What I have used of CLE and R&S, elementary levels, I think they do a pretty good job of telling the history as a "what happened when" without glorifying wars. They are not, strictly speaking, patriots -- neither are they traitors - but neutral, not so much pacifists but more non-participants in governments. They are about as law-abiding as folks can be, and will obey the laws of whatever country they live in, but they only respect governments because they see all authority as God-ordained. They see their true home as Heaven, not any particular place on this earth. OTOH, they do tend to see history since the Reformation as Anabaptist history, so there is that angle to it.
Let's hope they don't confuse the different toasters and accidently serve the pot toast instead of the Jesus toast!
Anyone who's watched Chariots of Fire knows which is God's favorite country. At government elementary schools, we were expected to sing the words quite often: And did those feet in ancient time Walk upon England's mountains green? And was the holy Lamb of God On England's pleasant pastures seen? Suffice it to say, "no" was not an acceptable response! And, incidentally, God's second favorite country has tried to steal His favorite country's most well-known patriotic song. Whenever I attend a graduation ceremony, I keep wanting to stand up and sing: Land of Hope and Glory, Mother of the Free, How shall we extol thee, who are born of thee? Wider still, and wider, shall thy bounds be set; God, who made thee mighty, make thee mightier yet!
I know this is completely off topic, but this caught my eye because this is how we are too. My youngest (now 4) is a HUGE dinosaur lover. Have you seen the tv show Dino Dan? He LOVES it!
No I hadn't even heard of it. I asked my boys and they told me they have seen it on the local kids station. My ds used to love Dinolab. Is that still on?
Never heard of Dinolab so not sure if it's on or not. Dino Dan I think is on Nick Jr. or PBS kids...can't remember which one. It's a cute show. I can't remember what ages your kids are, but my 4 year old loves it. I will sometimes catch my 8 year old watching it too before he quickly turns it off to pretend he wasn't watching it. :lol:
:lol: My boys are 7 and 9 now. They don't watch much TV. We do get a local station that has kid's programming similar to PBS and they watch that sometimes.
I know "the favorite country" thing is not being discussed in a heavy way so far (from what I have read). But why is it that so many Americans believe that we are so much better than other places? Sure, we have freedom and that is something I am extremely thankful for. We also have high crime rates and a disregard for life that some places don't have (and some other places do). We also have a rush, rush, tight time schedule mentality. Some places do not feel the need to achieve all the time and they put a higher priority on family relationships and simpler activities. Who is right? Actually something in between is probably right. The thing is-God loves Africans and Asians and people from the Middle East and South America, etc. In fact, I recently read that 2/3 of Christians in the world are not living in the West. I believe that it is also sad that so many Christians here in the U.S. are social Christians. I don't know the right word, but many people think they are Christian if they grew up in a "Christian" home. Authentic Christianity is something totally different.
I agree! I did a LOT of searching and comparing this year and I had to come up with something I was happy with. I can not in good faith teach my child something that makes me cringe. I actually did go with a "Christian" based LA/History program (Sonlight) but not b/c it is Christian. I picked it because it was literature based and I liked the teaching style. If by some chance we run into something I can't swallow, I'll use it to start a discussion with my children and we will go from there.
We use Abeka, but my kids are still young. My son, who is 8, has also read about evolution in different mags. and stuff my hubby has brought home. We just explain to him that God said that it's wrong, that HE created the earth. So he's getting exposed to it but in a controlled manner. I struggle with history books as they get older. Yes, God is in the history, but many of the books I've seen only show the good of the Christian walk. Fact is, there is some not so good stuff in the Christians history, just like any other religion. Also, not all wars were really fought because of Christian principles. Many of them were political messes and arguments that sadly brought patriotic soldiers into the middle
I guess it's a little easier for us. We are using Catholic curriculum and my son is already looking at some catholic colleges (he's almost 11) that he wants to go to. That said, we use secular math. My son loves Saxon and my DH loves helping him with it because it's the same math his public schools used when he was growing up.
