I’m Sorry To Tell You…

…but this is not Michelle writing but her daughter Iona.

Unfortunately my mum passed away on Tuesday night. As most of you know, she had experienced a long eleven year struggle with a complex illness that even I could not start to explain, and I feel she was ready to go home. She never made it to the hospital, but died at home attended by paramedics who did a wonderful, sensitive job. The cause of death is known, but as yet has not been properly explained to us by her GP, so I cannot give you any real information on that.

The family has come together and the children are coping as  well as they can, we hope you will have us in your prayers for the coming days and months, and as mum once wrote ‘if you don’t have a God, borrow one’.

I know that she appreciated the love and support she found from her internet friends and so we all thank you for any advice, kind comments and the faithful readership you offered her in her life.

Love,

Iona

x

Home ed happens anyway.

It’s been rough recently. For dysautonomia awareness month my dysautonomia is making me very aware of it.

This week is a quiet week for home ed. I’ve set music, reading, finishing off work including the Archimedes pack and we’ve started an artists lapbook.

I had a doctors appt to get to today. I was gone a long time. When I got back the children were doing some cooking with Iona. They had finished off all their lessons and watched an episode of SALSA (which they love) before starting some cooking.

It’s really heartening to see how they just continue to do their learning no matter what’s going on around them. They were pretty proud of themselves too 🙂

The plan for me is that I am to go back to the doc on Thurs if I’ve managed to stay out of hospital until then. As it happens half term is coming up so hospital wouldn’t effect things so much anyway. We’ll see. Hospital is no place for sick people – but I am running out of excuses not to go in.

Montessori; body, mind and soul.

I sometimes think our culture hasn’t so much embraced dualism as a kind of tri-ism. While the dualists liked to separate out the things of the body from the things of the soul, leading to some heresies where a “Christian” was told he could either do as he liked with his body, or must ignore it to death. But now we have separated out body and mind and ditched the soul. Montessori is a breath of fresh air in that she sees persons as whole; body, mind and soul. One interacts with the other.

In her education the child is not reduced to some one sitting and learning aurally by hearing the teacher and visually by watching the teacher – all very passive, but participates in his own learning and discovery by doing things, touching, manipulating, tasting, smelling and trying things out. I wish I had read her books while I was still doing my MA. It would have helped me a great deal.

I did my MA dissertation on how to bring children with various severe learning difficulties (especially autism) to the Sacraments. Montessori’s philosophy was rooted in three things (as far as I can see), her work with children with learning and physical disabilities, her Catholicness and her degree in engineering. At first sight you may wonder how they connect. Well, as I see it, Montessori learned a lot from the children she worked with in the hospitals. In my experience such children have amazing compensatory coping skills so that they can get a great deal out of life.

When I worked in a children’s hospice we had, what was called a “multisensory room”. Through light, sound and texture we could arrange the room to suit the child. Sometimes it would be warm, darkish and low stimulation, and at other times the children liked the music, bubbles and coloured lights. The walls were white so that they could be anything from low to high stimulation. Many children with autism in particular need low stimulation. There’s some evidence that children with ADHD cope better with it too. Montessori didn’t have to deal with the fall out from the over bright, shouting, busy stimulation directly aimed at children that we have today, but she understood children needing to learn through the experience of their whole body.

Montessori’s degree in engineering definitely influenced her brilliant idea to introduce geometry as a sensorial activity with very young children. It was a particularly brilliant plan in light of the children who first attended the “Children’s Houses”. While Charlotte Mason had the children under her care learn about the world around them through sensorial experiences with nature, the children in Montessori’s schools were in the slums of Rome. There wasn’t a lot of nature to be had. Even so, Montessori records how they found a piece of dump-land near the flats that the children turned into a little garden. Children feel and run their fingers around the shapes and edges whether of the items in the geometric cabinet or leaves and sticks from outside. The lessons introduce the names of the shapes and the children draw them, touch them, make them fit into place and so their whole selves get to discover the shapes.

So, how does Montessori’s Catholicness fit this? In my dissertation I wrote about how a church can be a multisensory room. (Putting aside the stuff that happened in the ’70s where churches became boxes with benches in them). In a church there are stain glass windows, statues, candles, marble, stone and wood. There is the smell of old incense – and at Mass the smell and sight of new incense. All of the accoutrements of Mass or the church when empty, are one big multisensory experience that does not require the participant to grasp spoken language (although that helps) or to be able to see (that helps too) or even to truly “get it” on a theological level. While the Mass has it all there for the Phd Professor- so everything is there for the severely disabled person. The Church knows that we need to have a relationship with God that is whole. We pray with our bodies, minds and souls just as children need to learn and form their relationships body, mind and soul. Montessori got this. In a nutshell I would say that Montessori produced a method of education based on a philosophy that we all need to interact with beauty.

Being Catholic in a nutshell: Why go to Mass every Sunday? (or every day even!)

I’ve decided to write some short answers to the stuff even Catholics don’t seem to know the answers to. I hear these questions a lot. So here’s the first one:

Why do Catholics have to go to Mass every Sunday? What is the Sunday obligation all about?

It’s like this. On the night He was betrayed Jesus took bread and wine during a liturgical meal (a Passover) and said, “This is My Body” and “This is My Blood” and then “Do this in Remembrance of Me.”

He didn’t finish the meal but went out to the Garden of Olives where He was betrayed and arrested. He was put through trails and torture before taking His cross and completing His Passion – a word that means to pour out – on Calvary, where He was crucified and died.

On the Third Day He rose.

Every Mass is a re-presentation (meaning to make present again but not a re-sacrifice, as that’s not possible or warranted) of that once and for all Sacrifice made by Jesus for us and our Salvation. When we go to Mass we are in a way actually there with Him as He offers His Body and Blood and then we can go forward and eat His Body as He commanded in John 6 so we can have Life in us.

Knowing that at each Mass we are drawn into participation with the Passion and can receive Him in His risen self; Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity then we are automatically obliged to do so under the First Commandment. We must put God first.

So, those who think doing something else is more important than being with God in such a profound way are making something else more important than God.

That’s it in nutshell.

Hospital Appointment – larynx/throat speech specialist

I’m sorry to write two medical posts one after the other but I had my hospital appt yesterday and thought I’d tell y’all about it.

I saw a speech cum throat- especially larynx specialist. I had been referred to her by my Respiratory Consultant who suspected that some of the asthma and other breathing problems may be Vocal Cord Dysfunction.

She took a very thorough history – I was in there for an hour – on NHS time!  We went through the different breathing problems; some obviously asthma, some orthostatic, some being something else. She was interested in the problems I’m having with swallowing and eating – without immediately jumping to daft conclusions.

Then she stuck a camera up my nose and down my throat. This is just the sort of thing a good Catholic girlie can “offer up” 🙂

From this delightful experience she told me straight away that my throat was “cherry red” and otherwise a bit of a mess. So I now have a dx of Vocal Cord Dysfunction (VCD) and EERD (a form of reflux)

In her talk about how VCD works she spoke of it as a spectrum disorder. On the mild end are those who have what I suppose sounds like voice strain; teachers, soldiers and opera singers being the most common patients. (As my Resp Con is a Colonal in the army I wonder if that’s how he guessed so quickly what was happening to me).

On the rough end come those of us with severe asthma and autonomic nervous system problems. She hadn’t heard of dysautonomia as hyperadrenergic POTS or IST but she really quickly grasped the ANS dysfunction side of things for me and how that kicks in with VCD.

I’m to start therapy which will be around breathing exercises and voice control. There’s no cure as it’s obviously ANS related but it can be better managed – which I’m all for.

THIS PAPER IS A VERY GOOD OVERVIEW

Since the TIA last week I’ve had some problems with being upright and breathing. Needing to lie down more often and the bloomin’ stairs are a killer. I’ve set something off that I can’t get on top of right now. What a shambles.

Chronically ill mother’s homeschool approach.

I’ve noticed that sometimes the question of homeschooling while chronically ill is lumped in with pregnancy as if they are the same or very similar. They aren’t. Even if (like me) you have the joy of nine whole months of throwing up left right and centre with some “mummy brain” thrown in – pregnancy is different in one very vital way. No one is pregnant for years on end, and many of the more yukky sides of pregnancy are both treatable and manageable. It is also silly to try and lump pregnancy as an “illness”. It is’t, even if the culture of medical elitism tries to tell us it is.

Chronic illness can be neither treatable nor, at times, manageable – and is way more unpredictable. When you plan home ed through a pregnancy you know there’s a point in which you can pick up again. When you plan through chronic illness it’s a whole different set of challenges.

So, what are the things that you can do if the Boss has called you to homeschool and He’s called you to carry the chronic-cross too? You can tell Him what you think of His plan 🙂 – and then you have to get on with it.

First things first. You see that big pile of guilt you’ve got building up over there. Deal with it. Sort out the fake from the real. Bin the fake and get yourself to Confession for the real stuff. If you are too sick for Confession (and there’s nothing mortal lurking about) you can pray a lot. He’s merciful like that. (even when you’ve told Him how you really feel).

Once that’s done (and yes I know it keeps rebuilding, but keep kicking it down) then you can move on to priorities. Prayer first. You’ll get nothing done without help from Upstairs. He has a lot of friends and relations who can be relied on to keep praying for you too. (Where would I be without St. Bridget of Sweden?) One of the wonderful things about the saints in heaven is that they can still pray, even when you, in fog, confusion and befuddlement can’t. Also we are fortunate that God, who is all wise gets a prayer of “Dear Lord, urdle, flurble mup.”

This little conversation is a good illustration of chronics homeshooling.

An article here asks a mum considering home education when she has chronic illness to think of a few things. It essentially says, pray, have a good husband and get some good fellow home ed mums on board to help out. It’s a good plan.

Yesterday a fellow home ed family came over. I’m still pretty crashed from the mini-stroke last week (TIA) but the mum of this family is completely relaxed around me no matter how wrecked I seem. She makes no fuss and simply does her bit around me. She takes the mic and allows me the space to do stuff when I think I can give it a go. Friendships like this are rare and to be treasured (so thanks Jo!)

This is another excellent article looking at a number of seriously chronically ill mothers coping with home ed

Then you must trust. While riding the trust you can plan for what curriculum you need to buy because you aren’t well enough to make it, teach it or organise it. All I can say on this is God Bless America! The UK has a shorter history of home ed (although it’s been around over 25 years) and has almost nothing of quality home ed resources sadly, (I think the awful national curriculum bares a lot of the blame – thanks Maggie Thatcher!). So, look at the American stuff. There’s a lot out there and yes it’s expensive (compared to making your own) and yes, most of it needs shipping and therefore costs are even higher and add the recent sneaky tax on educational materials in the UK and you’ll be in debt – but God never said debt was a sin; whereas not providing the best education you can for your children can be. You do need to plan your debt so you can pay it off, but I haven’t found a way of importing stuff without needing time to pay it off. It’s still a good option done with prayer, discernment and care.

Find ways to make resources do more than one job. Find ways to make cheaper resources when you’re well enough.  One of the things with most chronic illnesses and even acute ones like cancer, is there are good moments when you are more capable. Use them as best you can. I use those times to make and plan stuff that when I’m too sick I just can’t do.

But wouldn’t it be easier to sent them to school?

Not necessarily. First of all you would need to have a school that meets your children’s needs so you don’t have to undo the damage and do the home ed after school because not much ed has taken place in school. (Been there, done that; don’t fancy a repeat) Then  you’d need the energy to take and collect the children every day and cope with whatever fall-out the day has in store for you. That was hard enough when I was well!

Giving your children the best education you can give them is worth a lot and not having to undo stuff from school is a blessing.

Finally, all you can do is plan, pray, trust and take it one day at a time. I know more than one chronically ill mum who home educates children with some serious educational needs such as severe autism. Let them be an inspiration- not a moment of “Yikes! Why can’t I be that good?”

Language Arts Beginners Lesson Pack download

click picture to go to lesson pack

I have set up a 60 page language arts lesson pack for children aged around 6 to 7 or slightly older. It incorporates Arabella Buckley’s Bird’s of the Air as a listening and basic comprehension lesson. Listening is an important skill that children need to learn to be able to learn other things. Charlotte Mason used “living books” such as those written by Buckley to read to children and have them narrate back in their own words. In the lesson pack there is room for doing that but also simple question and answer format for early writing practice.

I’ve included an introduction to Montessori grammar with cut out sentence strips and cut out symbols at the back.

I’ve tested the pack on my youngest and she did well with it. She is very dyslexic so it does seem to suit children who may have

extra challenges in learning. I do have the proper grammar symbols and Heleyna loves using them, but you don’t absolutely need them.

The set only costs $2.75 so it won’t break even the most frugal budget.

It introduces nouns, proper nouns, articles and prepositions – which sounds like a lot for a 6 year old, but the visual and manipulative approach with the symbols seems to work remarkably well.

Click on the picture above to buy and the sig below to see everything.

Dysautonomia – what did you say that was?

Here’s quite a good explanation of the basics of dysautonomia. I notice she includes CFS (chronic fatigue syndrome) in the list. There is good science behind the idea that fibromyalgia is dysautonomic as it looks to be a form of hyperadrenergicPOTS. But I wasn’t aware that CFS has been included. It’s not that surprising though as some doctors (one in Australia that I can never remember the name of in particular) insist that up to 96% of patients with a dx of ME/CFS have some form of dysautonomia. But as Ramsay felt that a dx of dysautonomia meant a patient couldn’t have ME it’s a bit confusing.

Symptoms are very varied to the point where it has been said that each patient is different and certainly my Cardiologist agrees with that.

Death rates have not been measured although it seems to have a similar rate of suicide to other poorly treated chronic illnesses and there are a number of reports of sudden death similar to those associated with ME/cfs. As many of us have serious lung and Blood pressure problems it doesn’t seem that surprising that deaths happen. Studies in ME/Cfs show that heart failure is the number one cause of death with suicide coming in joint second with cancer – some more unusual cancers being oddly common among ME patients.

Talking anecdotaly I have come across a few people with a single diagnoses usually POTS or IST without blood pressure problems or anything else. The symptoms of POTS and IST can be pretty horrible on their own but there’s definitely a difference in degree compared to those of us with ME/Cfs and/or fibromyalgia to go with it.

Most people I know with ME have some kind of orthostatic intolerance. Mine is pretty bad these days. Can’t stay upright for very long without becoming nauseous, light headed breathless and blacking out (pre-synocope).

I don’t know what the end result of any research will be. There are tentative (poorly funded) moves to separate out the various forms of ME to get more accurate dx and hopefully treatment. It will very likely show that dysautonomia is either a form of ME or caused by ME or isn’t ME, but is dysautonomia.

One day we hope there will be suitable treatments that can put us into remission. But so far, that just isn’t the case.

Saw a GP today and hit the “they don’t know what to do” wall. Back on steroids but feeling pretty fed up. She did say she’d talk to my usual doc but she really wanted to refer me to another (insert very rude word here) neurologist. I refused.  Presently sofa’d – hope the steroids help.

Malala – a true heroine.

Watch as Malala Yousafzai tells Jon Stewart what she planned to say to the Taliban man who came to kill her.

She was shot two years ago when she was 14. She nearly died but the British army flew her out and brought her to my local hospital where she was treated and is looking very well!

Now 16 she is an amazing young woman.

The complete interview is here:

Making the Montessori equipment do more than one job.

Looking at the Montessori online shops like Absorbent Minds it would be far too easy to spend an absolute fortune making sure every lesson on every album ever downloaded was covered as prescribed. So here’s what I’ve been trying to do.

I have not gone back to the online shops. What I don’t see can’t tempt me. I remember that I still owe Josh money for the Montessori stuff I did buy!

I did work out over a long time what we needed for the widest possible work using the least possible equipment.

So. I have a lot of bead stuff. They are good for all the math work the three children do, including the Life of Fred books. They are also useful for geometry.  Heleyna (and the others) can make triangles, and other straight sided shapes with the bead bars.  She can also make angles with them. This means I don’t need the rods and have used a free download of geometric sticks for extensions from Livable Learning.

I’ve laminated a lot of the sticks and added small magnets for work on the whiteboard. If you do this a tip if not to put the magnets too close to the end

of the sticks as you need to be able to overlap the sticks for making shapes and some angles.

A lot of the “flat” Montessori materials are available as downloads to be printed on card and/or laminated. The decisions I have made on this, have been with and eye to the sensorial aspects of Montessori. I have bought things that are important for how they feel as well as how they look so the children learn through their senses and learn to train their senses in things like texture and weight.

I haven’t bought a lot of sensorial materials so I want the children to use other things around the house for that. I bought a set of glue jars  which can be used in various ways; add different beans for different weights. Add hot and cold fluid for baric touch (it’s not quite the same but it works). Different smelly things can be put in them and by  filling them differently with orange lentils they make sound shakers.

We use the trays as work space. Heleyna, in particular is an “all-over-the-place” kind of person. The little rim of the tray gives a gentle boundary to her exuberant nature as she learns.

The box of prisms for the brown stair can be adapted as spindles and rods for measurement of angle. We’ve also use them to make a narrow line for Heleyna to walk along to practice balance.

They are 1 cm² by 10 cm so they make great little measuring rods too. Heleyna has also used them as building extensions with the cubes and brown stair.

I’m sure I’ll have more multi uses as time goes on.

As I have the hollow cubes instead of the pink tower we can use them not only for tower and stair models and extensions but for pythagorian rules and for measurement of volume. They are also good for listening skills as the children can make the tower with the hollow side outwards and then blow into each cube listening for the faint change in tone as they blow from small to large and back again. We also use them for listening by banging them with a stick for different tones. Heleyna like to play a hide and memory game with them too. Memory games are very useful, especially for children with dyslexia.

Finally there’s a great way to save money on Montessori models by making them yourself from play-doh. We’ve been studying the earth in geography. The layers of the earth model is £10 + at it’s cheapest. We made one out of play-doh.

‘Scuze my dd’s scary stare there!

There’s a lot more that can be made with play-doh; I have big plans 🙂

Dysautonomia Awareness month

In the slightly strange world I inhabit I know quite a few people around the net who either have some form of dysautonomia or have one of the many co-mobidities that we have and so know about dysautonomia, even if they don’t have it. This can give me the false impression that everyone has heard of it and at least, has a general idea of what it is.

Dysautonomia isn’t well known and part of the reason is that it is supposed to be rare. The most common form is POTS with NMH; that is postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome with neurally mediated hypotension. The people with this get tachy when upright and their BP can drop like a stone. A lot of people with this have low blood volume.

Hyperadrenergic POTS is even rarer. We get tachy when upright and our BP will shoot upwards and for those of us on the “combo” end of things it will nose dive and shoot up again. It’s because the normal fight or flight responses are stuck on “ON” mode. This comes with the added complication that while we seem to be pumping out the adrenaline (ephinephrine) which is changed into noradreneline (norepinephrine) it might never really make it to dopamine, or if it does, not much dopamine is made. If it is made the uptake is poor and if the uptake can cope even a little, the re-uptake is bust. This is probably the root of my tremor and possibly the myoclonus too.

The depressed immune system means we have fun with infections.

Then in a small corner of rarity is IST – inappropriate sinus tachycardia. We have tachycardia all the time. In my case it’s around 100 (without meds) when I’m sitting still and can get down to the high 80s if I lie still – but often can’t do that. Upright it can get up in the 150s which is mild compared to some folk.

IST is thought to be a form of POTS but the medical jury is still out on that one. As there is very little research on IST – less than other POTS forms, it seems unlikely we’ll get many answers any time soon.

Other symptoms are brain fog – I hate it – confusion, memory loss, visual changes and auditory sensitivities.

We also get seizures. POTs related seizures are common and horrible. I had a one off the other night – thank God it was a one off. Seemed to be because I was particularly shattered. Not infection related this time. And that’s another problem – we don’t get seizures for one reason, we get them for a load and doctors like to call them “idiopathic” meaning they don’t know what causes them. They don’t respond to anticonvulsants unfortunately, so we are left with no treatment.

Dysautonomia ranges from mild through to severe where people are mostly stuck in bed with NG tube for feeding and sometimes oxygen. On the nasty end dysauto can be fatal; respiratory failure, heart attack, stroke seem to be the lead CoD.

This is a reasonably good article on IST as part of Dysautonomia.

So what does getting aware mean? Well first of all – if you have someone in your life with this disease, say a prayer for them. Be patient with them when they are acting spaced, foggy, tired or just off. Don’t assume that someone who is trying their best to be as normal as possible can keep that up every day. Crash days, weeks and even months happen. Be kind.

If you have money and know a good charity or research thingy then please do donate. We need research if we are ever to get good treatment, let alone a cure.

Archimedes lessons

Having done some of the basic experiments as part of the lesson pack following Archimedes and the door of science (book here) the children have also made the water clock, which is pretty simple to do. You need to make sure the pin holes in the paper cups are big enough for the water to drip though or time will stand still!

From there they have been learning about Archimedes experiments with number patterns. So we have been making triangle and square numbers and then cube and pyramid numbers. It was a good excuse to get out the bead material and the thousand cube box. 

It’s a lovely way to see and present some mathematical concepts.

The children seem to get more out of the lessons when they can stop writing for a bit and make something.

Heleyna tends to join in with those bits as well, so she’s getting a bit of an introduction via the work her older siblings are doing.

Much fun was had.

Home Education: Learning independence through spontaneous activity

I am reading The Montessori Method (free ebook) by Maria Montessori.  At the root of her method is the idea that children will find things out for themselves and that they desire and need independence. By constantly doing things for the children the parent or teacher is undermining the child’s ability to learn those skills for himself.

She has an interesting view that those who require servants are lacking in ability. Her view that the person who needs help because he has a physical disability is no worse off than the prince who needs help dressing because of his social status.

We habitually serve children; an act of servility toward them, but it is dangerous, since it tends to suffocate their useful spontaneous activity.

She differentiates between true service of others, such has assisting them to reach the independence they need and servility which is unhelpful at best and demeaning at worst.

She decries the mother who feeds her child without ever attempting to model eating herself or to help the child learn to hold and co-ordinate the spoon.  I think there’s a couple of things that cause this problem – which still very much exists today – and one is fear of mess. I have seen mother’s who can’t abide the phase where the child is trying to self feed and makes a right mess of himself and anything within a few yards radius.  There’s an underlying fear of dirt, I think.

The other reason for insisting on feeding a child who wants to feed himself is that awful modern thing of being afraid the child is growing up and won’t be a baby much longer. I have seen mothers who, can’t stand the idea that their youngest child is no longer a baby and they have decided (often without a reason) that there can’t be another.

Montessori bluntly calls mothers who won’t allow independence “not a good mother.”continuing

She offends the fundamental human dignity of her son, – she treats him as if her were a doll…”

Ouch!

I have to say, however strongly Montessori words this, she isn’t wrong. I worked with a class of children aged 4 to 5 and then the next year up when they were aged 5 to 6 (just before I got ill) and was amazed that most of the children couldn’t dress themselves. I don’t mean difficult buttons or laces, I mean putting on underwear and pulling on a sweatshirt. They couldn’t do it. The post-PE shambles, of trying to get 30 kids dressed, was astonishing to me.

Montessori says;

Who does not know that to teach a child to feed himself, to wash and dress himself, is a much more tedious and difficult work, calling for infinitely  greater patience than feeding washing and dressing the child oneself?

This is true. I am much more able to get the children to do things themselves when I am more with-it than when I’m so tired it just seems quicker and easier to do it myself. But it’s a bad habit to get into and one that takes a great deal away from the child.

I remember my friend telling me how she had picked up her son’s friend from school one day (they were both 10 at the time) and on the way home in the car the friend announced proudly that at school that day they had learned to cut an apple with a proper knife. Her son was unimpressed as he made lunch most days, cutting and preparing fruit, bread and whatever else was required with the right knives for the job and had been doing so for some time.

Children who are allowed to be capable are capable. But it takes time and commitment from the parents – lots of time, lots of commitment, at least to begin with. But soon enough a five or six year old can do a lot for themselves and a ten year old can do a lot more.

If you take the time and teach your children to be independent in what they do, they will more quickly learn independent thought as well, finding things out for themselves and asking questions about what they find.

It’s not the anger, it’s the guilt.

Someone I was in a short email correspondence with said that if it should happen that he became seriously ill, he would be very angry. I have to say, I doubt it. I don’t claim to know the inner emotional workings of the man who wrote this, but I do know how chronic illness works, and believe me, anger is a very tiring emotion and therefore not one that is tenable, for long periods of time. I’m not saying I’ve never felt angry or seen anger expressed by fellow Chronics – I have. Those of us who have rubbish or even abusive meetings with doctors will express justifiable anger; and sadly that happens far too often. But that’s just for those times.

The feeling or sense that bugs me much more of the time is guilt. I don’t know how ubiquitous this feeling is among us chronics, but it’s fairly constant with me, and as I think I’m pretty common, I am guessing there are others out there who struggle with it. I am not going to go into all the reasons I feel guilty, nor will I explain those awful moments when it comes to a head and I become a gibbering wreck. You don’t need to read about that.

This is not Catholic guilt. Wish it was – ‘cuz Confession cures that 😆

No, this guilt is about all the things I used to do that I can’t do. Some of it isn’t just guilt it’s a kind of jealousy of others which in turn leads to guilt; not just about what they can do I can’t, but guilt over the jealousy as well as guilt over not being able to do stuff. Quite a complicated mess for a brain-fogger to handle. Tiring mess at times too, leaving little left for something like anger.

So, how to deal with it.

First – a reality check. Sometimes things are bloomin’orrid and that’s life. So, accept reality. Don’t paint it worse than it is, and don’t run and hide from it. Get down with Fr Fran Fortuna’s Everybody Gotta Suffer and accept. This is easy to write and difficult to do, but it is, honestly, worth the effort.

Second; don’t assume that other people are cross that you can’t do what you used to do. Projection is a bad coping mechanism and is more likely to make the picker-upperer (there’s a word that just needs to exist) of your lost ability more cross with you than the business of picking up where you left off.

I know that many people are not projecting – that their friends and even family do tell them they are lazy, need to try harder, pull themselves together. The most difficult thing here to to stick with reality and accept that they are the one with the bad attitude and it isn’t your fault.

Third: Don’t give up because of the silly guilt. There is some mechanism in false-guilt that leads to fear. So, the temptation is, to throw up your hands (or just one if the other one won’t coordinate) and cry “Forget it! I give up!”

Take the good days and enjoy them. I’ve had odd days when I can play the piano again and even cook a meal once in a while without burning something, leaving something raw, filling the kitchen with smoke or killing any of the kids.

Lastly but most importantly of all be grateful.

If you just threw something at the computer screen, take it back and think a minute. There are still good things in life, even with chronic illness. I’m not saying pretend things are better than they are – but just be glad for the things that are good.

If you have reached that awful point where you just can’t see anything good then look for something small – a flower in bloom, a slice of cake or even the smell of rain. Anything that holds something good in it.

Finally it’s worth remembering that for people with ME/cfs and some forms of Dysautonomia that emotions can get a bit weird. Mood is heavily influenced by things like how our adrenals work, serotonin uptake, how malnourished we have become because of a busted metabolism and the generally busted HPO axis. This, coupled with mood changing drugs such as steroids can have quite an effect on our coping skills.

All we can do is keep at it. One day at a time – and on bad days one hour at time.

PS. I think I mentioned in a post where I’d seen the Cardiologist that I had decided not to have the tests for hyperadrenergic POTS done because they are very complicated and need lots of time and very skilled people.  Jackie’s very informative post here gives you the info on the tests.

ENDNOTE: I may also have mentioned that I am now on 10 mg twice a day of Ivabradine and as the max dose is 7.5 mg twice a day I spent a long time in the hospital pharmacy with my son.  Well, first repeat prescription request has hit the wall as the pharmacist is having the heeby-jeebies over handing the stuff over. I had written clearly on the the request that this was the Consultant Cardio’s decision and had been okayed by the hospital pharmacy and I assume the letter is in my notes by now – but it looks like there’s still some sorting out to do. I only hope this isn’t going to be an issue every time I need a repeat.  No anger or guilt – just frustration!

Book review; Lay Siege to Heaven Louis de Wohl

I think Lay Siege to Heaven is the best of de Wohl’s books. He has always done his homework on the historical context for any of his books and there’s a great deal of history here, but in this book he seems to have a strong understanding of Catherine Benincasa and her mother which gives a strong, three dimensional figure to both women. The books isn’t really about Mona Lapa Benincasa but she is there and you can’t help getting to know her.

Louis de Wohl does not give us a sloppy plaster saint, but rather a woman of fire and energy driven by her love of God and His demands on her.  He treats her relationship with God well and seems to have a good grip on the miraculous happenings from her intersession. I particularly love the way she seems to tell the hospital doctor off for being lazy lying dead in bed. Up he gets – plague free and alive again – and sets about his work with the same gusto she had with her care of the plague victims crowding the hospital and town of Sienna.

De Wohl does not shy away from the terrible mess the Church was in, with weak, comfort loving Popes keeping the Bride in her Babylonian Captivity in Avignon. The greed, simony and vice of the whole Avignon set up is made clear by de Wohl who has his information from history, the writings of St. Catherine’s friend Fra Raymond Capua and from Catherine’s amazing and at times rather shocking letters.

For the last ten years of her life (she died at the age of 33) Catherine ate nothing but the Eucharist. She is not the only saint who has been a living proof of the life of the Bread of Life. There’s a touching scene in the book in which the Pope, to test Catherine’s obedience, asks her if she would eat something should he command her.

She says she would obey him and eat whatever he commanded, but she could not obey him if he asked her to keep it down. She had eaten less and less over the years as food immediately came back until she stopped eating altogether.

There is a great deal of historical and biographical information on St. Catherine of Siena as well as the historical record of the years of her life. De Whol has been faithful to this giving the book it’s authenticity.

He touches briefly on her relationship with St. Bridget of Sweden and her daughter St. Katrin of Vadstena (aka St Catherine of Sweden). There’s a moment when she had asked Katrin to negotiate with the awful Queen Joanna of Naples and Katrin still smarting from what had happened to her older brother Karl, refused.

The Church has produced a few very great saints and St. Catherine of Siena is one of the greatest.

A chapel built on a rock in the grounds of the St. Malo retreat centre is named for her and was visited by Bl. Pope John Paul II. Recently a massive flood and mudslide destroyed a lot in the area although the floods came right up to the rock the chapel remained untouched. Catherine weathered the storms that hit the Church in her era, and those storms were great as the Popes were so weak. But she prevailed and at last the pope returned to Rome where he belonged and the beginning of the renewal could take place. There are many times over the 2000 years since Christ established His Church on Peter -Kephas- the rock and the apostles that the storms and flood waters looked to destroy her; but His promise stands firm.

Thinking and speaking and the major obstacle of the phone.

I lose my voice on a regular basis- in fact I have no voice right now – and my husband rather likes it. Cheeky divil! (as m’gran would say). Then there’s the entertaining aphasia in which dishwashers become fish-dishes and disappearing boxes as my dd so eloquently relates. Along with this are the times when the words are there and I can’t get them in the right order to make sense, or when someone is speaking to me and they sound like the parents in Humpf “blah blah blah”. I know they are saying real words but I just can’t make my head work out the meaning. This happens more often  and is much worse when I’m tired or when I’m on the phone.

I slur my words like a drunk and mix them up so I can speak like Yoda.

And what is it with the phone? I think it must be that the only clues my brain is getting is spoken language, and because I can’t see the person speaking, it’s much harder to understand them. There are plenty of times when this isn’t a problem at all, but at other times I have to really concentrate hard to understand what someone is saying to me and sometimes I say something banal in reply because I just don’t really get it.

I am not sure why, but for long periods of time I can behave like a sane person (my children may disagree). I can enunciate and use the appropriate vocabulary for the occasion. I sometimes have the skills I had when I worked, taking messages, handing out complicated information (in two languages) and generally looking and sounding efficient. Then out of the blue – it’s all gone. Worse still, I can’t always tell beforehand that it has gone , so I’ll answer the phone and be struggling to make sense or understand the other person.  The fish-man can phone and I am struggling to remember what a fish is, let alone whether I want to order any.

My children are remarkably patient. My husband has a wicked sense of humour over it but that keeps it from getting too scary. I still tease him about the night he came home to find no dinner cooked and me unable to string a coherent word together, let alone a sentence. He looked at me with that face he does and said, “I’d better get a takeaway.”

I’ve got an appointment with a speech therapist in October. She’s supposed to be assessing me for some kind of larynx dysfunction. We’ll see what happens there.

THIS SITE on Dysautonomia has just been shown me. It’s pretty good, clear info on the joys of having this silly illness. All I would say is the advice about salt should be taken with extreme caution; salt is for people with neurally mediated hypotension and low blood volume which usually manifests with narrow pulse pressure. Those of us on the other end of the dysauto scale with hyperadrenergic stuff going on; hypertension; or like me rapidly fluctuating blood pressure, and wide pulse pressure (had one of 80 recently YIKES!) should not be taking salt. unless a doc has noticed sodium issues and that needs proper treatment anyway.

I do get salt cravings- I know this happens with other dysauto folks too. It is more likely due to electrolyte imbalance than a genuine need to grab the Marmite. Try Diaoralyte instead m’dears. (Marmite tastes better…)

Thinking Love, Little Lessons; Alfred the Great

I’ve put a new lesson pack up. It’s a 24 page pack following Alfred of Wessex by Frank Morris. I’ve added extra historical information and there’s mapwork and artwork to be done.

There’s a genogram to complete – a simple one as an introduction to this process.

I’ve added a timeline and a couple of journal pages at the back. You can click on the picture or HERE TO GO TO THE LESSON

Don’t forget to look at the other lessons including the FREE STUFF

The Alfred pack is  only $2.00 so it won’t break the Home Ed budget.

Meanwhile I’ve just learned that the Govt of the Netherlands are out to trample the intrinsic human rights of families by banning home education. Governments are supposed to protect the rights of the people, not remove them.

You can sign the petition HERE and remember evil prevails when good men do nothing. Although I have to say I disagree with that little saying as doing nothing is not good.

Talent – it’s out there. Go and see.

I’m not sure I’m allowed to say this, but honestly, my children are quite talented really.

Alex is revamping his portfolio at WESTBURY BISCUIT and it’s looking good. You can click on the pictures and see how they came about. I love the Captain who’s creation you can see HERE. More recently he has been working his way through some Andrew Loomis work so he can get a good handle on drawing figures.

Things in the video games industry are a bit rough right now, but with a lot of hard work Alex hopes to make it onto the ladder when things improve.

Iona has a blog with her friend at Life the Universe and Would You Pass the Custard Creams? Iona posts her poems which are always funny. She has also set up a place to show her cakes as her business is officially launched by the end of next week. See her creations at Iona Rose Cakes.

I am being a proud mum, but you have to admit – they are good at what they do.

Home education; Simple Archimedes experiments

The children are reading Archimedes and the Door of Science and then following along with this lesson pack on Archimedes. Along with some questions and mapwork and a little Greek there are some basic experiments looking at some of the rules Archimedes discovered.

Even though the book and lesson pack are aimed at children Ronan and Avila’s age the experiments can be done by younger children too so Heleyna joined in with them. The first one looks at buoyancy and viscosity.  They filled a bowl with clear water and salt water, oil and syrup and then observed how the liquids separated. The they gathered some objects; marble, grape, cork and so on and dropped them into the bowl to see if they floated or sank and if they sank how far they sank. They were to write their observations. As a short extension we looked at emulsions. Mix the oil and water quite hard. Left to settle the oil and water separate again.

Then we make a hydrometer. A beaker is filled with “layers” again of water, sugar water, salt water, and cheap vodka (we have a bottle of cheap vodka for science of various kinds and for colour mixing for cake painting)  Then take a test tube and fill it with beads, beans etc – cork the top and place it in the beaker and see how it behaves.

After that we filled the beaker to the top with water and looked at the curve the water makes at rest.

Finally we did the displacement experiment. We filled a beaker with water and put it inside another container. Then the children added marbles to the beaker and measured the water that spilled into the  other container which told us the volume of the marbles we’d placed in the beaker.

Home education; freedom of the soul.

We know only too well the sorry spectacle of the teacher who, in the ordinary schoolroom must pour certain cut and dried facts into the heads of the scholars. In order to succeed in this barren task, she finds it necessary to discipline her pupils into immobility and to force their attention. Prizes and punishments are every ready and efficient aids to the master who must force into a given attitude of mind and body those who condemned to be his listeners.”

The Montessori Method, Dr Maria Montessori 1912

This paragraph follows an explanation of slavery. Montessori saw clearly that the school system in which a special bench that forced a child’s upright posture so they could sit all day and be talked at by a teacher, and go home saved from scoliosis, was all wrong. Of course, the doctor notices that children who are allowed to move around and find their own ways of learning are not in danger of twisted backs in the first place.

She finds the system of punishment and reward petty (red marks, detention and stickers are not designed for moral growth but merely conformity) and points out that without heroism – that is the will to do what is good because it is good – then corruption and cowardice are the results.

I think a brief look at our politicians clutching their Oxbridge degrees in one hand and what amounts to an allergy to telling the truth on the other, has to be a prime example of what Montessori warned us.

All parents have a right and duty to the education of our children, and we most definitely need to ensure they learn right from wrong. The tyranny of relativism was a mere yapping puppy in Montessori’s day. The Enlightenment had already brought some darkness in that area but it hadn’t grown to the proportions our poor children are faced with today.

Education is more than leading the child out. The child must grow and mature and as each child does this in his own way we can’t force understanding on them all at a certain age. Their age is mostly immaterial to their growth, maturity and ability to learn.

As Catholics we have a theology of the person that is deep and well considered. We know that the Sacraments give grace and so we get our children baptised but we also know that while the missing grace of Original Sin is mended by the graces that come with baptism, there is still the scar – the concupiscence – that we must all deal with. We tend to bend towards sin. But spend any length of time with children and you’ll notice that while they might need good guidance, boundaries and sensible discipline, they do have a strong sense of justice, if not mercy. Young children, particularly those under 7 or 8 – the age of reason, need close adult supervision to help form their conscience and curb tendencies to cruelty or meanness. We teach them to share, be gentle with others, and how to listen and basic safety.

Without this early formation children often lack social skills, basic kindness and even language. A classroom with at most two adults to thirty 4 year olds is not the place to do this basic learning; and that’s before you factor in the bizarre targets of the National Curriculum!

There is a cultural view that targets, exams and state provision are the be all and end all of education. I’ve even heard of parents who refuse to work with their OWN children when they can’t get the school placement they want, because they insist the state should provide.

Then there are parents who brag about how their child got A*s or whatever, in exams, but seem to have missed that their child is miserable, angry, incapable in social settings and lacking basic morals.

It’s well past time to change all this. When we consider that Montessori (and Mason) were writing over 100 years ago we look pretty dumb that we still haven’t set about changing things so that our children get a genuine education.

I was so wrapped up in the school model of education when I first began home education that when my children began to read books as Charlotte Mason would have them do, I got restless thinking that just sitting there reading wasn’t “doing” anything. How could I possibly know that my daughter was learning anything while she sat with a cup of tea in one hand and Notes From the Underground in the other?

But then I think it was C.S.Lewis who said that his best education came from being left to read the books in his uncle’s library. It took me a while to realise that when the children were “just reading” that they were learning. They expanded their reading and vocabulary. For Iona it helped her writing fluency and did more to stop her reversing letters and built up her general knowledge better than all those worksheets put together.

Home education; planning and organisation

This term I’ve set out to make sure the children have all their work planned and set out for them in two-week stints. This means they should always be fully prepped two weeks ahead so that no matter what happens they can simply get out their work and get on with it. There are some bits and pieces that don’t lend themselves completely to this – such as anything Montessori that I have to teach or some other bits that require help , but I am thinking that even then some of it should be easy enough for someone else to take over should it be necessary.

They each have a file with a timetable, dividers by day for two weeks and all the instructions and worksheets set out for the right day.

Ronan’s file has most of the “share” worksheets for when they are working together on something.

The timetable is set out showing subject areas for each day and what they must complete each day. I don’t set down a time

for this as it will vary depending on the length and difficulty of whatever they are doing. The only “rule” is that it must be done.

Ronan has really taken to this system and uses it well. Avila tends to forget to look at her timetable so can miss things out if I don’t remind her. But she’s getting there.

They each have a Learning Box in which workbooks, spare notes and reading books are kept. You can see that we also cram in the library books so they don’t go missing in the house vortex spaces.

Extra curricula is kept on the bookshelves in the order in which we use them (more or less) I’m not obsessional enough to have them all coded but I hope I’m obsessional enough that anyone could walk in and not get completely lost with what we are up to.

It really has saved time. Things like having the pens in their learning boxes so they aren’t constantly off looking for things is a great help and being able to just put my hand to whatever book we need straight away is much less stressful that having to hunt around for it.

Some of you might be thinking this is an awful lot of work. Well, yes and no. It’s pretty time consuming when I’m getting it all planned but as it rolls out I only need to plan one week ahead to keep two weeks ahead if you see what I mean and while that’s time consuming up front it saves a lot of time later. It’s still flexible enough I think – so far.

I’ve also decided to try and cut back the sheer volume of paper we still seem to get through. Heleyna in particular is using a whiteboard more often (the modern version of a slate or wax tablet). I am long past that awful phase of thinking that unless the children produced a mountain of worksheets that they weren’t learning.

I’ve lost the Greek pronounciation CD mind….. well, nothing’s perfect.

Sitting on a hard bench.

I can’t remember where I heard this but someone, sometime said s/he thought the reason churches had wooden pews was so that the pew-sitter didn’t get too comfortable. Christ isn’t a comfortable person.

This weekend we have had the ember days of the Triumph of the Cross and Our Lady of Sorrows. Both uncomfortable remembrances. The Triumph(or exultation) of the Cross came about like this:

St. Helena (mother of Constantine the Great) had found the true cross at Jerusalem and rescued it. She left part of it in Jerusalem at the Holy Sepulchre and took the rest back to Rome. Around 614 the Persians stole the portion of the cross from the Holy Sepulchre. Things went wrong for the Persians after that (an echo of what happened to the Philistines when the stole the Ark of the Covenant). In 629 the Emperor Heraclius took the cross back and carried it in fine procession back to Jerusalem and Calvary. However, upon reaching the city he found he couldn’t go on. Bishop Zacharias pointed out that Christ had not been so finely dressed when He carried the cross. The Emperor changed to a penitents robe and carried the cross the rest of the way.

We are proud to preach Christ crucified and know that He has commanded us to take up our cross each day to follow him. A hard bench in church is perhaps a very small reminder of that.

Our Lady of Sorrows with her seven swords of sorrow comes the following day. Despite the great suffering laid on her she continually said “yes” (Fiat) to God.

Yesterday I listened to the Catholic Answers programme with Steve Ray talking about the horrible persecution and mass martyrdom of Christians in the Middle East. He spoke of a nun whose entire family had been slaughtered and a Christian man whose heart was cut out and eaten raw by one of the the Muslim terrorists. We know what’s happening in Syria and some of us at least are horrified that our Governments want to aid the terrorists who are murdering as many Christians as they can get hold of.

Then after Mass yesterday a man spoke to us. He had come from Bethlehem with some of the beautiful olive wood carvings that he and his fellow Christians make. It’s all they can do to stay afloat there. The wall has done them much damage and they are trapped between Israel’s need for security on the one side and Islamic persecution on the other.

If you can possibly buy some olivewood carvings that will help Elias and his fellow Christians.  They are sold HERE and at ACN HERE 

Olive wood, he told us, is the second hardest wood in the world. Some of the carvings, which must be done by hand, take 8 months of work.

There’s nothing comfortable about that.

Home education; is there another method that genuinely works?

I know this isn’t true across the board in home ed circles. I am quite sure there are the cliques of home ed parents competing over Primula’s grade or some such thing. Thankfully, I haven’t been at the receiving end of that.

When I have a worry about how one of my children is learning or even a new discovery that works well, I can ask and share it with other mums who home educate and we’ll throw out ideas or straight forward reassurance.

So home ed mums are saints then? Sadly not, we’re all just human like everyone else. What I think helps us as a group is our education system is so different from the school system, and that’s because, as a group, we don’t have a system. There is no box we have to fit into or fail. There are no tests, no competitions or standards written and ticked. We have our children and they are all so very different, learn differently, have different needs and skills, that there isn’t a box to push them into.

There’s also a very high proportion of children with  “special needs” ranging from simply developing a little slower than average through dyslexia to autism and physical illnesses of various types. And there’s also the gifted children who usually have an area of learning where they outstrip others, but might be less gifted in other areas.

The nature of home education tends to mean that a lot of parents (not all) have an inherent respect for children, where they don’t need reminding of Charlotte Mason’s maxim that children are persons. We spend a lot of time together as families and we learn to adapt around babies, tantrums, learning approaches and mums needing a cuppa and a chat.

We work as a community with all it’s diversity and colour. Some of us have been doing it for years and others are just starting out.

I haven’t been told how brave I am for quite a while but new families often face this sort of back handed compliment. But I don’t think those of us who home educate are brave. I do see parents taking the first steps with trepidation and some fear, and I suppose it does take some courage, but when I see schooled children I think it’s their parents who are brave.

Since “official” kinds of education were invented by the ancient Greeks, Spartans and Rome children didn’t go to school until they were at least 7 to 8 years old and often went even later. It was understood that the foundational part of a child’s education was in a rounded upbringing with social skills and practical skills before the academic side was handled.

Within family and community children learned and grew before attending a more institutionalised system.

This was the system from ancient times until the end of the nineteenth century and it worked well.  Figures show that literacy levels in both Britain and America were as high as 95% before the Education Acts brought about mass schooling. Now they are nearer 60%.

I was told recently by someone who knows that many parents who find their 4 or 5 year old can’t get a school placement refuse to do any work with their own child because they have decided it’s the job of the state! That’s a shocking sign of how upturned our culture’s thinking is!

I think we actually need more families to avoid schools. The standards of education are having serious knock on effects among adults and our culture as a whole as we see not only the rise in illiteracy, ignorance and lack of ethical thought, but the sinking of science and medicine. There are studies and even pieces of research that are being published in what once were respected journals that surely would never have seen the light of day 100 years ago, simply because they are so badly designed and written.

Ken Robinson, John Holt, John Taylor Gatto and others including Dr Temple Grandin had spoken over and over about the state of education and they are being ignored. It’s up to us, as parents, to listen and be willing to bypass the shoddy standards and search for the best education we can offer our children. The more I look, the more I am convinced that home education is becoming the only answer, or one answer among very few others indeed.

While the mainstream media like ITV are asking whether home education can make the grade – surely they should be asking why school education is failing so very many children.

Telling Lies – can Christians ever do this?

I’ve heard the question over when is it ok to lie a few times recently. Overall the answer is, never. Christians are call to the Truth because in that is freedom. But there are the difficult questions side of it. We know that many Catholics, including priests and religious lied to the Nazi soldiers so as to save the lives of Jews living hidden in their homes, monasteries and convents.

I can’t think of any New Testament examples of a ‘good lie’ but in the Old Testament two stories stand out. The most well known is the story of the Hebrew midwives Shiphnah and Puah who lied to Pharaoh to save the lives of Hebrew boy babies that Pharaoh wanted dead.

The second example is when Jeremiah lied to the enemies of King Zedekiah over the advice he had given the King.

In these cases the mitigation for the lie is those demanding the information had no right to it.

It’s not easy to negotiate these kinds of mitigation against the rule “You shall not do evil that good many come of it.” It is far too easy to buy into the idea of doing something – or better yet, not doing anything – so that the good we think will come of it, (usually for ourselves) can be achieved. We turn a blind eye – which is lying to ourselves, far too often.

Despite the constant call from Jesus to seek the truth, follow the truth and be truthful, it seems that Christians can be just as dishonest as any other people. What’s worse is the dishonesty has been deliberate and self serving and like so many lies has been handed down through the generations.

The fallout from this is seen in children’s literature, particularly historical novels or books and obviously in some communities as I’ve heard so many deeply erroneous statements about the Church from people phoning Catholic Answers. There have been people throughout the years who have tried to restate the truth but lies are often fondly held to.

Even with those who are able and willing to correct, particularly historical black legends and misrepresentations, it’s still a right faff having to check what the children are reading in case it’s dishonest. The biggest problem is in anti-Catholic misinformation and in Victorian/Edwardian books in the public domain there’s too much racism and social-Darwinism to wade past. I haven’t found as much anti-Antisemitism has I had begun to think I would thankfully. But I really don’t understand why Christian writers should be so relaxed in misinforming their readers.

There have been good, honest writers from the Catholic side who have challenged the shoddy standards of historical accuracy from other Christians who either twist, edit out or just plain lie about Catholic people and the Church over the years.

Catholic writers don’t seem to feel the need to avoid the genuine bad stuff that has happened over the 2000 years of the Church. I suspect this is rooted in the stories of our greatest saints. You can’t really study the life of St. Bridget of Sweden, St. Catherine of Sienna or St. Padre Pio among so many others, without having to learn about the sins of the Church members, popes, cardinals and people. It helps avoid whitewash and keeps things real, without the need to twist the truth out of all recognition.

Over all lying is a very bad thing and best avoided. If we ever do find ourselves in a position where the only honest recourse is a lie – well, God help us, because those who have found themselves in that position are almost always under the power of tyrannies.  But Christians have no business misrepresenting history or repeating lies just because they can’t be bothered to actually check out the truth.

New Lesson in my shop: The first Christians and the Milgrim experiment

I’ve uploaded two new lessons to my shop.

The Freebie is a short lesson for older children on the famous Milgrim Experiment. I think it is less well known these days, but has a lot to teach us about the proper obedience due to authority and when to say “No!”.

Milgrim did his experiment in 1963 in light of the outcome from the post World War II Nuremberg trials, in which Nazi concentration camp soldiers were tried for war crimes. The men nearly all used “We were just following orders” as their defense.

Milgrim gathered a group of students and put them in a situation where they were to believe they were giving an electric shock to an unseen but heard subject in another room. He wanted to see how far the student would go in inflicting shocks to screaming subjects, no matter how apparently painful and dangerous, if someone in authority (in a white coat) told them to. The results were shocking and in some cases enlightening.

Click on the picture to get this freebie. Read first before you decide for your child.

The second lesson pack is a 53 page study of the Acts of the Apostles based on Marigold Hunt’s The First Christians (kindle) or Paperback here. There are questions and mapwork and added pieces of information from history and Biblical study.

There is some picture study from fine art depicting events from the beginning of the Church.

The set costs $3.73 and apart from the good price you’ll save in shipping. So you know you want to buy it. Click on the picture to go to the shop.