Since the death of Christ much of Europe has been Christian, especially after 300 to 500 AD. There were several instances in the Middle Ages where Islam tried to conquor Europe, but was fought back. It looks like now Europe is just giving up:
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Technorati tags: Muslim, Islam, Europe
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Technology - All your movies on a single DVD!
This is fascinating - All your movies on a single DVD:
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Scientists unveiled new DVD technology on Wednesday that stores data in five dimensions, making it possible to pack more than 2,000 movies onto a single disc.
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This is just an amazing breakthrough. At one of my first jobs out of college we had workstations with ten megabytes disks! These disks will hold terrabytes, a million times more storage.
The down side is they don't expect to be shipping these new disk for maybe as much as twenty years.
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Technorati tags: Technology, storage
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Scientists unveiled new DVD technology on Wednesday that stores data in five dimensions, making it possible to pack more than 2,000 movies onto a single disc.
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This is just an amazing breakthrough. At one of my first jobs out of college we had workstations with ten megabytes disks! These disks will hold terrabytes, a million times more storage.
The down side is they don't expect to be shipping these new disk for maybe as much as twenty years.
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Technorati tags: Technology, storage
Maybe we'll get another fifteen minutes of fame!
Last year Garvin Thomas of NBC Channel 11 interviewed Janine and I about our response to a court ruling in California which seemed to outlaw homeschooling. (You can still watch the video.)
Then the next day Janine was on the front page of our local paper!
Maybe we are going to get our second fifteen minutes of fame.
Greg Toppo of USA Today just contacted me about a recent report on the status of education in America. The Condition of Education 2009 was recently released. (Note it is a large PDF file of over six meg and 359 pages.) Greg pointed me to pages 15 and 135 which focus on homeschooling.
Greg summarized the report in his article Report: Homeschooling more widespread.
There are a couple fascinating trends in the report:
1) The biggest surprise to me was the demographics of boys to girls. There are almost three girls being homeschooled for every two boys. Any have an idea why?
2) Homeschooling continues to grow. The study found that in 2007 there appeared to be 1,500,000 million children being homeschooled, almost twice what it was in 1999.
3) The percentage of number of parents who are homeschooling for religious reasons has climbed to 36%. It use to be that there were three main reasons, religious, academic and school environment. They all had about the same percentage. Now the other two reasons are 21% and 17%.
I'll try to dig through the report a bit more when I have some time.
Now it is off to a meeting.
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education
Then the next day Janine was on the front page of our local paper!
Maybe we are going to get our second fifteen minutes of fame.
Greg Toppo of USA Today just contacted me about a recent report on the status of education in America. The Condition of Education 2009 was recently released. (Note it is a large PDF file of over six meg and 359 pages.) Greg pointed me to pages 15 and 135 which focus on homeschooling.
Greg summarized the report in his article Report: Homeschooling more widespread.
There are a couple fascinating trends in the report:
1) The biggest surprise to me was the demographics of boys to girls. There are almost three girls being homeschooled for every two boys. Any have an idea why?
2) Homeschooling continues to grow. The study found that in 2007 there appeared to be 1,500,000 million children being homeschooled, almost twice what it was in 1999.
3) The percentage of number of parents who are homeschooling for religious reasons has climbed to 36%. It use to be that there were three main reasons, religious, academic and school environment. They all had about the same percentage. Now the other two reasons are 21% and 17%.
I'll try to dig through the report a bit more when I have some time.
Now it is off to a meeting.
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education
Getting rid of bad teachers
One of the big reasons why public schools are ineffective in educating children is it is so very hard to get rid of bad teachers. The LA Times reports Firing tenured teachers can be a costly and tortuous task:
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The Times reviewed every case on record in the last 15 years in which a tenured employee was fired by a California school district and formally contested the decision before a review commission: 159 in all (not including about two dozen in which the records were destroyed). The newspaper also examined court and school district records and interviewed scores of people, including principals, teachers, union officials, district administrators, parents and students.Among the findings:
* Building a case for dismissal is so time-consuming, costly and draining for principals and administrators that many say they don't make the effort except in the most egregious cases. The vast majority of firings stem from blatant misconduct, including sexual abuse, other immoral or illegal behavior, insubordination or repeated violation of rules such as showing up on time.
* Although districts generally press ahead with only the strongest cases, even these get knocked down more than a third of the time by the specially convened review panels, which have the discretion to restore teachers' jobs even when grounds for dismissal are proved.
* Jettisoning a teacher solely because he or she can't teach is rare. In 80% of the dismissals that were upheld, classroom performance was not even a factor.
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Keeping bad teachers has several consequences:
1) Most bad teachers are not motivated to improve. Why bother, they have the job almost no matter what they do.
2) Average and good teachers are unmotivated. Why should they put themselves out to do a good job? Competence is not rewarded, only tenure is rewarded.
3) And the biggest consequence of all is students in government schools are getting a very poor education.
The next time someone claims parents can't teach because they are not professionals, I consider encouraging them to read about how many teachers are not really professionals either.
(Hat tip: Friends of Dave)
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, government schools, public school, public education, education
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The Times reviewed every case on record in the last 15 years in which a tenured employee was fired by a California school district and formally contested the decision before a review commission: 159 in all (not including about two dozen in which the records were destroyed). The newspaper also examined court and school district records and interviewed scores of people, including principals, teachers, union officials, district administrators, parents and students.Among the findings:
* Building a case for dismissal is so time-consuming, costly and draining for principals and administrators that many say they don't make the effort except in the most egregious cases. The vast majority of firings stem from blatant misconduct, including sexual abuse, other immoral or illegal behavior, insubordination or repeated violation of rules such as showing up on time.
* Although districts generally press ahead with only the strongest cases, even these get knocked down more than a third of the time by the specially convened review panels, which have the discretion to restore teachers' jobs even when grounds for dismissal are proved.
* Jettisoning a teacher solely because he or she can't teach is rare. In 80% of the dismissals that were upheld, classroom performance was not even a factor.
----------
Keeping bad teachers has several consequences:
1) Most bad teachers are not motivated to improve. Why bother, they have the job almost no matter what they do.
2) Average and good teachers are unmotivated. Why should they put themselves out to do a good job? Competence is not rewarded, only tenure is rewarded.
3) And the biggest consequence of all is students in government schools are getting a very poor education.
The next time someone claims parents can't teach because they are not professionals, I consider encouraging them to read about how many teachers are not really professionals either.
(Hat tip: Friends of Dave)
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, government schools, public school, public education, education
Teaching lessons about money
I like the account of the account of the Tightwad Mom teaching her children lessons about money.
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Technorati tags: money
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Technorati tags: money
Anyone read "Problem Solving 101?"
This review of Problem Solving 101 makes the books sound worthwhile. Has anyone read it?
Here's the first couple paragraphs of the review:
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This slim book by Ken Watanabe, (111 pages, made even slimmer for reading by the use of numerous "useful diagrams and quirky drawings"), is subtitled A Simple Book for Smart People, all of which may give you cause to read it. The author says on the first page that "One of my missions in writing this book was to show everyone a simple way to deal with the problems they face in their everyday lives." More specifically, he says "This is a book about kids solving problems."
But problem solving "isn't just an ability; it's a whole mind set...Rather than accepting the status quo, true problem solvers are constantly trying to proactively shape their environment." While he maintains most, or at least more, people can do this, children as well as adults, that doesn't mean they (you?) will.
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Technorati tags: Problem, Solving
Here's the first couple paragraphs of the review:
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This slim book by Ken Watanabe, (111 pages, made even slimmer for reading by the use of numerous "useful diagrams and quirky drawings"), is subtitled A Simple Book for Smart People, all of which may give you cause to read it. The author says on the first page that "One of my missions in writing this book was to show everyone a simple way to deal with the problems they face in their everyday lives." More specifically, he says "This is a book about kids solving problems."
But problem solving "isn't just an ability; it's a whole mind set...Rather than accepting the status quo, true problem solvers are constantly trying to proactively shape their environment." While he maintains most, or at least more, people can do this, children as well as adults, that doesn't mean they (you?) will.
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Technorati tags: Problem, Solving
Reminder - send in a post for the next Carnival of Homeschooling
Tami Fox will be hosting the Carnival of Homeschooling next week at Tami's Thoughts and Views.
As always, entries to the Carnival of Homeschooling are due Monday evening at 6:00 PM Pacific Standard Time.
Here are the instructions for sending in a submission.
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education, Carnival of Homeschooling
As always, entries to the Carnival of Homeschooling are due Monday evening at 6:00 PM Pacific Standard Time.
Here are the instructions for sending in a submission.
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education, Carnival of Homeschooling
Politics - How Washinton Rations
How Washington Rations is a good article about the complexities politics will run into as politicians try to craft rules for all situations:
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This is precisely the sort of complexity that the Democrats would prefer to ignore as they try to restructure health care. Led by budget chief Peter Orszag, the White House believes that comparative effectiveness research, which examines clinical evidence to determine what "works best," will let them cut wasteful or ineffective treatments and thus contain health spending.
The problem is that what "works best" isn't the same for everyone. While not painless or risk free, virtual colonoscopy might be better for some patients -- especially among seniors who are infirm or because the presence of other diseases puts them at risk for complications. Ideally doctors would decide with their patients. But Medicare instead made the hard-and-fast choice that it was cheaper to cut it off for all beneficiaries. If some patients are worse off, well, too bad.
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Choices in life tend to go across a spectrum. What is best for young people may not be best for older people. Unfortunately politics often degenerates options to a single choice. Officials will decide one course of action for everyone, which may too often is not good for everyone.
By deciding on one course of action, it will be harder for new technologies to cross the chasm and become the better choice, down the road.
(Hat tip: Dr. Helen)
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Technorati tags: politics, choice
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This is precisely the sort of complexity that the Democrats would prefer to ignore as they try to restructure health care. Led by budget chief Peter Orszag, the White House believes that comparative effectiveness research, which examines clinical evidence to determine what "works best," will let them cut wasteful or ineffective treatments and thus contain health spending.
The problem is that what "works best" isn't the same for everyone. While not painless or risk free, virtual colonoscopy might be better for some patients -- especially among seniors who are infirm or because the presence of other diseases puts them at risk for complications. Ideally doctors would decide with their patients. But Medicare instead made the hard-and-fast choice that it was cheaper to cut it off for all beneficiaries. If some patients are worse off, well, too bad.
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Choices in life tend to go across a spectrum. What is best for young people may not be best for older people. Unfortunately politics often degenerates options to a single choice. Officials will decide one course of action for everyone, which may too often is not good for everyone.
By deciding on one course of action, it will be harder for new technologies to cross the chasm and become the better choice, down the road.
(Hat tip: Dr. Helen)
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Technorati tags: politics, choice
Great medical breakthrough - how to increase your blood pressure
I wonder how often we do this?
"One way to get high blood pressure is to go mountain climbing over molehills."
-Earl Wilson (1907-1987)
(From Dan Galvin's Thought For The Day mailing list)
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Technorati tags: blood, pressure, Dan Galvin, Earl Wilson
"One way to get high blood pressure is to go mountain climbing over molehills."
-Earl Wilson (1907-1987)
(From Dan Galvin's Thought For The Day mailing list)
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Technorati tags: blood, pressure, Dan Galvin, Earl Wilson
Man vs. Machine on Jeopardy!
My father has played chess for decades. Now that he is retired he teaches chess classes.
He taught me the basic moves when I was two. I would move the pieces around for a couple moves, and then reach over and take his king!
I've been fascinated by how people have been able to program computers to beat chess masters.
It sounds like it may be harder for computers to win at Jeopardy - How IBM Plans to Win Jeopardy!
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For decades, humans have struggled to create machines that can extract meaning from human language, with all its messiness, subtle context, humor, and irony. Traditional approaches require a great deal of manual work up front to render material understandable to computer algorithms. The ultimate goal is to make this step unnecessary.
IBM hopes to advance toward this objective with Watson, a computer system that will play Jeopardy!, the popular TV trivia game show, against human contestants. Demonstrations of the system are expected this year, with a final televised matchup--complete with hosting by the show's Alex Trebek--sometime next year. Questions will be spoken aloud by Trebek but fed into the machine in text format during the show.
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I wonder if they will bring back Ken Jennings?
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Technorati tags: computers, Jeopardy
He taught me the basic moves when I was two. I would move the pieces around for a couple moves, and then reach over and take his king!
I've been fascinated by how people have been able to program computers to beat chess masters.
It sounds like it may be harder for computers to win at Jeopardy - How IBM Plans to Win Jeopardy!
----------
For decades, humans have struggled to create machines that can extract meaning from human language, with all its messiness, subtle context, humor, and irony. Traditional approaches require a great deal of manual work up front to render material understandable to computer algorithms. The ultimate goal is to make this step unnecessary.
IBM hopes to advance toward this objective with Watson, a computer system that will play Jeopardy!, the popular TV trivia game show, against human contestants. Demonstrations of the system are expected this year, with a final televised matchup--complete with hosting by the show's Alex Trebek--sometime next year. Questions will be spoken aloud by Trebek but fed into the machine in text format during the show.
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I wonder if they will bring back Ken Jennings?
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Technorati tags: computers, Jeopardy
From the archives - industry vs. genius
Our society seems to value genius more than work and so many parents don't teach their children a work ethic. We're trying. Our daughters will work hard at times. I think they are learning the lesson.
"In the ordinary business of life, industry can do anything which genius can do, and very many things which it cannot."
-Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887)
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Technorati tags: industry, genius
"In the ordinary business of life, industry can do anything which genius can do, and very many things which it cannot."
-Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887)
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Technorati tags: industry, genius
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Have you checked out HomeSchoolBuzz lately?
I was reading through some homeschool blogs for lunch today, when I realized I hadn't promoted HomeSchoolBuzz recently. Gary does a great job of staying on top of news on and about homeschoolers.
Also you might check out his Homeschool Blog Buzz. He provides snippets from homeschooling blog so you can get an idea if you are interested in a particular post.
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education
Also you might check out his Homeschool Blog Buzz. He provides snippets from homeschooling blog so you can get an idea if you are interested in a particular post.
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education
Hey Janine, check out Bananagrams
My wife enjoys Scrabble. I think she might enjoy Silvia's New Favorite Game.
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Technorati tags: Bananagrams, Scrabble
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Technorati tags: Bananagrams, Scrabble
Arizona education compare to other nations
Matthew Ladner has good graphs comparing Arizona education with other nations in Putting Arizona on Par with the Third World.
Arizona spends $9,707 a year per student. This is five to nine times more than third world nations, and 50% more than the European Union.
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Technorati tags: government schools, public school, public education, education
Arizona spends $9,707 a year per student. This is five to nine times more than third world nations, and 50% more than the European Union.
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Technorati tags: government schools, public school, public education, education
Looking at creating a startup company?
An article about What VCs Are Investing In has two interesting couple paragraphs:
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Enthusiasm for Web startups has, however, clearly changed since the height of the Web 2.0 boom. This is due partly to tighter economic constraints, but also to plummeting costs of starting Web businesses as cloud-computing infrastructure has spread. Since less capital is required to start a company, there is less need to turn to outside investors.
"I think most [Web] startup companies should not take venture-capital money," said Jeff Fagnan, a partner at Atlas Venture, during a panel discussion. He cited, in particular, companies building lightweight Web applications or software for portable devices like the iPhone. In some cases, Fagnan said, venture capital may damage a startup by creating conditions that push the company to aim too high from the outset.
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I wonder if Venture Capitalists will have less impact as more people realize that Paul Graham is right, Moore's Law means startups are much cheaper.
If you, or your children, are looking at creating a technology company, now may be a good time.
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Technorati tags: opportunity, Paul Graham
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Enthusiasm for Web startups has, however, clearly changed since the height of the Web 2.0 boom. This is due partly to tighter economic constraints, but also to plummeting costs of starting Web businesses as cloud-computing infrastructure has spread. Since less capital is required to start a company, there is less need to turn to outside investors.
"I think most [Web] startup companies should not take venture-capital money," said Jeff Fagnan, a partner at Atlas Venture, during a panel discussion. He cited, in particular, companies building lightweight Web applications or software for portable devices like the iPhone. In some cases, Fagnan said, venture capital may damage a startup by creating conditions that push the company to aim too high from the outset.
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I wonder if Venture Capitalists will have less impact as more people realize that Paul Graham is right, Moore's Law means startups are much cheaper.
If you, or your children, are looking at creating a technology company, now may be a good time.
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Technorati tags: opportunity, Paul Graham
From the archives - Age and wisdom
"The older I grow, the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom."
-H.L. Mencken
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Technorati tags: Age, wisdom
-H.L. Mencken
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Technorati tags: Age, wisdom
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Another response to increasingly high taxes
I eat my lunch at my desk and browser the internet. Today I was surprised to find a second response today by people who are frustrated that taxes and debt have climbed so high in the last couple months.
Dr. Helen reports that some Older workers 'going Galt' by retiring early.
People coming up on their retirement years are now often deciding to skip the last few years of work and retire. Instead of putting money into the government, they are taking money out.
This is known as an unintended consequence to raising taxes.
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Technorati tags: high, taxes
Dr. Helen reports that some Older workers 'going Galt' by retiring early.
People coming up on their retirement years are now often deciding to skip the last few years of work and retire. Instead of putting money into the government, they are taking money out.
This is known as an unintended consequence to raising taxes.
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Technorati tags: high, taxes
Millionaries Go Missing - this is what happens when you raise taxes too high
This would be a good lesson for all states to learn in Millionaries Go Missing:
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Maryland couldn't balance its budget last year, so the state tried to close the shortfall by fleecing the wealthy. Politicians in Annapolis created a millionaire tax bracket, raising the top marginal income-tax rate to 6.25%. And because cities such as Baltimore and Bethesda also impose income taxes, the state-local tax rate can go as high as 9.45%. Governor Martin O'Malley, a dedicated class warrior, declared that these richest 0.3% of filers were "willing and able to pay their fair share." The Baltimore Sun predicted the rich would "grin and bear it."
One year later, nobody's grinning. One-third of the millionaires have disappeared from Maryland tax rolls. In 2008 roughly 3,000 million-dollar income tax returns were filed by the end of April. This year there were 2,000, which the state comptroller's office concedes is a "substantial decline." On those missing returns, the government collects 6.25% of nothing. Instead of the state coffers gaining the extra $106 million the politicians predicted, millionaires paid $100 million less in taxes than they did last year -- even at higher rates.
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As we become more and more mobile, I think we'll see more and more of this. When one state raises their taxes to a much higher level than other states, people will move.
At some point I predict that could happen at a national level. If Congress continues to raise taxes, then people will move to a cheaper country.
(Hat tip: Digg)
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Technorati tags: Millionaries, taxes
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Maryland couldn't balance its budget last year, so the state tried to close the shortfall by fleecing the wealthy. Politicians in Annapolis created a millionaire tax bracket, raising the top marginal income-tax rate to 6.25%. And because cities such as Baltimore and Bethesda also impose income taxes, the state-local tax rate can go as high as 9.45%. Governor Martin O'Malley, a dedicated class warrior, declared that these richest 0.3% of filers were "willing and able to pay their fair share." The Baltimore Sun predicted the rich would "grin and bear it."
One year later, nobody's grinning. One-third of the millionaires have disappeared from Maryland tax rolls. In 2008 roughly 3,000 million-dollar income tax returns were filed by the end of April. This year there were 2,000, which the state comptroller's office concedes is a "substantial decline." On those missing returns, the government collects 6.25% of nothing. Instead of the state coffers gaining the extra $106 million the politicians predicted, millionaires paid $100 million less in taxes than they did last year -- even at higher rates.
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As we become more and more mobile, I think we'll see more and more of this. When one state raises their taxes to a much higher level than other states, people will move.
At some point I predict that could happen at a national level. If Congress continues to raise taxes, then people will move to a cheaper country.
(Hat tip: Digg)
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Technorati tags: Millionaries, taxes
Humor: Board caught plagiarizing a report on copyright reform
From Slashdot, funny:
"There is a storm brewing in Canada as the prestigious Conference Board of Canada has been caught plagiarizing US copyright lobby group documents in a report on copyright reform."
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Technorati tags: copyright, reform
"There is a storm brewing in Canada as the prestigious Conference Board of Canada has been caught plagiarizing US copyright lobby group documents in a report on copyright reform."
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Technorati tags: copyright, reform
More on Preschool being a bad, bad idea
Last week Janine wrote about a disturbing trend in Only 19 minutes of free play in Kindergarten.
Chester E. Finn Jr. has a great column on why we should Slow the Preschool Bandwagon which reinforces Janine's point that early academics is not good for children. If their brains are not ready, pushing academics does more damage than good.
(Hat tip: Friends of Dave)
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education
Chester E. Finn Jr. has a great column on why we should Slow the Preschool Bandwagon which reinforces Janine's point that early academics is not good for children. If their brains are not ready, pushing academics does more damage than good.
(Hat tip: Friends of Dave)
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education
The Carnival of Homeschooling is up
The Headmistress is hosting this week's Carnival of Homeschooling at The Common Room.
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education, Carnival of Homeschooling
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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, education, Carnival of Homeschooling
From the archives - Smart vs. Wise
I'm trying to be smart and wise:
The difference between a smart person and a wise one is that a smart person knows what to say, but a wise persons knows whether or not to say it.
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Technorati tags: smart, wise
The difference between a smart person and a wise one is that a smart person knows what to say, but a wise persons knows whether or not to say it.
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Technorati tags: smart, wise
Monday, May 25, 2009
How much in control are we really?
Dan Ariely makes me wonder Are we in control of our decisions?
(Hat tip: TED)
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Technorati tags: behavioral, economics, Dan Ariely
(Hat tip: TED)
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Technorati tags: behavioral, economics, Dan Ariely
One of our reasons for educating our children
Insightful and funny - Teenage Affluenza
I don't think our daughters have a bad case of this:
I think it is good to keep a constant eye out for this disease.
(Hat tip: knot in the string)
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Technorati tags: Teenage, Affluenza
I think it is good to keep a constant eye out for this disease.
(Hat tip: knot in the string)
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Technorati tags: Teenage, Affluenza
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