Miya's maths: Khan Academy 7th Grade

13 months ago I wrote that Miya had finished Khan Academy 6th Grade maths.  Today she finished 7th Grade.

She'll start 8th Grade maths tomorrow.  (If she was in the US she'd be starting as a young 8th Grader in September.)

We're almost certain that Miya will finish homeschooling and start secondary school (Year 9) at the beginning of next year.  We're not expecting that she'll finish 8th Grade maths by that time, but our attitude is that the further she gets through it the easier it will be for her as she adapts to school life.

Miya's maths: Khan Academy 6th Grade

I last wrote about Miya's maths nine months ago.

Since then Miya has been steadily working on Khan Academy US 6th Grade maths.

Miya has now completed 6th Grade, and yesterday started on 7th Grade (if she was living in the US she'd be starting as a very young 7th Grade in half a year).

One of the sticking points for Miya is her accuracy.  Khan is a mastery-style course, and so it requires students to get everything correct before moving on.  That's great in many ways, as it means that students have a solid foundation before attempting the next level.  Mastery-style reasons that if a student is still not quite sure about one thing, then it is going to get even less clear if they move on before getting that sorted.

However, a downside of mastery-style is that some students may make occasional mistakes because they jump into it and try to do it speedily all at once and forget to carefully think through each step.  They mostly know it, and could probably get it all correct with the occasional suggestion.  But it may be hard for them to get 100% entirely independently, and so it will be hard for them to move on to the next level.

I think Miya has been a bit like this, and this is why she has taken longer to get through 6th Grade (she started 6th Grade one year and 10 months ago).  Miya also strongly prefers to do it entirely on her own, and doesn't like me to teach/correct her.  She doesn't even like me giving her hints/pointers to remind her how to start a problem.

We'll see how 7th Grade progresses, but if it is as slow as 6th Grade we may need to change the way we are doing things.

Our tentative thought for now is that Miya will start school (Westlake Girls) at the beginning of Year 9 in two years.  It would be great if Miya could complete (or near complete) US 8th Grade before she starts.

HASCA and Covid

HASCA is the local homeschooling organisation that organises and provides a centre for sport and cultural activities for homeschoolers on the North Shore (Auckland).

In some cases, it's the only place that local homeschoolers can access activities (as otherwise it's via the schools).

Today, as HASCA members, we received an email from HASCA leadership:

Re: Temporary Hibernation

14/12/21

Dear HASCA members and friends,

We have been silent throughout lockdown and the subsequent change from the Alert Level System to the Covid Protection Framework (CPF) as, 1) we have basically been unable to operate, and 2) we have wanted to watch and wait and make a considered decision on how HASCA will move forward under the new mandates.

As well as the government’s directives, our decisions have been influenced by the organisations we partner with - the sports organisations, programme providers, and the venues we hire and utilise to bring our classes and programmes to our home-schooling community. Unfortunately, many are either under government mandate themselves, or have their own in-house mandates which will impact on HASCA’s operations and our ability to provide any sort of non-discriminatory programme for the immediate future.

HASCA strives to be an inclusive organisation that brings people together, connects and supports, and “creates community” for all home educating families. Therefore, segregating or excluding participation based on vaccine status is not something we feel comfortable adopting, and is not where our hearts are placed. Our goal has always been to bring people together, not to divide. We do not want to operate any of what we previously offered if participation and inclusion is based on a vaccine status or the presence of a vaccine-pass. It is for this reason that the HASCA committee has decided that HASCA and all activities operating under our umbrella will hibernate for the foreseeable future. This has been a difficult decision for us, but we simply cannot run programmes knowing we must exclude select families.

[...]

We think they've got this badly wrong.  They make it sound like vaccinations are mostly meaningless, having no significant impact on the health and safety of others who we might interact with.  We have replied to them as follows:

Hi HASCA leadership,

 

As long-term HASCA members we respectfully disagree with this HASCA decision.  We hope that you will reconsider.

 

It's sad that it's the kids who will be the losers in this HASCA decision.  Something is better than nothing for homeschooled children; for HASCA to remove this option for local families is wrong as in many cases this is the only place where local homeschooling children can participate.

 

There is no unfair discrimination in the vaccine pass mandates; it's about following the science, protecting the vulnerable, giving people free choices, then people accepting the consequences of their free choices.  Requiring vaccine passes when people gather in larger groups protects everyone by slowing down the transmission of a contagious disease that would otherwise overwhelm the hospitals.  In saying this, we accept the overwhelming majority opinion of the experts.  As homeschoolers, we aim to model good reasoning to our children.

 

We feel that as a vaccinated family we have done the right thing for the community, and it is not right that vaccinated families are now being penalised by HASCA, just because of the free choices of non-vaccinated families.

 

We assume this means that HASCA won't be organising the Athletics Day and Swimming Day in 2022.  But please do let us know if anything changes.

 

Glenn, Xiaoying, Mulan and Miya

Likely, next year our family would have done the HASCA Athletics and Swimming Days in term 1 (which we help organise), and Miya would have signed up for the HASCA netball team (terms 2 and 3).

UPDATE (17/12/2021): HASCA also posted a similar announcement to their Facebook page, to which I commented that we (our family) respectfully disagreed with their decision and linked to this blog for details.

To date there have been four responses.  Three other members commented on the Facebook announcement, thanking the HASCA committee for their work.  And HASCA leadership emailed me privately, letting me know that the HASCA committee unanimously agreed with the decision.  At no time so far has anyone responded to the substantive points.

I want to emphasise that everyone has been extremely polite and nice about it.  Everyone thanks each other and wishes each other all the best.  Once again, I have no doubt that everyone sees themselves as the good guys -- they believe they are doing the decent and right thing.  And for the most part they are.  Homeschoolers really are nice people, and we enjoy spending time with them.

But I also want to acknowledge that old saying -- the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

In this situation, HASCA leadership has made the decision to block access to education for local homeschooled children.  They can coat it with nice words, but the fact remains that they have made things worse for local homeschooled children.

The only reason they have given for this so far is that they think that the vaccine pass requirement for large group gatherings is unfairly discriminatory, and they don't want to exclude anyone.  So they'd rather exclude everyone.

It is fair enough if, individually, their families (committee members and the three Facebook commentators) choose to not participate until all families can participate -- that is their free right to freely choose for themselves.  (I understand that some families see HASCA as more about social gatherings.)

But it is wrong for HASCA leadership to deny other families the opportunity to make this free choice for themselves.  And it is wrong for HASCA leadership to reduce educational opportunities for children without providing alternatives.  As I see it, HASCA leadership has overstepped their duties by dictating (mistaken) morals to their members, while at the same time failing to uphold their more fundamental duty of providing educational opportunities to children that are otherwise only available to schooled children.

In my opinion, the correct thing for HASCA committee to do is to keep HASCA operating (for now), but acknowledge and accept the right for any HASCA families to not participate until they feel comfortable doing so.  This may mean a reduced leadership group, and committee members would be more than free to step aside for now.  It may also mean that HASCA would need to ask members to join the committee to continue to keep things running (I would consider it, if necessary); if they were unable to get the committee numbers then hibernating would be the right choice.

Given the (limited) feedback to date, there is a distinct possibility that a significant number of HASCA members are either (a) unable to participate because they have chosen to not vaccinate, or (b) unwilling to participate as they (mistakenly) see vaccine pass mandates as unfairly discriminatory.  If this is the case, then there is a distinct possibility that activity sign-up numbers would be too low to proceed anyway.  And so there is a distinct possibility that most (or all) HASCA activities would have to practically stop anyway due to insufficient numbers.   If this is the case, then so be it.

But HASCA leadership should have kept things going long enough to find this out first, one way or the other.  They should have opened it up to the members first, for the members to freely decide.  They should not have denied freedoms to their members.  And they should have thought more about the children who are missing out because of their decision to stop offering activities.

Schooling in lockdown

Here in Auckland, our Covid Level 4 lockdown ends tonight, after five weeks holiday working from home.  We've still got at least another two weeks in Level 3 lockdown, which for us means almost no change.  (It's getting doubtful that any of our pre-booked school holiday activities will happen in two weeks' time.)

In that time our family has used the car twice -- once to get a Covid test and once to get a Covid vaccine.

That's a big change for us.  In normal life we use the car most days, driving to the various activities that the girls do -- ballet, rock climbing, swimming, music, gymnastics, athletics, etc.  "Homeschooling" is not a very accurate name for what we do; I'm not the first to suggest it should be called car schooling.

So, how's our schooling in lockdown going?

One difference for us is that our exercise is now all home-based.  Mulan has Zoom ballet lessons five days a week.  Miya has rock climbing and dance Zoom lessons.  Our dining room is a dance studio, while our dining table is in the lounge acting as a jigsaw puzzle table.

We go for runs around our local area and do various conditioning exercises at home.  On the downside my hands are getting soft from no rock climbing; on the upside my golfer's elbow is coming right with no rock climbing.

The girls both have music lessons over Zoom.  Mulan has recorder lessons, while Miya has clarinet, saxophone and trumpet lessons.  Miya is continuing to prepare for her Trinity Grade 4 clarinet exam, which is still planned for late October.  As part of this, we've signed her up for aural test training at e-music maestro.

Miya's deskwork remains the same.  She continues doing Khan Academy and touch typing.  She's still only primary school aged, so it's more about natural in-context learning and inculcating good attitudes.  We do stuff quizzes, and the children use kahoot to set their own quizzes.

This lockdown Mulan and Miya have started online gaming with the cousins, playing monopoly, gartic telephone, scribblio, psych, forge of empires, etc.

But the biggest change is that Mulan is back at home learning with us, instead of going to school.

Before lockdown hit, Mulan had a total of 17 days at Westlake Girls High School -- just enough time to start getting used to school life.  Now she's doing lockdown schooling.

I've heard it said that lockdown schooling is homeschooling.  It really isn't, for one important reason.

Essentially, homeschooling is about the parents/caregivers being the final decisionmakers on what gets taught.  This includes:

(a) Deciding what sorts of knowledge, skills and values are truly valuable to pass on to the children, 

(b) deciding what methods will work best to teach each child,

(c) deciding what order and amount to teach the knowledge/skills/values,

(d) deciding what lesson content to use to develop the knowledge/skills/values, and

(e) assessing what the children do, which then feeds back into the above.

With lockdown schooling, parents/caregivers do none of this.

All that lockdown parents/caregivers do is oversee or help with the completion of the work that the schools have supplied to the students to do.

And this is what we are doing with Mulan right now.

Mulan is connected to her teachers online on her new computer, where they tell her what she needs to do.  As part of our normal family life Mulan tells us what this is.  We then work with Mulan on this as much or as little as she needs.

At one extreme, Mulan's school maths is so easy that we haven't been involved at all in any of her maths learning during lockdown.  She simply does the required work quickly on her own and submits it, getting full marks every time.  (I've suggested that since lockdown is continuing for longer we should get back into doing Khan Academy maths with her; it would be a shame for Mulan to go backward with her maths just because school is not challenging her enough.)

For Mulan's other subjects we have been involved to some extent.  For her longer writings (English, music, science, etc) we typically read and give advice after she has written them, though sometimes we also talk through the ideas before she starts writing.  With the music composition, Miya helped out (Mama and I were useless!).  Miya also helped with the photography unit for English.

According to Mulan, what she has been learning over the past five weeks in lockdown is of a similar amount to what she was learning during those 17 days at school.  The main difference for her is that she says that she spends maybe three hours each day working on it rather than the full school day.  In other words, lockdown learning is, for Mulan, much more time efficient that school learning.

Nonetheless, Mulan says she would still rather be at school than do lockdown learning.  For her, learning at school in the social environment is more enjoyable that learning at home.  Even though school uses up more hours it seems that it is worth it.  And also, lockdown means missing all the other out-of-home activities we do; returning to school means also returning to ballet, swimming, gymnastics, athletics, etc.

From my point of view, lockdown learning is working better than homeschool learning, in the sense that Mulan is very responsibly taking charge of what she needs to do and calmly getting it done.  I've been very impressed with how she's gone about things during lockdown.  When she was homeschooling, if I had have told her to do the same thing she would have mucked around and tried to avoid getting it done.  I think partly she enjoys teasing me (she wouldn't dare tease her teachers in that way!) and partly it is hard to get started on something that is initially slightly out of one's comfort zone.  At least for Mulan, having an outside person setting the tasks is the key.

Having said all that, lockdown, for our family, has been a much-enjoyed quality time together.  We all get on well, and it has been wonderful to have Mulan around home again during the day.  As much as we'd like lockdown to end, and get back to all the fun outside activities, it really isn't that bad at all.

Maths update

I last wrote about the girls' maths work back in May of 2020.  It's time for another update.

Both girls continue to do a little maths work every day, year round.

Miya:

As of today, Miya has completed 63% of Khan Academy 6th Grade.

If she was in the US she'd be starting 6th Grade in September (at the very youngest end).

Mulan:

Mulan has completed Khan Academy 8th Grade and Algebra 1, and is 41% through Geometry.

I think I am right to say that Algebra 1 is taught in 9th Grade and Geometry is taught in 10th Grade.

If Mulan was in the US she'd be starting 9th Grade in September.

However, Mulan has now officially started school in New Zealand, entering Year 10 at Westlake Girls High School.  (I'll probably write more on this later.)  After a few days in a normal class, Mulan has observed that they are working on stuff that she covered a couple of years ago.  We're now talking with Westlake about options for keeping her challenged in maths.  It seems that either she'll transfer to an extension class or her current teacher can give her other work.

Gender is not a spectrum

This article seems very sensible to me.  I think I'm a radical feminist.

I continue to play my miniscule political part, tearing down the gender boxes as a stay-at-home-homeschooling-dad.

... or is that my real gender -- SAHHD?!

Decision time for Mulan at school

The other day I wrote about the possibility of Mulan going to school.

We have some choices, as we live in zone for both Takapuna Grammar School and Westlake Girls High School.  We could start at either school at any time, or choose to continue homeschooling.

We've now met with the enrolments Deputy Principals of both schools (Westlake last Friday, and Taka on Tuesday).  Both were very good, and we came away with useful info about both schools.

Taka also showed us around, but we forgot to ask Westlake.  Likely, as a family we'll have a look around Westlake during the weekend.

We've now got to the point where the final decision will be Mulan's.  It will be her call about how she would most like to do her study (and if she chooses to continue homeschooling, she will need to put in the hours of deskwork at home).

The decision is (a) whether to go to school, (b) if so when, and (c) if so which one.

My personal inclination is Westlake starting in Term 3.  (She'd stop rock climbing, and possibly stop gymnastics.  Dance, music, swimming and athletics would likely continue, but we'd need to keep an eye on things.)  But I'm completely happy with whatever Mulan decides.

If Mulan decides in the next several days to go to school, then we'll start preparing for the change and submit the enrolment forms.  If she decides she'd rather not go to school, then we'll start upping Mulan's deskwork time at home in preparation for NCEA studies.

Location:

We live about 5-10 minutes walk from Westlake.  We live at the edge of the Taka school zone, and there are no ideal buses.  Likely, Mulan would spend over an hour each day travelling to and from Taka.

The strong advice from Taka is that it's best to go to one's closest school.  They would be okay if Mulan chose Taka, but thought it made more sense for her to choose Westlake.

Given that Mulan would prefer to continue as many of her after-school activities as possible, it makes sense to spend minimal time travelling.

So, unless there are other overwhelming considerations, Westlake would be first choice.

When to start: Qualifications:

If Mulan goes to school, both schools recommend starting at the beginning of term 3 this year (26th July).  Neither recommend a term 4 start.  Alternatively, Mulan could start in term 1 2022.

Starting in term 3 gives Mulan half a year in Year 10 to get used to school life before starting NCEA 1 qualifications in 2022.  She would get more familiar with the subjects, so then more knowledgeably choose her NCEA subject options.

Or we might think that NCEA 1 is relatively easy and unimportant, and Mulan doesn't need prep time for it.  We might instead treat NCEA 1 as prep and practice for the more important NCEA2/3, and if so starting in 2022 is okay.

When to start: Activity clashes:

As well as qualification considerations, Mulan also needs to think about how time-consuming school will be, and how much it will restrict her other activities and interests.

Schools aren't as efficient as homeschooling, with respect to study, and school will require more of a time commitment than homeschool study.  Almost certainly, if Mulan goes to school she'll have to stop some of her current activities/interests.  Starting later means that she can continue more activities longer.

Homework:

We asked both schools the expectations for homework.  Westlake said under an hour a day.  Taka said 1-2 hours.  Of course, theory may differ from reality.  We've heard from school-goers that 1-2 hours at NCEA level is at the minimum end, and is for those merely aiming for passes (not merit/excellence).

For us, less homework is better, so that Mulan can continue with more of her non-school activities/interests.

There is also the question of whether homework is necessary.  It could be argued that more homework means less efficient use of in-class learning time.

Resources:

Schools have some pretty awesome toys and resources, which is out of the budget of homeschoolers.  Playing with the school's science and sports equipment would be great fun.

Both Taka and Westlake are decently well-funded with good resources.  Both schools achieve very good academic results.

Looking around Taka, it's an older school with some older buildings.  Some areas looked a little more worn, but on the whole it has a classic, warm, wood-finish look.  Taka is next to the beach, and sports lessons are sometimes held there.  There's more open land area, with football fields.

In contrast, Westlake appears more modern and corporate in it's style, and new building construction is continuing.  With less land there are no open fields, and the land use is more tightly planned.

Single-sex vs co-ed:

We'd initially been leaning more towards Taka because it has both boys and girls, just like the real world.  Westlake is single sex, so more artificial.

But there is something to be said for girls-only schools.  As Westlake said, it's cleaner and quieter without the boys!  Also, boys are often inclined to push themselves forward more than girls, so girls can miss out in co-ed schools.  Mulan's personality is often more hang-back-and-wait (like mine), so she may better suit the girls-only environment.

As long as girls don't go boy-silly in a girls-only school, it seems possible that the single-sex learning environment is slightly better for Mulan.

Friends/social:

Mulan knows a few athletics friends go to Taka, but doesn't specifically know of any friends who go to Westlake.  This is another reason we had initially been leaning towards Taka.

On the other hand, Westlake specifically raised the possibility of placing Mulan in a class with people she already knows, and it seems that they would organise a buddy-system with classmates helping her get familiar with things.  Taka did not offer this.  In general, Westlake came across as being more sensitive to psychological/social needs, and appeared to have systems in place to help with this.  Taka did not mention anything like that.

Study style:

I think the deciding factor (homeschool or school), for Mulan, is study style.  Is she prepared to self-motivate for one-to-one or self-study learning at home?  Or will she be more motivated in group learning at school?  Which would be more fun (or less awful)!

At the moment, I think her personality suits the group study, but it's her call about whether she would rather commit to self-study discipline (if, for example, she wanted to be maximally efficient with her study so that she could have more time for her other activities/interests).

Subject choices:

If Mulan chooses to go to school, the next decision is which subjects to choose.  Mulan already does dance, sport and music, and these are all possible school subjects.

We asked both schools their thoughts on students choosing so many non-desk subjects.  Westlake said all subjects are good, and those ones still have 2/3 deskwork.  They said it's best for students to choose subjects they enjoy.  (This is what I had said.)

In contrast, Taka suggested that someone who does dance outside of school doesn't also need to do dance as a school subject.  They suggested, for example, instead doing a social science subject.  (This is what Mama has said.)

With Mulan fluent in Chinese, there's also the question of if/how to include that.

But we don't need to make a decision on this now.  If Mulan decides to go to school we'd enrol first and then get more subject info from the school.

I'll probably write more when Mulan makes her decision.

Our exercise

Here's what we're doing for exercise these days, getting into winter and our athletics off-season.

Me:

Monday: Rock climbing 1-2 hours with Miya

Wednesday: Rock climbing 1-2 hours with Miya and Mulan

Thursday: Weights 1-2 hours

Saturday: Weights 1 hour with Mulan

Sunday: Running 1 hour with Mulan (winter training, uphill/stairs reps)

Mulan:

Monday: Contemporary dance 2 hours class

Tuesday: Ballet 1 1/4 hours class

          Swimming 45min class

Wednesday: Rock climbing 1-2 hours (including 1 hour class)

          Ballet 1 3/4 hours class

Thursday: Swimming 1 1/4 hours class

          Ballet 1 1/4 hours class

Friday: Biking 1 1/2 hours paper delivery

          Gymnastics 2 hours class

Saturday: Ballet 2 1/2 hours class

          Weights 1 hour with me

Sunday: Running 1 hour winter training with me

Miya:

Monday: Rock climbing 1-2 hours with me

Wednesday: Rock climbing 1-2 hours with Mulan and me

Thursday: Contemporary dance 1 hour class

          Rock climbing 2 hours class

Sunday: Gymnastics 2 hours class

Mama:

Tuesday: Zumba 1 hour class

Thursday: Spin 45min class

Once a week: weights 45min

Daily quiz

It's probably been a few years since I last prepared a school lesson for Mulan or Miya.

But a few days ago I spent a couple of hours working on a worksheet handout to give to them.

It was all Mulan and Miya's idea, and they demanded that I write it for them.

The reason?  Lately Mulan and Miya have got into doing the Stuff news website's twice daily trivia quizzes.  Each quiz has 15 multi-choice questions on general knowledge and newsworthy happenings.  Often the girls answer it first (separately) and then they grab me and watch me attempt it.  Results are slightly competitive, and this morning Mulan scored higher than me (Miya equaled me)!

A few days ago the girls decided that we could make up our own quizzes.  So, the plan was that the four of us would each design a 15-question quiz, and then we would each answer everyone else's quizzes.  Mulan and Miya wrote up a list of possible question topics, and our questions couldn't repeat topics.

The end result was that I had to research and write a quiz for the family.  It was a shock to the system to actually have to sit and prepare a lesson.

On Friday we sat around the dining table together and answered each others' quizzes.  Mama chose to do a China-focused quiz, while Mulan chose super-tough questions.

Lots of family fun, and some learning, too.

Term 2 activities

Winter is coming, and school Term 2 started last week.

Once again Mulan and Miya are busy with lots of activities (and most activities are term-based).

Mulan:

Ballet/dance: Ballet continues to be Mulan's number one activity.  This term she has dance classes five days a week at Mainly Dance -- 6.75 hours of ballet and 2 hours of contemporary.

Athletics: Athletics is Mulan's number two activity.  Athletics competitions have finished for the season, but for the first time we've decided to do some winter training (Mulan and me together).  We're aiming for twice a week.  One session is running, and is mostly uphill/stairs reps.  The other is weights.

Music: Mulan has a private recorder lesson once a week, and continues to practice her instruments most days.  She also plays the ukulele or guitar with Yeye once a week.  While she enjoys music, it's not her main passion and she's decided (for now) to stop her private cello lessons.  Pre-Covid, last year she was preparing for the cello Grade 5 exam, but that has now stopped.

Swimming: Mulan has two fitness squad sessions a week with NZL Swim.

Gymnastics: Mulan has one lesson a week at North Harbour Gymnastics.

Rock climbing: Mulan has one lesson at week at Northern Rocks.

Newspaper delivery: Mulan has just started delivering the Property Press paper.  It takes her about 1.5 hours once a week.

School: Mulan catches the bus once a week to my Big Sis' home, where she spends the day doing schooling with her cousins.  She does bookwork maths, science and music theory.  The reason is that we're strongly considering Mulan going to school next year (Year 11, NCEA 1) and this is practice for her (and us).

Teaching: Mulan co-teaches one Chinese language class each week with Mama at Chinese4All.

Miya:

Rock climbing: Rock climbing is Miya's number one activity, and she typically goes to Northern Rocks three times a week, including a lesson each week.

Music: Miya has a private clarinet lesson once a week, as well as saxophone and trumpet lessons at Belmont Music Centre.   She continues to practice her instruments most days and is planning to sit the Grade 4 clarinet exam this year.

Dance: Miya has contemporary dance lessons once a week at Mainly Dance.

Gymnastics: Miya has one lesson a week at North Harbour Gymnastics.

Teaching: Miya co-teaches two Chinese language classes each week with Mama at Chinese4All.

Census at school

Yesterday we completed the Census at School.

This is an online survey that all Year 3-13 school children may complete.

It's a non-profit educationally motivated project hosted by the Stats Department at Auckland Uni and with the help of the Ministry of Education and Stats NZ.

In other words, it's a legit survey for kids to learn about stats, not a commercially-driven data-gathering exercise.

The questions were enjoyable and mostly easy for Mulan and Miya to answer.  The games section was a great idea for a bit of fun competitiveness.

A small challenge for us was that the question-designers mustn't have considered homeschoolers -- a few questions only made sense if the kids physically go to school and then have an "after school".  Those don't apply when schooling is a lifestyle, not an event.

After completing the questions, the girls spent some time on the website going through the questions from previous years and examining the data.  They've now got the Live Dashboard open to look at every once in a while.

Te Tiriti o Waitangi

We've just read Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

Okay, so not specifically the Treaty (of Waitangi) itself, but a cartoon booklet put out by the Ministry of Education.

It's a quick and simple intro for kids, written as a leveled reader for Mulan-aged children with a reading level of Miya-aged children.

I learnt of it via a Facebook homeschooling group, where the poster opined that "bias is showing".  (Unfortunately, the poster didn't detail the biases.)

I'm no expert, but I think it was a pretty good and fair summary, and well worth reading.  But happy to be corrected by those more knowledgeable.  (I take it that the guy at the beginning represents many of my generation, and I think it's great that a more nuanced understanding is now being taught.)

The eggplant

The girls and I finished watching The Eggplant a few days ago.

It's a 6-part YouTube whodunit, investigating the mystery of who put a giant papier-mâché eggplant in the middle of the school rugby field.

Mulan and Miya quickly got into it, and were super-eager to keep watching more episodes.

Oh, it's actually an "educational" production, funded by the Department of Internal Affairs, helping kids to stay safe online.

It's really well done, and we highly recommend it.

Homeschool athletics

More athletics!

On Tuesday we had our annual HASCA homeschool athletics day at Onewa Domain, using the Takapuna Athletic Club equipment.

We had just over 100 children competing, with 12 different events happening throughout the day.  It's a pretty full-on day for the kids, with many of them choosing to do eight or so events each.  Some kids are familiar with the events while for others it's their first time trying it out.  So, it's a mix of fun have-a-go and also pushing hard.

It's the third year we've run it, and once again I was involved in the organising. To run all the events we need a lot of parent helpers, and I feel that each year it's getting easier to manage, as families start to know what's involved and each person does their bit.

I was on microphone duties again, directing traffic and walking the field checking it was all going smoothly.

Mulan and Miya competed again, hanging out in their age groups most of the time.

A good time had by all, and we plan to run it again next year.

Term 1 2021 activities

The new school term is starting, and we're finalising Mulan and Miya's activities.  Some things have already started, and we're easing back into our normal busy routine.

Mulan:

We're thinking about Mulan going to school in 2022, for Year 11 and NCEA 1, so this may be her final year of doing multiple activities.  Last chance to squeeze in lots of stuff, before the desk work gets serious!

Ballet/dance continues to be Mulan's main activity.  She's got a term pass at Mainly Dance Studios, to attend as many classes as she wants.  This year she's working towards the ballet Advanced Foundation exam and the contemporary Level 5 exam.

Athletics is Mulan's second activity.  We've joined the Takapuna Athletic Club for the season.  Her big aim this season is to be selected for the Auckland Interprovincial team, competing in Easter.  The big competitions for the season are all coming up over the next several weeks.  Mulan does well at all events, but especially does triple jump, 80 metre hurdles and long jump.

Music: Mulan continues to have private recorder lessons each week with Kevin Kim.  After dislocating her finger a couple of months ago she took some time off cello, but is just now re-starting to play.  Once she has de-rusted, and the finger strengthens up enough, she'll probably return to weekly private cello lessons.  We're looking at maybe doing Grade 4 theory and Grade 5 cello exams.

Swimming: Mulan has newly signed up for classes at NZL Swim -- she has two classes each week with the Swim Fit squad.  

Gymnastics: Mulan is again in the Extension 2 class at North Harbour Gymnastics, having one two-hour class each week.

Miya:

Rock climbing is Miya's main activity.  She and I have got memberships at Northern Rocks, and we go there about three times each week.  She's signed up for weekly classes, and we're starting to look at whether she might want to join some competitions.

Music: Miya is continuing to learn multiple instruments.  She's having weekly private clarinet lessons with Brendan Dalton, and has signed up for saxophone and trumpet lessons at Belmont Music Centre.  She may do the Grade 4 clarinet exam this year.

Dance: Miya decided to stop doing ballet, and this year is just having contemporary lessons at Mainly Dance Studios, working towards the Level 1 exam.

Athletics: Miya does athletics with Mulan and me, especially doing well in all the field events.

Gymnastics: Miya is again in the Extension 1 class at North Harbour Gymnastics, having one two-hour class each week.

Horse riding: We've been seriously looking into regular horse riding lessons, especially for Miya but maybe also for Mulan.  It's not happening in term 1, but we'll see if we can squeeze it in after athletics has finished for the season.

Climbing, music and jumping

As I often say, one of the huge advantages of homeschooling (at least for us) is that it's so much more efficient than school-schooling.  We get to spend more of our days doing what we want to do.

Rock Climbing:

On Friday, Miya completed a "green" climb for the first time at Northern Rocks.  (She's the first in our family, too!  I almost got it, but not quite -- maybe next week?!)

What's a "green"?  Here's the grading system:

The way I feel it (as a near-beginner to all this, having only started a month ago), purple is do-able for someone who has done some strength training (weights, gymnastics, etc), but hasn't specifically rock climbed before.

Green, to me at least, needs a bit of rock climbing experience.  Green holds are a bit smaller and need some finger strength that people wouldn't normally have without some climbing.  And green also seems to need a bit more experience with technique -- balance, strategy, etc.

So, good on Miya for getting to that next level.  Miya is really enjoying the climbing, and the two of us do an hour or so three times a week.

Music:

Yesterday morning, Miya had her Class Recitals at Belmont Music Centre.

Several classes performed in front of an audience of about 70 or so family and friends.  All students did extremely well, especially considering that this year's learning has been hugely Covid-interrupted.

Miya is learning three instruments this year, and good on her for consistently practicing most days.  She's made huge improvements and is sounding really good.

Miya was up on stage twice yesterday for both trumpet and clarinet (keyboard was a couple of weeks ago).

Athletics:

Yesterday afternoon, Mulan and I competed in athletics again.

This week, both of us did triple jump.  Our results are here.

Neither of us got PBs (personal bests) this week, but Mulan did get a best non-wind-assisted jump of 9.32m.  (Her PB of 9.53m was wind-assisted.)

This season, Mulan is often doing athletics two or three days a week, with competitions and training.

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And then both girls do ballet a few days a week, gymnastics once a week and swimming once a week.  Mulan is continuing with cello and recorder lessons each week, and Miya also does athletics.  And that's just the structured activities.

If the girls went to school, they probably wouldn't have time to do half of this.

The Queen's Gambit

We've just finished watching the TV series, The Queen's Gambit.  It's a great story; highly recommended.

It's also inspired Mulan and Miya to try out chess again.

Back when I was Miya's age, my Standard 3 (Year 5) teacher, Mr Pratt, taught us class how to play chess.  He had a class set of chess sets, and we'd all often play during school hours.  Mr Pratt joined in the games, too; he was hugely encouraging to us, and I remember some great games with him.

I quickly got into it, and my grandfather gave me my first chess set (bottom right in the picture above).  I'd take my set to school, to play in class (hence the slightly battered board!).  My grandfather also later gave me my big tabletop set (top left in the pic).

I played heaps that year, thanks to my school teacher, but drifted away after the school year ended.  I've only ever played occasionally since then, though a few years later I did buy myself the computer chess set (middle in the pic).  I'm very much an "intuitive" player, and know almost zero about historical games and strategies.

Anyway, Mulan and Miya are having lots of fun playing together, and I've played them both a few times, too.  I've now got to be at my best to beat either of them.

As if my poor brain wasn't tired enough, the girls decided that I needed to do what the main character did in The Queen's Gambit -- play multiple games simultaneously.

So, we set up the three boards, and I played Mulan, Miya and Mama at the same time.  It wasn't easy!  I made a couple of big, silly mistakes while trying to keep three games in my head -- Miya noticed the one against her, but Mama missed her opportunity to take my queen.

All good fun, thanks to a great TV show.

It was also fascinating watching the final game in the final episode, knowing that it was based on an actual game played by Professor Robert Wolff's son.  (I've been following Professor Wolff's blog for several years now, and have learnt a lot from him.)

Sherlock

Mulan and I finished watching the TV series Sherlock several days ago.  If you don't know, that's the version of Sherlock Holmes from a few years ago, with Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman playing Holmes and Watson, and set in modern times.

We watched all the way to the end of series 4, and the final episodes especially were a great opportunity for Mulan to learn a little more about history.

But I don't mean that Mulan learnt more about Victorian England and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Rather, I mean that Mulan (and Miya) learnt about jumping the shark.

We found a YouTube clip of Fonzie jumping the shark in Happy Days, and had a chat about the meaning of the term.

The way I see it, the central core of Sherlock Holmes is the reasonableness.  Everything else can be changed, but at heart Holmes is about step-by-step reasoning that may not be clear at first but is obvious (or at least extremely plausible) once explained.

The first half of Sherlock followed this format.  Even though it was set in modern times, and twisted the Conan Doyle stories somewhat ("A Study in Pink" instead of "A Study in Scarlet"), it was still recognisably reasonable.

But from series 3 onwards (at least in my opinion), the writers tangled themselves in knots trying to ever outdo themselves with complexity.  In the end they overreached, and resorted to mysticism.  That is, they abandoned the central core of Holmes -- the reasonableness.  In the place of reasonableness, they invented super-humans who could see and do things that were beyond comprehension.  We no longer got the step-by-step reasoning; in its place was teasing and hand-waving gestures to inexplicable higher levels of thinking.  It was drama without substance.

For both Mulan and me, series 4 was not so fun to watch compared with the earlier episodes, and we only wanted to finish it for the sake of completeness.

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A much better recent Holmes story, in our opinion, is the 2020 Enola Holmes movie, which we also watched recently.  Highly recommended, especially for teen and tween girls.

Book review: I don't have enough faith to be an atheist

When I write my book reviews, or my more serious thoughts, I generally try to explain my reasoning as clearly as I can.  I try to understand the writers, and feel the views as charitably and accurately as I can.

This is partly for you, my readers, but honestly, it's mostly for me.  Spending time putting my thoughts in writing really helps me to get clear in my own head how I see things.  Until I write it out, I frequently have only a general and vague sense of my position on things.  And in writing it down I sometimes change my own views.

But there are exceptions to this.  And this is one.

In this post I'm not going to give my reasons.  I'm merely going to give my conclusions (with a bit of biographical background).  I'm not arguing; I'm merely stating.

It's not that I couldn't give my reasons.  It's just that I have no interest to take the time to do so.  In this particular situation, writing it down won't help me to get any clearer on how I see things.  And to be honest, it kinda bores me.

So, take what you will of what follows.

One of my nieces is in school year 13, and she is hugely busy with book work, getting up enough credits to go on to university or whatever.  Good on her!

The required reading for one of her courses is Norman L. Geisler and Frank Turek's 2004 book I don't have enough faith to be an atheist.

My Big Sis, Gugu, and I chatted about this, and consequently I requested the Geisler/Turek book from the library.

The main claim of the book is that the evidence points in favour of Christianity, and so atheists are actually required to have more faith than Christians.

Gugu and I grew up in a Christian family, and since teenagers we have often had long and enjoyable conversations about religion, science and other deep matters.  A big chunk of my masters degree was on the philosophy of religion, and for a couple of years I was the tutor for the 2nd/3rd year undergraduate philosophy of religion course at Auckland Uni.

So, while my background is not enough to be considered a professional expert, I think it is enough to say that I am competent to evaluate good versus bad contributions to the subject.

And in my opinion, Geisler and Turek's contribution is in the bad category.  It is not worth reading, and should definitely not be used as the required reading for secondary school students.  It is a serious failing in New Zealand's education system that this is part of a course that gives university entrance credits.

As I was reading it, I was often finding multiple errors on each page.  There are far too many logical missteps, factual errors and misrepresentations of others' views.  Repeatedly, Geisler/Turek committed the fallacies of false alternatives and strawperson.  Repeatedly they made the mistake of being uncharitable to their opponents views, imagining that they had dismissed, in a few lines, the ideas of people who had spent decades on these complex issues; in reality all that Geisler/Turek did was dismiss cartoon versions that few take seriously anyway.  There was an overall sense of the authors not quite "getting" the ideas they were trying to present, but alongside that there was a kind of blissful, contented arrogance from them that they had got it right.  If I had to describe this book in a word, I'd say it was clumsy.

I want to be clear, this is not about religion.  It is about facts, logic and evidence.  Geisler/Turek made claims about where the evidence points, but repeatedly got the facts, logic and evidence wrong.  That they happen to be arguing against atheism, and for their version of Christianity, is irrelevant.  I have also said similar things about badly written pro-atheism books (eg, several years ago I read a bit of work by Sam Harris; in my opinion he's the atheistic scholarly equivalent of Geisler/Turek).

Unless my niece wants to go through any specific pages with me, that's all I feel the need to say.

To kill a mockingbird

We're still continuing to watch movies.

Last night we finished watching the 1962 movie, To Kill a Mockingbird, which was based on Harper Lee's 1960 book of the same name.

It's one of those must-see classics which I'd previously never got around to watching.  Mulan said it was much better than she was expecting!  I've also never got around to reading the book; I've now requested it from the library for Mulan and me.

Back when I was at university, one of my lecturers, Tim Dare, had recently written an article called Lawyers, Ethics, and to Kill a Mockingbird.  While I hadn't read the book, I thought what Tim wrote made sense and it stuck with me.

Last night, after finishing watching the movie, I re-read Tim's article.  The idea that Atticus Finch is a tragic figure makes sense to me.  Tim writes:

Atticus’s story too is tragic. Regarding the rule of law as tremendously important, he presents his arguments in its favor to the jury with passion and all of his professional ability, recognizing that the life of an innocent man rests upon his success. But he fails, and Tom dies. When a decision over Boo is required, Atticus is struck by the similarities between the cases. Both Tom and Boo are mockingbirds: innocents who it would be sinful to harm. ... When Boo kills Bob Ewell, Atticus, cast as protector of both men, must decide whether he will allow another outsider to face the same threat. Confronted with the possibility of another tragedy, Atticus’s faith in the rule of law, and perhaps his courage as well, fail him. He cannot bear the possibility that he will be party to the death of another mockingbird. 

In the end, Atticus abandons the principles that determined his selfunderstanding, secured his unique and valuable position in Maycomb, and received his passionate defense. That is the stuff of tragedy: a principled man has come to doubt the adequacy of principles by which he understands himself and abandons those principles. Whether or not it is wicked to try people in the secret courts of men’s hearts now depends upon which men’s hearts. ... Tragically though understandably, he is not prepared to risk a vulnerable person effectively in his care, having so recently seen how his legal system mistreated another similarly placed outsider.

... Cast as a tragic figure, Atticus yields a very different message than that which he conveys as a wise figure. We are not meant to admire what he does but to be struck by the gravity of his loss. Viewed as a tragic figure, his message is one about the value of the principles he has abandoned, not one about the desirability of regarding them as disposable, trivial, or burdensome.

I'm also persuaded by Tim's main point regarding legal ethics.  I highly recommend the article.

UPDATE 14/8/2020: I finished reading the book yesterday (Mulan sped through it a couple of weeks ago).  I highly recommend the book, and it is even better than the movie.  I agree with Tim's interpretation above; in the book it is clearer to see than in the movie, and there are several hints along the way suggesting Atticus' tragic fall.