Good morning, and happy Friday! Today is going to be hot, but the temps drop tomorrow and it's supposed to rain, so I'm looking forward to the cooler weather and having the house opened up again. It's also the last weekend of the summer for us, so I'll be trying to get everything taken care of so we can start SCHOOL ON MONDAY!!! \o/
I'm going to miss the long, lazy days of reading; I get so much reading done in the summer, and then, with the craziness and hecticness of school days (homeschool or not!), I tend to read somewhat less during the school year. Much less now that we're homeschooling - or, I should say, much less of my own books. We've got a huge lovely stack of history, science, geography, and language arts books out from the library right now, all of which I'm looking forward to reading with my daughter, with plenty more interesting books to come. I'm really looking forward to our units on various Native tribes and the Vikings.
Here's what I found interesting online this week!
How Ramona Quimby Taught a Generation of Girls to Embrace Brashness
Who doesn't love the Ramona books? I read them all to my daughter the year before she started school, and I'm hoping I can get her to reread them soon, because I'm sure she'd love them all over again (hmm, maybe I'll 'assign' one this year and go from there...). My daughter was a tiny Ramona when she was little, chaos following her everywhere. Her chaos is more self-inflicted these days (like covering herself on mud on purpose the other day!), but I still see the Ramona in her. Ramona made us all feel okay to be spirited, made us understand that getting frustrated and feeling left out and speaking out were all important parts of growing up. Beverly Cleary knew what kinds of books kids needed, ones with real kids who got in trouble, who didn't always make the right choices, who acted just like they did, and Ramona Quimby provided multiple generations with exactly that.
In a rare move, school librarian fights back in court against conservative activists
GOOD FOR HER. I am 1000% against book bans. There are books I've discouraged my daughter from reading yet, as she's not ready for the text, the message, the heavy emotions, or certain things in the book, and that's exactly what parents are supposed to do - FOR THEIR OWN CHILDREN (my son was very much able to handle some of the stuff my daughter cannot. Those cool I Survived books? The Choose Your Own Adventure books based on history? Too scary for my daughter at this age, but my son was absolutely obsessed when he was eight). Going around and trying to make it so that no one else can read those books? Not cool. Going around and harassing and threatening librarians? That makes you a terrible person. I'm glad to see one of these librarians standing up for herself and her staff, because they deserve to be safe and live free from harassment.
Speaking of book bans...
Book Ban Backfire: Texas School District Forced to Pull the Bible
Oh, Texas.
I went to a public high school, and we discussed the Bible as literature in my AP English class when we covered The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. It absolutely has its place in public education (not as a religious text promoting certain beliefs or acts - that's a task for the various religious institutions that use it - but as a document with literary, historic, and cultural significance), but it looks like Texas didn't consider the full consequences of its actions (much like my daughter the other day when I asked her, "How are you going to get your clothes off without getting mud all over them?" She responded, "...I actually hadn't thought that far ahead." Oops!). And there are definitely things in the Bible that make it, uh, questionable purely in terms of content when it comes to appropriateness for kids. Song of Songs, anyone? That section of Ezekiel? The story of Noah and his daughters? Eep.
I'm not saying Texas was correct; I'm saying book banning is stupid and leads to things like the Bible getting pulled off school library shelves, when kids may need it to dig into, say, the many references to Rose of Sharon when they're reading The Grapes of Wrath.
'Never seen it this bad': America faces catastrophic teacher shortage
This is definitely going to be an interesting school year. (I have said this every year since 2020, and I would like to stop, kthnx.)
So many schools are relying on long-term subs, cutting classes (I've read articles talking about schools lacking things like physics teachers, which some colleges require. How are those kids supposed to be competitive when the education they need isn't even available to them?), herding large groups of kids into auditoriums for 'study hall' that lasts half the day, simply because teachers have gotten fed up with the constant negative rhetoric and harassment aimed at them. I don't blame them at all for abandoning ship, but unfortunately, that's exactly what these groups want, and it makes me so sad. BTW, there are already schools around the world having to shut down because of rampant COVID amongst the staff and students, so really, this school year is starting out great for everyone...
Experts warn of high levels of chemicals in clothes by some fast-fashion retailers
(First off, I object to the use of 'chemicals' here. Everything is made of chemicals. The editor should've required the writer to be specific. Lead, PFAS - those forever chemicals that are making rainwater unsafe to drink - and pthalates are what we're concerned about here.)
I'm no fan of fast fashion. It's bad for the environment, terrible for the workers, and the quality of the clothing is absolute garbage, and this is just one more reason to stay away from the stuff.
Lawmaker Tearily Explains Teen Almost Lost Uterus Because of Abortion Law He Voted For
Truly not sure what this guy expected. Every pregnancy can turn deadly in a heartbeat; that's just the nature of the beast. I wish it weren't the case; it would've made my pregnancy with my son so much less stressful and the fallout less painful, but that's not the case. Everyone was screaming that cases like these were absolutely going to happen, but lawmakers like this dude refused to listen, and now people are suffering. Like the woman in Louisiana currently being forced to carry a baby with a fatal skull condition. The baby, if it survives the birth, will die soon afterwards; the condition it has ensures that. My heart breaks for the woman who wanted this baby and who is now forced into a horrible situation of being forced to endure this doomed pregnancy and being subjected to risking her own life for this.
And finally...
I had NO idea about any of this. To my generation, Paris Hilton is known for the being the ditzy chick from The Simple Life, the reality show of the early 2000's that she starred in with Nicole Richie, and her use of the phrase, "That's hot." She was kind of a joke back then, and I had no idea she had been forced into one of these 'troubled teen' institutions and physically and sexually abused for years before her appearance on that show. I've read into those places before, which were all the rage when I was young and constantly splashed all over various talk shows, touted as the solution to all your teen's poor behaviors. Help at Any Cost by Maia Szalavitz is an excellent and very important exposé of this terrible industry, and Jesus Land by Julia Scheeres talks of the author's own experiences at one of these places. I highly recommend both of them.
I'm so proud of Paris Hilton for using her trauma to help others. These camps are horrible places, most are unregulated, and the kids come out of them with more problems and trauma than they went in with. They shouldn't be allowed to exist, and I'm glad she's speaking out against them. I'm so sorry she had to go through everything that she did, and I wish her healing and success in her campaign.
And that's it for this week! I'm going to head into the kitchen and take care of the dishes, then get some things cleaned up before we need to head out to my daughter's counselor. We may stop by Aldi on the way home to check if their shipment of mandarin oranges came in yet (they hadn't made it when we went on Wednesday), but that's really all we've got going on today. Leftovers and a salad for dinner, which makes me happy. : )
Wishing you all a restful, peaceful weekend. Shalom, friends. : )
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