One year, I was newly single with 5 kiddos under 8 still at home with me. It was a rather hard time for us all, as I was only employed part time and was going to college part time. My husband had just decided he didn’t want to be married anymore and had left our home without paying the mortgage or utilities because, as he said, he needed the money for his new place. The kids and I didn’t have any savings, so things were more than tight. I turned to our church for help, and signed up for foodstamps. The day our foodstamp card came in the mail was one that I rushed out to purchase much needed items for our table. What I didn’t know was that before it could be used, the card had to be activated and the pin number would come in the mail separately. I shopped our local discount store and got up to the check out counter and couldn’t use the card! There was a huge line of people behind me waiting to check out and I was holding up the line because I couldn’t get the card to work. I felt humiliated, not only for holding up the line, but also because now everyone in the line and at the store seemed to know that we were using foodstamps. The lady that was just behind me in line seemed to recognize the dilemma at hand and without a bat of her lashes, reached in her purse, pulled out a wad of money and handed it to me, more than enough to cover the cost of the food. It brought me to tears that a stranger would reach out and meet our needs in such a manner. She didn’t give me her name so I could pay her back, but said pay it forward.

Another time a while later, I was now working full time nights at a local gas station. It was close enough to be handy and my oldest teenage daughter was at home to watch the younger kids while I worked. One night an elderly couple came into the store. They stood out from my usual customers - a blind woman was walking behind her husband while holding on to the handle of his wheelchair. They looked road weary and after using the facilities, they asked me if I knew where there was a truck stop nearby as they needed to get some money sent to them via Western Union. They were traveling across country to be nearer relatives and had run out of money. Their little pickup out in the parking lot was filled to the brim with nearly every earthly possession it looked to me. They couldn’t afford to find a motel to spend the night, so I pointed them to a quiet corner of the parking lot where they parked for a few hours of shut eye. I went back inside and when my other customers had gone, I was able to check my wallet, for the elderly couple were on my mind and I wanted to do something for them. Wouldn’t you know it, but I had the exact amount that the lady had been able to bless me with back at the grocery store! I was able to pay her blessing forward to this elderly couple. It felt good.

Have you been blessed by someone, somehow, but you don’t know how to repay them? Maybe you don’t know who it was that blessed you, someone played “Secret Santa” with you and gave you something without strings. I challenge you to pay it forward. You will be glad you did!

By the way, I just got my grade in this class and I got a B+!!! Pretty good for having flunked it 30 years ago when I first took it! I am more than satisfied with this B+. Now, on to Anatomy and Physiology next semester, with a writing intensive history class thrown in too.

******

Pleasingly plump or morbidly obese, no matter what you call it, Americans have a problem with body fat. Estimates from the CDC show that 33 to 35% of adult Americans have a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or greater. With the additional weight comes greater risk for a host of other health problems such as heart disease, sleep apnea, diabetes, high blood pressure, stroke and osteo- arthritis. The more a person weighs, the less they feel like exercising because their body aches and tires easily, often leading to additional weight gain compounding more health problems, and you get a vicious cycle. The more weight a person accumulates, the more the problems can build, and what might be a mere minor inconvenience at 10 to 20 pounds of additional fat, becomes a major health concern when you’re looking at 100 or more pounds of adipose tissue.
With nearly one-third of Americans fighting the battle of the bulge, a 100% increase in obesity from the years 1976 to 1980, there is hardly any family that is untouched, this author and her family included. While genetics may partially contribute to the tendency to gain or hold onto additional body fat with what has been dubbed by some as the “thrifty gene,” psycho-social factors of depression, chemical dependency, as well as lifestyle and food choices play heavily into the problem.
Today’s lifestyles are much more sedentary than previous generations and filled with more processed and refined foods than ever before as well. The personal problem with excess weight must be addressed by each individual or it will become a major health problem at some point in time for that person. If that person gets diabetes due to the excess weight, the diabetes can lead to other complications like blindness from macular degeneration and amputation of limbs, drastic consequences for poor choices in food and lifestyle.
What can be done to combat this growing epidemic problem? First, the person in question must find the motivation within themselves to conquer the bad habits that brought on the additional weight, or there will be no program, pill or procedure that will effect any long term change. The “stinkin’ thinkin’” that got them in the predicament in the first place must be replaced with positive self-talk to reprogram, as it were, the original personal computer, one’s own brain, the feelings, attitudes and beliefs that will help change one’s behavior for long term success with weight control.
The next hurdle is to find a program that will help retrain their eating habits. Actually, it is not hard to find a program, the difficulty will be choosing just one from the many available and finding one that suits the person’s own physical makeup and habits. Some of the more reputable programs that are out there are Weight Watchers, Atkins and South Beach where the food is purchased at a regular grocery store and the eating plan(s) are followed at home with or without group meetings, either online or in person. There are other programs, like Slim 4 Life, Jenny Craig and others that offer prepackaged food programs that can be drop shipped to the person’s home and all one has to do is heat and eat, all the work has been done for them.
According to the National Institutes of Health’s report, losing weight not only helps to control the co-morbidity diseases overweight people suffer from, it can also “decrease the likelihood of developing these diseases.”1 It would seem obvious then, that the benefits of loosing weight would be many, increased longevity, better overall health, and higher quality of life, versus not loosing weight and having a higher likelihood of death and disability. Even modest weight losses of 5 to 10 percent of initial weight can improve the risk factors associated with obesity, which in turn benefit the individual in the long run.
This author is personally acquainted with the trials and tribulations of living life as an overweight and even obese adult, having been overweight since childhood. With the advent of a new decade, the big 5-0, this author was challenged to make a change and do something for herself as she was sick and tired of being sick and tired. Little health problems were beginning to take a toll and mount into bigger ones.
Starting off in the Weight Watcher’s program in January 2008, this author found tools and camaraderie at the Weight Watcher meetings, but after 3 months on the program and yo-yo-ing up and down with a only 5 pound loss, she decided to investigate other programs for assistance. A customer came into her place of employment that shared his success with Atkins. This wasn’t the only good report on the program by happy and successful “low carb-ers”, so Atkins was moved to the top of the list.
After reading about the science behind the Atkins program, promoting the body to catabolize it’s own fats in a process called ketosis by limiting daily carbohydrate intake to 20 grams for the first 2 weeks, the author decided to embark on the program.
The difference between Weight Watcher and Atkins was immediately noticeable. With Weight Watcher you were limited to the amount of food you could consume and as you lost weight, you also lost points, which further decreased the amount of food you were to eat, and when you had reached your daily point level, you were supposed to be done.
In contrast, the Atkins program has 4 stages in which one gradually adds back carbohydrates into the diet. The first stage, called the “Induction Phase”, there is a limit of 20 carbs per day, but you have a long list of foods that one is free to eat their fill from until satisfied, but not stuffed. After the 2 week induction, comes the “Ongoing Weight Loss” or OWL for short, where carbohydrates are increased 5 grams per day per week for gradual weight loss, so for week 3 there are 25 carbs, week 4 has 30 carbs, week 5 35 carbs and so on, to gradually continue weight loss. Then comes the Pre-Maintenance Phase where the increase in carbs can be an additional 10 carbs per day per week, and might last 2 to 3 months depending on the amount of weight needed to loose. Some participants find it helpful to stay in the 35 to 45 grams of carbs per day range, while other might be able to tolerate 60 grams per day. It just depends on the physical makeup of the individual, their personal metabolism, sensitivity to carbohydrate cravings and level of activities engaged in. The last phase is the Lifetime Maintenance Phase, which 90 daily carbs are allowed, but many may stay in the 60 carb range to avoid weight gain.
With the Atkins program, the author didn’t crave more food at the end of the day as she had with Weight Watchers, because one has a feeling of fullness longer with the consumption of high protein and fat on Atkins.  The pounds seemed to melt away. Within 5 months of starting Atkins, the author was 50 pounds lighter than the beginning of the year, and only 5 pounds had been from following the Weight Watcher’s plan.
After being on the Atkins program a month, it was already easier to bend over and tie one’s shoes. Clothes were also fitting looser. The benefit of this quick success gave the author encouragement to continue on the program. At the end of 2 months it was noticeably easier to walk and exercise - less huffing and puffing!
The hazards of this procedure can be constipation, and some contend, loss of muscle and tone. If bad habits of staying away from unhealthy carbs like chips, cookies, excess bread, etc. are not broken, then when one stops the Atkins program, like any other weight loss regiment, you can regain your lost weight and even add a few more pounds.  This is why it is imperative to change the underlying habits that lead to the weight gain in the first place and to make a conscious decision to change the lifestyle as a permanent part of one’s daily life and not resume the mindless nibbling and empty calories of the former days or the weight will come back with a vengeance.
When using the Atkins program, or any weight loss program, the short term prognosis can be good. It’s easy to get the weight off initially, but as was discussed earlier, if a person’s habits aren’t changed that brought about the weight gain in the first place, then long term prognosis won’t be good, since usually when a person gains the weight back, they also gain more than they lost, creating a vicious cycle of yo-yo dieting if allowed to continue.
Craving carbohydrates has always been one of the downfalls of trying to follow any diet program for this author. It’s been her experience and success with the Atkins program so that she very highly recommends the program of eating low carbohydrates to facilitate weight loss and hopefully maintain the motivation to make the lifestyle changes to keep the weight off permanently. She is now 35 pounds away from her goal weight and sees this as a new way to eat, not just a temporary way to loose weight. It is a lifestyle change that will make the process of weight loss permanent. This author has been known to stock up on Dr. Atkins’ New Diet Revolution paperbacks at the thrift store to pass out to interested friends and family that want to know how she lost the weight.

Footnote:

1. Clinical Guidelines on the Identification, Evaluation, and Treatment of Overweight and Obesity in Adults (City: National Instututes of Health, 1998) xxi.

Bibliography
“Obesity and Overweight: Introduction” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. URL http://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpa/obesity/. Accessed November 29, 2008.

“Native American Obesity: An Economic Model of the “Thrifty Gene” Theory” Timothy J. Richards, Paul M. Patterson. American Journal of Agricultural Economics. Volume 88, Issue 3. Pages 542 - 560. 2006 American Agricultural Economics Association. Accessed November 29, 2008.

“Obesity on the reservation”  Tim Post. Minnesota Public Radio
June 2, 2003. URL http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2003/06/02_postt_obesitynative/ Accessed November 29, 2008.

Shad Helmstetter. “What to Say When You Talk to Yourself.” January 1990. Pocket Books Publishers. 256 pages.

Susan G. Dudek. “Nutrition Essentials for Nursing Practice.”  5th Edition Revised May 2006. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. 741 pages.

Robert C. Atkins. “Dr. Atkins’ New Diet Revolution.”  December 2001. Harper Publishers. 560 pages

Abstract
The paper discusses the issues of  Obesity and the heath problems that are exacerbated by it. The procedure discussed by the author to help this growing epidemic is the Atkins’ Nutritional Program for the low carbohydrate method of weight loss.  The author’s personal experience and success with Atkins is also discussed.

Appendix
Example of BMI calculation:
Non-metric conversion formula = [weight (pounds)/height (inches)2] x 703
A person who weighs 164 pounds and is 68 inches (or 5′ 8″) tall has a BMI of 25: [weight (164 pounds)/height (68 inches)2] x 703 = 25

Technorati Tags: weightloss

-The Road Scholar

Free Spelling Resources!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Does Your Child Have The Spelling Gene?

By Diane Flynn Keith

Some people’s brains are hard-wired for spelling - it just comes “naturally” to them. Others struggle endlessly with spelling drills and workbooks resulting in little progress and lots of frustration.

The emphasis on spelling in schools and homeschools as a critical language arts skill is over-rated. There are plenty of intelligent people who excel in every school subject including reading, who cannot spell well. They suffer the indignation of red marks on papers that scream, “You’re stupid! You can’t spell!” Somehow, these non-spellers graduate from school and college and go on to lead productive lives. Not spelling well doesn’t mean you’re condemned to dumpster diving for a living.

John Wells, a professor of phonetics and president of the Spelling Society in an interview with The Times Online said:

• “It’s time to remove the fetish that says that correct spelling is a principle mark of being educated. …Text messaging, e-mail and Internet chat rooms are showing us the way forward for English.”
  

The written language is evolving into a more phonetic and simplified form.

The Times Online also reported that research conducted by Anthony Monaco of Oxford University suggests spelling ability may be embedded in your DNA. He tracked the development of 6,000 children and identified a gene that helps guide brain cells into the cortex of the developing brain that may affect the ability to read and spell. We all have it, but about 15% of the population has a slightly different version of that gene that may account for information processing differences.

Science doesn’t have all of the answers yet, but progress is being made toward understanding the difference between Spelling Bee champs and chumps.

So what can parents do to help their children in the meantime? Avoid judging your child’s ability and intelligence based on whether or not they can spell well. This truly may be an inherited genetic trait. If spelling isn’t their “thing” - give them the tools they need to edit their own work. Understand that every brain is different. Visual learners can “see” the correct spelling of a word in their mind’s eye. Auditory learners will be better at sounding out spelling words. Explore multiple methods that will help your child decode the language in a fun and engaging way. Here are some helpful resources for those with and without the spelling gene:

SpellingCity.com is a terrific website that will help your children (ages 5-13 or grades K-8) improve their spelling skills for FREE. Spelling City includes:

• Over 37,000 words, including plurals, contractions, future and past tenses.
• 8 spelling games! Students can play games with their spelling words that are automatically generated by a program at the website.
• A REAL human voice that pronounces the spelling words and sentences making it easier to understand and learn.
• A “Teach Me” function that spells out the word using both visual and auditory input to improve retention.
• The ability for teachers and parents to enter and save their own spelling lists for their students/children.

Get the 28 Rules of Spelling - Free! from the Riggs Institute that sells spelling curriculum and workbooks.

Scripps National Spelling Bee - For those who have the spelling gene, get free resources, study suggestions, spelling word lists that include parts of speech, language origins, pronunciations, definitions, and sentences for thousands of words.

2009 Spell It! - This is the official study resource of the Scripps National Spelling Bee from Merriam-Webster. You’ll find plenty of free tips and activities to improve spelling.

Free Homeschool Spelling Course - When you get to this commercial website you’ll find a FREE 30-lesson homeschool spelling course for students in grades 6- 8. It includes printable spelling rules and step-by-step lessons. The idea here is that if you like the spelling course, you may be motivated to purchase their other courses in grammar and punctuation.

Free Spelling Worksheets - Get free spelling worksheets for elementary grade and remedial students including spelling rules like “silent e”, consonant blends, plurals, suffixes, prefixes and even word search games to reinforce spelling.

Play Games To Improve Spelling! Here are some suggestions:

Spelling Hangman - This classic kids game helps hone spelling in a fun and engaging way.
Word Safari Game - Practice spelling while playing a fun online video game.
Alphabet Soup Spelling Game - Try this arcade style game that will challenge your spelling skills.
Spelling Games - Play and learn with these games based on the Dolch Sight Words list.
Catch the Spelling - This site was designed for ESL students, but can be used for grades Pre-K through 8 (approximately). Players use the arrows on their computer keyboard to move “the catcher” to catch falling letters in the correct order to spell out a designated word. Younger children and non-readers will need parental help.
Scrabble, Boggle, and UpWords - These terrific board games from Hasbro improve spelling skills. Click on the link to play the games online for free.
Funbrain: Spell Check - Need a little drill and practice work? This site offers an easy and hard spelling test. There are 20 sets of 4 words offered in each test. The Spell Check game is designed for 4th grade through Middle School. Younger children may find the Spellaroo version of the game on this site a little less difficult.

Copyright 2008, Diane Flynn Keith, All Rights Reserved. Diane Flynn Keith publishes the rave-reviewed Homefires Ezine with 5,500+ subscribers. If you’re ready to save time and money, ease your anxiety, and learn how to have fun homeschooling, get your FREE subscription now at http://www.Homefires.com.

******

America has a drug problem, not necessarily an illegal drug problem, but one from common over the counter medicines, antibiotics and prescription drugs that most Americans consume without batting an eyelash, yet are ending up in our water supply in ever increasing numbers with no thought of the long-term consequences. Its common to self medicate for every ache and pain from attempts at Saturday afternoon quarterbacking, and running doctor to get an antibiotic for every sneeze, sniffle or earache that comes along. The drugs themselves might be for legitimate purposes, such as to kill a strep infection in a child’s throat, or from questionable purposes, like overmedicating our elderly generation with drugs to make them more docile and easier for the caretaker to care for. When the drugs are consumed by animal or human, the excess is excreted and ends up in either local waste treatment facilities or in the farmer’s manure pile where the resulting slurry of sludge oftentimes pumped back onto to the farmer’s fields as fertilizer. The medical industry has promoted the disposal of out dated drugs by flushing them down the toilet, further contaminating the resulting sewage. Both methods of dealing with wastes tends to leach pharmaceuticals back into the environment which end up in the ground water. Municipal water treatment systems were built to filter out contaminates such as pesticides and lead, not pharmaceuticals and so far the pharmaceuticals aren’t readily decomposing in the environment, with lingering effects on plants and wildlife.

The EPA has studied the adverse effects of pharmaceuticals on wildlife, linking them to inter-sexed fish, and other mutations in amphibians and birds. Researchers are continuing to study the effects of these lingering drugs through our water system on humans and are looking at possible links to the increase of some cancers and neurological problems in children. Since the EPA has no regulations for testing of pharmaceutical residues in water treatment systems, we have no basis for safe levels exiting the treatment plants or limits to the amounts of drug residue that is in municipal water supplies. What the effects of the combination are of birth control pills, pain killers, anti-depressants and a host of other compounds in a water “cocktail” will need to be studied in further detail. The problem becomes how to remove the drugs from the water so the water can be reused without returning the contaminates to the water supply. Cleaning up the already contaminated water supply is an enormous undertaking.

No one has studied the long term effects of low level consumption of various pharmaceutical “cocktails” in humans or animals, not to mention the plants that grow in the fields where the raw sludge has been applied. There have been several short term studies that show plants are susceptible to antibiotic poisoning which can either kill the plant outright, or stunt its growth and resulting in lower crop yields. Just as in previous years we came to learn of the harmful effects of DDT and chlordane and the impact of those substances to act as endocrine disruptors, which may lead to increased risks of some forms of cancer, so too, these new drug cocktail might prove to have unintended side effect of this drug-crazed society. There are few that realize that anti-bacterial soap residue kill fish. With the growing concern of the misuse of antibiotics to attempt to treat symptoms not intended for its use and perhaps the resulting antibiotic resistant strains of virulent bacteria, it would seem prudent to study the impact of pharmaceuticals upon the water cycle closer.

If water from the tap becomes unsafe to drink or bathe in, society will have a paradigm shift. No longer will turning on the tap be taken for granted. Each home or building will need it’s own self contained distiller or reverse osmosis filtration system to remove harmful contaminates.. Filling up the pool and allowing the kids to play in it will take extra thought and precautions. The problem of pharmaceutical contaminates is of further concern as there are plenty of beneficial microbes and bacteria in our environment that are being negatively affected by the pharmacopeia of modern America. What will this do to the terra firma in addition to the ground water? Will this turn the “breadbasket of the world” into the great American Desert, or perhaps a vast “No Man’s Land”?

Some of the solutions being proposed to lessen or eliminate the problem are:
•Stop disposing of outdated or unused pharmaceuticals in the toilet.
•Take them back to the pharmacy or doctor’s office for mass disposal and possible incineration. If that is not possible, then mix the old medication with kitty litter or charcoal briquettes and dispose of with solid wastes, like in the curbside trash service.
•Recycle sewage waste to reclaim toxic drugs
•Research ways to assist the chemical decomposition of pharmaceuticals in agriculture.
•Research and utilize alternative methods to standard pharmacopea, such as improved nutrition.

The AP investigation was long overdue and hopefully serves as a wake up call, even though it comes 10 years after some original scientific research on the subject. Americans as a whole were unaware of the effect that common drugs were having on the water supply and if the situation isn’t soon remedied, the coming crisis will make the current financial woes look tame.

What can the individual do to assist the ground water clean up?
•Don’t dispose of old or unused medications in the toilet.
•Refuse to buy soap products that have anti-bacterial additives.
•Buy animal fee that is unmedicated and boycott producers of feed that routinely utilized medication in their feeds
•Encourage families to be responsible for their own health care decisions, cradle to grave, and not run to the pharmaceutical solution at the drop of a hat.

Bibliography

Christian G. Daughton. (May 2003). Cradle-to Cradle Stewardship of Drugs for Minimizing Their Environmental Disposition While Promoting Human Health. II Drug Disposal, Waste Reduction, and Future Directions. Environmental Health Perspectives, Vol 111, No. 5. 775-785.  Retrieved September 29, 2008, from http://www.jstore.org/stable/3435103

Janet Raloff. (June 29, 2002). Pharm Pollution. Science News, Vol. 161, No. 26. 406-407. Retrieved September 29, 2008 from http://www.jstor.org/stable/4013500

Greg Peterson. (July/August 2007) Water Worries. E-The Environmental Magazine, Vol. 18, Issue 4. 16-20. Retrieved September 28, 2008 from
http://search.ebscohost.com.proxy.kclibrary.org/login.aspx?direct=true&db=afh&AN=25444975&site=ehost-live

Jeff Donn, et al. (March 10, 2008) AP: Drugs Found In Drinking Water. USAToday.com. Retrieved September 28, 2008 from http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-03-10-drugs-tap-water_N.htm

-The Road Scholar

Have you ever read John Taylor Gatto? He’s the former New York City public school teacher and author of several books including The Underground History of American Education: A School Teacher’s Intimate Investigation of the Problem of Modern Schooling“, “Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling“, and the newly published “Weapons of Mass Instruction: A Schoolteacher’s Journey through the Dark World of Compulsory Schooling.”

In his latest release, Gatto lays the foundation for showing that public schools train children to remain children. He also gives us hope that there is a better way - to train children that can be independent thinkers, that can rely on themselves to banish boredom, to become leaders and adventurers.

Here’s an excerpt from the newest release as posted on OdeMagazine.com:

• Now you needn’t have studied marketing to know that two groups of people can always be convinced to consume more than they need: addicts and children. School has done a pretty good job of turning our children into addicts, but it has done a spectacular job of turning our children into children. Again, this is no accident. Theorists from Plato to Rousseau to our own Dr. Inglis knew that if children could be cloistered with other children, stripped of responsibility and independence, encouraged to develop only the trivializing emotions of greed, envy, jealousy and fear, they would grow older but never grow up.
• Now for the good news. Once you understand the logic behind modern schooling, its tricks and traps are fairly easy to avoid. School trains children to be employees and consumers; teach your own to be leaders and adventurers. School trains children to obey reflexively; teach your own to think critically and independently. Well-schooled kids have a low threshold for boredom; help your own to develop an inner life so they’ll never be bored. Urge them to take on the serious material, the grown-up material, in history, literature, philosophy, music, art, economics, theology—all the stuff schoolteachers know well enough to avoid. Challenge your kids with plenty of solitude so they learn to enjoy their own company, to conduct inner dialogues. Well-schooled people are conditioned to dread being alone, and seek constant companionship through the TV, the computer, the cellphone, and through shallow friendships quickly acquired and quickly abandoned. Your children should have a more meaningful life, and they can
• First, though, we must wake up to what our schools really are: laboratories of experimentation on young minds, drill centres for the habits and attitudes that corporate society demands. Mandatory education serves children only incidentally; its real purpose is to turn them into servants. Don’t let your own have their childhoods extended, not even for a day.
• There’s no telling what your own kids could do. After a long life and 30 years in the public school trenches, I’ve concluded that genius is as common as dirt. We suppress our genius only because we haven’t yet figured out how to manage a population of educated men and women. The solution, I think, is simple and glorious. Let them manage themselves.

I’ve grown to appreciate his candor and experience. I especially appreciate that he is such a strong advocate for alternatives to public education, given that he was a public school teacher for 30 years.

Why not grab a copy for yourself, or ask for it at the library? You might find some additional ammo for those relatives that like to ask during the holidays, “So when are you going to send little Johnny/Janey to school and get a REAL education?”

-The Road Scholar

From the FEC’s website, in part it says:

• In order to appreciate the reasons for the Electoral College, it is essential to understand its historical context and the problem that the Founding Fathers were trying to solve. They faced the difficult question of how to elect a president in a nation that:
• was composed of thirteen large and small States jealous of their own rights and powers and suspicious of any central national government
• contained only 4,000,000 people spread up and down a thousand miles of Atlantic seaboard barely connected by transportation or communication (so that national campaigns were impractical even if they had been thought desirable)
• believed, under the influence of such British political thinkers as Henry St John Bolingbroke, that political parties were mischievous if not downright evil, and
• felt that gentlemen should not campaign for public office (The saying was “The office should seek the man, the man should not seek the office.”).
  How, then, to choose a president without political parties, without national campaigns, and without upsetting the carefully designed balance between the presidency and the Congress on one hand and between the States and the federal government on the other?

from The Electoral College by WC Kimberling
http://www.fec.gov/pdf/eleccoll.pdf

Here are some resources you might like to share with your kids. No time like the present to introduce these topics!

HowStuffWorks “How the Electoral College Works”
http://www.howstuffworks.com/electoral-college.htm

The Electoral College: How It Works in Contemporary Presidential Elections
http://www.fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/28109.pdf

In Defense of the Electoral College
http://www.alec.org/am/pdf/Electoral_College_Defense.pdf

Lesson Plan for The Electoral College for grades 3-12
http://exchange.co-nect.net/legacy/Schools/Election/theelectoralcollege.pdf

Lesson Plan: Debate the Electoral College
http://www.c-spanclassroom.org/PDF/Debate_the_Electoral_College_LP.pdf

Interactive map of the States with Electoral Votes per state. Also able to view historical maps of election results.
http://www.270towin.com/

Hope these help spark some lively discussions!
-The Road Scholar

I guess the subject of death is one we all want to avoid because it reminds us of our own humanity and frailty, and yes, even our own short lifespan. But as Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living,” so I take this time to reflect on what this gossamer thread of life is really made of.

Take a stroll through any graveyard and what do you find? A bunch of headstones and markers that list the person’s name with the date of birth and the date of death. Between the two dates, you usually find a dash symbol - a small and seemingly insignificant symbol, but is it really? The dates symbolizes the life lived, a beginning point and an ending. The middle, the dash, is the stuff that made the life what it was, what is left behind and remembered - the dash symbolizes the legacy of that lifetime.

During the course of our interactions, a bit of each of us rubs off on one another. Your legacy is not only the physical items you leave behind with your money and your will, but it includes your character, who you were and what you did, who you’ve touched, and what you leave behind for others to remember you by. Our ancestors left us a legacy of freedom as shown in the Constitution and guided by the hand of Providence. They poured their blood, sweat and tears as a legacy to the generations after them. Will our legacy stand the test of time like theirs has? What kind of legacy are you storing up for your friends and family? Are you giving your children precious memories of enjoyable times? Are you banking love credits with your sweetie that will warm the cockles of their heart after you’re gone?  Sure, you may leave behind a fine house and lots of money, but what about your character? Will you leave behind people who will genuinely miss you, children and grandchildren that loved you so much they endeavor to emulate you, to pass along the very substance of you to future generations?

I’m not saying we all must roam the earth in sack cloths and ashes, but do we really have to keep up with the Jones’? If we look at that new car we want to purchase as a week’s worth of time away from our loved ones each month for up to 5 years, is it worth it? Can we make do with a car that we can pay cash for instead and have more family time as a result and less debt to boot?

I know there are other single parents, like myself, that struggle with the legacy that the other parent is leaving the children. Sometimes the legacy is one of abandonment and feelings of being unloved, or unworthy. Sometimes the legacy is anger for what they couldn’t or wouldn’t give. Not to worry, there is a solution. You see, you can change the legacy you are leaving behind. You can change the perception of the legacy the other parent is leaving behind too, by lovingly giving grace and mercy to the very person you might not think needs it. Just remember that the other person can’t give away anything that they don’t possess themselves. They can’t give a legacy of love and acceptance if they don’t already own those things in their life. God tells us He will be a Father to the fatherless, a Defender of the widow and orphan. You can appeal directly to Him to help make up for the shortcomings of not only yourself, but the other parent.

Please take a few moments to watch the video and see what you’re planting. What is your legacy to the generations yet to come?

I immediately went out and put in a few applications that very day. Over the weeks I was out of work, I revisited my desire to go back to school so I could get a better job. Both my sisters are X-ray Technicians and make better than gas station wages. I had been toying with finishing up my schooling for either an RN or an X-ray Tech, so after talking to several people in both professions, I made the decision to pursue a career in X-ray Technologies.

The cheapest way to do this, in my area at least, is to pursue a hospital based training program. To get into the programs, there are pre-requisites, and as it happens, I need some classes. Anatomy and Physiology is one class I need and the other is Algebra. The pre-reqs to get into A&P is either a Biology or Chemistry class, and as it happens, I didn’t have either. Did I mention that I was finding this out a week after classes had started? The college won’t let you into a class after it’s had 3 class meetings, so my choices were severely limited. I couldn’t find an open Algebra class at all, and the only class I could squeeze into was Chemistry. Many moons ago, my first semester in college, I took a Chemistry class. While I passed the lab, I bombed miserably on the lecture portion. It went over my head and I never asked for direction or assistance, which was my own fault.

Today we are almost 6 weeks into the semester, give or take. I understand and am comprehending more in this class than I ever did in my last one, even though I started the class a week behind. Yes, I had to play catch-up, and it concerned me for a moment. But like any good homeschool mama, I now know how to look for help when I don’t understand a concept. I also have access to something that wasn’t even invented back then - podcasts!

There are so many educational subjects available to supplement your studies, I daresay you could dive into whatever subject strikes your fancy and you’re likely to find something out there with a podcast that will help. In my case, to help me get up to speed with the rest of the class, I went to iTunes and looked up Chemistry podcasts. You know what? I’m still using them to help supplement the in-class portion of my studies. I can download them to my iPod and take them with me and listen on my way to work. I can go over them time and time again until the concept becomes clear and sinks in.

Now if this homeschool mama can work and go to school and keep the house (reasonably) together with the kids still being able to learn, then I know more of you can do the same if you need to. Don’t settle for less, strive to be better! Go for the best! You might have to think outside of the box, but there are various ways to go about a self improvement regiment. Do you have little kids still at home and don’t feel you can get out and leave them just yet? Then investigate the library or internet. Have you always wanted to learn another language or perhaps embarque on a new venture with eating better, taking care of yourself and becoming more physically active? There’s no time like the present!!! Make a commitment to yourself first and foremost, because if you don’t take care of you, you can’t take care of anyone else. God’s Word tells us to “love thy neighbor as thyself,” Matthew 22:39.

I have to admit since the breakup of my marriage, I hadn’t taken very good care of myself. This year was a significant decade birthday for me - 50 if you really want to know. I don’t feel it on the inside, but the outside didn’t match what I felt in my head. I felt frumpy and less than beautiful. I didn’t want to look in the mirror at what I’d let myself become.

So I did something about it.

Right before I got fired, I started the Atkins Program. This is something I researched as I didn’t feel the Weight Watchers I had been attending was meeting my needs, it was hard to stick with the program, and I was having a hard time paying for the monthy meetings. With Atkins, I was seeing good results, and as it happened, being fired didn’t send me into a tailspin in regards to loosing weight. Forty pounds less later, I still am having good results. I have become more physically active. I also now have a job that is as good as a gym workout, my stamina is improving and I feel so much better about myself. Not only has my physical shape changed for the better, but my mental outlook has too.

So take some time for yourself in the midst of your single homeschool adventures. Learn some things for you, things that you don’t have to write down in your children’s planner. You may not have to write them down, but I’m sure the lessons you learn will be passed along anyway! I got a glimpse at Budding Artist’s weblog the other day and I was surprised to find she had penned that she admired me for all that I was doing for her and the family. Now she’s my sober child that doesn’t say much or go into details about her feelings, so for me, this was news that I will treasure.

What kind of legacy will you leave to your children? I’m not talking about money. Money comes and money goes. I’m talking about the important stuff in life, how to do or make do with what you’ve got and how to go after what you need, how to give to others by giving to yourself.

God indeed feeds the birds of the field, but he doesn’t throw the worms into the nest.

Go out and find the worms for yourself.

You and your family will be glad you did.

-The Road Scholar

I think housework can be like that. You put off doing something you don’t like, but it needs to be done, and when you do it, you get a certain satisfaction and maybe, just maybe, even pleasure in the doing. So why the procrastination? Just like Dennis, we don’t see the need. We need to help ourselves see the need in order to get the pleasure.

For some reason, I am not by nature, organized in my housekeeping. How I wish I had gotten the gene from my mom’s mom that was a natural organizer. I think I got the recessive gene from my father’s mother that was a pack-rat extraordinaire. Actually, I’m not nearly that bad, but I realize it could be worse - and it could be better. But I also have to realize (or is it rationalize?) that I am a single parent that has to work, and when I work, my kids, who are of an age they can be home alone, don’t pick up and put away when they move from one activity to another without prompting from me the way I would like. Funny, my house was actually cleaner when I had 8 kids living at home versus the two here now. Of course, I wasn’t a single mom back then and I had 6 more pairs of hands to help with the chores. I’ve had to learn to pick and choose my battles in the mean time.

Other things that I’m learning about are timers. Set a goal and set a timer. For instance, you might have a dawdler at the kitchen sink who will take hours exploring the science of bubbles, using up the whole bottle of dish soap yet only cleaning 10 dishes in 2 hours. (Does this sound in the least familiar to anyone besides me?) Help them sort and stack the dishes to pre-organize the area. Set the timer for a reasonable time (20 to 30 minutes might be a good place to start) and give a reward when the job is properly finished. Helping make cookies maybe? Special time on the computer? You choose.

Set a timer for each room and give each person a different chore in that room. Once the room is straightened and presentable, move on to the next. Set the timer again and divy up chores and off you go again. See how much you can get done in 15 minutes for each room, I think you’ll surprise yourelf.  Personally, I don’t like to get out the vaccuum until the basics are done because it is a pain to get it out and then stumble over it while you’re moving from room to room, but to each his own. Your house layout is probably way different than mine.

You could even make a contest of it where you divy up the rooms that need attention between all the people you have at home. Gather up all the supplies needed, trash bags, laundry basket, dusting rag and spray, whatever you need and set them in a central location for everyone to use without going back and forth to the supply closet. Set the timer again and see who gets their tasks done first. Reward the winner with something special, a chocolate bar, make their favorite cookies together, or even a special movie night. I think in the beginning rewards are beneficial because it gives a tangible sweet reward for doing something that might not be so sweet and pleasant.

Do you have anything else in your life that leaves you lackluster? How about yard work, or paying the bills, getting homework done, starting a new exercise program? Try setting a timer and see if that doesn’t help motivate you. You will realize that doing the chore, it doesn’t really last forever like you may have feared. Perhaps by breaking up the seeminly insurmountable task ahead of you, whatever it may be, will help you meet your goal.

You do know how to eat an elephant, don’t you?

One bite at a time.

So instead of moaning and procrastinating, get out the timer and take a bite!

-The Road Scholar