Category Archives: Misc. Education

To wrap up my discussion of online books, I’ll give you a bit of what I’ve come up with in our past 2+ weeks of lessons. Here is a list of the resources we are using and whether the texts are available online or not. I believe I am getting better results than may be normal, because of the topic we are studying, but perhaps not.

Of course, there are other books online that you could use instead of my choices that aren’t online, but I base my choices on the ideas presented in the books, not just the topic of the book. (Same reason why I don’t just trek down to the public library and pick up, for free, any ol’ book on the topic we are studying.)

Spine books:

• Building the Nation by Charles Coffins – available online (not available through us, out of print)
• Sketches from Church History – NOT available online, and I haven’t found a preferable substitute online. If you know of a REALLY good one, written at an introductory or child’s level that is online, please let me know.
• Another Spine option was From Sea to Shining Sea and From Sea to Shining Sea for Children –  (but we aren’t using it this time around) – NOT available online

Missionary Biographies:

• The ones we chose are NOT available online, but suitable substitutes may be, perhaps even autobiographies of better quality, but perhaps not at the children’s individual levels.

History/Literature:

• The Adventures of Colonel Daniel Boone – available online
• Of Courage Undaunted – NOT available online, however you can find Lewis and Clark’s Journals online. Our choice was made as literature for children.
• The Story of Inventions  – available online as Great Inventors and Their Inventions

Youth – History and Government:

• Universal History in Perspective – NOT available online (out of print), her Abridged History of the United States is available online, if you don’t want the perspective of Universal History in this study.
• A Basic History of the United States – NOT available online (or from us, but is in print, available through the publisher)
• Democracy in America – available online part 1 – part 2

I’ll just briefly mention some of our other areas of study tied in, such as the arts. Our Music studies are mainly from The Gift of Music (classical) (and a lot of CD’s) and the Mr. Pipes series (hymns) (and a lot of playing and singing). We have added some internet resources in. I mentioned some of the hymn sites we use in a past post – here. There are many sites with Classical music info, but I haven’t researched them out well enough to know what would be most helpful in studies based on biblical principles.

Our Art studies are mainly from StoneBridge Art Guide, God and the History of Art. I’ve also added in some selections (biographical sketches) from The Christian History of the American Revolution, and a few websites. The internet is super for finding pictures of art pieces.

Our Poetry studies for this study are mainly from American History in Verse. We also use Favorite Poems: Old and New, and various book by individual poets (mainly Dover publications). But I have also found some things online

So… enough for today. There’s a brief synopsis of our “current standings” as to whether our family’s home education could be done for “free” with online resources. To some degree, Yes. But I am very thankful that (except for a few obscure resources) I don’t have to rely on doing that.

I’ve become a convert. We’ve owned many “Hentys”, books written by G.A. Henty, for many years. The girls and I attempted to read some many years ago, and I’ve dabble a bit in the past, but they always seemed slow moving to me, too detailed in interests that were more “boy stuff”. None of the girls ever got into them.

Well, I decided to take up Henty once more, this time through some audios I had bought, mostly through a going out of business sale, (so VERY cheap,) and others with credits I had accumulated at audible.com, or through our CBD links. In listening I immediately recognized my holdback, I want the “real history” story and NOW, rather than to have it slowly woven through the fictional story. That’s just the way I am. I read VERY little fiction. It just isn’t worth the time to me. But recognizing this, helped my to relax, get caught up in and enjoy the story, (as long as I could listen while I was going to bed or getting up, so I wasn’t using time I could be doing something else,) knowing that in the end I would have a good deal of “real history” learned.

Henty has been praised far and wide as the great writer of “boy’s” stories. I knew I couldn’t shun him, but neither was I personally caught up in him. I now know his place – here anyhow.

Although I won’t allow fiction to take the place of “purer” history through source documents, I’ve always advocated literature of the time period to go along with that. I believe Hentys can have a strong place in that position. And I plan to utilize them more in that place. I’m hoping that my boys “catch on” and enjoy them more than the girls did. I may have to hook them with the audio versions too.

P.S. For those of you who want those online books to download – here’s a link at Project Gutenberg, scroll down to Henty.

My conclusions from my “Free Lunch?” posts Parts One and Two.

Yesterday brought frustration. I had the Conclusion to this series on “Free Lunch?” done and ready to post. Along came a “low battery” shut-down, (my old computer just went to sleep, not complete shut down) causing the loss of the entire article. So today I will try to quickly reconstruct my thoughts, which have since moved on to other topics.

This may surprise you after reading Parts 1 and 2 of this series, but I am REALLY grateful for online books. I download MANY of them. One of the reasons is because I LOVE old books. Well, I love BOOKS, but particularly believe that in general it is easier to find GREAT old books, than new books. I have some of those too, but old books have stood the test of time as to their worthiness.

When I hear an old book being recommended, I usually check online to see if it is in “electronic print” there for me to take a look at. I usually read several pages to see if it is something that is worth getting as a  “real” (physical) book. (I have difficulty in, and choose not to, read long books off the computer screen.) Then I begin the search process, both through online “old book” searches, and antique book stores as I’m able, to look for those I particularly am interested in.

If I am unable to find a “real” book of one I really want, (or find a copy I can afford) then I will print it off, knowing that the paper and ink and time are worth it, even though it will not be of “heirloom” quality.

I haven’t done this yet, but I believe if the book is in a “public domain” format, I should be able to have a print service make a hard bound copy for me. Then I will have a more worthy keepsake, though not “heirloom”.

So in conclusion, I have had to eat some of my words, and have realized that many of the books I like to use in our education are indeed available online for free. (Though many also are not.) And you can provide at least a portion of a biblically principled education that is designed for excellency and coherent completeness with “free” resources. But “free” resources are not really free. Are the costs for what you get a worthwhile investment? Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

I am SUPER GRATEFUL to have these resources available. But it is not my goal to base our entire curriculum around only what I am able to find available “for free” online, especially just because it is “free” and easy to find. I will continue to plan our curriculum based on excellent living books and biblical principles. And I will use online books as they fit into that, knowing now that more, in the areas I desire, is available than I had previously thought.

But just like as in the “real” world I don’t generally find most of our resources at the “popular” (currently “in”) home school places, neither will/do I find all the online resources we use at all the “coolest home school hangouts”.

Thank you HL for challenging me in this. I have grown through my researching it out. And no longer will I say that a biblically principled education based on excellence cannot be done, at least in part, using many “free” online resources, for those that choose to use those types of resources (filling in with inter-library loan and a few choice purchases). And for those of you whose library building is a slow process, online books can help you decide which books to buy as the finances allow, and which are worth using, at least for now, in a print out form.

Continuing my “Free Lunch” post …

In choosing my very specific books, planning our latest studies, I came across an old book I really wanted to use that is no longer available. It is part of a series that I love, and have all the others up to that point, but has now gone back out of print. I decided to check my ebook sites that are bookmarked. I found it! I also decided, since my time was already stretched to the max – so why not spend more time :-/, to look for other books we are using this year, just to see if they are available for free online. I found many of them (disclaimer – for this study, in these areas. I’m not vouching for my complete curriculum.)

I still hold that many of the foundational books we use, books that are key to our studies and therefore I’d not give up, can not be found “free on the internet”. Perhaps many (probably not all) of these could be ordered through Interlibrary loan, if necessary.

Probably my great question about a “free” education this way is, “Is it really?” I won’t even factor in the cost of the Internet, but will say I can teach my children wholly without it, the “old fashioned” way, with books. But we’ll allow it as a given since it will probably be an expense incurred even outside of education. If your “reason” for having the Internet IS education, then begin the cost of education at approx. $400-500 per year for Internet. I won’t include the computer itself into the cost either, but did you buy a computer “for school”? Need a second one for the kids, for school? These are costs that aren’t part of our “education” – so I’ll allow them as “no added cost”, although if you have several children and they are all reading all their lessons off a compter, you probably have had to buy an extra one or more – or are printing all the books, (see below). Books – I’ll also count them as “Free”. (I’ll allow the possibility that you can find ALL the books you want to use on the Internet for “free”. Although in reality I don’t believe this to be true. Although it MAY be somehow possible, I doubt that it is wholly realistic for a complete, coherent, bibical principles basced education to find EVERY resource for “free”. If someone can prove me wrong, it is an area in which I would be happy to eat my words.)

So here’s the cost. Are you going to print out all of those books you find or read them on the screen? Reading on the screen is “free” (fi you didn’t buy extra computers). But at what cost to your eyesight? Reading onscreen for many hours a day is not really a good choice for children (or adults). The cost may be your vision. That’s a high price to pay.

The other alternative is to print out your books. Have you totaled the costs of ink and paper? I’m told that the way to go is a laser printer, far cheaper per page for large amounts of printing – but a big initial investment. And not usually what you have at home already connected to your computer. Did you add that laser printer into your cost of “free” education?

What about the end result? Say you’ve printed off all these books. How did you bind them? Put them in a 3 prong folder? Use brads and duct tape? A 3 ring binder? Comb/spiral binding? All of these have various costs, granted some negligible. But what quality of “book” do you have? Not an heirloom to pass on or even a cheap paperback to resell.

But the greatest “cost” factor I see, is that your children don’t see the value of books. They are just something we print out, and possibly throw away when we’re done. They don’t see books as worthy property, worth sacrificing for. So is education really worth much?

As my children learned early on in Economics, TANSTAAFL – There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. [unrelated article on TANSTAAFL]

Conclusion? Stay tuned… You may really be surprised!
Read it here.

I wonder how that title will come up in search engines. But I don’t write for search engines, I write my thoughts – to provoke you to think. This post is on how someone else provoked me to think. And how I am in the process of eating my words – at least to some degree.

In corresponding on a home school elist, I stated that I didn’t know that how I plan our studies could be done “free”, that we use specific books and that I am very careful about the books we use, and that in general we look for books written from a biblical (or at least not ANTI-biblical) viewpoint.

I admit, before going on, that I have something others may not have – a love for great books. If you don’t have one, you should begin to cultivate one. It’s truly necessary, espeically for an educator and parent. I have been collecting good books all my life, since I was a child. I truly agree with Erasmus that, “When I get a little money, I buy books. If there is any left over I buy food and clothes.” Obviously this is hyperbole, but building a great library is a love of mine, inherited from my dad. I own thousands of books and am constantly weeding out things that don’t fit the highest of standards to make room for more truly great books. (I don’t buy or keep twaddle. If there is a “just ok” or “twaddley” book we want to read, we’ll borrow it from the public library.) I will also say I am a major bargain shopper and my library has cost FAR less than it is worth. Never pay full price for anything if you can in anyway get it legitimately for less!

On the other side, and the reason that prompted my reply to the elist, I see many home educators “now-a-days” that are just looking for how to home school for FREE. The quality doesn’t matter, the content doesn’t matter, all that matters is that it is FREE – and for some, another qualification is a “heap o’ fun”! Although I thoroughly believe learning should be one of the greatest joys of life, “fun” and “free” aren’t my qualifying prerogatives in providing my children an excellent education. I have nothing against either, they just aren’t my goals. A good education is worth sacrificing for, not a free add-on; and education requires labor, not just fun and games.

Back to my “lunch” story. We use some great newer books, some/many are not ones you find at home school curriculum fairs or on swap lists. We also use some great old books, again not always the popular reprints. It obviously takes (has taken) time to come up with the curriculum I write for our children and the book lists I put together. I have to admit I was thinking in terms of my already stretched to the limit time constraints. Is that really “free”?

But she did get me to thinking, could what we do be done by those who truly had no ability to build a library?

To be continued … here.