SOTDRT Textbooks

[chaotic life]

The Jewish manager of the plant was also a Northern and thus considered Devil's Spawn incarnate. Southern black janitor trumped Northern Jewish transplant who controlled the plant and represented all that the Southerns in Georgia hated.

If the man accused had been a Southern white man, I'm quite sure the janitor's testimony wouldn't have mattered in the least.

[thoughtful]

The Jewish manager of the plant was also a Northern and thus considered Devil's Spawn incarnate. Southern black janitor trumped Northern Jewish transplant who controlled the plant and represented all that the Southerns in Georgia hated.

If the man accused had been a Southern white man, I'm quite sure the janitor's testimony wouldn't have mattered in the least.

No doubt.

If I remember correctly, this dramatization of the case implied that some of the willingness by those higher up to believe the janitor's testimony was due to wanting the votes of African Americans:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095678/

But I could be remembering that wrong -- it's been a long time since I've seen it, and I know that it took some liberties with the story.

As for the SOTDRT, I think this is how fundie kids do well on multiple-choice tests:

[Scone]

If I'm to understand correctly, though, the Duggars don't use these books, right? What, are they too liberal for them? If that's the case, I'd hate to see what Switched-On Schoolhouse "teaches."

You're in luck. Kinda. I was brought up on Switched-On Schoolhouse, but sporadically because my parents couldn't afford to buy all the subjects in all the grades and couldn't be bothered to check I was actually doing it so after a while I just... stopped. I'll tell what I can remember though.

SOS is actually just a computerised version of AlphaOmega, and it's pretty similar to Abeka in a lot of ways. I haven't seen any of those AO Lifepac books in a large amount of years but if you're feeling especially keen you can probably pick them up cheap on Ebay or something. I can't speak much on their science because my parents never really bought that one in my year and I wasn't that interested anyway, but I remember the math was often just plain wrong. Possibly a bug in the programming, but annoying.

History was very much like those Abeka quotes- I definitely remember having to learn which of Noah's sons was supposed to have moved where and started which races, and I also remember being very frustrated at how America-centric it all was. I was studying ancient Babylon and all I was getting were random things about the American legal system. Incredibly annoying.

We didn't have English per se, we had "language arts". Not sure if that's a fundie thing or an American thing, all of my curricula had that quirk. It taught me basically nothing- no good literature, no critical thinking skills, barely any grammar. It did teach me about apostrophes and commas though, thank goodness. Someone asked in another thread whether SOTDRT even covered essays. My answer is not really, no. SOS did assign essays and reports, but never actually taught you how to write one so I just never bothered.

Mostly I just did Grade 5 Bible, over and over again, for like 5 years. I couldn't move on because that was the highest grade we had, and it was an easy subject that still kept my parents off my back because I could say that I was doing school and they would never bother to check.

So... yeah. I can't remember any specific quotes because I haven't looked at any of this stuff in over five years now, but I can look if anyone is interested. The CDs are all with my family in Australia but I could ask a sister to dig them out. I can assure you that it is not a very good education.

[Conuly]

We didn't have English per se, we had "language arts". Not sure if that's a fundie thing or an American thing, all of my curricula had that quirk. It taught me basically nothing- no good literature, no critical thinking skills, barely any grammar. It did teach me about apostrophes and commas though, thank goodness. Someone asked in another thread whether SOTDRT even covered essays. My answer is not really, no. SOS did assign essays and reports, but never actually taught you how to write one so I just never bothered.

Language Arts is definitely the term used in American schools for the class that handles any combination of: Reading mechanics, writing, spelling, grammar, literature, vocabulary, and penmanship. If your school does free reading (sustained silent reading, D.E.A.R) or journal writing, they'll fall under Language Arts as well.

In the same way, social studies is the class that combines: history, geography, current events, civics, and study about world cultures.

Particularly old-fashioned individuals decry this and will often blame problems in schools with the fact that these aren't taught as separate, discrete subjects.

[Maude]

That's awful, scone. I consider a good education to be a vital part of a child's upbringing, so to me that just screams neglect. Yet another argument in favour of homeschool regulation.

Language Arts is definitely the term used in American schools for the class that handles any combination of: Reading mechanics, writing, spelling, grammar, literature, vocabulary, and penmanship. If your school does free reading (sustained silent reading, D.E.A.R) or journal writing, they'll fall under Language Arts as well.

In the same way, social studies is the class that combines: history, geography, current events, civics, and study about world cultures.

Particularly old-fashioned individuals decry this and will often blame problems in schools with the fact that these aren't taught as separate, discrete subjects.

ETA: Our elementary schools are like this, but in high school they're all separate subjects.

[Scone]

Language Arts is definitely the term used in American schools for the class that handles any combination of: Reading mechanics, writing, spelling, grammar, literature, vocabulary, and penmanship. If your school does free reading (sustained silent reading, D.E.A.R) or journal writing, they'll fall under Language Arts as well.

In the same way, social studies is the class that combines: history, geography, current events, civics, and study about world cultures.

Particularly old-fashioned individuals decry this and will often blame problems in schools with the fact that these aren't taught as separate, discrete subjects.

Hmm, interesting. When I went to (a small, private, Christian, not representative) school the Language Arts were called English, but we also had Social Studies, being exactly what you just described. I believe the NCEA system has English and Social Studies but History is separate from Social Studies. I don't know, I completely skipped highschool and at university level they're all very much different subjects *shrug*

Thanks for the information :)

Oh, it was absolutely neglect. Homeschooling IS regulated in New Zealand, but the Education Review Office is overstratched so don't check as often as they should, and there are ways of getting around the rules. I remember the Home Education Foundation would send out information on how to make a good impression on the ERO, how to write a curriculum plan that looked super impressive and even things like insisting on having the review meetings in a public space like a library instead of in your home. On paper my sisters and I received a fantastic education, and we were all pretty precocious kids, so we got through the reviews just fine. My mum would write up all these timetables and lesson plans that were never used, and we had lots of stuff like "consumer maths" and "home economics" on there, when what she really meant was that it was our job to run the house and look after the little ones and do the shopping.

We could read and write and didn't look or sound obviously neglected or unhappy, so the regulation process never picked up the fact that we were barely learning anything.

[PennySycamore]

I have long refused to use ABeka for homeschooling because it was so lousy academically so clearly biased and dishonest.

That said, I took a state history class last fall, from a PhD professor who espoused all of the same garbage about slavery as what is in ABeka. He and I went rounds on more than one occasion. He wasn't dumb enough to outright praise the KKK, but he certainly downplayed them as well intended but ill displayed protectionism. It was a state uni, but I always felt I was a fundie in disguise with his PhD just the same.

It wouldn't surprise me if the prof was a member of the League of the South. They're a bunch of Neo-Confederate Southern apologists who think the antebellum days were just peachy for enslaved African-Americans. Unfortunately, they have made some inroads into academia. Ron Paul has ties to the founder, btw.

[TudorRose]

It wouldn't surprise me if the prof was a member of the League of the South. They're a bunch of Neo-Confederate Southern apologists who think the antebellum days were just peachy for enslaved African-Americans. Unfortunately, they have made some inroads into academia. Ron Paul has ties to the founder, btw.

the first friend I made after starting homeschooling is big on Confederate good, Abe Lincoln bad. We took our families on a combined trip to the local history museum, which had an exhibit on the US presidency, and I was surprised to hear her kids parrot the pro-slavery/states' rights junk. (On the other hand, she was probably surprised to hear MY son parrot the civil rights/destruction of America stuff when we got to that part of history, so whatever.)

But it was the first I'd learned that there are people who homeschool to teach their children their side of the 'War of Northern Aggression.'

[Anxious Girl]

The Klan tried to help reform America? WTF is up with these people? :shock:

[SisiL78]

I guess what the Klan did was a type of reform..... It just wasn't positive or progressive reform. Its definitely a bastardization of the word, but for some people suppressing black people's rights is a good thing.

I'm just so tired of the Klan and pro-slavery apologists. These people are no better than the Holocaust apologists and deniers. I think secretly many people think that African Americans and Jews should just "get over it". And maybe we all could if it didn't keep happening on a regular basis. In Asian and Middle Eastern countries slavery is alive and well. Human trafficking is far too common in the United States. Genocidal wars haven't stopped raging for decades. These ignorant and shortsighted people won't care about it until white Christians are persecuted. Anytime a single missionary overseas gets jailed for breaking laws in some Muslim country they are all up in arms. But, they still criticize Clinton's getting our country involved in the Serbo-Croatian conflict b/c brownish Muslims were the victims.

[chaotic life]

I tried SOS on school year. I had a child with significant medical needs and seriously liked the idea that the kids could be self guided on the computer for a lot of their studies.

We only did it one year. First, it was TERRIBLE for grammar. By the end of that year both of the kids who had done SOS were a year behind in their grammar and we had to work hard to catch back up with what they missed. Second, the program only worked as well as the child was committed to it working. As a PP mentioned, there was no enforcement through the program. My oldest did his work deligently and only lost grammar skills. My second skippe and skipped and skipped and it became a constant battle between us. I caught her everytime, but she got further and further behind and less and less she would actually bother to complete in the program.

I don't recommend SOS but at least I sold it for essentially what I paid for it after that year. It's quite popular with large homeschooling families, that's for sure.

[JesusFightClub]

History was very much like those Abeka quotes- I definitely remember having to learn which of Noah's sons was supposed to have moved where and started which races, and I also remember being very frustrated at how America-centric it all was. I was studying ancient Babylon and all I was getting were random things about the American legal system. Incredibly annoying.

We didn't have English per se, we had "language arts". Not sure if that's a fundie thing or an American thing, all of my curricula had that quirk. It taught me basically nothing- no good literature, no critical thinking skills, barely any grammar. It did teach me about apostrophes and commas though, thank goodness. Someone asked in another thread whether SOTDRT even covered essays. My answer is not really, no. SOS did assign essays and reports, but never actually taught you how to write one so I just never bothered.

I certainly wish to cast no aspersions on you, you seem to write very well, but I went partly to state school and also was placed in a religious school for a fair wee while, and we had streaming for ability. The more academic kids did English. The ones with problems, shall we say, did Language Arts. (I'm from Scotland as you can tell by location in my avvy). My brother ended up in Language Arts and I was in English.

It's really boring apparently. It's stuff like maybe writing a CV or you write daft wee stories along the lines of "What I did on my holidays" and you get help with reading and writing. I had to make up a portfolio and submit it as well as write a mini dissertation, he had to write a page at a time. My brother is very smart indeed but his talents academically weren't spotted til later in life, he was a bit of a tearaway at school. He was only interested in football at the time though he had no problems reading and writing. So I totally sympathise with you.

[Scone]

I certainly wish to cast no aspersions on you, you seem to write very well, but I went partly to state school and also was placed in a religious school for a fair wee while, and we had streaming for ability. The more academic kids did English. The ones with problems, shall we say, did Language Arts. (I'm from Scotland as you can tell by location in my avvy). My brother ended up in Language Arts and I was in English.

It's really boring apparently. It's stuff like maybe writing a CV or you write daft wee stories along the lines of "What I did on my holidays" and you get help with reading and writing. I had to make up a portfolio and submit it as well as write a mini dissertation, he had to write a page at a time. My brother is very smart indeed but his talents academically weren't spotted til later in life, he was a bit of a tearaway at school. He was only interested in football at the time though he had no problems reading and writing. So I totally sympathise with you.

Yeah, that sounds probably about right, though as far as I'm aware there was no higher English version. I think I mostly skipped the SOS Language Arts stuff because it was boring and below my level anyway. I remember being frustrated with the English classes at school too, it was all reading comprehension stuff at a level far too simple for me. There was no streaming for ability at school, and not really any at home either.

I'm actually an English major at university now, but I owe very little to my schooling. All my literary knowledge I got from slacking off school and hiding in a corner with a pile of classic novels, almost all my grammar comes from studying Latin at university, and my essay writing skills come from a Practical English paper I took at Polytech (kind of like a community college). I'm learning to write a CV right now and wondering why I was never taught this before. It's incredibly frustrating.