Another Monday, another school shooting.

JOPLIN, Mo. (AP) — Authorities say a 13-year-old brought an AK-47 to his Joplin, Missouri, school and fired it this morning — but no one was hurt.

Authorities say the student wore a mask and pointed the assault rifle at the principal, an assistant superintendent and two students, pleading — “Please don’t make me do this.”

The superintendent says the teenager fired a shot into the ceiling and broke a water pipe. But administrators talked him into leaving the building, and police were waiting outside with weapons drawn.

The incident forced about 700 students to leave the school to wait for frightened parents to pick them up.

The superintendent calls it a “very close call.”

Joplin is a city of about 41,000 in southwest Missouri.

UPDATE: Police also found a note in the boy’s backpack (along with diagrams and military manuals) which indicated he’d planted an explosive at the school. Bomb-sniffing dogs “hit” on a locker at the school. Details are still forthcoming.

UPDATE: Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt, upon learning of the shooting, said it is worth considering proposals to permit teachers to carry guns in light of the recent spike in school shootings.

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Dr. Homeschool explains how to restore your child’s self-confidence when making the switch from public to homeschool.

The Carnival of Homeschooling goes retro for its 40th installment at Homeschool Buzz. In this week’s edition, Phat Mommy challenges homeschoolers to provide an answer — a very detailed answer — to those who’ve always wondered “What do homeschoolers do all day?”

October is Gay and Lesbian History Month in Philidelphia’s public school system, according to the school calendar. Administrators say the program is part of the district’s steps to recognize different racial and ethnic minorities, and was added along with Hispanic Heritage Month in September, African History Month in February and Asian Pacific American History Month in May. No special programs are planned; however, schools with gay-straight alliances may schedule their own events.

The school district is not surprised that some parents — reportedly 120 — are irate.

”We have our policy that says the district is committed to foster knowledge and respect for all,” she said.

Cummings said a decision on whether to include Gay History Month on next year’s calendars would be made later.

”Our calendar this year is a celebration of diversity. Whether it will continue to be the theme in years to come, we’re not sure,” she said. (Source: Miami Herald.)

“A number of people are dead,” including the shooter, following an attack at a one-room Amish schoolhouse in Pennsylvania.

Police surrounded the one-room school late Monday morning, and the Lancaster County 911 Web site reported that dozens of emergency units were dispatched to a “medical emergency” at 10:45 a.m.

Two hours later, about three dozen people in traditional Amish clothing, hats and bonnets stood near the small school building speaking to one another, several young people and authorities. At least two ambulances had left the scene, and at least one person was taken on a stretcher to a medical helicopter.

Developing story at CNN.

UPDATE: Meanwhile, in Las Vegas, two schools were locked down after witnesses reported seeing a student carrying a weapon. Schools throughout the country have been on alert following fatal shootings last week in Wisconsin and Colorado, along with a disrupted murder plan also in a Wisconsin school. Even so, experts report that the number of non-fatal school shootings is down to 24 this year, from 85 last year.

UPDATE: The shooter in Pennsylvania was a commercial milk truck driver, himself a father of three and with no prior criminal history. Reports indicate that he left rambling suicide notes discovered by his wife. When she called him on his cell phone, the shooter said he would not be coming home — he was trying to settle “something that happened 20 years ago.” His method of revenge involved tying young school girls together by the feet. After letting boys and adult women in the classroom go, he shot three of his captives and wounded 7 more before killing himself. There are more details, but my stomach can’t handle such brutality anymore.

The European Court of Human Rights recently declared that German parents have no right to educate their children at home. This is the most recent blow in a campaign against German homeschooling parents, one which has resulted in heavy fines and jail time for parents who persist in education their children at home. (A .pdf copy of the decision can be found here.)

The German homeschooling community had been awaiting the results in this matter, considered a “test case” by many European parents who view compulsory education, particularly in the area of mandatory sex education, as a violation of their religious beliefs.

This would seem to be a clear-cut matter under Article 2 of Protocol No. 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which states:

No person shall be denied the right to education. In the exercise of any functions which it assumes in relation to education and to teaching, the State shall respect the right of parents to ensure such education and teaching in conformity with their own religions and philosophical convictions. (Emphasis mine)

The Court, however, declared that the interest of the state outweighs parental convictions and, more troubling, deems the State better able to determine what is in a child’s best interests than that child’s own parents. (Ironically, this decision comes on the heels of a industry study which found that German schools are experiencing “educational poverty” and fare poorly at educating students sufficiently to replace retiring workers.)

While the Court postured itself as defending the rights of the child and declared the State to know better than parents the best interests of their children, it also endorsed a “carefully reasoned” decision of the German courts indicating the State had an interest in subordinating value systems competing with the state’s secular values. The Court agreed with the finding of Germany’s Federal Constitutional Court which stressed “the general interest of society to avoid the emergence of parallel societies based on separate philosophical convictions and the importance of integrating minorities into society.” (Source)

Register your protest with the German Embassy:

Wolfgang Ischinger
Ambassador
German Embassy
4645 Reservoir Road NW
Washington, DC, 20007-1998
(202) 298-4000
or send an email.

UPDATE: More on the notion that parental rights arise only after the State exercises its rights with respect to a child at Principled Discovery.

This summer, eBay announced that it would no longer allow the sale of used teacher’s editions with homeschool curricula. The company asserted that such sales violated eBay’s fair use policies since the company had no way to verify whether the sellers/purchasers were, in fact, teachers.

The homeschooling community has been outraged.

But where there’s a niche there’s always someone willing to fill it. The latest entrant is the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), which just announced the launch of its Curriculum Market.

Excellent! Now I have a good reason to go hunting through the basement for all of the books we’d bought last year but don’t need anymore.

As any homeschooling parent can tell you, the most frequent question (or challenge) we encounter from other parents about our child’s education environment boils down to the dreaded S-word: Socialization. As in: “Kids who aren’t forced into social interactions with other children their same age can’t possibly be considered ’socialized.’”

Witness, for example, the kerfluffle that happened at Dean’s World when he agreed with me about the perils and pitfalls of public school attendance as the primary method of ’socializing’ kids. The one thing missing from the conversation at Dean’s was a single scrap of evidence that any ’socialization’ occurs through the public school system, much less that it’s inherently superior. To put it another way, a staggering number of people seem to believe that public school attendance is synonymous with socialization.

The circularity of the argument is nearly laughable when one recalls what socialization means.

socialization

(psychology) The process whereby a child learns to get along with and to behave similarly to other people in the group, largely through imitation as well as group pressure.

Suffice it to say, then, that both homeschooled children and their public schooled counterparts are ALL socialized. The question is: to conform to whom? Homeschooling parents, myself included, believe that the greatest gift we can give our children is a personal role model, a functional home, a family that stands behind them in their own pursuit of excellence, and an education consistent with the morals that we claim.

And that, Ladies and Gentlemen, is what alarms those who believe children should be sent to public school so they can be socialized. They fear Johnny will be warped because his parents — who do not believe in evolution, for example — choose not to make that part of Johnny’s science curriculum. They cloak it in concern whether Johnny will know how to get along with other runny-nosed children his age, whether he’ll know what it’s like to be picked last for a team, whether he’ll be prepared to ask a girl on a date some day long down the road or if he’ll crumble the first time his boss passes him over for a promotion (assuming he can even get a job, being homeschooled and all).

But what they really, really mean is this: they don’t share the same morals as Johnny’s parents. They want Johnny to learn what they themselves believe, and they wrap it up in a nice, neat little package they call ’socialization.’ Or, as Freeven noted in the comments:

The socialization argument is a canard. Public schools can’t be defended on the academic merits, so they have to look elsewhere for talking points. These things get parroted around, but ask for any hard evidence and the discussion is pretty much over.

Interesting, isn’t it? Non-homeschoolers do not believe that parents should have the right to independently educate their own children in a manner consistent with their family’s moral beliefs if they don’t share those beliefs themselves.

Frankly, I don’t call that ’socialization,’ although I do agree it smacks of a different dreaded ’s-word.’

UPDATE: Anwyn’s trying to decipher the comments of a Montessori advocate who, while remarking on the “positive social effects” of that approach notes: “Typically the home environment overwhelms all other influences in that area.” While I, being jaded, interpret that remark as yet another educator who believes that schools are inherently superior to a child’s actual parents, Anwyn’s taking a proactive approach and actually emailing the ‘expert.’

The 39th Carnival of Homeschooling is up at PalmTree Pundit where Anne is missing the mainland’s autumn colors and weather.

Hmm, I wonder: if I sent her a box of fall leaves would she send me some manapua and some poke?

These days, it’s increasingly common to read about schools searching out homeschooled students. Usually, however, the stories are about colleges actively recruiting homeschooled students.

Not this time:

Teachers, starved for technology, are bounty hunting homeschooled children.

Such is the case in Mason County, Ky., where The Ledger Independent reports that local public school teachers are being encouraged to make house calls to dropouts and homeschoolers alike, convincing them to return to school.

For each student that rejoins the fold and stays for a year, the teachers receive new technology in their classrooms.

While it’s disturbing that homeschoolers are being equated with dropouts, I’m more concerned with the reasoning of Superintendent Tim Moore, who is behind this clever idea.

When asked to defend his attack on home educators, he replied, “Education is more than learning in books.” He added, “social aspects of school are important as well,” according to the article.

Frankly, I’ve never understood what the allegedly beneficial “social aspects of school.” I recall classrooms filled with students trying to break the rules behind the teacher’s back in order to impress their peers, kids who were chubby or who wore glasses being or who just looked different being chased and sometimes “pantsed” or “canned” or just beat up by gangs of brats wearing designer clothes, smart children who acted stupid in order to make friends and girls who slunk around with caved-in shoulders to disguise their developing bodies from the taunting and leering eyes of their friends. And, before you ask, I was usually among the worst offenders.

Most “socialization” in the public schools seems to teach merely this: those with the fastest punch, the slyest tricks, the snidest attitude or the most expensive clothes are inherently more worthy of attention — be it good or bad. Teachers can do little to nothing about this, aside from sending a particularly unruly child to the principal’s office (which achieves the kid’s goal of getting both attention and out of class) and principals don’t have the time or legal power to do much more than make phone calls to parents too busy to care. And as for the ’social aspects’ of classwork, most kids learn by second grade to do as little as possible in order to pass. Not to excel, mind you, just pass.

Nevertheless, the Superintendant of the Mason County schools believes he’s doing a service for students by pulling them out of one-on-one home education programs where children learn to work on their own, get along with adults, and take pride in their behavior, their efforts and their accomplishments.

I can only assume that with logic like his, he’s a product of the public school system himself.

In what’s been touted as the first known Beijing case involving a homeschooled child, the court has determined that compulsory education laws mean compulsory public education.

The case arose from a dispute between divorced parents of a child in the custody of his divorced father, who has also been educating him at home. The mother’s suit to change custody claimed that homeschooling amounted to educational deprivation.

The mother Wang Yu, 37, who said she worked at the Beijing branch of the Hong Kong-based newspaper Wenweipo, had accused her ex-husband of isolating their son by forcing a home education on him.

“Kept at home all day with little social communication for two years, the boy’s well-being has been damaged,” said Wang.

But Hou Bo, the father, refuted this, saying home education had a lot of advantages for the boy.

A test conducted by the Galaxy Primary School in Shijingshan District this month showed the child, who should be in the second grade, had already reached the level required for grade four students. The boy said in court that he enjoyed his home education.

The mother lost the case because there was no evidence proving the child was unhappy because of the father’s education system, according to the court. (Source: China Daily.)

Nevertheless, the court decreed that the boy must attend public school in accordance with China’s newly-revised Compulsory Education Law. And why? “[H]ome education is absolutely not advocated,” said an official involved in revising the law.

Yesterday I mentioned that I signed The Big-Eyed Boy up for Time4Learning after reading about it over at Dreah’s.

Today, I’d barely finished serving breakfast and starting a fire to warm the house (it’s still chilly… hooray!) when the Boy asked if we could “start playing school yet.” Well, dang! I sat him in my chair, booted up the computer, and let him have full control of the mouse.

No, I didn’t get a lot of blogging done and barely responded to any email, but he made it through three lessons in Language Arts, two in Math and one each in Science and Social Studies. And that was just before 10 a.m.

Meanwhile, I had a chance to actually step away from our homeschool corner in the kitchen to squeeze in a workout, do a little cleaning and start pre-sorting financial stuff for our tax returns.

Yee-freaking-hah!

This, I believe, calls for a celebratory martini.

Every morning, right about the time my coffee kicks in, I foolishly believe that today will be the problem-free day in homeschool, that today he won’t tune out in the middle of a story or lesson, that we’ll be able to get through at least one subject without him insisting “It’s snack time!” (which he seems to think should occur every 15 minutes).

Every day I hope for him to show even an ounce of interest in the lessons I put together with coordinating hands-on projects, library books, complimentary websites and file folder centers. Just an ounce, mind you. I don’t expect him to get enthused — even if we are learning about subjects he said he was interested in — and I don’t expect him to bound out of bed eager to shun computer games or the PlayStation in favor of math, grammar and spelling. But some sign that he occasionally enjoys it, every so often at least, well, it would certainly improve my Mommy Morale.

So when I read about Time4Learning at Notes from A Homeschooling Mom, I couldn’t resist checking it out. And, as I sat clicking around on the site looking at the various lessons and activities, The Big-Eyed Boy hovered nearby. Within minutes, I’d been evicted from the computer as he “played school” on his own. He finished a language arts lesson and cruised on to another, and when it was done he couldn’t wait to do science. He even took a quiz and liked it! (And passed, too, I might add.)

In fact, he enjoyed it so much that I didn’t have to sit practically shackled to his side just to keep him on task. I did some laundry, checked on how he was doing, then caught up on a little reading myself. Meanwhile, he kept at it — and loved it! Whose kid is this? Mine?!

We’ll be incorporating Time4Learning in our school day from now on, no doubt about it. Now I’ll have to see about finding him a cheap computer of his own, or else I’ll never get to use mine during the day again.

The 38th Carnival of Homeschooling is up at The Thinking Mother. Just in time for our homeschool lunchbreak around here, too!

Since I missed National Sneak Some Zucchini Onto Your Neighbor’s Porch Day back in August, I’ve wound up with a bumper crop and no poor sucker to pawn it off on. So, rather than endure yet another side dish of zucchini with tonight’s dinner, I decided our homeschool math session today would focus on fractions and measurements — specifically, doubling my Zucchini Bread recipe (below).

Although it’s too late for me to submit it to this week’s Carnival of the Recipes (Poetry Quiz edition) at Technogypsy, with luck I’ll remember to send it off to next week’s host, Men in Aprons (oooh, the imagery!).

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