Learning is for Everyone is hosting a Tapestry of Homeschool survey in an effort to counteract the modern day mythologies of homeschooling than range from misperceptions about socialization to assumptions about religious beliefs.

….

Homeschoolers comprise a diverse and multifaceted community. Getting a better picture of who we are can help us support one another better, as well as better protect our collective right to direct our children’s learning.

Which reminded me that I’d intended to link to the March edition  of Unschooling Voices.

Once the Feds get involved, there will necessarily be more reporting requirements, at the very least to our states, so that our ducks will be lined up just so and we can keep more of our money. Once the Feds get involved at any level, in any aspect of homeschooling, defining eligibility and limits and constraints and what happens to those who don’t follow the rules, we will lose something that we may never be able to regain: the homeschooling freedom we currently enjoy from the Feds….

If we advocate for tax credits — beneficial as that money would be, as much [of] a right to that money as we have — we will essentially be inviting the federal government to notice us. To define us. To monitor us. To calculate us. To nickel and dime us. To determine us. This is an invitation that we cannot rescind. It’s a way into our lives — a door, if you will. And once it is opened, it will never be closed — not by us and certainly not by them. It will only open wider and wider and our freedom will shrink ever smaller. And we will have invited this.

Yes, I want my money, but not at that price. To paraphrase Ben Franklin, we homeschooling parents have freedom from the federal government — if we can keep it.

Go here to read the whole of “Freedom From the Feds.”

To watch all entries go here. (Be advised that when you navigate away from the contest’s YouTube page — as happens when you click on one of the videos — then the other videos that appear after the video ends, and those listed in the Related Videos section, may or may not not have anything to do with the contest.)

Here (PDF) is the press release, with information about the winners.

HT: An Unschooling Life

Religion & Culture
Islamic Homeschool Diary: Something I Found [video: A Land Called Paradise]

Books, Literature, Poetry, Plays
Farm School: Poetry Friday
Semicolon: Saturday Review of Books (26 Jan 08)
Cajun Cottage Under the Oaks: This Week’s Book Walk (31 Jan 08) , Shakespeare 101, and Begin Your Shakespeare Portfolio

Mathematics
Here in the Bonny Glen: You Are Going to Love Me for This One [Timez Attack Times Table Game]

February Resources
Doc’s Sunrise Rants: February 2008 Teaching Resources

Read it online, download it in PDF, or purchase it in paperback.

Executive summary here (8-page PDF).

The National Academies Press offers more than 3,700 free online books in a wide range of science topics.

HT: Living the Scientific Life

webcast.berkeley/courses
UC Berkeley current and archived courses back to Fall 2001

webcast.berkeley/events
Prominent speakers and on-campus events

HT: Why Homeschool

Excerpts (emphasis added):

It is inevitable that we will not all go about homeschooling the same way, and that we won’t have the same ideas about how to protect our right to homeschool. I think that’s a positive thing. We need diversity, and we need a wealth of ideas and strategies….

But you know, it’s not easy to sit by when someone else takes an approach you think is particularly unproductive, or maybe one you even think is counterproductive. It happens. We’ve all been there. I’ve come to the conclusion that it won’t ruin us unless we get stuck there and stop doing what it is that we know we’re good at. Not every strategy will turn out to be effective. Not every one will win friends. But intention is worth a lot, and I’m trying my best to accept the good intentions (for homeschooling, not necessarily for me) for what they are, to honor them, and move on….

There IS change. There will continue to be change. It doesn’t depend on people thinking like we do, or agreeing to work together, or joining a particular organization. Just do what you do best. Do it with your heart and soul and mind engaged. Try to be generous and patient enough to let others do it their way, even when it grates on you. Remember that this homeschooling life IS the art of the everyday, after all.