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Notes from the Smithy...  

October 2008          #65

GREETINGS/CONTENTS

Hello from Southern Oregon!  Autumn has come; school is underway, and God is showing His glory in all the fall colors.

NEWS                                     what’s happening

JUST FOR FUN                      clever Q & A

BOOK INFLUENCE              a look at two studies

RECENT READS                    a few from me

MISCELLANY                       as it says

NEWS

I still have a smattering of slightly damaged copies for sale.  I am selling them at regular prices but with free shipping and handling on any order in which they are included.  You need to email me for availability.

The DVD project continues to progress.  We have put together a background, got the lighting figured out, and filmed some.  This DVD will be about the writing book.  It is a supplement, not a replacement for the book.

Thanks to those of you who have sent notes regarding the books.  The successes of your students is always gratifying to me to hear about.  Recently I received the following from a lady in Texas.  “My next door neighbor is a retired third generation English teacher.  She is very impressed with your books which has given our homeschool some credibility.”  It appears the local expert has weighed in with positive comments.

At the very end of September, my dear wife and I managed a few days away and went north to Portland and Seattle.  We were able to visit a couple of bookstores that carry our products and were thankful to meet and speak with the owners.  We also enjoyed the time away and the opportunity to spend time with some special friends in the Seattle area.  It was a restful time and nice to be able to enjoy the Pacific Northwest scenery for a few days.

JUST FOR FUN

Here’s a few questions with some answers that take some liberty with the English language and its pronunciation.

1. How do you catch a unique rabbit?

             Unique up on it.

2. How do you catch a tame rabbit?

Tame way!

3. How do crazy people go through the forest?

They take the psycho path.

4. What do you call a boomerang that doesn't work?

A stick.

5. What do you call cheese that isn’t yours?

Nacho cheese.

6. What do you call Santa’s helpers?

Subordinate Clauses.

7. What do you get from a pampered cow?

Spoiled milk.

8. What do you get when you cross a snowman with a vampire?

Frostbite.

9. What lies at the bottom of the ocean and twitches?

A nervous wreck.

10. Where do you find a dog with no legs?

Right where you left him.

11. Why don’t blind people like to sky dive?

Because it scares the dog.

12. What kind of coffee was served on the Titanic?

Sanka.

The INFLUENCE OF BOOKS

The National Endowment for the Arts has put out two studies, the most recent coming out in November of 2007.  The earlier study, “Reading at Risk,” was published in 2004 and assesses the drop in reading literature from 1982 through 2002.  The latest report, “To Read or Not To Read,” speaks to the same issue of declining reading in the overall population of the United States, but it makes a number of other interesting observations.  Let’s take a look.

Poor reading skills tend to equate with lower pay, lack of or poor employment, and fewer chances for advancement.  Poor readers generally don’t read as much as good readers.  It is a downward cycle for the poor readers.  They don’t read well, so they don’t read much, which means they don’t get the practice they need to improve.

Poor readers have lower academic success.  Generally speaking, prisoners have worse reading skills than the general population.  Also poor readers are less likely to be active in civic life, volunteer less, and vote less than better readers.  Being a poor reader definitely brings personal and social disadvantages to the individual and to the society as a whole.  “Whether or not people read, and indeed how much and how often they read, affects their lives in crucial ways.”

“Reading correlates with almost every measurement of positive personal and social behavior surveyed. It is reassuring, though hardly amazing, that readers attend more concerts and theater than non-readers, but it is surprising that they exercise more and play more sports—no matter what their educational level.  The cold statistics confirm something that most readers know but have mostly been reluctant to declare as fact—books change lives for the better.”

As parents and teachers, it should be obvious that those under your care ought to be taught and encouraged to read, not only for their school work, but for their pleasure as well. 

The reports have a number of charts and figures explaining how reading for pleasure has declined over the last twenty years, particularly among the younger folks.  While the amount of reading for school and homework has remained about the same during this time period, the amount of reading for pleasure has declined.  It is the daily habit of reading for pleasure that makes the difference.

Another piece of data showed that while those with more education tend to read more, the decline in reading for pleasure was just as evident among college graduates as it was with those with no college education.  As a nation our reading for pleasure is declining in all educational groups.

The most probable reason given, not only by these studies but by others, is the explosion of electronic media that beckons for our time.  The internet, video games, movies, television, cell phones, and the like are responsible for sucking up vast quantities of time that once might have been utilized as reading time.

One fascinating part of the study showed that the number of books in a home had a great influence on the test scores of student.  Interestingly enough, the test scores measured were in science and history, not literature or English.  The chart showed the average test scores grouped by the number of books in the home.  The data was from the 2005-2006 tests given to high school seniors.

• books in the home          science     civics    history
•               100+                161          167        305
•               26-100             147          150        289
•              11-25                131          134        275
•               0-10                 122          123        265

Science and civics scores range from 0 to 300. History scores range from 0 to 500.  Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics

It appears that the mere presence of books, and the more the better, allows for opportunities for children to pick one off the shelf and hopefully read it or at least read in it.

Here are some more findings reported in the study. This data is from the workplace regarding reading.

• • 38% of employers find high school graduates “deficient” in reading comprehension, while 63% rate this basic skill “very important.”
• • One in five U.S. workers read at a lower skill level than their job requires.
• • Remedial writing courses are estimated to cost more than $3.1 billion for large corporate employers and $221 million for state employers.

These findings reflect on the poor reading habits and abilities of a large portion of the workforce in the United States, and it reflects on their education or lack thereof.  Wide reading for pleasure and instruction is crucial to building a better understanding of the cultural sea we all swim in.  During my teaching years, I often had a sign hanging up in my room which said, “The man who will not read has no advantage over the man who can not read.”  I had another one: “He who reads has many teachers.”

Allow me two anecdotal remarks.  When I was in high school, I happened to be sick for some days and came back to a test in biology.  I had done the work at home, so I was expected to take the test at the regular time.  I did and scored well.  My teacher liked to put a tough question at the end of each test.  He called it his submarine question.  I happened to know the answer to that question since I had read an article about the cowbird’s odd nesting practice in my Boy’s Life magazine.  Because I had not been in class and heard his talk on the cowbird, I was under suspicion of cheating.  I had to bring in my copy of the magazine; that proved that I had known the answer from my independent reading.

The second incident occurred years later when I was teaching.  I walked in on a discussion of three folks in the faculty room.  They looked at me and asked a question totally unrelated to what I was teaching.  I happened to have enough knowledge about the subject and gave them an answer.  Then I asked them a question, “Why would you ask me?”  The response was, “Because you read.”

My father belonged to the Book of the Month club.  We had a bookcase full of various books.  An elderly librarian took a liking to me and recommended various authors whom I read.  My mom read to me when I was a wee child, but that ceased soon after I was able to read.  During my late elementary and high school years, I subscribed to some magazines; I remember Boy’s Life and Popular Electronics being two of them.  Television did not come into my home until I was a junior in high school.  We got one station, and it was only on from about 4 PM until maybe 11 PM or midnight, beyond my bedtime anyway.

The upshot of the above was that I had time to read; I was encouraged to read, and I liked to read.  I still do as my reading list in this newsletter attests.

How can you help young people to read?  Obviously you ought to have books around, a good number of them.  As parents and teachers, you ought to be encouraging your children-students to read books not tied directly to schoolwork.  When I taught in junior high, I read to my students, sometimes short stories, sometimes poems, sometimes essays, and once in a while parts of a novel.  The students seemed to like it, and I know it encouraged them to read.  I had a personal lending library in my room that grew to 250+ paperbacks, most of which I had read so that I could tailor my recommendations to a given student.  Perhaps you might have some discussions about a given piece of writing.  As teachers, you can give extra credit for any outside reading so long as it meets some basic criteria.

On the flip side, if possible it would be wise to limit the amount of time spent watching TV, playing video games, or entertaining themselves on facebook.  While I find nothing particularly wrong in any of those activities, I do believe they represent the primary competition for reading time.  That being said, less electronics and more reading is probably better in all cases.  And parents, why not enjoy a good book yourselves one of these days?

Both of the reports mentioned in this article are available at the National Endowment for the Arts website, www.nea.gov.

RECENT READS

Summer is a busy time, but I try to stay on task with my reading.  Here’s my reading list for the last quarter.

I like Terry Brooks.  I began reading his Shannara books many years ago and sort of got away from them.  A local used bookstore was going out of business and had all paperbacks on sale for one dollar each.  I couldn’t resist.  I read a trilogy of his called the High Druid of Shannara series.  The three books were Jarka Ruus, Tanequil, and Straken.  These books were typical Brooks.  They were fun to read, and I liked them.

Jon E. Lewis edited The Mammoth Book of Eyewitness History.  It consisted of excerpts from all sorts of sources; the key was that they were people on the scene as it unfolded.  The first entry was the Summerian schoolboy’s account.  The final entry was in late 1999.  The last quarter of the book dealt with the 20^th Century and was mostly from the writings of jounalists.  It was a short refresher course in history of some major events.  I did wonder at some of his inclusions, but overall it was an interesting book to read.

The Vietnam War occupied my college years.  Some of my friends went there and were quite changed by the event.  By God’s grace, I did not have to go to Vietnam, but Jeremiah Denton, Jr. did.  His book, When Hell was in Session, is primarily about his time as a captive, most of which was spent in the Hanoi Hilton.  Mr. Denton was there for quite a number of years, most of which were very difficult.  Only at the end did the pressure ease up.  His descriptions of the torture he received at the hands of the Viet Cong were painful to read and certainly way more painful to endure.  Just one example: imagine a pipe being rolled along your shins with a man jumping up and down on it.  Many times he passed out due to extreme pain.  As a high-ranking officer, he was at times in charge of those in his building or wing.  Of course the VC knew his status, so he was subject to extra torture by virtue of his position of leadership.  The book was written some years ago, but copies should be available.  John McCain is mentioned once in the book; it is a favorable comment.

Will Henry writes westerns.  I’ve read many of them, and he is an accurate writer.  His historical information is on target.  He also writes under the name of Clay Fisher.  The Day Fort Larking Fell was a surprise.  It turned out to be a comedy, and it was a hoot to read.  I had many a chuckle.

While in a bookstore in Portland, I engaged a fellow looking through the sci-fi section and asked him what authors he was reading.  We shared some names, and then he picked up Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman and strongly recommended it.  I bought it and read it.  Whew, talk about different!  The story takes place in and below London, mainly in the sewers and sections of the underground railway.  He is one inventive writer.  There were unresolved questions at times, but the story flowed nicely, and the characters were engaging.

Green Gone Wild by M. David Stirling is a recent book, and it is timely.  Mr. Stirling is a lawyer, and the book is very carefully and fully documented.  The basic subject of the book is environmental politics and how they have changed the social climate in the United States.  He explains the difference between conservation and preservation.  He gives an historical account of the war on DDT and mentions how one man, a professor from San Jose State used to lecture about the harmlessness of DDT and would eat a teaspoon of it at every lecture.  That man died of a heart attack at age 84 while climbing a mountain.  Mr. Stirling destroys the argument that every species is necessary in the overall ecology; that is a false premise held by the preservationists.  Environmentalism has become the pretext for greater and greater government control at the cost of jobs, property rights, and even human lives.  It’s an eye opener of a book.

I read a western by Louis L’Amour, Catlow.  I also read three books by W.W. Johnstone, a western called Matt Jensen: The Last Mountain Man, a modern action novel, Jackknife, and a military fiction book called The Last of the Dog Team, which I would not recommend.

1.  Excerpts of material from this newsletter may be freely used so long as proper credit is given as to the source.  Feel free to copy it and pass it along.

2.  This newsletter is posted quarterly on the website, and it is emailed free to those who wish to subscribe.  The email version is yours for as long as you want to receive it as long as I continue to publish it.

3. Now that school is back in session, I am beginning to get questions regarding answers or procedures in the books.  Email me if you have questions.  The more specific you are, the more likely my answer will be directly helpful.

4.  The busy season has passed.  Thanks to all of you who purchased books or recommended them.  No sales would mean passing from the scene.  I am thankful for the positive response to our materials over the years.

5.  The next issue of Smithy Notes is scheduled for distribution sometime in mid-January.  Lord willing, look for your next installment around then.

BY HIS GRACE ALONE,

Frode Jensen