For LibraryThing

This is my first blog post in ages. What . . . over ten years?

I rediscovered the excellent resource, LibraryThing, just recently, while going through super-old files in my hard drive.

Quarantine makes it possible to clean up a lot of life's loose ends!

It has been so long since I have done an update on my LibraryThing account, that I had forgotten my login info. Apparently, I had an email address, of @gordondarr.com. I don't remember this at all. 

My current email address did not work for login. Neither did the last two or three that I could remember.

I still have my AOL. I presently have about three google email addresses. There's one for Dexter Schools. My HEC email address. I'm the manage of the HVFCentral@aol.com account. I continue to monitor my Dad's (RIP) email accounts.

I had an aiserv email once, as well as earthlink. I have a Washtenaw Community College email address, and one for the University of Michigan. I probably have others that have been assigned to me, forever, from college applications.

The next big enhancement in world connectivity, will be a bot that goes out and gathers up all of a person's online activity - anything with a login. It will locate everything still active, as well as stuff that has gone into suspension for lack of use.

That happened to me with PayPal. I owed them something like $12, from a balance of over fifteen years. It was attached to my Earthlink email, to a bank account I no longer have. I was unable to do some things on PayPal and I couldn't figure out why. I did all that I could to aggregate all my PayPal accounts, and separate them from my business usage. But still, I could not login, even thought their own automated system affirmed that I had everything right.

I had to talk to an actual person, who dug deep and discovered that my account frozen, due to an unpaid balance from 2003. I'm glad they were not adding interest!

So now . . . to get back into LibraryThing, I was asked to create a blog post here . . . the one thing they had left, that could confirm my identity. So here it is!

One happy result is the reactivation of this blog . . . and a very entertaining piece of prose for my LibraryThing help of the day!

Here's to Good Reading!

Last Post

This will be my last posting on this blog, until further notice.

I want to focus more of my efforts on setting up the Hudson Education Center (HEC).

The vision for HEC is to:

* Provide free tutoring and classroom instruction to children
* Empower parents as full education partners
* Have an arts focus
* Recruit the best teachers anywhere, and pay them like true professionals
* Use free market instruments to raise our funds
* Protect the intellectual integrity of all of our stakeholders
* Teach children how to think, not what to think
* Build our communities
* Attain K-8 accreditation

I will continue to blog on the Ning site that is under development, dedicated to HEC.

Thanks for reading, thinking, and commenting . . .

Free Thought - Free Schools - Free Markets

Subject Concordance - A Help for Truth Seekers, by George J. French

This pamphlet, from Advent Christian Publications, is a handy guide that addresses only the distinctive doctrines held by all Advent Christians. It deals with man's nature, the definitions of death, soul, heaven, immortality, resurrection, eternal punishment, and the big one: docrtines of the return of Christ at the end of the age.

The Advent Christian Church was the first to join the National Association of Evangelicals when it was formed some fifty or so years ago. Today it enjoys fellowship with most mainstream evangelical denominations.

There are no narratives in this booklet. It is only 18 pages long and is a quick read.

But, you would not want to read this through, as a novel. You would use it for personal Bible study, or as a resource for lesson or sermon planning.

For my friends that are not Advent Christians, it would be an interesting thing to study.

The problem with those that disagree with our AC conclusions, is that they could not come up with a similar booklet, with anywhere near the volume of Scriptural references in this pamphlet, to support their view. The orthodox views of immortality soulism, heaven and hell, and judgment tend to lean on a certain quality of text, one or two here and there, that bolster their views. But if the Bible student wishes to have a lengthy list of Scriptures to support this or that doctrine, it would be hard to top this collection.

I recommend this book to all Christians, and even to non-Christians that might be surprised to find that there are some among us, with such odd beliefs as these! And such a discovery may even, God willing, lead a person to Christ!

Teaching Problems and the Problems of Teaching

This book, by Magdalene Lampert, is one of my textbooks from my teaching certification program at the University of Michigan (MA, Educational Studies, 2006).

I had always wanted to go back and re-read it, more carefully, not subject to the pressures of a course syllabus. The book is primarily a set of reflections on teaching math to a classroom of 5th graders. It covers the year, from September to June.

Lampert uses transcripts of actual recordings made while she taught, to drive the content of the book. She covers such things as how to establish a classroom culture, preparing for lessons, working with students independently, leading whole-class discussions, teaching to cover the curriculum, etc.

There is simply no way to read a book like this casually. There is too much in it, that needs to be filed away for easy retrieval. The best use of this type of teaching instructional book is to refer to it constantly in your own group of upper-elementary kids.

This type of teaching resource, however, is not my favorite. The format, where the teachers narrates his or her own moves and behaviors in a live classroom, always struck me as rather self-absorbed. Ms. Lampert is indeed an excellent teacher, that can share much to new teachers. But the "I, me, mine" emphasis throughout becomes a distraction rather than a help.

But she will focus on one specific problem, and address her handling of it, in several chapters, covering various teaching situations and concepts.

She builds her approach on a triangular model, where the teacher, the students, and the content are at the end-points, and the area in the center is the teacher's "practice", that area where the teacher must manage infinite different scenarios of personality, curriculum, social situations, learning needs, etc.

As I read through the book, I found myself formulating my own model, a four-square grid like Covey's Priority quadrants - where the quadrants are based on: Student can/can't do the work; and student does/doesn't "get it". Your goal will be to move the kids up to the quadrant where they both can do the work, and "get it." (I was a math student that could do the work, but never got it until I was an undergrad in calculus).

I felt that Lampert quite overdoes the interactions with a student named "Saundra", where she makes a sort-of project out of not letting the class leave for recess until Saundra sees where she made a mistake in a fractions word problem, and will admit it publicly while saving face. There are a lot of layers of concern here, for the teacher, and Lampert handles it well. But I found myself thinking "Let the kids go to recess - Saundra will get it eventually - let it go!"

In the modern push for educational reform, we have ample research-based models to guide the teacher. We know more about human behavior and development than ever before. But somewhere lost in the mix is the idea of just letting kids be kids, letting them relax and find their own pace for learning.

I will refer back to this book again and again, throughout my teacher career. But I will keep in mind that there are no super-human teachers, and that even exceptional teachers like Magdalene Lampert have much to learn.

Amazing Discoveries within The Book of Books

This book, by Ralph Woodrow, has been in the Huron Valley Fellowship Library for some twenty years or more. I was the one that first ordered it. I had read some really good stuff by Mr. Woodrow, and was excited about adding this book to the collection, and getting around to reading it someday.

My Dad read it shortly after we ordered it. And at the time he said that it was "okay - not that great."

So here, finally, years later, I was able to read through this rather short (143 pages) and quite readable volume.

Dad was right. There are two big problems with this book:

1) There are few actual "discoveries" from the Bible ("The Prayer of Jabez," for instance - now that was a discovery!)

2) What few unique items there are in this book, are really not that amazing.

So I am going to suggest that the casual reader, or Bible student, not read this book. There is not much there. And it is too full of goofy little jokes, peppered throughout, that are neither biblical nor amazing, and is escapes me why Brother Woodrow felt he had to include this stuff. Example:

"It wasn't the apple on the tree that caused trouble; it was the pair (pear) on the ground." Little tidbits like this are scattered throughout, and they are a distraction.

However, I must say that there are some high points - which are momentous enough to merit discussion. The section on Jonah, pages 37 thru 40, is outstanding, and I daresay Woodrow's insights here are not likely to be found anywhere else. And yes, his explanation as to why Jonah was sent to Ninevah does border on the amazing.

And there is at least one half-way decent joke; one you are not likely to have read dozens of times already on one of those replaceable letter signs in front of churches. Take this one, on page 104: "How many wives does the Bible allow for each man? Answer: Sixteen (four better, four worse, four richer, four poorer)".

And Woodrow makes the valid observation, on page 106, that the expression "immortal soul" appears only once in the Bible and is applied to God. And he notes that the title "reverend" is applied never to a preacher, but to God himself.

He points out many other popular phrases or concepts that never appear in Scripture, like on pages 109 and 100, where he mentions the words "Trinity," "God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost," and "rapture."

These points, at least, may lead to some vigorous and loving debate among people that love the Lord, and His Word.

The book picks up some steam, and ends on a strong note. The final section, devoted to all the uses of the word "River" in the Bible (there is a River in the Garden, and a River in the New Jerusalem - and rivers figure prominently throughout Scripture) is perhaps the best of the entire book.

If all of this has your attention, then maybe you will want to reference the better sections in my comments - without having to read the entire book. If so, call me, and let's talk!

The American Presidency in Political Cartoons, 1776-1976

This book, by Thomas C. Blaisdell, Jr., and Peter Selz, was fascinating to me, when I first came across it at the Little Professor bookstore in Maple Village Plaza in 1976. It was just one of dozens, or hundreds of books coming out that year, having a connection to the American Bicentennial.

I was a sixteen years old browsing books, took one look at it, and bought it.

This book, however, is a drudgery to read. It is thirty-two years later, and I finally read through the entire thing for the first time. The problem is that, until about 1940, most of the "cartoons" (a mis-used word. A "Cartoon" is the name for the first moving pictures of animated characters. "Carte", or "story", or "drawing", plus "toon", or "tune": a story set to music. Drawings that actually move, a la the earliest Disney cartoons that had no dialogue, just music in the background), are extremely difficult to follow. One single drawing might have dozens of lines of dialogue, written very small.

And next, the book is written more as a college textbook, and as such is a dry read. The text accompanying the drawings has more to do with style of the illustrations, than on discussing the history addressed in the drawings.

But by the Twentieth Century, the drawings take on more of an artistic tone. More of the message is contained in the artwork itself, than in the dialogue.

The book is of interest only to people that want to become political editorialists, or on the most serious Presidential history nut. I would not recommend it to anybody else to read.

And, the liberal bent of the authors is so pronounced, as to distract from enjoying the book on its own merits.

Woodrow Wilson and the Progressive Era

I enjoyed reading this excellent work by Arthur S. Link. It covers the Progressive Movement in America, starting with Theodore Roosevelt's second term, all the way through the very beginning of Woodrow Wilson's second. But most of the book deals with President Wilson's first term, where there was a flourishing of the Progressive agenda: Income Tax, Labor reform, anti-trust legislation, direct election of Senators, and the establishment of a foreign policy based on morality and human rights.

Link does not go overboard in hero worship of Wilson, which I'll admit is something that I had readied myself for. He addresses Wilson's imperfections, his ego and self-righteousness. The same qualities that enabled him to steer one of the most ambitious reform administrations in U.S. history, also contributed to his eventual fall from grace and effectiveness in his second term.

The "6th year" jinx plagued every American President in the 20th Century. Truman had his troubles in Korea and labor problems. Eisenhower lost Congress in the midst of Soviet expansion. LBJ had the escalating war in Vietnam and unrest in the streets. Nixon had Watergate. For Reagan, it was Contragate; Clinton, Monica Lewinsky; and Bush II, the Iraq pre-surge stalemate and economic woes.

Even FDR had his troubles, which, while he was able to win re-election not once, but three times, still his popularity and effectiveness waned throughout his administration. Had there not been the rise of the Nazi menace in Europe, he may very well have been forced into retirement in 1940.

President Wilson had his obsessive push for ratification of the League of Nations Charter. He pinned his legacy on it, and it ruined him. This book deals with the good times of his administration.

But ninety-two years hence, President Wilson's legacy is secure. He ranks up there with the "Near Great" to "Great Presidents," due to his skillful marshaling of the Progressive agenda, and effective management of our victorious war effort. Indeed, he has always been one of my favorite Presidents.

My primary "take-away" from this book, is a clearer understanding of the immense significance of Wilson's term. Prior to 1912, the Progressive (liberal) movement could have gone either way. It was up to Theodore Roosevelt, or Wilson, to carry the banner of Progressivism into the White House. Roosevelt, by failing to win the Republican nomination, bolted the party and ensured both his and incumbent President Taft's election by running under the standard of the newly-formed Progressive Party.

Had Roosevelt been elected in 1912, or even in 1916 or 1920, his Progressive Party may have eclipsed the Republican Party, leaving the conservative element to settle in the Democratic Party under the leadership of its Southern wing. The Progressive movement would have been permanently married to the strong, militaristic, and even imperialistic vision of Roosevelt. His social morality and early advocacy of equal rights for minorities would have found a home in his brand of progressivism. And the modern environmentalist movement would likewise have been elevated to a major tenet for the Progressives.

But Wilson carried the day, and secured for the Progressives, a home in the Democratic Party. Thus began the Democrats' historic and permanent linkage as the party of economic equality and electoral reform. Civil Rights and the Environment would wait until another day. The hawkish tendencies, and linkage to the rights of business, of the Republicans, were also cemented during the Wilson years.

The Democratic Party that followed: that of FDR, of Truman and JFK, of LBJ and Jimmy Carter; indeed, of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama - would not have been, had Woodrow Wilson not been so successful in laying the foundation a little less than one hundred years ago.

I hope that President Obama studies the lessons of Woodrow Wilson well. Make the most of the first term. Get your agenda through. Steer a middle course (as Wilson did) so that the most important elements of your program may become law. But beware of the pitfalls of the second term!

This book is a must-read for all students of American history.