, a convict who found redemption through an unnecessary act of kindness, and Inspector Javert, who is duty bound to find the escaped convict and return him to justice. The story is sweeping, including the compassion shown by Jean Valjean to an orphan girl, whose mother died as a direct result of him passing judgment upon her and firing her.
Jean Valjean assumes responsibility for Cosette, the orphaned girl, originally from a sense of ethical duty and one of repentance, but comes to love her as his own daughter… seeing in her God’s forgiveness and compassion. Through impoverished and revolutionary France, we travel with Jean Valjean and Cosette as they try to live a moral life, one step ahead of Valjean’s sordid past. If Valjean were to go back to prison, accepting his ethical fate, Cosette’s life would be in ruin, and his sacred promise to her mother to protect her would be broken.
While the book could provide a dozen summaries and debate questions, there is one aspect of the story that is especially appropriate for this purpose, and that is the experience of Inspector Javert.
In every sense, Javert is a moral and ethical man, properly discharging his lawful duties. Jean Valjean is an escaped criminal and it is Javert’s duty to find him, and return him to prison (where he was lawfully sentenced to life, under the ethical laws of France). Through a series of events, Javert is saved from being killed by the mob, by Valjean. It was another act of unnecessary kindness, and one that would have guaranteed that Valjean could escape his past. But Valjean has become a moral man and could not help but save Javert from a wrongful death, even if that meant that Javert would return him to prison.
Javert, confronted with the dilemma of earthly justice (ethics) versus God’s Justice (morals), kills himself as his final act of reconciling the conflict between his head and his heart, forsaking his soul in the process.
We, the reader, are left to determine the moral question of Javert’s salvation. Would he, in taking his own life (the ultimate defiance of God), be forgiven by God and accepted into His Grace? Is a man who is conflicted in his ethical and moral duties, forgiven when his life’s circumstance provides him the choice to do neither?
* * *
But the above tales are no longer relevant in today’s world of microchips, the science of stem cells, and long and prosperous lives, right?
But while my views on the morality of the death penalty have nothing to do with how I vote as a judge, they have a lot to do with whether I can or should be a judge at all. To put the point in the blunt terms employed by Justice Harold Blackmun towards the end of his career on the bench, when he announced that he would henceforth vote (as Justices William Brennan and Thurgood Marshall had previously done) to overturn all death sentences, when I sit on a Court that reviews and affirms capital convictions, I am part of “the machinery of death.” My vote, when joined with at least four others, is, in most cases, the last step that permits an execution to proceed. I could not take part in that process if I believed what was being done to be immoral.
Justice Antonin Scalia, in God’s Justice and Ours, examines the topic in a method wholly different from Inspector Javert, but his reasons and conflicts derive from the same source of conflict.
So it is no accident, I think, that the modern view that the death penalty is immoral is centered in the West. That has little to do with the fact that the West has a Christian tradition, and everything to do with the fact that the West is the home of democracy. Indeed, it seems to me that the more Christian a country is the less likely it is to regard the death penalty as immoral. Abolition has taken its firmest hold in post-Christian Europe, and has least support in the church-going United States. I attribute that to the fact that, for the believing Christian, death is no big deal. Intentionally killing an innocent person is a big deal: it is a grave sin, which causes one to lose his soul. But losing this life, in exchange for the next? The Christian attitude is reflected in the words Robert Bolt’s play has Thomas More saying to the headsman: “Friend, be not afraid of your office. You send me to God.” And when Cranmer asks whether he is sure of that, More replies, “He will not refuse one who is so blithe to go to Him.” For the nonbeliever, on the other hand, to deprive a man of his life is to end his existence. What a horrible act!
To determine if Scalia can perform his ethical duties on the Supreme Court, he considers the lessons of his education, and answers (for himself) the question presented to Sir Thomas.
So I have given this new position thoughtful and careful consideration-and I disagree. That is not to say I favor the death penalty (I am judicially and judiciously neutral on that point); it is only to say that I do not find the death penalty immoral. I am happy to have reached that conclusion, because I like my job, and would rather not resign. And I am happy because I do not think it would be a good thing if American Catholics running for legislative office had to oppose the death penalty (most of them would not be elected); if American Catholics running for Governor had to promise commutation of all death sentences (most of them would never reach the Governor’s mansion); if American Catholics were ineligible to go on the bench in all jurisdictions imposing the death penalty; or if American Catholics were subject to recusal when called for jury duty in capital cases.
* * *
It is conjecture, but I would assume that Scalia wrote that essay for the same reason I often write something down. It is a method of exploring the issue fully, a way of examining it, and then throwing it out there, to see if I’ve made an error.
We cannot learn only through our personal experience. That would require us to test every theory, make every mistake, and discover the lessons with a great amount of risk and time required. It would deny that history exists and that there is a kind of shortcut we can take to determine right from wrong, to strengthen our morals and character, and through which, behave as psychically-moral beings… clear on the differentiation between our earthly duties and our moral sense, and the psychic and physical realms.
Education of the moral sense is and has been accomplished through the study of history and literature, and I have summarized only two examples above to illustrate how that is done, one fiction, one not. To deny this historical record, or to suggest that man can commune with his modern fellows to discern and define the way we should behave and conduct ourselves, is the epitome of the self--the elevation of our single lives to one of prominence above everyone who has come before us. It denies that we are a continuum. It is the ultimate act of self-centered, self-obsessed childishness. It is the belief that the world really does revolve around me.
Would Scalia be the kind of judge he is without the morals education he received? We know he is a competent jurist, fully capable of understanding the trade-aspect of his profession (ie, the mechanics). Would legal ethics have been sufficient to ground him? Do we need and want men who find a balance between ethics and morals and have learned the wisdom to know the difference?
We study to learn the mechanics of science, ethics, and law. They are an ever-changing sphere, and asks what we can do. Morality is fixed. We need only discover it by morals education, and is what we should do.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Educating Your Children IX: Teenagers
I would probably do a better job writing this post if I were drunk (but I can’t drink anymore). It is only through a stupor that I could write this section with the proper degree of cynicism and honesty. It is in this post that I have to bring up the dreaded topic of IQ, and push everyone’s buttons.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, there are a number of things we can do to help a child achieve their potential. Nutrition and nurturing are facets of it. What is important to accept is that there is a fixed point, at the end of the potential line. We can’t get over that wall. We can and should try to get as close to it as we can, but there is a risk of diminishing returns if we keep slamming our heads into it.
It makes good sense to determine your child’s IQ when they begin their teenage years. What you do with that information, however, is what makes it a good or a bad idea.
Captain Barbarosa (Pirates of the Caribbean) regarding abiding by the Pirate’s Code: “They’re more like guidelines, really.”
History gives us a number of examples of determining a child’s fate during this period in their lives. It is no accident that the Jewish tradition sets manhood and entry into the club at age 13. It is not an accident that the eighth grade was the traditional stopping point of schooling, when a person’s life was at a crossroads. There is a kind of stability in a child’s development, once they get to this age. (I caution those who take exception to the generalities I’m referring to here, and take them as literal/absolutes.)
A child with an IQ of 75 is not going to medical school.
The average IQ of the population as a whole is, by definition, 100. IQs range from 0 to above 200, and among children, to above 250. However, about 50% of the population have IQs between 89 and 111, and about 80% of the population have IQs ranging between 80 and 120, with 10% lying below 80, and 10% falling above 120.
For IQs below 120, IQ is the best predictor of socioeconomic status of any psychometric measurement. In more complex jobs, IQ is better than even education or experience at predicting job performance. In her article “The General Intelligence Factor”, Scientific American Presents “Exploring Intelligence”, pg. 24, 1999, Linda Gottfredson states:
“Adults in the bottom 5% of the IQ distribution (below 75) are very difficult to train and are not competitive for any occupation on the basis of ability. Serious problems in training low-IQ military recruits during World War II led Congress to ban enlistment from the lowest 10% (below 80) of the population, and no civilian occupation in modern economies routinely recruits its workers from that below-80 range. Current military enlistment standards exclude any individual whose IQ is below about 85.”
“Persons of average IQ (between 90 and 100) are not competitive for most professional and executive-level work but are easily trained for the bulk of jobs in the American economy. By contrast, individuals in the top 5 percent of the adult population can essentially train themselves, and few occupations are beyond their reach mentally.”
“People with IQs between 75 and 90 are 88 times more likely to drop out of high school, seven times more likely to be jailed, and five times more likely as adults to live in poverty than people with IQs between 110 and 125. The 75-to-90 IQ woman is eight times more likely to become a chronic welfare recipient, and four times as likely to bear an illegitimate child than the 110-to-125-IQ woman.”
In his book, Straight Talk About Mental Tests, The Free Press, A Division of the Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc., New York, 1981, pg. 12, Dr. Arthur Jensen cites the following four IQ thresholds:
(1) An IQ of 50 or below. This is the threshold below which most adults cannot cope outside of an institution. They can typically be taught to read at a 3rd or 4th grade level. However, they cannot normally function in the customary classroom setting, and they require special training programs.
(2) An IQ between 50 and 75. At this level of intelligence, they generally cannot complete elementary school. Most adults will need smarter help in coping with the world.
(3) An IQ between 75 and 105. Children in this IQ range are not generally able to complete a college prep course in high school.
(4) An IQ between 105 and 115. May graduate from college but generally, not with grades that would qualify them for graduate school.
(5) An IQ above 115. No restrictions.For IQs in these ranges, the influence of IQ upon socioeconomic status is dramatic. 31% of those with IQs below 75 were on welfare, compared with 8% of those in the 90 to 110 IQ interval, and 0% in those with IQs above 125. 55% of mothers with IQs below 75 went on welfare after the birth of the first child, compared with 12% of those with IQs between 90 and 110, and 1% of those with IQs above 125. Income is highly dependent upon IQ up to an IQ-level of about 125.
The table below (also from the above referenced site) provides some useful information for our purposes.
Frequency | Options | |||
| >1% below 30 | Illiterate | Unemployable. Institutionalized. | ||
| >1% below 50 | 1st-Grade to 3rd-Grade | Simple, non-critical household chores. | ||
| 1.5% below 60 | 3rd-Grade to 6th-grade | Very simple tasks, close supervision. | ||
| 5% below 74 | 6th-Grade to 8th-Grade | "Slow, simple, supervised." | ||
| 25% below 89 | 8th-Grade to 12th-Grade | Assembler, food service, nurse’s aide | ||
| 50% below 100 | 8th-Grade to 1-2 years of College. | Clerk, teller, Walmart | ||
| 100 to 111 | 1 in 2 above 100 | 12th-Grade to College Degree | Police officer, machinist, sales | |
| 111 to 120 | 1 in 4 above 111 | College to Master’s Level | Manager, teacher, accountant | |
| 120 to 125 | 11 in 10 above 120 | College to Non-Technical Ph. D.’s. | Manager, professor, accountant | |
| 125 to 132 | 1 in 20 above 125 | Any Ph. D. at 3rd-Tier Schools | Attorney, editor, executive. | |
| 132 to 137 | 1 in 50 above 132 | No limitations. | Eminent professor, editor | |
| 137 to 150 | 1 in 100 above 137 | No limitations. | Leading math, physics professor | |
| 150 to 160 | 1 in 1,100 above 150 | No limitations | Lincoln, Copernicus, Jefferson | |
| 160 to 174 | 1 in 11,000 above 160 | No limitations | Descartes, Einstein, Spinoza | |
| 174 to 200 | 1 in 1,000,000 above 174 | No limitations | Shakespeare, Goethe, Newton |
The table above gives us the outside edge of our wall--the potential of our children, based on their IQ. Expecting them to be able to exceed the wall is no different from expecting them to grow taller than their physical potential, for a girl to grow a penis if we wanted a boy instead, or to suddenly start growing blond hair, where their red hair used to be… just by trying harder. It isn’t going to happen, no matter how hard they try.
At this point in a child’s development is when it is often easier for someone else to make these decisions, because our role as a parent has to change. Until the teenage years, when an IQ test really is an accurate predictor of their potential, we’ve been akin to You can do it! Now our role and our job as a parent has to change. We have to become dispassionate (but optimistic) advisers rather than cheerleaders.
Since IQ was often related to birth order, customs were developed around that. It was preordained that the first son would inherit the family business, the second son would go into the military, and the third son would join the clergy. Birth order isn’t a 100% reliable as an IQ predictor, especially if sons are born more than two years apart, but it is an interesting phenomenon (that we can now understand scientifically.
We don’t like to look at our children so critically, nor are we thrilled with the idea of having to be honest and direct them in a way that might be contrary to our personal desires for them, or even their own desires. We like to hold out hope for a different outcome and so we leave all doors open to our children.
I can’t support that idea, because it has no grounding in fact/reality.
Sharing a child’s IQ with them has some risk. Children with normal or low IQs can be discouraged or defeated. Children with higher IQs tend not to work as hard. Just because someone’s IQ is high doesn’t mean they’ll achieve their potential. It just means it is possible for them to aspire to the more heady professions and careers. They still have to put forth an effort. Resting on one’s laurels is not achievement nor success make. A person can have a high IQ but still have a low degree of stamina or discipline. This laziness tendency with smarter kids is partially learned behavior, especially if they’ve not had to exert much effort in a public-type school environment. They’ve gotten away with something, they think, but that early laziness habit will be a difficult one to break.
Now the nice thing about IQ is that it tends to be genetic. If parents have an IQ of about 100, odds are good their children will too. This means that the definition of happiness and success of the parents will be satisfactory to them, and any disappointment they might have that their child won’t be another Einstein will be tempered by those definitions. Because it is a general tendency doesn’t mean it is the reality, so an IQ test will provide definitive proof, and give parents an idea of how to approach the teenage years.
Paraphrasing dialog from A Fish Called Wanda: “Apes can READ Nietzsche. They just can’t UNDERSTAND it.”
If a child has an IQ in the normal range (about 100), it makes no sense to direct their academic pursuits with subject levels that will be beyond them. As the quote above illustrates, they’ll be able to go through the mechanics of doing the work, but it won’t have any lasting impact, nor any academic purpose. Their response to Nietzsche will be something along the lines of “Huh?” It is at that point that their literary selections might be better directed to Louis L’Amour, Judith Krantz, or Robert Heinlein, instead of Joseph Conrad or Truman Capote. They can read Conrad and Capote, because they’ll have the mechanics of reading, but they’ll only understand them at a very superficial/literal level… which is OK, too, but reading it won’t raise their IQ, ie, make them any quicker/smarter than they are, nor will they benefit from the exposure to the writing quality, density, or underlying message.
IQs are similar to the capabilities of modes of transport. You might be able to get a bicycle to go 120 miles an hour, down a severe hill, but it can’t do it on the straights (and you risk life and limb in doing so). A bicycle won’t ever fly, as an airplane will, unless you drive it off a cliff. A car is designed to travel on highways, but depending on the car, it might not hold together (or be safe) above 80mph.
Below an IQ of 110, children entering their teenage years need to be directed to careers in the trades, not directed to college or university (in the conventional sense). What we provide to them (as their educators) is preparing them for their careers and what they’ll do when our home-schooling is “done.”
Some colleges offer trade school education, so “college” can be a confusing term these days. Many places (such as police or fire departments) have outsourced their trade instruction to community colleges, so “colleges” aren’t completely ruled out if that’s the direction.
In general, with the caveat above, if a child has a normal or lower IQ, their “education” stops at their teenage years, and their “training” begins.
What becomes an interesting challenge is parents with children with IQs remarkably different from their own. A parent with an IQ in the normal range might not be the best educator for a child with an IQ of 120 or above. That child needs a mentor who has similar capabilities, so tutors or private school should be considered. It is not as problematic for parents with higher IQs and children lower, but that also presents challenges because the parents will have a hard time relating to how and why the child learns more slowly, and retains less (or misses the “big picture” so easily). That parent will tend to get frustrated by their child’s abilities (or skip over basics, assuming the child has them), and that isn’t a good thing for that child. A child’s emotional development and their well-being is just as important as their academic development.
What is also interesting about higher IQs is the tendency for empathy and compassion to be lacking. Whether this is learned behavior (by living in a world with the majority of people so easily duped by their smarter fellows) or whether there is some sort of genetic synthesis isn’t really important. What is important is to accept that this tendency exists. Children with higher IQs need to have character, empathy, integrity and honor education, more so than their go-along-to-get-along, lower IQ peers. If it is genetic, it probably won’t be effective, but because we cannot be certain of that, we need to try.
This, as I said, is a very difficult subject, because it pokes at people’s egos and their sense of fairness. It is also incredibly difficult for parents to direct a child away from things that might interest them, or sound good on paper, when the child has no hope of actually achieving it (even if they passionately desire it).
For parents with children in the higher IQ range, I suggest an academic program similar to the one detailed here, with the focus on university preparation. For children with normal or lower IQs, I suggest some of the more traditional curriculum, such as this.
It is possible to get an accurate read of a child’s IQ when they’re younger (and choose their educational direction sooner), but it should be repeated at the entry to the teenage years, just to be certain.
If we were living in a different time, it would be possible to direct your normal child into the trades and secure for them an apprenticeship. Unfortunately, we are mostly prohibited by law from doing that sort of thing now, and so these efforts must be delayed until they are 16 or 18… but that is what you can do to help that child, even if it doesn’t sound as sexy or exciting. It’s honest, however painful that might be to accept.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Educating Your Children VIII: Learning Inventory
As I’ve mentioned many times in this series, you have to have Goals and Objectives. It is what you use as the basis for finding materials, evaluating them, as well as a method to test you and your child’s success and progress. What are your educational goals? Well, I don’t know what YOUR goals and objectives are. I can’t evaluate if they’re good or bad, or if you’ve chosen good sources. What I’ll attempt to do in this post is provide a list of goals and then expand it. You will have your own lists, but can use this as a model for developing your own.
As I’ve included before, here is Thomas Jefferson’s goals for public education, and they were OUR goals (as I saw no reason to reinvent the wheel):
- To give to every citizen the information he needs for the transaction of his own business;
- To enable him to calculate for himself, and to express and preserve his ideas, his contracts and accounts, in writing;
- To improve, by reading, his morals and faculties;
- To understand his duties to his neighbors and country, and to discharge with competence the functions confided to him by either;
- To know his rights; to exercise with order and justice those he retains; to choose with discretion the fiduciary of those he delegates; and to notice their conduct with diligence, with candor, and judgment;
- And, in general, to observe with intelligence and faithfulness all the social relations under which he shall be placed.
The above were the goals for our home-school, at the point when we determined if we were “done.” Education is never “done” but we’re providing a cutting off point equivalent to a high school diploma. The above list is the last point in our home-school, but it is age specific.
By exploding each point, we can establish objectives. They will be broader, more like milestones than learning objectives. Let me illustrate with the first one:
To give to every citizen the information he needs for the transaction of his own business;
- Arithmetic, bookkeeping, accounting, and taxation
- Marketing, sales, and advertising
- Law, licenses, and permits
- Fiduciary responsibility
- Correspondence and contracts
- Hiring, mentoring, and payroll
If we take the above to an extreme, it could lead to Masters in Business Administration or it might involve focused studies in Agriculture, Manufacturing, or the Arts. That’s not our focus in K through 12. What we’re wanting to provide in K-12 are the foundation skills, and more theoretical and practical knowledge. That is our end point with each of the above provided broadly.
If our child is five years old, we’re not going to try to teach them accounting, or even bookkeeping. We have prerequisites to learn, before we can get to those subjects. But that’s the direction we’re heading, with the prerequisites as learning milestones.
Let’s look at ONE of those, arithmetic.
Can the child write? Does he have the small motor skills to hold a pencil? Has he demonstrated that he understands the concept of numbers, beyond the ability to recognize and name the shape? Has the child demonstrated that he understands the difference between a whole and a fraction? Does he have the ability to count, beyond simply mimicking?
The entire discipline of mathematics, of which arithmetic is a basic building block, is a language. It is a language, just like English or any other spoken and written language. It has rules, the equivalent of grammar, and exceptions. Beyond the basics of it as a language, the ability to perform it (beyond understanding it theoretically) requires mental calisthenics (calculations). Those building blocks can be further broken down, such as adding, then subtracting, then multiplication, and then division. All of those skills have rules and special symbols and words. You can teach your child to recite “two plus two equals four” but does he understand what he’s saying and what it means? Does he understand the synonyms of “two and two are four” or “two + two = four”?
That’s a lot to learn!
But children generally do this so easily and at such a young age that we tend to gloss over just how much language they’ve acquired and understood in order to be able to do it. How easily they do it depends on how consistent and precise we are with language.
They also have to be able to recognize and write those symbols, requiring that they’ve developed the small motor skills to hold and control a pencil. Is the child mature enough to hold a pencil without risk of them sticking it in their eye or eating the eraser? If not, start with a crayon! Dexterity and maturity are required. You’d no more give a six-month old a pencil as you would give a seven year old the car keys and ask them to drive to the store for a gallon of milk. Even before you teach the child to drive, they have to learn to make transactions with others, understanding the concept of currency, tax, and change. If you give a five-year old a $20 bill, will they come home with the right change? How would they know if they were short-changed?
The point of detailing the above is not to be verbose (OK, maybe a little), but to illustrate that there are dozens of dozens of prerequisites to doing things we think of as easy and common. We might remember the first time we got short-changed, but do we remember how we were taught to do it ourselves, so it doesn’t happen to us again?
In addition to being able to calculate the cost of something and determine if we were short-changed, there are other aspects of language that allow us to engage the seller in the transaction. “I want a glass of milk, please” told to a waiter is a contract. Children can learn to state the basics of contracts by having to order what they want at a restaurant. They learn this by modeling the language and behavior of their parents, which is why it is so important that their parents are consistent in how they do these things. If one parent always does the ordering (although a common custom in etiquette) the child might get the idea that the parent will always order for them, or use shyness as an excuse not to have to do it themselves. Did they forget the “please”? Did they forget to specify the “size”? Did they forget to include special considerations or preferences, such as “medium well,” “plain,” “ketchup only,” or “no onions”?
I’m not suggesting that children learn “the hard way” for everything, forcing them to live with the consequences of a hamburger delivered with onions, but these things are learned gradually, with lots of prompting and reminders from the parents. If the child can say “I want a hamburger, please” they should be congratulated when they do that (with a big smile and nod of approval the first time they do it). The parent can add “plain, please” and then tell the child at a later point that they can say “I want a plain hamburger, please” to make sure it gets to them the way they want it.
When we order something at a restaurant we have engaged in a verbal contract with the business. When we order something we have committed to paying for it, even though we don’t say “I would like a plain hamburger for $2.95, and I will pay for that hamburger if it is delivered within a reasonable time, and as specified.” That’s implied. Does the child know that yet? If they bring a peanut butter sandwich instead, do you have to pay for it, if you ate it?
There is also a contract with the wait-staff. We are required, even though it isn’t written down anywhere, that we will pay them 15% to 20% in tip, if they deliver it to our table. How much above 15% we tip them will be based on the quality and speed of the service. Does the child know how to determine quality or speed? Does the child know that the tip percentage is different (10% to 12%) if it is a buffet service? What about “to go” service at a traditional restaurant versus a fast food place? What are the standard rules for tips and when they apply?
These are social customs, combined with legal customs, based on an honor system. But it is complicated! Children can learn about those customs by seeing them modeled and being asked to take the money and the check to the cashier, and having to bring back the right amount of change. Does the parent review the check, making sure that they were charged only for what they ordered and received, or to see if the tip was included? Are you explaining what you’re doing when you look at the bill? Can your child do it?
These concepts and customs make up the basics of a civil society, and provide the basic building blocks to understanding boilerplate contracts and the idea of “unwritten rules.”
When looking at a menu with pictures, parents can talk about the fact that the Fruity Tootie special doesn’t look exactly like the picture when the pancakes arrive. That’s marketing and advertising basics. “Yes, the picture looks appealing, but if you’ll remember, you didn’t like it the last time you ordered it.” This helps a child learn about deceptive advertising, and matures in being able to short-circuit their impulsive instincts, which prepares them to read the small print in contracts.
In providing a learning inventory by age level, the above illustrates how much more is learned and required in order to do things we think of as simple. A child isn’t born knowing that you must add a minimum of 15% to a restaurant check, nor are they born knowing how to calculate percentages.
Playing a restaurant game with the child and parent taking turns acting as the waiter, creating a menu, having a cash register, etc., are GREAT ways to teach a child these things, including having the savvy to be able to be able to speak up for what they want. What happens when the waiter leaves the table, and goes to the kitchen to get your order? These things don’t happen by magic. The parent or the child can become the restaurant chef, preparing the order, and then having one person of the role players deliver it to the waiting customers. If the parent complains about how the food was served or that it took too long, the child learns empathy, and has an understanding of how long it takes to prepare food, and to be able to gauge the speed and quality of the service they receive (quality is an abstract concept).
But as you can see, I hope, playing games like this with your young children provide them with skills they will have to have to get along in the world, as well as providing a foundation for skills and knowledge they will have to learn later.
You can play all sorts of games with young children to prepare them for their social engagements. You can play the restaurant game above, going to the grocery store, and play department store from the clothing in your closets. You can learn about taking inventory of your pantry, before you go to the store, to make sure you buy only what you need and like. A child can learn about sales and how to calculate markdowns, by putting little stickers, such as “10% off” or “50% off” on different drawers and racks in their closets, and then give them monopoly money to buy a wardrobe. The list of preparatory games is endless!
One of the games we played in our house, which has endless benefits for a child (once they’re ready for it), was “The Bank of Mom.” I’ve written about this before, but we gave each of our children a check register (we all have extras laying around). It was a checkbook with only the check register (no checks). Each of our kids were given an allowance each week. Out of that, they had to buy everything (except their school books and groceries). They had to buy EVERYTHING else from their accounts: their clothing, entertainment (toys, games, movies), basic toiletries (deodorant, toothpaste), etc. This meant that they had to take their checkbooks everywhere, and their transactions were totaled and paid for separately. I actually paid for everything, but the amounts were subtracted from their balances. I had veto authority, of course, but I didn’t have to exercise it very often. It teaches a child the basic mechanics of household budgeting, but it also teaches them (very quickly) to be wise shoppers. They learn another very important lesson: they recognize the amount of money being spent on them, versus the things that are provided to them. They see the amount of the grocery bill and realize they didn’t have to pay for it.
Their allowances were quite high, because this wasn’t just “mad money.” The allowances were not directly tied to a punishment/reward system either, so there were no punitive dings if they didn’t do their chores. Chores and household responsibilities are required, and that was the basis for their having their food and shelter covered, not coming out of their individual accounts.
Since they paid for things, they treated their clothing and personal items with a great deal of respect.
The “Bank of Mom” also had an end date. Our children knew that once they reached the age of 16, the Bank of Mom and their allowances ended. They had years of experience knowing exactly how much they needed to live on, and so when they got their first jobs, they knew that the $50 or $60 they were earning a week wasn’t going to enable them to live like millionaires… and let me tell you, when they saw the amount of money that was deducted from their paychecks in FICA and other taxes, they were PISSED. They also understood that Mom and Dad weren’t going to continue to pay for their basics once they had the ability to earn money. Their food and shelter would be paid for (as long as they were in school and contributing), but they had to pay for everything else. Springing that on them, at age 16 or 18, before they’ve had any experience with budgeting and forecasting is TOO LATE.
They quickly transfered those skills to managing their real bank accounts and debit cards.
(In the last year, our daughter had to quit working because of her school schedule and her responsibility of chauffeuring her brother to and from school. She doesn’t have to be told to appreciate the small allowance she now receives again, nor how to manage it. While she might moan a bit about having to run errands for us, or drive her brother hither and yon, she does it, because she realizes these things were done for her, and it’s “payback time.” She thanks us every week for the small amount of money she receives, not seeing it as any sort of entitlement, but as a gift. She can be sent to the local club store with a grocery list a mile long, with my debit card, and I have no fear that she’ll run off to Hawaii with my debit card. That trust was earned and the skills diligently taught.)
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The above explained the concepts of prerequisites applied to long term goals, broken up by skill set and age appropriateness. With those caveats, the following is a basic guideline of what your children should be learning, and by when:
Toddlers:
- Small motor skills (to hold a pencil, dress themselves, turn the pages of a book, navigate and use objects, such as the sink, toothbrush, towels, and washcloths)
- Spacial concepts (pouring, setting their place at the table, holding fork/spoon and serving themselves)
- Sit quietly and attentively (5 minutes or so) [Update: Please read this article about DI and the effectiveness of Direct Instruction (intensive language instruction), more here.]
- Number and letter recognition
- Basic language skills (sentence structure: noun, action and multi-actions, such as put on your shoes AND socks, get a bowl AND pour cereal/milk) and engage with strangers in social settings (ordering at a restaurant, for example) and demonstrating basic etiquette of “please” and “thank you.”
- Arithmetic readiness
- Basic organization skills: knowing where things are stored in their rooms (clothing/toiletries/toys) and in the organization of the kitchen (knowing where the milk, cereal and other items are stored and put away)
Age 5 (or about)
- Basic writing skills
- Basic reading skills
- Arithmetic language
- Use more advanced objects in the house (the toaster, TV/DVD player, radio/stereo, and basic computer skills, such as the use of a mouse, inserting and removing CDs/DVDs)
- Respecting the property and privacy of others (awareness of body)
Age 9 (or about)
- Reading and writing
- Awareness of self and others (children, by age 8, should have a strong sense of self, different from their parents/siblings, ie, their thoughts are not their parents thoughts, nor are their preferences the same as their parents, and they should recognize and understand pecking orders, sufficient to understand that rules are different for adults/children or their siblings from themselves, with REASONS)
- Tell time/read a clock and awareness of time in how long it takes to get dressed, cook a meal, etc.
- Engage in the world in small interchanges (buy something and get the right change, recognize forms of currency and be able to add up the cost of something before going to cash register to pay for them)
- Spatial: Basic inventories and the ability to measure ingredients, manipulate objects
- Manners: Be able to sit quietly through a movie, use proper table manners, and be able to cut their own food. In addition, they should be able to make basic introductions and understand the appropriateness of clothing to a particular occasion, and buy and plan for presents, Holidays, and other social interactions, including setting the table, meal planning, and serving and seating arrangements
- Begin writing and reading cursive, composing notes, cards, and letters and the appropriate contents thereof
Age 13 (or about)
- Reading and writing to express abstract thoughts and ideas (understanding the abstract morals of stories, distinguish fantasy/fiction from facts, and basic logic in writing)
- Grammar fundamentals and language rules (including spelling)
- Expanding vocabulary
- Budgeting and forecasting money and time
- Humor, story and joke telling, literary criticism, and summarizing key points and restating important elements, and the ability to make bulleted lists and create outlines (categorization and inventory)
- Basic route planning, map reading, calculating distances, with time and various travel-modes with fuel consumption
- Health, hygiene, and basic maintenance (they should be doing their own laundry and maintaining their wardrobes and room organization, for example, changing their own sheets and making their beds, and keeping their rooms reasonably tidy, coordinating outfits, and keeping inventory of the disposables they use/need)
- Keeping their word and commitments, and to negotiate time and responsibilities
- Self reliance: ability to cook small meals for themselves and siblings (using the oven, microwave, and stove top and follow recipes, ability to sew on a button, wash the car, complex chores such as watering/mowing, follow basic instructions to assemble toys), use tools, and make all purchase types
- Participate and carry on conversations with adults, showing respect, deference, proper manners, and inquisitiveness
- Basic attack and problem solving skills
By the time a child is 13 (or about), they should be self-functioning individuals, with the mechanics of the broad disciplines of the Three Rs. What they haven’t learned entirely is to override their impulses and instincts, to be safe in all situations, but the above basics will prepare them for when their hormones begin raging, and when they’ll need your guidance, kindness, and patience the most.
Age 14 and beyond will be addressed in the next post.
