I suggested to my wife that “American culture” is an oxymoron. I was contemplating making a list of thought provoking oxymorons; “modern education” and “liberal enlightenment” would be on the list. Deanna disagreed with my claim that there is no such thing as American culture, so I had to...
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In addition to the work I perform for www.homeschoolcounselor.com, I also provide consulting for college admissions departments. One of the more common questions I am asked by admissions leaders is, “How can we be more successful in matriculating homeschoolers?” Pardon my cynicism, but when I hear this question, I feel...
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The incandescent light bulb changed our world. Society embraced the new invention. As we adapted, darkness no longer stopped the show. Now people can work and play any time, day or night. It is hard for us to imagine that the setting of the sun would significantly alter most...
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As I sit down to write this article, my mind keeps returning to the remembrance that it is March and it is time for the National Latin Exam. I love the exam, and I love the fact that it measures my students against students from around the world (even...
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Have you ever been to Monticello? If so, were you amazed that Thomas Jefferson, our third president and founder of the University of Virginia, was his own architect? Did you know that America’s first president (under the Articles of Confederation) Peyton Randolph could write in two languages at the...
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Some people believe the “Tebow Laws,” which are being proposed in various states, are a positive advancement for homeschooling. However, I believe homeschoolers should seriously consider the following perspective: although it is, perhaps, mostly like-minded friends who are pushing these “Tebow Laws” through their state legislatures, these laws are...
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What is an orchard? The easiest and most obvious answer is that it is a large field with fruit-producing trees, intentionally planted for the purpose of harvesting large quantities of fruit. The less obvious answer, however, is the one that needs to be considered. Therefore, since “brevity is the...
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I have been familiar with the name 0f Mother Teresa all my life, but I was not really inspired by her until recently, when I read Malcolm Muggeridge’s short book entitled Something Beautiful for God. Mother Teresa vowed, as have the men and women who work with her ministries, to...
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“We think it our duty to notice that, outside of and, so to say, beyond his faith, the bishop had an excess of love.”1 This is Victor Hugo’s description, in his novel Les Misérables, of the Bishop of Digne, a man who gave away his bishop’s palace to the local charitable...
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Even apart from profound connection with mathematics, music is pre-eminent among the arts for the order and clarity, the sharply defined character, of its elements. Music moves us, sometimes to overpowering emotion. It does so through well-defined structures, through an order of tones and rhythms. It is not...
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We have spent the past few months discussing the enigmatic thirds in Latin: third declension, third conjugation, and now, third declension adjectives. Let us review the basics of the thirds. Third conjugation verbs have –ere (short “e,” in contrast to the second conjugation which has a long “e” with a...
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If you have ever read Robinson Crusoe, you may remember one of his most serendipitous discoveries. Crusoe, the shipwrecked castaway, finds barley growing by his homemade shelter and realizes that he himself must have grown it, however unintentionally. He deduces that the grain has grown from what he believed to...
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