Boing Boing: Map shows how kids aren't allowed to roam around

Boing Boing: Map shows how kids aren't allowed to roam around: "The Daily Mail has an article about how kids have been restricted from roaming far from their houses when they play or go to school, and why this is bad for their mental health. It includes a map that shows how, over four generations, the roaming range afforded to kids has shrunk to the size a a backyard."

My wife and I are talking about this right now. She is leaning more toward homeschooling because the school is just under a mile away, there is no way we can let a kindergardener walk that far alone and across a major road.

It isn't abduction that is our big fear, it is all the crazy drivers around here. They have some good crosswalks around here and some bad ones. You can guess where we are:(

The US isn't Ready for the Next Big Thing

Inability to meet "grand challenges" of physics likely to hurt US competitiveness
: "Although the US has dominated the field during the 20th century, a number of reasons are listed to suggest that it is poorly positioned to continue at this pace. As someone who has followed the funding situation in biology carefully, the problems facing physics appear to be essentially identical."

It comes down to this. Our children don't have the education to solve these hard problems. They are too busy getting schooled.

The Universe of Discourse : How to calculate binomial coefficients

The Universe of Discourse : How to calculate binomial coefficients: "I ran across this algorithm last year while I was reading the Lilavati, a treatise on arithmetic written about 850 years ago in India. The algorithm also appears in the article on 'Algebra' from the first edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, published in 1768.

So this algorithm is simple, ancient, efficient, and convenient. And the problems with the other algorithm are obvious, or should be. Why isn't this better known?"

Okay, this is pretty darn advanced stuff, but it goes back a long way. The Seljuk empire was coming to a close at that time in Turkey but it controlled Northern India, as was the Sumatran Empire. So it was an exciting time of change.

Playtime, learning and entrepreneurship

Short shrift today but these are fascinating links.

No playtime, no learning.

Let children learn by taking risks

The Loose Reins on U.S. Teenagers Can Produce Trouble or Entrepreneurs

Do We Make Too Much of Adolescence?

TV's 'Mr. Wizard' Don Herbert dies at 89

TV's 'Mr. Wizard' Don Herbert dies at 89: "'He really taught kids how to use the thinking skills of a scientist,' said former colleague Steve Jacobs. He worked with Herbert on a 1980s show that echoed the original 1950s 'Watch Mr. Wizard' series, which became a fond baby boomer memory."

Now this is something terrible. Mr. Wizard was one of the greatest uses of television ever. Science was real when he was on. We'll miss him. Math is the language of science but he made it easy to understand and do.

The saddest thing of all is that Amazon doesn't seem to carry any of his shows. But you can head over to Mr. Wizard Studios to get them.

Science is dangerous and I think a lot of people are afraid of the nannys who sue when they see something dangerous. Heck, I remember reading that someone wanted to bring back an old chemistry kit but a third of it was illegal to sell and of the rest no corporate council would sign off on the risk. And we are wondering why there are never enough scientists and engineers to go around.

There aren't many science shows out there. Junkyard Wars, Mythbusters, Bill Nye and Alton Brown are the only ones I can think of. Sadly most of the other science shows skip the important parts.

How testing is changing kindergarden

The Times has a article that is troubling to me. I am a father of a 4-year-old and she just makes the birthday cutoff by 3 days. We are still a few months from the start of school, but I am not sure she is ready for kindergarden just yet.

My concern is that since she is so young, she will be put in the "gift of time" group which will put her at a disadvantage in school for the next decade. They tracked the effects of being too young into the 8th grade. She has shown us great creativity and problem solving skills. I really don't want her to be mind numbed just because of her birthdate.

I am sure that over time, that more and more schools will be moving up their birthday cutoffs just to do better on the standardized tests that come years later. They would be stupid not to, but I do not believe it to be in the best interests of the children to do it this way. But the best interests of the individual has never been a primary focus of education but rather the group, the state.

Homeschooling is looking better and better to my wife.

Its not the school, its the parents.

There is a lot of talk about successful schools and failing schools and how one stacks up against the other and so on. And I have come to realize that it isn't about the schools or the teachers. its the parents.

It is annoying when something is staring you in the face and you just don't notice it. This has been one of those things.

Many parents move so their children will be able to go to the "good school." Often these good schools are in the more affluent part of town. They spend lots of money on a house they can barely afford to help their children get a good education. These are the parents who make their children to do their homework before television and games. These are the parents who teach their children real world skills.

How many times have I heard teachers lament, "The parents aren't involved in their children's education."

With parents like these, these children would do well virtually anywhere. Look at the Asian community, they are often enough mixed in with everyone else but the parents make sure they do their homework and study for tests and they are involved, pushing and challenging their offspring.

Kansas city spent enormous sums of money on their school system a few years ago and nothing changed. The buildings were upgraded and everyone got books and lots of computers were made available but the parents stayed the same and so did test scores.

Are parents going to change? Not likely, they have quite enough to be going on with already. I just want to make it easier for those that do want their children to be successful.