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Hey, any sky-gazing fans out there--here's a list of the meteor showers you can catch soon. (I'm a fan of watching the sky; it's nice and dark in Charles City County, and we have our own little observatory.)
Leonids: November 6-30, peak TODAY!
Geminids: December 4-17, peak around the 14th
Usids: December 17-26, peak around the 22nd
Quadrantids: December 28-January 12, peak around January 3
And coming up later in the year: the Lyrids in April, the Eta Aquariids in April-May, the Perseids in July-August, and the Orionids in October.
Keep your eyes on the sky!
www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/science/meteor-showers-2018.html
The Leonids and More Meteor Showers That Will Light Up Night Skies in 2018
nytimes.com
All year long, Earth passes through streams of cosmic debris. Here’s our list of major meteor showers and how to spot one.20 hours ago
When we were there in October, the night before the shearing, we were able to see the Gemenids. I’ve never seen anything like it. Most of the kids got cold and couldn’t hang, but my eight-year-old and I sat by the pond and stared at the sky for well over an hour. Magical. 💫
Just saw this posted right beforr your post. earthsky.org/tonight/radiant-point-for-leonid-meteor-shower?utm_campaign=shareaholic&utm_medium=f...
I only have four, and I can't even TELL you how many people IN ACADEMIA said to me, "HOW many? HOW?" As if I were raising a barbarian horde large enough to swarm the walls of civilization.
Oh, and the other stuff too. Although I guess my pig-raising pictures aren't really dispelling any stereotypes just now.
3 days ago
I have five. I get asked if we're "done," and I say, "No. We're not going to win the land war in Asia any other way!"
I have nine kids, and people count. The best time was when I had "only" five some years ago and we were flying to Washington DC to visit grandparents. We boarded a plane in Atlanta and a white-haired man in first class was moving his lips as he counted my husband and I board with our kids. I sent him "the look" and he squirmed in embarrassment. As we got to our seats my husband said, "Did you notice Newt Gingrich in first class?" Yes, Mr. Gingrich moves his lips when he counts,
I loved it the first time a fellow homeschool mama said to me, "oh, you only have four." 😂 Definitely not the typical world reaction!
How about, "Are they all yours?" That one comes up an awful lot. "Yep, even the one I'm nursing!"
I have 3 kids, otherwise known as a homeschool starter pack 😁
Yup, so funny to see people trying to count inside their head as I give the ages of my entourage. "Yes, that makes 6," saving them the trouble. Always people are nice. Mostly they say "I could never do that." My elevator speech is - Children are like goldfish: they expand to fill the environment. One child takes all your time, 2 children take all your time, 3 children .....
I have 2. I'm usually the odd one out at homeschool get togethers. But I get the giggles every time someone asks if we have a farm. Nope, we live in the burbs.
I get some weird comments, too, and I only have 3 boys. When did 3 kids become so astonishing? 😄
Yes! I get asked if I'm bringing my daycare to Costco.
Susan Wise Bauer I was feeling sheepish during the first part. We also have a farm: large garden, dairy cow, etc. 😂 Also four kids. Apparently I'm living up to much of the stereotype.
If anyone says to me shockingly how many kids we have, I just retort that, in my small circle of friends (you know, being homeschoolers and all), I know FOUR families with NINE kids each, and a BOATLOAD of families with five kids or more apiece. That usually shuts them up.
I always said that were weren't a REAL hs family--we didn't have goats! We only raise sheep and cattle.
My response to four is always, “Calm down. It’s less than one hand.” Sometimes it feels like a lot, but it’s not. 😁
Joy Cherrick and Kevin Cherrick
OMG! We drove a 4x4 pick up and not a mini van... wore jeans not dresses - We must not have been 'real'.....
My SIL has nine 🙂 Just doing her part! Average number of kids in a Muslim family is four per wife... So there’s that. Sixteen kids in one family is not uncommon.
I have four. Many people tell me that they're amazed at how well my children can speak to adults and hold conversations. But no farm, just some weird pets.
I had 5 boys... I wish I had a dollar for every time someone asked me if « I was trying for a girl? »
I live in the Bay Area and I have five kids. People here don’t do that often. Then, when I say I homeschool! The other day a mom from my four year old’s preschool came by my house. I was at CC with my 8 year old. She asked our nanny a bunch of intrusive questions about my schedule. I guess she figured because I wasn’t home in the middle of the day I must not be homeschooling for real. She even commented that she doesn’t know how I am really homeschooling because I’m so busy. Little did she know, I was out with my eight-year-old because I was homeschooling at that very moment. People just don’t get it.
A person actually did ask me if I churned my own butter when she found out I homeschooled. I don’t get the connection, but after this video, I see I am not the only one who has been asked this question. Hilarious!
We have four and people often respond, “WOW.”
"But....but...how do you, like, LEARN?" That was a question my 9yo received last week.....from a teacher.
We don’t raise goats or chickens. Just crickets, mealworms and frogs.
This is the BEST!!!
FX Aidan 😂😂😂
It's not just a problem for U.S. schools--interesting to see other countries grapple with the testing/assessment monster.
"Children as young as 11 are being put on a “GCSE flight path” and taught an increasingly narrow curriculum, teachers say.
"Schools are preparing children for GCSEs from the start of secondary school and have an obsession with exams, meaning access to arts subjects is being restricted, according to a survey....schools are focusing children on their GCSEs from Year 7, the first year of secondary school, and limiting exposure to a range of subjects including music, art and drama. Schools are under pressure to devote time to core GCSE subjects because assessments by the government focus on English, maths, science, a foreign language and history or geography.
"GL Assessment, which commissioned the YouGov survey of parents and teachers, said schools felt forced to offer a 'limited, bare-bones education'. It found that more than three quarters of teachers and three fifths of parents believed their schools were offering a more restricted curriculum from an earlier age."
AND I have to think that this is a related phenomenon...
"The number of children being home schooled has risen by 27 per cent in a year."
Still a small phenomenon in the U.K., but that's an impressive percentage.
www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/schools-force-pupils-to-focus-on-gcse-curriculum-from-age-of-11-q...
Schools force pupils to focus on GCSE curriculum from age of 11
thetimes.co.uk
Children as young as 11 are being put on a “GCSE flight path” and taught an increasingly narrow curriculum, teachers say. Schools are preparing children for GCSEs from the start of secondary school...3 days ago
Such an obsession for curriculum is one of the reasons this civilization is no longer able to produce people like Shakespeare, Leibniz, and Beethoven.
When the goal is to fit into government expectations rather than develop the student according to his or her God given gifts and abilities, the path will reflect that reality. I prefer the many options in the United States over the test driven "funnel" in other countries which directs children onto a path at an early age. There is always room for late-bloomers to reinvent themselves in the U.S.!
As an American whose son prepared for and took (and destroyed) the IGCSEs, I will say in the defense of GCSE/IGCSE testing that studying for these exams equips a student with a MUCH, MUCH better education than what students get in the US. The two systems cannot be compared - the GCSEs/IGCSEs are handwritten, wholistic, and the study path for preparing for them is deep, wide, and substantive. We here in America would be SO much better off with the GCSEs as our educational system. I typically homeschooled my son, but when the opportunity to attend British schools presented itself, we lunged toward that with no holds barred. The time my son spent in British schools was the most educationally enriching of his entire academic career thus far (he's now in college in the US).
So much for society having learned what we were supposed to from Dorothy Sayers.
I think it might be worse over here. This is a typical account from a teenager www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-46181240
One of my biggest frustrations as a high school freshman (in 1972!) was being told to prepare THEN for my career, by picking “good” classes, and getting “good” grades, to get into a “good” college. At least those were broad classes. Don’t get me started on AP...
I'm from the UK, and I think there are a combination of factors which lead to this being almost inevitable. Generally speaking education is seen as being the responsibility of the state, which is reflected by the small numbers in private or home-based education. The state is stretched for funds, and so the education budget has faced not growing in line with the desire of teachers and schools. Most state school education is classroom based and 'academic', and so there are subjects like music, or art, or even sport to some extent which the schools would generally struggle to teach well (in my opinion). And so perhaps the schools are just focusing on what they can do to the best of their ability, especially at a time when there has been a drive for strengthening a core curriculum. The consequence often seems to be that education feels like a qualification factory, which leaves students either competing for the prize without caring about the subject, or disenchanted with the whole system.
