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23rd June 2011

elorie @ 11:13am: Announcement I am going to start deleting/purging communities and LJ stuff that isn't being used. If someone wants to take this community over, let me know.

14th September 2007

elorie @ 10:59am: Teaching human evolution Hey! I know, long time, no post...

However, I decided to do a unit on human evolution for my son, both because it's part of my "story of the world" approach (we are going to start on early civilizations next) and because he'll never get this stuff in school...For reference, he is 13 and would be in 8th grade.

I am using "The Field Guide to Early Man" http://www.amazon.com/Field-Guide-Early-Man/dp/0816015171 because it was in the library. It's not a very recent book, and the field of paleoanthropology is constantly changing because of new discoveries, but it's still pretty decent. I've also got copies of "Origins" by Richard Leakey and "Lucy" by Donald Johansen lying around, but we are mostly working from the other book. We have also watched two videos, one a really old "National Geographic" one and a more recent PBS special called "Journey of Man".

Here are some questions I asked him to answer. The first two are reminders since it's been a while since we were talking about biology:

What is binomial nomenclature?

What is a species? What is a genus?

All of the human ancestors are called “hominids”, regardless of genus. Hominids include which genii? (This is the plural of genus)

What is the oldest known hominid?

What is the oldest known member of the genus Homo?

Which hominid species was the first to make stone tools? Fire?

Which one was the first to leave Africa? Why did they leave? What made them able to leave?

How old is Homo sapiens? (This is a trick question)

How long ago did modern humans (Homo sapiens sapiens) appear? Why are we called Homo sapiens sapiens? What is the other type of Homo sapiens?

You may notice that different books give different dates and even categorize species differently. Why do you think that is?

Look in GALILEO Kids for articles on human evolution and find the most recent discoveries. Do the most recent discoveries confirm or change what is in the books?

Bonus: Why is there a controversy about teaching evolution in schools?

25th August 2006

elorie @ 3:31pm: Tennessee Aquarium I went to the Georgia Aquarium and was less than impressed. I am thinking about going to the Tennessee Aquarium tomorrow, and poking around on their website found this: http://www.tnaqua.org/KidsTeachers/Homeschool.asp

I don't think I can drive up there for their Homeschool Day (I'm going tomorrow to my high school reunion, but it's a three-hour drive more or less) but it does sound interesting....Maybe in January.

6th August 2006

elorie @ 10:23pm: first day homeschooling my kid This is what I'm doing at the moment:

We got videos of the first four episodes of "Life on Earth", as well as a bunch of books on fossils, the history of life, and evolution. Also, I have a high school biology textbook...not a really recent one, but it was free.

He has problems with his handwriting, so I got him a calligraphy set. He can do that OR typing for a little while every day. (Web site here: http://www.learn2type.com/)

He's also supposed to practice his trumpet and draw a little.

Every video he watches or book he reads, he is supposed to write a summary of and put it in his notebook. I check these for errors; words he misspells become his spelling words.

Currently, he's mostly reading whatever he wants; as we go along, I'll assign more reading. Books he reads go on a list.

I've also set him to a project: List the ages of the Earth in order, and do some kind of presentation (art, computer slide show, essay) about each of them. He is supposed to include the time frame, what animals and plants appeared in that era, and what was going on environmentally (supercontinents, that sort of thing). Later, we are going to do something with the classifications of life.

My current theory is that I'm going to start at the beginning and work forward. First we do the history of life on Earth, fairly quickly because I know he's seen a lot of this before. Then we do human ancestors and prehistory up to the late Neolithic. Then we start talking about the development of writing and beginnings of history...and work forward from there :)

27th July 2006

elorie @ 11:08am: I'm reading The Well-Trained Mind, on classical education. I like some aspects of the approach...teaching history as a story, for example...but history doesn't start with the Romans and Greeks :) It would be hard to fit into their four-year system anyway, so I'm going to do this:

-Start with cosmology and theories about the origin of the universe, while reading different creation stories from around the world, then the solar system. Also, some sacred geometry to ease him into math. There's an observatory here, so we can go and talk about astronomy.

-Go back over geology and formation of the continents briefly, as I know he's covered this. Then talk about the evolution of life in stages, time-wise and also by phylum. (I don't feel like we have to get into huge detail here, just so he knows about them).

-Start talking about human evolution and earliest pre-history. At this point, we'll start going continent by continent, beginning with Africa. We can work our way from the early hominids and stone tools to ancient Egypt.

-Then we'll switch to Asia and talk about the early civilizations of India and China, then Europe (Sumer and Babylon, Greeks, Romans, Celts, and so forth) then the Americas.

-Actually what I want to do is go around and talk about the development of civilizations and writing in different places, and THEN start talking about the Hellenistic world of Greece, Egypt, and Rome (which is where the classical curriculum outlined in the book starts.

So, what with all that, I think I can keep him busy for a while. And he'll learn about stuff most people never encounter until college, or never.

17th July 2006

elorie @ 1:23pm: I'm a freak, but a fun one... I am toying with the idea of doing things like a section on ancient Rome (or any other time/culture, but Rome was what I was researching today) and doing things like:

-Make thewonderboy a tunic and bolla, like a Roman boy would have worn.
-Have him research what ancient Romans ate, and have some Roman meals
-Have him learn what a Roman boy would be learning...that is, Roman history, how to read and write in Latin, Roman religion, and rhetoric. (That fits, not coincidentally, with classical education and the trivium).

I could do this with lots of different cultures and time periods, but Rome is actually easier than most because we know a lot about what they were doing, their religion and civilization, and (thanks to sites like Pompeii) their daily life.

I'd like to do it with a lot of different things, but I'm not sure where to start. With the earliest humans seems logical, and I could incorporate some of the wilderness skill stuff as well but...where can I learn how to knap flint? ;)

Is that really cool, or just weird? Not that weird bothers me, mind you...

9th July 2006

elorie @ 11:56am: woo! jackpot! http://www.gpb.org/public/education/index.jsp

This is Georgia Public Broadcasting's Education program. It's aimed, actually, at public schools, but homeschoolers can also sign up for it. They have various educational programs which include not only videos but classroom materials and, in the case of the language courses, scheduled "classes" via telephone with native speakers. They have a three year Japanese program :)

7th July 2006

elorie @ 2:20pm: Oh, and... Another Useful Thing: Self-sufficiency. On the principle that the surest basis of self-esteem is the ability to provide for your own needs.

My son already picks up after himself (more or less), does basic housework, and cooks a little. He makes a mean quesadilla.

I'd like him to learn to cook more, manage money, garden perhaps, sew (at least enough to repair clothes). As he gets older, some basics of carpentry and mechanics (he could learn how to fix his bike, for example). What else?

elorie @ 11:29am: Why, and how.... It helps to have a plan. Or a statement of purpose. Or, in the case of magic, a ritual intention. So I'm working out how I want to go about this home schooling thing, and why I think some things will work to suit my purposes, and what it is I'm trying to do, anyhow.

Here are some ideas I think are important:

Inherent worth and immanent divine.
Understanding the world around you, especially the natural world. I think reality is the best teacher :)
Being present in the here and now. (see #2)
Creative expression

I'm planning on doing a combination of unschooling, Charlotte Mason, and classical education. I've only skimmed the surface of these, and I'm planning on checking more books out of the library and reading more, but the gist of it is this:

Unschooling. No set lessons and definitely no tests, unschooling is based on the notion that children are naturally curious and want to learn. Letting them follow their own interests is not only the best way to motivate them, but the best way for them to learn as well. It also incorporates the world as you encounter it as your classroom....going to the grocery store and adding up your purchases, for example. It requires a certain amount of being light on your feet, but it's also something I tend to do already. More to the point, something thewonderboy does already...he's currently reading The Tao of Pooh, because he wants to.

Relationship to above ideas: If my son is a little expression of the divine, there's a sense that he also has inherent wisdom. I think that if you want to know what you are meant to do, look at your natural talents and inclinations. It's not for me to decide what my son is meant to do, only he can do that, and his natural interests will be the best preparation for that.

There are also things he needs to know in order to get along in the world which may not exactly stir his interest, but I figure I can work them in.

Charlotte Mason method. I'm a little fuzzier on this one, but it involves using stories and art and nature as "textbooks", short lessons, and a huge emphasis on observation and what she calls "narration", that is, reading a story or looking at a work of art or going on a nature walk and describing what you just read or saw. She calls this the "act of knowing". She also says, "Never be indoors when you can rightly be without."

Relationship to above ideas: Observation of the world around you...the real world, as it is unfolding right now, not at an artificial remove...and understanding what you see, is ultimately the best teacher, the strongest protection, and the most effective guide.

Classical education. This is the method of education used in Western civilization for millenia. It's based on what's called the "trivium"....grammar, logic, and rhetoric. Grammar is defined as the basic parts of things and facts (not only language; that's just the use of the word we see most often). Logic is analysis of cause and effect and of the relationships between things. Rhetoric is expression...in Greek and Roman times, this meant oral expression and the art of telling stories and making speeches.

I'm a little murkier about how this relates to the above principles, but really this is a method that will give some structure to the wild-hair aspects of the other methods, and it's the content that will relate most clearly to what I'm aiming at. I'll probably have a clearer idea once I've read the book I'm going to check out, which is called "The Well-Trained Mind".

More later, this has gotten long enough...

5th July 2006

elorie @ 3:04pm: A proposal.... I won't call it a "modest proposal" because that would bring on unfortunate associations. :D But I've noticed this community doesn't get any traffic. Maybe that's because I restricted the membership too much, or because I got sidetracked from the original intention...I don't know.

Anway, as I see it there are two options:

One, keep to the original intent of the community, but open it up a bit more. If there were more people, there would be more stuff. That has advantages and disadvantages.

Two, renovate the community and turn it towards my current interest of Pagan homeschooling. I have lots to say on the subject, and I bet some other people do too. The question is whether the current membership will be interested or not.

What say you?

13th November 2005

luna_virgo @ 9:59pm: Freya rosary I had planned a blot ("bloat" - Northern tradition's word for a ceremonial offering, usually alcoholic) for Freya sometime this weekend. Friday night and Saturday passed, and I kept postponing it in favor of time with my girlfriend, housecleaning, movie watching, and sleep, which is how most of my weekends are spent. Last night, my cat Leo, the spoiled fat tabby in my icon, was very persistent in pursuit of attention. I have noted in the past that he is quite capable of conveying messages from Herself, so tonight I gave him and his brother Smokey some catnip, and devoted some time to Freya.

( Read more...Collapse )

Current Mood: happy

8th November 2005

elorie @ 1:10pm: the archangels are bugging me again.... I so don't think of myself as a CM (ceremonial magician) and I don't have much truck with Christo-Paganism either (Not a critique of people who do. It's just not my thing.)

However. One of the consistently strongest manifestations I get in circle are the Archangels as guardians of the four directions; they are also generally terribly enthusiastic about helping me. Michael in particular.

Why? I don't know. But I felt prompted to do the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram (as it appears in wossname Kraig's book) last night, and they were all, "Well, that's nice. You need to set this room up with some altars and do this more often, missy."

This also goes along with my sudden obsession with 72 this and that, grimoires, and the Kabbalah. Why, I ask you, why?

I've got this notion in my head of equating the archangels with the Feri guardians in a syncretic kind of way. It isn't such a stretch.

lupaloo and I need to do our angel ritual we keep threatening to do...angel shoes and all....

31st October 2005

luna_virgo @ 3:55pm: Intro and plans for Hallows Just a brief introduction, for those who don't know me: I'm Gina and I live in central Alabama. I've been a witch for close to 14 years (since age 20), first as an eclectic Neowiccan and for the last 6 years or so as mostly Heathen (not Asatru) with occasional forays into Voudon and Feri. I read tarot and use astrology quite a bit. My ritual practices are pretty much just whatever works. I'm on a more familiar basis with Freya than any other deity, but I'm not formally dedicated to Anyone. I've always been strictly solitary but lately I'm wanting something more.

So tonight after my secular festivities (which will involve candy and horror movies), I plan to tend my altars and make offerings. Goldschlager for the Heathen gods (with a shot for my friend who passed away last December - he loved the stuff), rum, candy, and new saint candles for the New Orleans Voodoo shrine I've had since Katrina, and fresh water and candy on the ancestor shrine (to which I need to add a photo of my great aunt who passed this year as well). Then I have a feeling there will be some work with Freya and possibly Odin, and a tarot reading.

Tomorrow I'm taking a vacation day from work for my yearly practice of family grave decoration. This being the Deep South, land of huge extended families and 10 million churchyards, it involves a circuitous route of back roads between 6 cemeteries in 2 counties. But I love doing this. I have always loved cemeteries, but more than that, it's a reminder of my roots to drive around this mostly rural area my family has lived in for almost 200 years. I also believe that tending graves strengthens the ancestral bond and thus improves luck.

Tomorrow night is the New Moon in Scorpio, which is in my 6th house (work, health, service) conjunct my Venus. Seems like a good time to start working on something. I think I'll begin with a commitment to keep a written journal again, to write in before I go to bed at a decent hour (taking care of myself has not been high on my list of priorities lately), and to record dreams in. Basically I need to commit to a renewal of daily maintenance on a physical and spiritual level. Not just when I feel like it or when something big is happening, but every day.

So what are your plans for this holiday, or in the near future?

Current Mood: busy

28th October 2005

elorie @ 10:54am: In the spirit of things... I'd like to do some stuff we used to do in former groups way back when...one of which was, putting people on the spot :)

I want you to think about writing something...either an area of expertise, or just a ramble to spark a discussion. I've already set jenkitty on to writing about dance in ritual, and I posted my own views about What a Witch Should Know.

So, think up something. Or expect me to come stalking you in e-mail or via chat and suggesting something for you :)

elorie @ 9:33am: Re-post from my own journal... I have been contemplating, and discussing with a couple of people, what someone who is studying witchcraft should know when they are done.

I think the mistake many people make is to treat it like an academic subject…assign reading, and so forth. I think that’s a mistake. It leads to a whole bunch of “book Pagans” running around who think that just because they can recite all the elemental correspondences of the Tree of Life backwards that means they know something. I would go so far as to eschew theory altogether at first, just start people in doing exercises and games that teach the basic skills, and only start in on theory later. This is because if you TELL people what is going on, all too often you give their intellect a way to box it up and label it, which defeats the purpose. Better to confuse ‘em for a while until they are good and shaken up and then give them explanations that will produce an “aha!” moment or ten. They learn better that way anyway.

Basic tools

Ground/center
Breathwork
Visualization/meditation
Trance
Dreamwork
Anchoring mental/emotional/energetic states
Feeling/projecting energy
Connection/immersion
Cast circle/call quarters
Call/dismiss divinities and energies
Banishing/cleansing
Ways to raise energy…chants, etc.

Basic applications

Ritual
Divination
Spellwork
Healing

How to teach these….

I like the format of Reclaiming’s Elements of Magic class, where you work your way through the four elements and spirit, teaching different skills along the way. Plus, I like the energy of teaching in groups. In this way the skills get integrated into the actual practice of ritual; plus by the time you have cast a circle six times (one overarching circle, one for each element, plus spirit) you have the ritual format memorized. You learn different ways to do every part of the ritual, and in the final one the students are expected to come up with a ritual on their own.

For Air, for example, you spend some time meditating on Air…you do Air exercises (breathwork, chanting) I’m fond of using a Frisbee as a metaphor for communication. You come up with Air associations. I also like singing the entire Air circle casting, because I’m like that. You build an Air altar.

Air can be kind of talky, but I prefer singing and free association (and Frisbees) to a lot of discussion of theory. I’d rather encourage people to talk about themselves a bit, get to know each other. Also set class boundaries, because that’s an Air thing too. If I discuss theory at all, it’ll be something a little opaque like the notion that a circle is both a microcosm of the Universe and an expanded boundary of the self. (That’s perfectly obvious if you’ve been doing this a while, but not particularly if you haven’t).

For Fire I like to do nonverbal circle casting and direction calling, and have people go around and introduce themselves non-verbally. I also like to tell Pagan lightbulb jokes. In this section you play with fire and energy, talk about chakras, and let people feel up each other’s auras.

Water is trance or divination. The students start taking the casting/calling roles; you can take volunteers. Leading through trance and talking about trance takes up time, and it’s the class most likely to run over time. Water associations, water altar, and so on.

Earth. This time you assign parts (the class before so they have time to prepare, unless you are just sadistic like me) and the students do all of the casting and calling. This is often the part where people teach spellwork, though we’ve also done a labyrinth ritual, and I like to have people go sit on rocks J

Spirit: this is the ritual the students are supposed to plan and carry out themselves, and the teachers just go along for the ride.

As I say, I like this format and I like the toss-‘em-in-and-see-if-they-swim approach of it. It does teach ritual format and introduces some basic skills pretty quickly.

Where my experience of Reclaiming (and this may be due entirely to the distance issue, but then, it was hardly even mentioned) was weak was with daily practice.

Daily practice is how you build up your psychic muscles. Ritual is how you develop them further. Ultimately, you are meant to apply all that to the rest of your life in a profound way…and integrating it into your life is helped along by daily practice.

Practice

I keep a dream journal, and a “waking” journal, I meditate and do small personal rituals. That’s my daily practice; I may not do all of these at once. Sometimes I go for walks. Sometimes I just sit on a rock and commune with it, or sit on my back porch and have a conversation with the rose bush. I look at the world. Some element of the physical should be in there…taking up yoga, tai chi, belly dancing, or martial arts is a good plan.
Ideally there should be a balance between the inner, navel-gazing stuff and the more physical, outward directed stuff. Going camping, volunteering to pick up litter or plant trees, gardening…any or all of these can be part of a spiritual practice.

At some point, after someone has been doing a daily practice for a while, I would have them go off and do something spiritual but unrelated…Zen meditation, attending a retreat or ritual for another spiritual tradition. I especially like sending former Christians with attitude back to church and getting them to analyze the service in terms of ritual structure. Something from a culture completely alien to their own is also very good.

This is the point at which I’d introduce some book larnin’. Talk about theory. Divination….Tarot, astrology. Reading fairy tales and myths. I think every Pagan needs to have at least a cursory knowledge of Tarot, astrology, the Kabbalah (mine is very cursory indeed) and world mythology just so they can carry on a conversation at a Pagan gathering. Plus those things can be useful in themselves. A knowledge of the history of Pagandom (ancient and modern) is also good. Plus the Wheel of the Year will get learned if you do those rituals as you go along…I’m not a fanatic about it personally, as I lean towards the Fay-related holidays (Imbolc, Beltane, Midsummer, and Samhain) and sort of gloss over the rest. But I’d make sure someone I was teaching knew about them.

It’s also pretty essential that someone do what we euphemistically call “inner work” which is basically Dealing With Your Shit. Many of the tools…meditation, trance, and so on…are aimed at this, and I only mention it separately because it’s worth emphasizing.

I would teach folk magic all along because that is what I know; that fits into the personal rituals. I’m also fond of cultivating serendipity as a practice and magical technique.

Advanced skills

(in more or less this order, and these are all things I want to practice much more before I go teaching anyone else)

Control of your personal energy space. Expanding/projecting your aura, contracting it, grounding and centering under stress, channeling energy (healing and so forth). These will develop over time anyway but after someone has had time for the basics to sink it they can be discussed in more detail. Ideally those responses should be so ingrained that they kick in under stress or in a confrontation and generally become automatic. Mine are not as ingrained as I would like them to be.

Priest/essing a ritual; in other words, managing the energy of one. This would include discussion of such concepts as a “cone of energy”, “calling the drop” and so on. Far too many people out there squelch the energy of a ritual or never let it build up. This results in boring-ass rituals.

What Reclaiming calls “deep witnessing” which is going into a deep, very grounded trance and simply observing the energy of a ritual. This is harder than it sounds.

Shifting, oracular divination (scrying, seith, that sort of thing), and aspecting…I consider all these related. In some sense being able to do these things is the ultimate goal, because they are essential to the shaman's role; and I consider witchy training to be shamanic training.