Today marks the autumnal equinox (also see the equinox pages at Earth and Sky) -- which is also known as the beginning of astronomical autumn (in distinction from the meteorlogical autumn).

There is a myth that the autumnal and vernal equinoxes have a special property which enables eggs and brooms to balance in a unique way. Today might be an opportunity to demonstrate how to debunk a myth. Students might also like to consider measuring a shadow (perpendicular to the ground), erecting a sun dial, or marking the point on the horizon where the sun rises in the morning and sets in the evening - something which can also be done using an app like "The Photographer's Ephemeris," or viewing a simulation on a website.

However, it was on a summer soltice that Eratosthenes calculated the circumference of the earth using some "simple" geometry (n.b. geo = earth and metry = measure). Thinking ahead a few months . . .  I wonder if some classical Lutheran schools around the country (or the world?) might re-enact Eratosthenes' experiment on the next December solstice -- or perhaps the following June -- and communicate their findings via Skype . . .

The statistics are alarming. Enrollment in Lutheran schools is declining sharply and Lutheran schools are closing in greater numbers over the past 25 years.

In his 2014 work entitled, When Lutheran Schools Close: A Study of Ministries Under Stress, Rev. Dr. Richard Zeile examines the decline of Lutheran Schools in Detroit, Michigan, during the 1990's. Ten Detroit Lutheran schools that closed during the decade 1990 to 1999 (The remaining ten closed by 2010) were examined by comparing statistical data, leader surveys, and the author's participant journal to compare the interplay of theory, fact, and assumption. The failure to acknowledge demographic trends, with an inadequate theology of church growth, led to dysfunctional responses on the part of congregations, staff, and district officials. Theoretical questions, so often neglected by participants in ministry, go to the heart of institutional integrity which requires shared vision and values, as well as a sober cognizance of circumstances. A theology of the cross, which recognizes that God is with His servants even (or especially) in failure, and thus prizes faithfulness rather than institutional success, is needed to provide an authentic basis for the ministry of Christian schools in times of stress.

With a little knowledge of embedding code into a webpage or an HTML block, a fair number of tools and interactive time-spacers can be made available to students through WIDGETS.

I place widgets on our Moodle course pages for our students to spend their time engaging in some wordplay or history if they have completed their other assignments. These widgets have proven to be more beneficial than other things they might be doing. They could also be placed on a schoo;'s home web page.

Check out the examples for "This Day in History" or "Word of the Day" at The FreeDictionary by Farlex which makes the HTML/CSS code for widgets available here.

There may be adolescent boys who are opposed to singing because it doesn't seem manly enough.

These two video clips may be of some use -- even if they do nothing more than to give some courage to a music teacher who has to face the formidable opponents of such boys in a music class:

Non nobis, Domine is sung by the victorious troops after the Battle of Agincourt in which their opponents had been heavily favored.

Men of Harlech was sung in the Michael Caine film, Zulu, as a response to the Zulu war chant when the British were about to be overrun by the tribal warriors in the Battle of Roarke's Drift.

Sometimes, those brave teachers new to Latin (i.e. those having a go a teaching something they had not previously learned) are worried about how to pronounce the Latin. I try to tell them not to worry about it too much, even if "Mr. Chips" nearly lost his teaching position for objecting to the "modern" approach to Latin pronunciation (1939).

There are several different schools of thought about pronunciation, e.g. "classical," vis-a-vis "ecclesiastical." There is no shortage of material on the subject - one might even consult Quintilian's Institutio Oratoria, Book I.xi.4ff, (Loeb, p. 185) who took the matter quite seriously:

"What then is the duty of the teacher whom we have borrowed from the stage? In the first place, he must correct all faults of pronunciation, and see that the utterance is distinct, and that each letter has its proper sound. There is an unfortunate tendency in the case of some letters to pronounce them either too thinly or too fully, while some we find too harsh and fail to pronounce sufficiently, substituting others whose should is similar but somewhat duller. For instance, lambda is substituted for rho, a letter which was always a stumbling block for Demosthenes . . ."

There you have it. If Demosthenes had difficulty, we might also. We might, then, be attentive, but flexible so that the matter of pronunciation while learning does not altogether become an impediment to the progress which we hope to make.

To this end, some might appreciate this resource: Read it Right (though, if it ought to be "Read it Rightly" some things might be suspect from the outset).This comes to us from the Association for Latin Teaching, which I became aware of through the Classical Association. (When one applies for the free membership with the Association for Latin Teaching, one also get access to their Latin teachers' forum and back issues of The Journal for Classical Teaching.

The numbers of LCMS schools which have closed their doors in the last 20 years is alarming -- if anyone cares to take notice. Generally, I suspect that the issue is economics: congregations cannot afford to maintain the school budget. But can we afford to be without Lutheran schools?

I think it's time for an old paradigm to become redivivus among LCMS schools: the one-room school house.

Granted, people might have to begin thinking a little bit differently about education -- and that's something rather difficult for many LCMS folk to do. (I won't put a smiling face emoji here, but I could . . .)

In the first place, families in the LCMS need to be awakened to the idea of classical Lutheran education in contrast to what education has become in our society today. I think it's possible. And secondly, I think the success of LCMS home school families has trailblazed the way so that more people might be open to the idea. (By this, I don't necessarily mean homeschoolers, but rather others might consider one-room schools in light of the success which classical Lutheran home school families have had.)

It's not just a novel idea for LCMS elementary education. Other schools are doing it, too. See this article: The Case for One-Room School Houses. I believe some teacher colleges in our western states currently train teachers for this sort of experience. Even here in Chicago, we have a few members in our congregation who attended one-room school houses in rural areas when they were children, and they grew up to have very sucessful lives in the big city.

This year, our school has been "right-sizing." Everything has been going as well as one might expect at our school without any major contentious controversies, but due to budget issues and a demographically-typical decline in enrollment, we are moving toward three grades per classroom where we have had two.

One of the major concerns of parents (a few of which withdrew their children to enroll them in public school) was whether it was humanly possible to teach three levels of math and other subjects in the same length of school day when only two were taught. If they thought back for a moment, however, they would have realized that some people may have thought the same thing when the decision was made to go from one grade per classroom to two. Notwithstanding, our school has shown that academic accomplishment has by no means diminished. I believe the same could be said of a one-room school -- especially given the technological advances available today.

Perhaps a more detailed description of how this can be done is the subject for another blog -- this one is too long already. But if you have other anecdotes or resources about one-room school house experiences, please share them in the comments! 

Some 20 years ago, when I first embarked on my classical Lutheran education trek, I followed many leads. One of them led to "Direct Instruction" (capital D, capital I) for a number of reasons which appealed to me.

1) They emphasized the mastery of material.

2) They promoted a direct, highly orchestrated method of instruction utilizing hand signals and scripted lessons rather than "discovery learning" wherein students were permitted to self-discover material or to work in groups. (To be sure, not the best approach for every subject, but it was wonderful in making certain each and every student was engaged in the lesson.)

3) They had done quite a bit of research on Project Follow-Through, a little-known, highly-documented government program which followed on the heels of the Head Start program.

4) It was through this program that I was introduced to the Orton-Gillingham approach to teaching phonics which was language-based, multisensory, structured, sequential, cumulative, cognitive, and flexible -- the most widely used and familiar version is Romalda Spalding's method, The Writing Road to Reading produced by Spalding Education International.

5) It really showed its strength with children in inner-city schools (one of which I was serving at the time), but also worked well with children in other socio-economic environments.

6) It led me to learn about the Baltimore Curriculum Project, a curriculum which, in form if not in fact, has elements worth emulating in classical Lutheran schools.

While I don't know that I would endorse any of their materials without qualification for classical Lutheran education, I think it would be worth one's while to become familiar with the organization and history of The National Institute for Direct Instruction which still seems to be going strong in some parts of the country.

One is hard-pressed to find a curriculum better than the Shurley Grammar Method for teaching the principal parts of speech and the basic mechanics of grammar. The art of writing well, however, consists in something more than learning the rules of grammar and punctuation.

At the risk of minimalizing a couple of noteworthy programs, I believe Andrew Pudewa's Institute for Excellence in Writing does well in teaching students how to summarize what they read and to be economical in the use of words (unlike this sentence). I think the strength of Andrew Kern's The Lost Tools of Writing does as much for getting students to think as it does to write.

Now it may be that I am not sufficiently acquainted with those programs -- and for that reason I do not mean by this brief blog to give them short-shrift -- but so far, they do not seem to address writing style in the way that I imagine it. The problem is, at this point, I do not have any other comprehensive program to recommend. I have a full-shelf-a-half of books and texts from which I pick this and that.

I like a number of the exercises in Holt, Rhinehart and Winston's "Elements of Language" (there are several levels -- for the sake of discussion, check out Sentences and Paragraphs, ISBN 0030563143 and Combining Sentences ISBN 0030563062). If you are on a budget, check out a used textbook company like Follett.

I also like Richard Nordquist's work in Passages: a Writer's Guide (ISBN 9780312101176) and Writing Exercises: Building, Combining, and Revising (ISBN 9780023882203). Again, if on a tight budget, these can be acquired as used copies from Amazon or alibris. I have enjoyed his grammar website for years, though he stopped serving as the site's editor in 2016.

Ever on the lookout for helpful material, I just ordered June Casagrande's It Was the Best of Sentences; It Was the Worst of Sentences: a Writer's Guide to Crafting Killer Sentences (ISBN 978-1580087407). Check out her website: Grammar Underground.

There are, of course, those who want to throw out grammar rules and stylistic conventions altogether -- and one can find their "creative" approaches in many places. It is not a bad idea to become familiar with them as long as one does so without swalloing hook, line, and sinker.

CNN recently reported that there are several hundred classical schools in the United States:

Classical schools are less concerned about whether students can handle iPads than if they grasp Plato. They generally aim to cultivate wisdom and virtue through teaching students Latin, exposing them to great books of Western civilization and focusing on appreciation of “truth, goodness and beauty.” Students are typically held to strict behavioral standards in terms of conduct and politeness, and given examples of characters from history to copy, ranging from the Roman nobleman Cincinnatus to St. Augustine of Hippo.

There is such a revival in classical education that there is a new college entry examination, intended as an alternative to the SATs. A dozen colleges are now accepting the results of the Classic Learning Test (CLT).

An excerpt from The Genteel Imposter: Newman's Social Criticism

Newman remarks in his Idea of a University that it is far easier to find examples of gentlemen than saints. The reason should be obvious: “The world is content with setting right the surface of things; the Church aims at regenerating the very depths of the heart” [Idea, p. 203]. So Newman sees the gentleman as superficial. In this he has many literary precedents from Horace to Moliere; but Newman’s objection does not vent itself in high satire and then depart with good-fellow handshakes all around.

There is genuine danger; in Newman’s view, something is being disguised: “The splendours of a’ court, and the charms of good society, wit, imagination, taste, and high breeding, the prestige of rank, and the resources of wealth, are a screen, an instrument, and an apology for vice and irreligion” [Idea, p. 202]. What is being hidden by the fine ways of genteel society is original sin: “What, indeed, is the very function of society, as it is at present, but a rude attempt to cover the degradation of the fall, and to make men feel respect for themselves, and enjoy it in the eyes of others, without returning to God” [P.S. VIII, p.266].

What is missing is virtue which comes with holiness; and any attempt to supplant the role of virtue with that of liberal education is futile: “Quarry the granite rocks with razors, or moor the vessel with a thread of silk; then may you hope with such keen and delicate instruments as human knowledge and human reason to contend against those giants, the passion and pride of man” [Idea, p. 121]

If your school has a website maintained by someone you know, you might enjoy adding some free content using FreeDictionary.com. Other educational widgets are also available with a bit of "Googling."

This link has examples of what the blocks can do on the left-hand side and the HTML code in the boxes on the right. You can easily use these, for example, to look up all the words which end in "-able" and all the words ending in "-ible" to make a comparison. There are vocabulary activities and this-day-in-history resources as well.

Students in my classes have responded well to Nathaniel and Hans Bluedorn's The Fallacy Detective and The Thinking Toolbox.

The books are available at a discount to Christian schools -- and some of the web resources include a Short List of Fallacies and How to Use The Thinking Toolbox in a Classroom.

Catherine Duffy has a critical review here.

"Wow! What's THAT?" I exlaimed to my wife (who teaches Grades 1-2). She was working on a jigsaw puzzle of a map of the Nile delta with 3D figurines of Egyptian architecture . . . and scanning them on her phone for multimedia connections!

National Geographic has produced a series of 4D cityscape puzzles (3D + time dimension) for Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome - as well as Paris and Chicago!

The 4D Cityscape puzzles are affordably-priced and might make a wonderful gift or activity for students during the summer or during the school year.

Occasionally, when looking to give examples of vocabulary in context for SpellingCity lists (many of the example sentences there are poor) or Vocabulary.com or creating a quiz, I make use of two sites:

Words-In-A-Sentence

and

Use-In-A-Sentence

CAVEAT: Because these two sites have random ads on their pages, I do not recommend them for student use.

I tend to take an eclectic approach to curriculum development rather than relying on any single series. I have enjoyed and grown in my teaching abilities by purchasing, working through, and adapting materials like Andrew Pudewa's Institute for the Excellence in Writing, Andrew Kern's The Lost Tools of Writing, and Classical Writing by Lene Mahler Jacqua and Tracy Gustillio.

There are also online resources such as The University of Wisconsin - Madison's Writer's Handbook and

Vocabulary ought not merely be associated with tedious assignments; Words are fascinating! I have grown in my vocabulary primarily by reading literature and listening to lectures, but I have also learned by playing with words: Scrabble, Crosswords, Jumble, Balderdash, and more. 

When students complete their assigned work early (and well), I encourage them to put their minds to work on something constructive. One way to do this is to make use of some online word activities. Here are a few to get you started:

Word Ladder

Word Winder

Daily Cryptogram

Mad Takes (like Mad Libs)

Rate Speeches is a wonderfully practical website to use in a curriculum where students are learning to give speeches. It provides a speech timer, rubric generator, a speech evaluation form generator -- and examples of speeches from contemporary sources for the class to practice evaluating and discussing.

I came across Dr. Richard Paul and The Foundation for Critical Thinking so long ago, that I was buying VHS tapes of his lectures. They really helped me develop an understanding of critical thinking which emphasized CONTENT - contrary to the progressive education's approach to teaching critical thinking as a "skill."

Now many of these videos are on YouTube. You may find the time well-spent if you devote some time to watching these:

How To Teach Series - 9 Videos

Critical Thinking for Children - 5-Part Series

President Elect Trump's nomination for the Secretary of Education is Betsy Devos. She claims to be opposed to Common Core, but some organizations apparently don't believe it. That is the position of the group Stop Common Core in Michigan.

I tried finding some primary sources, actual articles that Devos might have written or speeches that she gave. I haven't been successful in finding any, even on her own webpage: http://betsydevos.com/

Exactly what are her objections to Common Core? Stop Common Core in Michigan advances some facts. And before any classical Lutheran educators start praising Donald Trump for opposing Common Core, it might be worth the effort to find out what it is about Common Core which Donald Trump opposes. The philosophy that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" is not always a wise one to pursue.

It will also be interesting to see where The LCMS education execs, The Lutheran Education Association (LEA), and the Concordia University system's professors stand on this now that the political winds seem to be blowing a different direction. Will it be any easier to find primary sources from them than it appears to be for Devos?

In order to play baseball, one needs to know the rules of baseball. Mastering the rules, however, doesn't enable one to play baseball well, to pitch, catch, throw, hit, and run.

Learning grammatical rules is certainly important for writing well, but a mere knowledge of the rules doesn't help one to compose well. Grammar is an essential part, but style and rhetoric are not to be neglected. So, what resources are there for teaching rhetoric and style to students who must compose essays, reports, and research papers?

One resource I found recently seems to help a great deal: Richard F. Nordquist's Writing Exercises: Building, Combining, and Revising. It needs a little adaptation to fit into the coursework of my middle school students, but I find that the exercises are quite practical and attainable.

Richard also has a very helpful grammar blog which I have enjoyed over the years located here: http://grammar.about.com/