Daughter training

[fundies_like_zombies]

I had never noticed before but there seem to be a LOT of books out there about training daughters.

Prob mostly used buy homeschooling families.

Such as

Training our daughters to be keepers at home

a proverbs 31 daughter

the pearables books on home ec.

far above rubies

true womanhood

Does anyone have any experience with these?

What do they cover?

How much practical useful education would a girl get from them?

It is basically training girls to be tidy, to cook and to be submissive not for college or a job?

I want to order one just to see what is in them!

[Guest Anonymous]

They basically teach the daughters to be.... well, slaves to their husbands and children. Its sick.

[fundies_like_zombies]

They basically teach the daughters to be.... well, slaves to their husbands and children. Its sick.

But what sort of topics do they cover?

[MaddieMoody]

http://www.amazon.com/Training-Our-Daug ... 839&sr=8-1

The review of that one describes what's in it.

And wow, that's an expensive brainwashing manual.

[fundies_like_zombies]

http://www.amazon.com/Training-Our-Daughters-Keepers-Home/dp/B000OUQ46A/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1313949839&sr=8-1

The review of that one describes what's in it.

And wow, that's an expensive brainwashing manual.

7 years to learn to be a keeper at home????????

It is expensive anyway but more so as the review says it doesn't teach all the subjects and extra books are needed.

[fundies_like_zombies]

lol!!

"Training Our Daughters To Be Keepers At Home

(book) by Mrs. Craig (Ann) Ward

Courses Include

Godly Womanhood Gardening Knitting

Sewing Family Finances Crocheting

Cooking Home Management Embroidery

Caring for the sick and injured Braiding Rugs Cross-stitch

Childbearing/Breastfeeding Making Greeting Cards Basketry

Caring for Elderly & Comforting Hospitality Home Business

Those Who Mourn Child Development Soapmaking & Candlemaking

Making a House a Home Child Training Family Celebrations

Flower Arranging Raising Animals"

braiding rugs? basketry? Not exactly essentials surely!

I am guessing that the submissive / slave bit is in the Godly womanhood chapter.

[Jencendiary]

braiding rugs? basketry? Not exactly essentials surely!

If you keep them busy doing meaningless make-work, they don't ever have the free time to start thinking & questioning. It's like when you were at that evil communist public school and had a substitute teacher with worksheets & assignments your real teacher never would have made you do. It's not about learning, it's about keeping you quiet and occupied so you aren't trouble.

[aggythenostic]

Yes, and interestingly enough, you don't find a lot of "Training Our Sons" guides, do you? Of course, in order to serve God, girls should learn...cross-stitching. What the f**k? Do they think if you pray hard enough, it really will become 1864, that Golden Age of Women? Well, except for the dying in childbirth, having no rights thing.

The review of that book is kind of enlightening because it reveals where these women are coming from, IMO. It's horrible that they actually learned math or science in school, and not how to milk a cow! How dare their parents let them be concerned with 'worldly things' when one day they were going to have to learn to stretch a single chicken breast to feed a family of fourteen! And I love how she wants to know what "heat will do to food."

It is a pick-and-choosy how-to manual, that is, some subjects are described in great detail and others are glazed over... in the case of learning to cook, it will tell you to go to ABC cookbook and learn to cook dish XYZ, with no explanation the basic tenets of cooking, i.e. what heat does to food, what spices go well together, different cooking methods, etc. Do you see what I mean? Sometimes the book tells you to do something you can do on your own without anyone telling you, and that will be the extent of the lesson.

[fundies_like_zombies]

That is sad AND scary.

What sort of parent wants that for a child to restrict them and their future so much. Especially if the parents weren't brought up like that.

[fundies_like_zombies]

googling and just seen character training which I think is aimed at girls.

Characteristics to learn

charity

cheerfulness

compassion

contentment

courage

determination

diligence

forgiveness

honesty

kindness

meekness

modesty

obedience

patience

respectfulness

truthfulness

willingness

wisdom

Some sound like good things to have in your character but other like meekness were crazy and others like obedience is more like dog training.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

I think there's a big component of being obsessed with certain periods of the past to all this, really - 1864 and the homesteading thing, or rural life possibly up to WW2. It's the romance of the bootstraps, and idealizing a time when the frugal answer to a lot of things really WAS to DIY and knit your own socks.

But for better or for worse, the world has changed, the economy has changed, and the frugal thing to do currently is often not to knit your own socks, because they can be had at a discount retailer for far less than you will spend even on the supplies to make them, never mind the time you'll put in. But the fetish for pre-industrial rural skills remains. As a hobby, well, knock yourself out, but if it's really about saving money and not about having a certain "look" and being matchy-matchy all the time, you can get clothing in particular for cheaper than homemade.

Cooking is a different story, but even there there's a point where it no longer makes sense to insist on canning your own plain tomato sauce or grinding your own flour, when both can be had in pure versions for very little money at any mainstream market. And of course you can learn about cooking techniques, chemistry and all, from either non-religious specialized books or (better yet) take a class at the (horrors!) community college where you can get hands-on instruction. Possibly even while working. I mean, plenty of people manage to cook their own food while holding down a day job that lets them buy all those cans of tomato sauce.

A lot of the "training..." books seem to be more lists of skills that someone has decreed are appropriate for girls to know, with the religious basis for their reasoning, rather than any actual manuals. "If my daughter is to be Godly (or more to the point, if others in my community are to agree that my daughter is Godly) she should know X, Y and Z..." Sort of a list of skills that will supposedly teach the character traits that fundies_like_zombies lists up there.

Thinking about this now it strikes me though - the Titus 2 and Proverbs 31 crowd is big on hands-on learning for the domestic tasks. It's better to learn from your mom or some women in the community, by hand, how to knit and sew and can. Yeah, you can learn from a book, but it's considered not as authentic. Yet when it comes to music, that same crowd is all about how you don't really need a teacher, you should just learn from a DVD.

[Daenerys]

I think I managed to pick up all the skills needed to run my own household whilst simultaneously going to school full-time. It's not that complicated for those living in the 21st Century with all our technology.

The Amish are another matter - I watched a programme about them and was seriously awed/impressed at how much work they do, and how much is possible with the minimum amount of technology.

[kaetrin]

I wonder if those manuals are marketed toward the first-generation fundie mothers, who often weren't raised to be domestic goddesses, and feel insecure about passing on these now all-important skills to their daughters. It's the first generation fundie women who spout all the angst about how much time they wasted in youth such that now they don't know how to run a household Really Properly -- however they are made to feel inadequate as homemakers, they turn around and impose 7-year homemaking courses on their daughters so that the daughters won't end up with the same perceived lack of skills. Never mind that the daughters will probably pick up most of what they really need just by staying at home with all the younger siblings for so many years...

My mother never bought any homemaking courses for any of her seven homeschooled daughters, but even with her more mainstream Christian upbringing, she could already cook, bake, can, sew, scrapbook, clean, and organize with the best of them. And what she didn't know, someone else in the extended family probably did. To this day, when my totally non-fundie extended family gets together for holidays, there is a heck of a lot of cooking and knitting going on. Even my one boy cousin dabbled for extended periods in things like pot-throwing and french-bread-baking, and is perfectly willing to get a lesson from Grandma on how to make perfect lemon meringue pie. So I mean, the domestic arts are part of my family culture enough that we absorbed them easily into our fundie lifestyle. But others who don't have that experience might very well feel ill-equipped to teach it. Another instance of making people think there is a problem so they have to buy a solution, I suppose...

[clibbyjo]

My homeschooled daughter and sons are raised the same. They all cook, clean, do dishes etc. The boys walk the dogs and the girl does the cat litter, only because they worked it out themselves that way.

I am teaching my daughter to be a strong woman who can do whatever she wants in her life. She likes to sew(lady gaga clothes for barbies) and she plays hockey and is a green belt in Tae Kwon do. She wouldn't wear a frumper unless I paid her to go undercover at a Maxwell convention(she probably still wouldn't). I cannot imagine training my daughter to think she is LESS than her brothers. She is against the fundie lifestyle and gets as mad as I do when women are held back.

[mnb357]

I can't speak to the book, because I haven't had time to read either it or the reviews, but I think "Home Economics" if you will, are very important FOR BOTH MALES AND FEMALES, equally. It's important for your kids to know how to balance a checkbook, grocery shop on a budget, cook a simple meal, clean a bathroom, do a load of laundry, perform simple household repairs, and make appointments. I think it's important for all members of the family to know what goes into making a household run efficiently.

When I homeschooled my third grader for a brief period, one of his tasks was to plan and cook a dinner once a week. He also had to perform three household tasks of his choosing each week, from a list including: Laundry, cleaning, yardwork, sewing, baking or home repair. He made some lovely throw pillows, stacked a cord of wood, and made a really decadent batch of cookies among other things. Were I to homeschool my girl, the list would be the same...though I don't expect she'd manage to stack as much wood as my son due to her size/strenth.

In my high school there was a class called "survival" which taught such things...but, I wasn't allowed to take it, because my parents thought home ec. courses were not suited for a girl who was headed to college. I regret not taking those classes, because it would have saved me a lot of angst and money when I graduated from college and had to set up my own household.

[Guest Anonymous]

googling and just seen character training which I think is aimed at girls.

Characteristics to learn

charity

cheerfulness

compassion

contentment

courage

determination

diligence

forgiveness

honesty

kindness

meekness

modesty

obedience

patience

respectfulness

truthfulness

willingness

wisdom

Some sound like good things to have in your character but other like meekness were crazy and others like obedience is more like dog training.

They want their daughters to acquire traits that normal people look for only in their pets.

[maybeizfundie]

I have TODTBKAH. (that acronym looks funny!)

It is basically a complete home-ec course, along with the daughters at home ethos. In the latter years of the course it goes into "Things you can do to keep busy without working or going to college."

A lot of the stuff I already know, but I've looked up specific stuff in there occasionally.

May be using the home-ec lessons and patterns with my boys. :D They are all interested in sewing and cooking.

[Joykins]

"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects." -- Robert Heinlein

[Deleted12]

Don't these people have teh YouTubes?

You can learn to do a LOT of things by watching videos on there.

[Lillian]

I don't get it. That's the kind of stuff I do in my spare time with my grandma. I've learned the basics of pretty much everything listed in Training Our Daughters (besides breastfeeding....WTF!!), and managed to go to school and university full time. It's not that hard, really.

[SamuraiKatz]

http://www.amazon.com/Training-Our-Daughters-Keepers-Home/dp/B000OUQ46A/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1313949839&sr=8-1

The review of that one describes what's in it.

And wow, that's an expensive brainwashing manual.

The book cover says it all. All of the crafts surround what I am sure is a KJV Bible!

My feminist raised daughters all do various hand crafts. Three of them knit and crochet. Two have them have taken up an interest in sewing. The sewing thing is recent. They are coveting my new computerized stitch sewing/quilting machine. :D

Like me, they do these activities for the personal satisfaction....no salvation issues here!

I feel sorry the girls enslaved in this system... What if you aren't good a cross stitching...and your cooking is more like the wife on Green acres?

[fundyfunland]

I think I managed to pick up all the skills needed to run my own household whilst simultaneously going to school full-time. It's not that complicated for those living in the 21st Century with all our technology.

The Amish are another matter - I watched a programme about them and was seriously awed/impressed at how much work they do, and how much is possible with the minimum amount of technology.

Well said! I think you're right. Back in the day (or now current Amish day) women's jobs would have been much more meaninful, challenging, and fulfilling then they are today.

[notsocommon]

Don't these people have teh YouTubes?

You can learn to do a LOT of things by watching videos on there.

No joke! You Tube is the first place I go if I want to learn how to do something!

[fundies_like_zombies]

I have TODTBKAH. (that acronym looks funny!)

It is basically a complete home-ec course, along with the daughters at home ethos. In the latter years of the course it goes into "Things you can do to keep busy without working or going to college."

A lot of the stuff I already know, but I've looked up specific stuff in there occasionally.

May be using the home-ec lessons and patterns with my boys. :D They are all interested in sewing and cooking.

Is it quite practical then?

I was thinking it would be kinda full of feminine / submissive stuff.

[fundies_like_zombies]

Well said! I think you're right. Back in the day (or now current Amish day) women's jobs would have been much more meaninful, challenging, and fulfilling then they are today.

Maybe that is what they are trying to do - trying to get that meaningfulness back. So people think that they are doing something worthy even if all they are doing is ignoring modern stuff and going the long way around to do everything.