Smrt Lernins

Another good week at the McLernins house.

Captain Science did chapters 21-24 in Life of Fred: Fractions (a curriculum I discussed pretty thoroughly in this week’s Secular Thursday) and bridges one and two. He’s still having some trouble with multiplying mixed numbers, so we’re slowing it down next week, letting him work on the remaining three bridges for the chapter, and maybe doing some additional mixed fraction and improper fraction work. He’s really more of a decimals and percents kind of kid, so I hope we can get to the next book soon so he can fly!

The Captain has memorized Prometheus Amid Hurricane and Earthquake! He learned in it a week and can recite it to others. We’re working now on enunciating and standing still while reciting. What to learn next? I’ve looking through some likely candidates, but will welcome suggestions. Greek poetry, please!

In that same vein, history progresses well. The captain read the sections on Greek city-states in History: The Definitive Visual Guide and the Alexander the Great sections in History: The Definitive Visual Guide and Eyewitness: Ancient Greece. His essays were on the conflicts and cooperation between city-states and on Alexander’s life. We’ve scaled back a little on the dates and vocab this week, focusing more in important people. He’s reading The Golden Fleece right no and is likely to finish that tomorrow or Sunday. He wants to read The Iliad, but the only translation I have is definitely written on an adult level, and I worry he’ll be bored. Maybe I’ll challenge him with it and see how he does? It’s not long, just dense. I need to start including some reading from Uppity Women of Ancient Times. Cleopatra wasn’t the only important woman who lived prior to Queen Elizabeth, no matter some people might think.

Science was fantastic this week! He’s really putting in a lot of effort into the new physics unit, which covers sound vibration, from Science in a Nutshell. We have to leave the building when balloons are involved, because Patchfire doesn’t like balloons, but otherwise, the unit is nice. The Captain is giving thoughtful, thorough answers, and loves the hands-on experiments with the tuning fork and other sound-making implements. He’s also reading the third Percy Jackson novel.

Captain Science started back with Writing Strands doing a short section on expanding sentences as we build back up to a more rigorous writing schedule. Handwriting is still on hold until I can order the theory manual for Spencerian Penmanship. In Growing With Grammar, we started chapter 7, adverbs, though we did only one lesson this week in the interest of other activities. He’s got a good grasp of grammar, so if something needs to be trimmed for time, that’s the one that normally goes. He’s absolutely devouring Vocabulary from Classical Roots, doing lesson 3 this week in about 10 minutes, and hasn’t missed a question yet. I need to get the quiz book from Patchfire so we can do a quiz.

I have discovered that we need a much better dictionary. I no longer define words for Captain Science when he asks me, “What does [word] mean?” I make him look them up, but our little Webster’s Concise English Dictionary just isn’t cutting it. I love his ability to read definitions and rephrase them in context of the conversation or reading. He seems to have such a natural gift for language. I hope it will apply to foreign languages, too, as I’d like to start one in the spring. As much as I wish we could be classical enough for Latin, it’s likely going to be Japanese.

Co-op was kind of a crazy mess this week, due to a visit from the Carlos Museum mummy wrap program, which Captain Science had already seen last year at public school. The kids ran amok and I have no idea who much learning the Captain actually did. We need to start finding some other outside activities.

The Tank had a busy week at preschool, but more and more I am wishing he wasn’t enrolled anywhere. It’s been good for him, there’s no denying it, but I really think that I’ll start homeschooling him next year. He’s done all manner of paintings with body parts and objects (elbows? gauze?), but it’s really just about getting him out around other kids, which I could do in other places.

Babypie has been busy. She’s now crawling up a storm and has started *gasp* pulling up on things! This means she’s in to everything and I keep having to fish random objects out of her mouth — magazine pages, pennies, toys, food she doesn’t need. She keeps us all on our toes. Her silliness is probably Captain Science’s biggest distraction during the day, as the two are just nuts about each other.

I have to say, I’m pretty pleased with this week. Next up, Halloween tomorrow, where Babypie will be Rosie the Riveter, Captain Science will be a ninja, and The Tank will be a police officer like his daddy.

Because I only ever assume I’ll have one Halloween per child to dress them in any way I please (as Captain Science was very vocal about his costume choice by his second Halloween), I chose to dress Babypie as Rosie the Riveter this year, specifically trying to recreate the iconic poster. She’s going to be dressed in a polka dot bandana, denim overalls, something resembling a workshirt, and a little dirty smudge on her face, while I’m going as the background of her poster, wearing a yellow t-shirt with a blue speech bubble with white letters that say “We Can Do It!”

I had a dilly of a time getting the shirt ready. I bought the only yellow tee in my size at Target and two cans of spray fabric paint, which proved to be a bad choice, as the blue spray I used on the speech bubble wicked underneath the stencil, making a huge green blob, as the blue also proved to be far from opaque enough. There were tears and angry exclamations, but when the shirt dried, I appliqued a piece of blue fabric on over the green blob and made a passable speech bubble. I made a stencil for the words, tested the white spray, and managed to get it all over the table, thankfully sparing the shirt. Finally, I just painted the letters on by hand, which was a bit tedious, but doable.

While I was painting on these letters, I entered into a strange mental state, where I was suddenly really struck by the meaning behind them and what this represented. Rosie the Riveter is often used as an icon of feminism, because she represents the women who took on male-dominated trades during the war. Because of that, I think a lot of women (the conservative and/or religious homeschooling moms I see on the WTM forums, for example) might not give her a lot of credence, or perhaps they place more significance on the fact that after the war, Rosie returned to being a homemaker or other “acceptable” female trade. They may not think they can identify with Rosie. They may not think of themselves as being much like Rosie.

What can Rosie represent to all women? “We Can Do It!” Rosie says, baring a strong arm, dressed in her practical work clothes. We Can Do It! “It” for Rosie was stepping into a traditionally male job, working long, hard hours doing physical labor that she likely never expected to have to do. She likely didn’t grow up longing for assembly line work, a job as a welder, a chance to put a war ship together, but when she was called to do it, she went. She stepped outside her cultural constraints because it was necessary to do it. She put her own physical and possibly mental comfort on hold. She sacrificed, however temporarily, the things she wanted to do, preferred to do, or was simply used to doing, so that she could serve a tremendous social and economic needs, often doing so under brutal conditions with pay far below that of a man in the same job.

We Can Do It! “It” for each of us may be something different, a different sort of necessary, but difficult labor, a different kind of sacrifice, a different kind of service. “It” is anything we could choose to shirk, but don’t, any tremendous task that could overwhelm us, but doesn’t, every hardship that begs us to just surrender, but will not break us. We Can Do It! We can do it because we have to, because we know it is right, and when we do, we become a Rosie, too. We don’t have to bare our muscular arms to show the world that we’re Rosies. We do it through our actions every day.

Every woman can be a Rosie.
Every woman who has ever put the needs of her children before her own is a Rosie.
Every woman who has overcome a cultural norm for the sake of doing what’s right is a Rosie.
Every woman who has served a greater good, when not serving would be easier, is a Rosie.
Every woman who puts out a hand to help other women find strength is a Rosie.
Every woman who holds her head up high under duress and hardship is a Rosie.
Every woman whose work goes unappreciated, but who keeps on working anyway is a Rosie.
Every woman who reaches out to her sisters in her community is a Rosie.
Every woman who refuses to give up is a Rosie.
YOU are a Rosie.

You can be a Rosie in jeans, in a suit, in a uniform, in modest dress. You can be a Rosie with no children, with one child, with many children. You can be a Rosie working out of the home or in the home. You can be a Rosie if you are an atheist, a Christian, a Jew, a Buddhist. You can embody the strength of Rosie without ever picking up a hammer. You can embody the strength of Rosie while you change a diaper, scrub a floor or fix a meal. You can be Rosie when you educate your children at home.

Rosie is a strong woman, who owns her choices, who sees an obstacle and works to over come it, who does what is necessary regardless of whether or not it’s easy. A Rosie commands respect, not through force or a loud shout for attention, but through tireless effort, pride in her work, and the strength to do the tasks that must be done. That’s not just a feminist ideal, but one that any woman, any person can reach for.

Be a Rosie. Be a woman who knows that She Can Do It!