Dreaming Redux

It might have been helpful if I had first said WHY I want to start a school.

I had a great education. I think part of the reason it was so good, however, is that school was interesting to me. I took full advantage of the opportunities that were given to me. I was able to study sciences, history and literature at the highest level offered in my school. In addition I was able to do drama and debate. I participated in mock trial and learned a lot about government. I traveled with various teams and groups both to compete and to watch. I learned much about community from being part of the strong culture in our school.

I have spent many years pondering why I enjoyed school so much, but I've also realized something that every school must come to face sooner or later: my education primarily prepared me to be a successful student, and by extension, a teacher. I'm not certain that it prepared me all that well for other things. I've come to believe over the years that school should prepare students for more than just more school. It should prepare them for what the culture of their chosen fields of study will look like. In other words, they should spend less time in science reading textbooks and more time experimenting, collaborating, publishing and crunching numbers. History students should also spend less time in books (unless they are primary sources) and more time relating current events to older ones. History should have a heavy component of geography driven by cultural studies to achieve true understanding. Math needs to be studied in the context of real-world engineering problems so that students see how it is practical, useful and lucrative. You get my drift. And always, always, in every single course, students should be writing, writing, writing all the time.

We need to enculturate children to be citizens of the world and not just into school, or even just into the United States.

My other gripe with school is that it is too compartmentalized. English. History. Biology. And so on. The problem with that approach is that students miss completely the connections that make the world exciting, wonderful and functional. For example, how awesome to study evolution as a unifying theory of biology while simultaneously studying the naturalistic literature that rose out of the time, or the political and religious forces that came into play while society turned more to science than faith. How truly fantastic to overlay all of this with the era of colonialism and discuss exactly what was going on in the western psyche that made this colonialism okay. Did increasing secularism make this better or worse? Are we so different now? Is the US ideal of democratic governments in the middle east just another way to gain resources we don't have? To spread Christianity? Is it different?

I want students to leave school learning to ask questions, not just to answer them. And I want them to know how to search and search until they find answers, or at least better questions. I want them to know how to think critically and engineer solutions to complex problems. I want them to be able to speak in front of a group, write a paper that is truly professional in whatever subject is given them, to present their findings and hold a smart discussion, to write a resume any young person would be proud to hand off.

Schools need to be structured in ways that tailor a child's education to their needs: Smaller schools. Technology. Teachers more often as tutors instead of "sages on the stage." A cohort of student-colleagues and teachers. A cohesive framework in which to work. Teachers paid like professionals who are paid full time to work full time.

Stay tuned . . .

Overheard at Home Pre-School

"Jesus made our bodies." Yes, He did, I affirmed in the simplest explanation available to a barely three year-old, who is not my child. Her statement made me slightly guilty. Our theme today was, in part, the letter "E" and for snack we were making elephant ears. Fry bread the size of a basketball hoop covered in sugar. Guilty because it isn't exactly the healthiest snack for little God-given bodies.

It's all about the theme right?

Around a mouthful of fry-bread she added, "Jesus gave me a boba."

Um . . . okay?

"And Jesus gave my brother a penis."

Oh! So at your house you use the correct word for male anatomy, but not female, apparently.

My own baby Jedi pipes up and says, "Boba is green."

"No!! My boba's not green. It's by my bum."

"Yes. Boba is green."

I realized, in time to break up any further argument or proof from the little girl ready to pull her pants down, that THIS:



was the Boba in question.

And The Youngling is right. His armor is green. I'll have to take Miss Visitor's word for the rest.

Almost as funny as the language misunderstanding between two pre-schoolers however, was finding this picture while looking for Mr. Fett.


The title of this gem? "Boba Fett is My Dad." And while my inclination is to offer my condolences, it is important to note that the child looks ridiculously happy. This picture came from a blog post boasting 40 BOBA FETTS. It is more than possible that nobody here (except maybe TamathyC) geeks out on this kind of stuff the way I do, but can anyone offer an explanation, psychological or cultural or otherwise, for how Boba Fett, a character with only a single line in the original trilogy, became such a cult-classic?

It's Not Easy Being Green, Though It Might Not Be Too Bad

The best subject that I ever taught was part of my first job: Advanced Placement Environmental Science, lovingly called APES by the many outstanding students I met in that assignment. As much as I loved it, I wasn't really very good at it. I was only a few years older than the students themselves, my own background in the subject wasn't that vast, and my classroom skills at that point were pretty weak. (In fact, my adjustment to that first teaching job might make an interesting post. Like the day I found the ten-inch rusted scissors in the front desk looking as dangerous as two daggers held together. The students told me the previous teacher used to threaten them with the scissors. Nobody was sure if he was joking. Then he had a nervous breakdown. But I digress.)

APES is such a fun subject because it requires teachers and students to pull from their entire knowledge base. A working knowledge of all the major sciences--ecology, biology, chemistry and physics--is essential. In addition, a student must be able to take their science knowledge and view it through a lens of both political and social systems in order to see how knowledge applies to actual reality. An empathy for, and willingness to understand, different cultures is helpful. To all this, mathematical models of varying complexity are a large part of the subject, as well as an ability to interpret and understand statistical renderings of data.

One of the chapters in our book was one the three R's. (No, not THOSE three R's, which aren't really R's anyway.) Reducing. Reusing. Recycling. Until I studied environmental science with my students in some detail I had not understood that these R's are not created equal. Instead, the order in which the are presented represents a hierarchy of desirability.


Recycling gets a lot of publicity. Perhaps because the effects of an entire community adopting a broad recycling program are easily and quickly measured. My large recycling bin is picked up every other week and I can clearly see all of the trash that has dodged the landfill to be turned into new, useful consumables. Recycling is a pro-active process that makes me feel good. From a cost-benefit analysis, the recycling of most products represents a large savings in both the short and the long-term. (Glass is a rather glaring exception--it is NOT always cheaper to recycle glass than to create new.) However, when you look at energy inputs and outputs in a system, recycling is only one step away from manufacturing new products from scratch. A rather large step, and an important one, but still not optimal.

Better than recycling is reusing items. A couple of years ago, quite by accident, I found myself looking around the local Goodwill. I found a large variety of nice items, in a clean and bright store, and the prices just couldn't be beat! Though I don't shop there often for my kids--the non-baby clothes are often too worn, and there is no shortage of hand-me-downs here at home--I have been able to satisfy (and justify!) my craving for "new" things to wear on a regular basis, and I get the satisfaction of finding some really awesome deals. My thrift shopping has also encouraged me to contribute at the other end. Our house is pretty small, and so I aggressively clean out closets, bookshelves, kitchen cupboards, etc., taking bags of various sizes for donation monthly. Besides being "green," my purchases provide jobs for adults with mental disabilities and if I designate my donations as being for the local women's shelter, then the group is given in-store credit in the equivalent amount of my donation so that battered women can purchase needed items for themselves and their children. Shopping thrift is obviously not the only way to reuse items, but it is one way.

Of course, the best of these R's, and perhaps the hardest is to "reduce." I'm not even sure that for Americans reducing is a matter of "doing without," but perhaps a re-defining of what our needs are. I'm not talking about legislation here, or curtailing our freedoms (though if America continues on its reckless spending habits, and its subsequent depletion of natural resources, this is exactly what will happen), I'm talking about being honest with ourselves about whether or not we carry attitudes of entitlement that have nothing to do with government assistance. The American lifestyle both sucks global resources while simultaneously, perversely providing jobs all over the world to satisfy our lust for cheap goods.

The further irony is that if Americans become more conservative, careful and cautious in their spending habits, our economy slows. Yet, the question must certainly be asked if the levels of economic growth achieved in the late nineties were ever sustainable. The answer, of course, is no. American economic history over the last century has been dominated by boom and bust cycles--some more dramatic than others. But cautious principles of personal spending, and an adjustment in expectations about what we "deserve" out of life would create an economy of sustainable long-term growth, even if that growth was relatively slow.

The stores are filled lately with kitschy "green" products. Everyone makes their own $1 grocery store bags now (mostly made so cheaply that they can only be called "reusable" for a handful of trips to the store), but the clothing is probably my favorite. Tee-shirts that say things like, "Love Your Mother" or "I (Heart) Boys Who Recycle." The irony is that these tee shirts are manufactured in plants that are thousands of miles away (even China is sub-contracting labor to North Korea) by workers in appalling conditions so that Old Navy or Wal-Mart of whomever can market them for $5 apiece at earth day time. They sell thousands of unneeded products, making money from volume instead of huge mark-ups, exacerbating environmental and social problems so that people can wear items saying how much they hate environmental and social problems.

Before I'm too hard on the big box type stores, however. It is also important to point out that corporations, like Wal-Mart are leading their own "green" revolution, because they have found the great cost savings that comes from conserving. Turning on half as many lights, and converting those lights to more efficient types, saves a single store tens of thousands annually. This translates to tens of millions company-wide. If there is to be any true revolution in America, companies will have to be on board. Companies will not get on board without such commitment making the bottom-line more attractive.

But I'm not pointing my finger at you or anybody else. I think today I am pointing it at me. This fantastic opinion piece by columnist Thomas Friedman appeared in our local paper today. He argues for finding somebody new to blame for the BP Oil spill: The (Wo)Man in the Mirror. If BP cut corners it is because each of us, on some level, wants to constantly find cheaper ways to maintain, or expand, our truly luxuriant lifestyle. Is "luxuriant" going to far? I don't think so--by any comparison to the rest of the world, and especially to history, our lives are filled with leisure and ease. I too often complain about my tiny house, forgetting that my house is still larger than the average house size in 1950, when people had much larger families.

In the last year or two, we have made a couple of adjustments (besides my Goodwill shopping) to the way we do things that haven't been too hard, and have helped us be a little more green and have a little more green. A couple of years ago, Plantboy bought a rather large composting bin, but as he put it in a rather unobtrusive place in our yard, I was okay with it. We keep a small can in the house that I fill with scraps, usually while I make dinner, and we take it out nightly. We layer these green scraps with a brown layer (usually leaves) every so often and each spring he opens the bottom and like MAGIC!* beautiful mounds of rich, dark, nutrient-rich earth come spilling out. Saturday night we enjoyed our first meal filled with garden goodies--baby tri-colored carrots, buttery Yukon Golds, and tender beets. While I know that plenty of people like beet greens, we are not those people, and the 40 days of rain we've had these past weeks made them rather unpalatable-looking. Anyway, I chopped up the stems and greens anyway, marveling at that large pile of organic matter for adding to the compost. Today's unwanted beet greens might be next year's green beans.



What an amazing thing.

Gardening, composting, sewing and reaping, working and observing together as a family has been a huge blessing to us. When I asked Plantboy what he wanted for Father's Day he said, "Is it weird to say that I want a 25 pound bag of organic fertilizer?" Maybe. But no weirder than wanting a $300 stick for hitting a little white ball. And much more useful.

The second change we made was this summer. When we first moved to our city, it was the first time we'd owned a home in a couple of years and we didn't have a lawn mower. A friend from Church loaned us a fixer-upper. Thanks to Plantboy's mad mechanic skills, he has managed to keep this thing running through three summers. This spring however, he confronted the reality: to keep it going now would require some pretty major fixes, starting with new spark plugs and working from there.

Or, he wheedled, we could get one of these instead:

He had mentioned the manual lawn mower before, but I was never sure that he was entirely serious. Still, the $100 price tag was very attractive and I agreed, if somewhat reluctantly.

I love this "machine." The Wall Street Journal earlier this week ran a lengthy article on the new trend in souped up lawn mowers with iPod ports, alternative fuel versions and cushy seats. These models run anywhere from $3,000-$10,000. (You'd have to use a lot of bio-fuel to justify that sucker.)

But if you have a smallish plot of turf (we have systematically been pulling out grass ever since we moved in), this might just be an answer. Saturday I mowed the entire lawn (Plantboy edged) in about 30 minutes. The manual mower seems to work best if you push it fast, so I actually got my heart rate up while mowing. I finished without a pulled rotator cuff from the pull-start, nor the smell of gasoline in my clothes and hair. It is so quiet that listening to my iPod would have been entirely possible. The way it cuts the grass doesn't damage the blades as much, so my shoes and feet weren't grass stained when I finished. The best news is that Jedi Knight and Padawan can push the thing if they work together. Like a team of baby oxen.

Now if we could just stop using disposable diapers . . . .




* Okay, not magic, it is a very natural process of biological decay. But just because a thing can be explained doesn't mean it isn't remarkable.

May the Fourth Be With You

Today is International Star Wars Day. I hope I don't feel compelled to talk with a lithp, I mean lisp, all day.

I'd like to take a moment from our regularly scheduled program to geek out on you. (If you think that IS the regularly scheduled program, then you can just keep your comments to yourself.)

When I was about five, I had a set of Underoos with R2D2 on them. No, they were not for boys. The original Star Wars movie (Episode IV: A New Hope) was released the month I turned two. One of my earliest memories is of going to the theater to see Episode V (The Empire Strikes Back). I was five. The film was scary. The movie theater had a ceiling that was old and dome-like, the supports made of wood. I remember leaning back in my seat to avoid the scary and thinking that the ceiling looked like the underside of huge spider. Not exactly the most comforting thought.


By the time Episode VI (Return of the Jedi) came out in 1983, I was in love with Luke Skywalker. That's right, NOT Han Solo. I was never big on "the rebel factor." (Ironic really, as Luke was technically a leader in the rebellion, but with all the force stuff he was mostly a straight arrow.) During the nineties, I wore my hair short and blonde a la Meg Ryan or Jenna Elfman. When it would grow out and need a cut, my older brother would assume Luke's whiny voice and say, "But Uncle Owen! I was going to go into Tashee Station to pick up some power converters!" Ah, Luke! You are my first love.



I was as shocked as the rest of the world in finding out that Luke and Leia were siblings. Particularly after his undisguised admiration in Episode IV, and that highly un-sisterly kiss she plants on him in Episode V. And why aren't Jedi allowed to marry anyway? Are they basically highly violent monks and nuns? The world may never know, though there are plenty of people who've asked the question. Yes, I've watched their YouTube videos.



When I was in college, if I was feeling a bit of insomnia, I put on Episode IV and was asleep in 20 minutes. Not that I don't love this movie, but that I have honestly seen it 100 times if I'd seen it once. But no matter how many times I see it, I always cry at the end of Episode VI when Darth Vadar decides he can't stand idly by while his son is tortured, and throws the Emperor to his death in a cloud of cackling and blue lightning.

I still remember the kid who told me, in about the third grade, that because the Star Wars movies were episodes 4, 5 and 6, that one day they would make episodes1-3. I had hoped beyond hope that he was right.

Now I think my own imagination was almost better. Like so many old-school Star Wars fans, I find myself asking, "Why did they even make these movies?" But then I only have to pause long enough to consider all of the merchandising my Jedi have talked me into (or I've talked them into?) in the last two years and the remainder of the movies, as well as The Clone Wars, starts to make a lot more sense.

These "new" Star Wars movies (which my Jedi never call them), are called

Episode I: Attack of the Horrible Child Actors

Episode II: The Worst Love Story In This Or Any Other Universe

Episode III: Revenge of the Incomprehensible Plot

The original trilogy is hokey. From special effects that look drawn on to props that look like duct-taped and spray-painted broom handles. Lucas must have maxed out his credit card at Radio Shack for some of this stuff. But it is the campiness that makes it a classic. Ridiculously implausible scenery is coupled with stilted dialogue common to the genre. (It must be noted that the mediocre screenplays of the first are Academy Award worthy compared to the second trilogy.) However, the beauty of the first films is the genuine and believable interaction of the tree main characters. Harry, Hermione and Ron owe a lot to Luke, Leia and Han. What smart and tough girl doesn't want to find herself in such a triumvirate? Only with a different hair-do.



In his more recent efforts, Lucas substitutes flashy graphics and technology for genuine human interaction. Of course it was obvious that the banthas were just dressed up elephants! But they were real, and it made the whole thing feel more real. I just don't think you will ever elicit any kind of positive response about Jar Jar Binks from anyone older than, say, seven.




After the fiasco of the first three episodes, start to finish, animation was the only thing left to Lucas. Still, I'm quite a big fan of The Clone Wars. When I'm less distracted by the animation married to reality (because it is ALL animation), and long, meandering plot lines are replaced by 23 minute stories, and the actors only have to be as good as their voices, it works pretty well.

It is embarrassing to say for just how long I could go on this vein.

Just after Episode I premiered, there was a Trivial Pursuit Star Wars game issued. My mom bought it, but my brothers and I found it no fun after just a game or two. (My sister looked at us like we were all nuts; the Star Wars love is but one in a very long list of Ways We Are Not Alike.) Why? It was too easy. There was hardly a question we couldn't answer, and an individual's turn might drag on for 10-15 minutes.

As I survey the many pop culture references that still abound regarding these films, I think that for better or worse they are here to stay. It might be possible that these movies, particularly the originals, are the most influential cultural phenomenon of my generation. And they are, hands down, the best thing to come out of the 70's.

There is a prize in this post today. To enter, you must put a Star Wars quote into your comment. For even more fun, leave the quotes uncredited and we can all guess who said what.

The Force will be with you. Always.