This is theoretical, wrt seamless combining, as dd6 is working on fluency in reading and letter formation at the moment - haven't decided when to start WWE, and am shamefully procrastinating on starting a more deliberate BW lifestyle (although dd6 does love to tell stories of her own) - but I've thought about it ;), and here's what I've got so far: My basic plan is to do both in parallel, as separate activities serving related but separate goals. The goal of BW is to learn to be a *writer* - to develop into the kind of person who uses language to serve real, meaningful goals. So it combines inspiration to write - appreciating good examples of the written word, highlighting and creating opportunities to write - with teaching writing with a focus on how and why for-real writers write. Writing is a means of communcation, of expression: writers write because they have something they want to say. And BW focuses on giving young writers the confidence and desire to express themselves - to want to write for the only reason that matters: that they have something to say. BW does more than just inspire the desire to write - it gives several tools for learning the nuts and bolts of the craft - motivated by the sensible notion that if you have something you want to say, don't you want to learn to say it well? But BW does seem to more or less follow Peter Elbow in not valuing the ability to be fluent in the surface conventions of SWE - since it doesn't really affect the content of the writing, they figure it's not worth spending too much time on. Actually, there seems to be this assumption that people are either "naturals" at copy-editing or not, and no amount of training will change that immutable fact, so might as well not bother spending much time teaching it. The naturals will naturally develop it, and the non-naturals never will, so no reason to teach it either way. Just divorce the bulk of the learnable writing process from the non-learnable skill of copy-editing - so writing is accessible to all - and teach the non-naturals how to outsource or kludge their way through the minimal necessary aspects of copy-editing at the very end. But I disagree that the ability to attend to the surface details of the mechanics of writing is unlearnable - that either you got it or you don't, and there's nothing to be done either way. Certainly it is easier for some than others, and some might find it so difficult to learn as to not be worth the time - but fundamentally I believe it to be a learnable skill. And so does SWB. In fact, she laments the lack of explicit teaching of those writing mechanics as their fundamental flaw. I wonder if the reason those programs don't teach it is because they don't think they *can* be taught. Anyway, that brings me to the goal of WWE - to learn to *write*. WWE/WWS have the fundamental assumption that all aspects of the craft of writing are learnable, and they are going to teach them to you step-by-step, in a way that doesn't require you to be a natural at any point. While BW does indeed include explicit instruction in writing, it embeds it in real writing. This is a plus in terms of motivation - you are learning what you need right now in order to accomplish what you want to accomplish right now - but generally a minus in terms of efficiency. Plus, BW's focus on doing what comes naturally is great for building on strengths, but less great for remediating weaknesses. So, the point is that WWE provide targeted practice at all aspects of the craft of writing. It doesn't provide the *motivation* to write - the *why* do it - but it thoroughly provides the how. It doesn't leave anything to chance, class anything in the, "only naturals can do this" pile. I've thought of there being three aspects to a subject that I want to be sure to include in my homeschool: *inspiration - seeing and appreciating the best of what has been done in that art (art appreciation, reading good and great books, reading biographies of scientists, mathematicians, appreciating the beauty of math proofs) *instruction - learning the nuts and bolts of the art, so as to gain the ability to use it (the sometimes artificial exercises that experts in the field have determined are the best way to teach the fundamentals of the subject/art) *doing - actually using the art to do what experts in that art do (writing as writers do, history as historians do, math as mathematicians do, science as scientists do) The inspiration is needed to see what is possible, to be motivated to work at learning and practicing the art. The instruction is needed to actually learn it, especially for non-naturals. And the actual doing is needed to see the point to it all - I mean, to do it yourself is the ultimate goal, yet too often people never get to experience anything but the process of learning to do, and mistake that for actually *doing* it. There are many stories of people who think doing sums is what mathematicians do, or doing writing exercises is what writers do - because in all their years of schooling that was all they did in *learning* to do math or write, and no one ever showed them that it was merely exercises to learn, not the end goal of learning. And as a result, many well-meaning people went too far in the other direction, and ditched all exercises - all artificial means of "learning to write" and "learning to do math" in favor of learning math by doing what mathematicians do, and learning to write by doing what writers do, and learning history by doing what historians do, and learning science by doing what scientists do. The problem is that beginners are not experts, and all the acting like experts in the world won't, itself, allow them to *become* experts unless they are naturals. Which continues to perpetuate the notion that expertise is all innate, that either you have it or you don't, and there's nothing you can do to change it. Many, many people *could* learn to become experts - if only someone would *teach* them. Jettisoning explicit, "artificial" instruction and exercises - because they don't reflect what real experts do (except that most experts *do* practice all lot - that's how they became expert and that's how they maintain and grow their expertise - and they use the results of all their practice when they use their expertise to do real things) - is just as flawed as doing nothing *but* exercises until "expert" status is reached. Anyway, I see BW as the inspiration and doing parts, and WWE as the instruction part (with some inspiration, too) - complementary goals. Ok, no idea if that is helpful, but it's my two cents, anyway ;).

So, re-reading the intro - Why Writing Programs Fail - to Susan Wise Bauer's Writing With Ease (SWB's WWE - you can read it here). Her points: *Speaking is natural; writing is artificial. -Kids *do* instinctively learn to speak, but expecting the same in writing is foolhardy, as while some kids do take to writing without outside instruction/prompting, writing is *not* a natural-to-humans process. All human societies have spoken language, but very few of those languages were ever written down. And in those societies with written language, the vast majority (until recently) had very low literacy rates - scribes and administrators might need to be literate, but the majority of people got on just fine without being able to read and write. I do agree with her here - that the act of recording speech through symbols representing sounds (or syllables, or words, or ideas) is *not* instinctual human behavior - it is definitely a learned behavior. I don't agree that "learning to read and write" - in the "learning the sound/symbol correspondences and how to use them to encode and decode speech" sense - "is as natural as learning to speak". *SWB goes on to extend that artificiality to say that, "written language is an unnatural foreign language, an artificially constructed code. Compare written dialogue with any transcript of an actual conversation, and you'll see that written language has entirely different conventions, rules, and structures than spoken language." However, I think I mostly *disagree* with SWB here. Peter Elbow, in his book Vernacular Eloquence (and if you want to play along at home ;), Elbow has drafts of many of his chapters available at his university page), addresses this issue in depth - I will have to go back and refresh my memory on the particulars, but broadly speaking he says: *The main difference isn't between speaking and writing, but between formal, planned language and informal, unplanned language. Informal language, whether written or spoken, is remarkably similar in structure and word choice, as is both written and spoken formal language. (He offers a rebuttal to the "read a transcript of unplanned speech and see how different they are" argument - don't remember details :shifty, but core point was the underlying core English grammar was the same.) *Even with those differences, formal, planned English (referred to as Standard Written English, or SWE) and informal, unplanned English speech are still *English*, and as such are far more linguistically similar than they are dissimilar. The difference is far more along the lines of a different register than a different language - and most people have learned multiple spoken registers, and switch easily between them as the situation calls for it. *SWB's next point is that, "[t]he rules of this foreign language must be learned by the beginning writer - and they have to become second nature before the beginning writer can use written language to express ideas....[t]he convention of the...language need to become second nature, automatic - invisible to you - so that you can concentrate on the ideas, rather than on the medium used to express them....Ask a student to express ideas in writing before she is completely fluent in the rules and conventions of written language, and she'll freeze. She can't express her thoughts in writing, because she's still wrestling with the basic means of exp<b></b>ression itself." Agree and disagree. Agree: medium needs to be invisible; lack of fluency makes the process infinitely more frustrating, to the point of giving up. Am experiencing this right now - typing with kids sitting on you and impeding full use of your hands forces you to direct extra energy to the mechanics of getting the words down and that comes with a cognitive cost - less energy available to *think* - very frustrating :banghead. Experience same thing re posting on iPhone - medium works against me, have to direct energy fighting it - so many times I had to simplify what I wanted to say (or gave up even trying to say it :(), because I just. couldn't. say. it on the iPhone. The iPad's the same way, though to a much lesser extent - I'm just not as fluent on a touch screen. (Nor, as the foregoing paragraph proves, am I as fluent when typing one-handed with two kids snuggled up to me.) My frustrations with posting complex thoughts on the iPhone (there was lots of cursing, and lots of frustrated, "I have something to say, but I just. can't. *say* it on this stupid phone" - very disheartening :( - has brought home to me the vital importance of practicing to fluency, to automaticity. Letter formation, sound-symbol correspondences, punctuation/capitalization - all of that has to be so ingrained that writing a word, a sentence (actually a clause), is as easy as speaking it. Handwriting (and later touch typing) has become a *huge* priority around here - I do *not* want mechanics to trip up - silence - my dc. My disagreement relates to both the previous point (SWE has way more in common with unplanned English speech than not) and the one coming up (SWB separates putting an idea in words from writing it down in a more absolute way than I agree with): in my opinion, and in my experience, once basic mechanics are down, writing is as easy as "speaking onto the page" (to use a lovely Peter Elbow phrase :)). Now, SWB does sorta agree with this - she *does* separate the "putting ideas into words" step from the "putting words on paper" step, and, like Julie Bogart (Bravewriter creator), she has budding writers orally narrate with parents taking dictation (and has students copy back their narration, or part of it). SWB does require students to use SWE, or the oral components thereof (which is? isn't? odd given her implied position that oral language is vastly dissimilar from written language - I mean, I totally agree that all the important features of SWE are present in planned speech, but I didn't think SWB did.) Ok, losing the thread here - kid distractions - I think my basic objection was related to freewriting - the use of writing itself to generate ideas (not just record ideas already generated), and that freewriting - speaking onto the page - generates writing that is a lot closer to SWE than "SWE is a foreign language" advocates give credit for. That, basically, you *can* harness what the tongue intuitively knows and does automatically in unplanned speech as your base for teaching writing in general, and SWE in particular. That in fact SWE is just one of many possible registers for writing, not *the* written language. SWB is right that it takes a fair amount of exposure and practice to internalize the SWE register (or any register) and be able to use it effortlessly, though. Can't neglect copious amounts of reading of SWE. But I *don't* think that she's right that SWE is functionally a foreign language. I fall on the side of "writing is recorded speech", and learning any particular register in writing is comparable to learning a particular register in speech (the ease of which is, granted, highly related to the amount of time you spend hearing that register, and how different it is from other registers you know). *SWB separates writing into two distinct and non-overlapping steps: putting an idea into words, and putting words onto the page. And she maintains that the problem with most writing instruction - that makes it "fundamentally flawed" - is that it doesn't explicitly teach the "putting words onto the page" step. While mature writers are capable of doing both tasks without a problem - not generally consciously aware their minds are doing two tasks (not one) - it's cognitive overload for beginning writers. "Young writers need time to learn the conventions of their new language. They need to become *fluent* in it before they can use it to express new ideas....While immersion techniques often work for spoken foreign languages, they don't work nearly as well for writing - which is, after all, an artificial code rather than a natural speech exp<b></b>ression." Ok, continuing the theme, I agree totally that beginning writers need time to become fluent in the mechanics of writing :yes. But I'm thinking strictly what is needed to turn speech into writing - knowledge of sound/symbol correspondences, letter formation (the ability to physically form those symbols), and basic punctuation (the ability to indicate, in writing, the pauses and other temporal elements of speech that aid understanding). (Spelling, capitalization, and strictly visual punctuation marks and conventions (such as apostrophes indicating possession and contractions) are in this weird middle ground for me. On the one hand, from a "writing is recorded speech" view, they are surface edits only - they don't really affect what is said/heard. And very good writers of the past were inconsistent with all those things. But from the perspective of SWE, they are a big, huge honking deal. Even if your ideas are good and sound, surface mistakes like that are going to cost you, because they are like big blots on the page, jolting the reader out of the flow of the words. It's like forcing them to look through a dirty glass pane to look at your painting, instead of a perfectly clear protective glass that is effectively invisible - no matter how good your painting is, it's going to look less than it could behind dirty glass. And while for big things you ought to always do a big polish at the end, do you really want to have to seriously copy edit (versus a quick check) *everything* you do? To ignore *all* issues of spelling and conventions until the end, to not have *any* of that be automatic, to always have to look it up? I mean, you *can*, and it's nice to have that option when you need it, but for most of the writing in life, it's awfully handy to be able to dash something off that is basically correct without having to expend conscious brainsweat on the surface things. I do understand Peter Elbow's advice to not get hung up on surface things when you are trying to get your ideas down. But isn't it better to not get hung up on it because you get it right without thinking - you're fluent in spelling all the usual words and all the usual surface punctuation and other conventions - than to teach yourself to quit noticing mistakes - and thus make copy-editing both necessary and a big chore. Granted, working for fluency is a bigger investment at the front end, and as an adult, it may well be a better use of time to find ways to compensate. But for kids, I think the investment is very much worth it.) However, SWB seems to have a much broader understanding of mechanics - she's including sentence structure and grammar (probably diction, too) into her "basic conventions". While I agree that those are all good and necessary things to explicitly study re: learning to write, I disagree they are fundamentally different in writing vs speaking. I don't believe you are functionally starting from scratch in those areas, that you have to build all that up from ground zero :no. I really do believe we have a vast resource in our spoken competence, and that consciously and explicitly making connections between what the tongue knows intuitively and what we are trying to accomplish in writing - build as much as possible on what we already can do - is a very natural and powerful way of achieving written competence. Elbow's Vernacular Eloquence is in fact all about just that - it is a totally awesome book, and well worth reading if you are drawn to the Bravewriter approach to writing (worth it for everyone teaching writing - or wanting to write - actually, but it is more likely to resonate with people who have friendly feelings to brave writer).

I've been expending time and brainsweat the past few months on trying to really *understand* the similarities and differences between SWB's approach to writing, and the Bravewriter/Peter Elbow approach to writing (Peter Elbow is one of the main influences behind BW - TWJ lists three of his books as inspiration - and I loved TWJ so much I looked them up on the spot - and I love Peter Elbow so much I now have five of his books and still haven't gotten back to TWJ because of it :shifty). Anyway, after many hours of thinking and typing today, I finally reached something of a breakthrough on part of it, and I'm so chuffed I'm posting it here in the hopes it might be helpful to others :). I'm putting my sum-up and sum-up of the sum-up ;) up top, and then I'll post the big, long analysis that led to that, so as to not clutter up the main post. To sum up: I agree with SWB that developing fluency and automaticity in producing Standard Written English (SWE) is a good thing, and that it takes time and effort to achieve. I disagree that SWE is effectively a foreign language compared to unplanned English speech, and that you cannot/should-not harness spoken competence in teaching written competence in SWE. (And, actually, SWB sorta-kinda gives a nod to the importance of involving the ear and the tongue: she is a big advocate of lots and lots of reading of SWE - helps internalize the patterns and feel of SWE - and I think she's a fan of reading aloud, even when students are fluent readers (even if she isn't, I still am :shifty:giggle). And of course she uses narrations in spoken SWE as a key component. So I'd say she *does* value spoken competency in learning to write - she just doesn't think non-SWE language (whether spoken or written) has anything to offer in teaching/learning SWE - that "writing is a foreign language" thing.) I agree with Peter Elbow that we can and should build on our spoken competency (regular ol' unplanned speech) in teaching how to develop written competency - that writing is basically recorded speech, and that our intuitive knowledge of spoken English is a powerful help in learning to both speak well and to write well - is in fact the *core* of our language knowledge, and all our conscious, explicit language learning should build on it and be rooted in it and continually refer back to it. I disagree that the better solution to non-fluency in mechanics and surface conventions is to adopt crutches to get by (learn how to separate the bulk of writing from the parts you aren't fluent in, so you can write effectively in spite of your lack of fluency, dealing with that lack by pushing it off until the very end, when you either rely on handbooks or friends or paid professionals to copy-edit), instead of working steadily to achieve fluency. (In fairness, Elbow does actually value learning to be fluent in those areas - and offers up ways to harness our intuitive knowledge to get us most of the way there with knowledge we already have - but his primary audience is college students and adult students - who have already passed by their main chance to become fluent in those mechanics - and Elbow doesn't want to feed into the idea that you can't be a writer until you can churn out error-free prose. And I *do* agree with him, strongly, that it is much easier to turn good writing into correct writing with a good dose of copy-editing at the end than to attempt to turn blah correct writing into *good* writing - the latter is in need of much more than a quick polish. He's totally right that they are surface issues - I just am concerned 1) about the practical issues of not being able to turn out workmanlike relatively error-free prose on the first try, because so much day-to-day writing goes infinitely smoother with that skill, and 2) the lingering negative effects of not being fluent, no matter how good the kludges - I understand doing the best you can with what you've got, but when starting from the beginning with new writers, who have *time* to work to fluency, I don't want to settle for a second-best kludge-y non-fluency unless I *have* to, due to issues outside my control.) To sum up the sum up ;): The key difference does indeed seem to be the idea of writing as a foreign language - is our intuitive spoken knowledge of English a base to build on, or a parallel track, with no intersection with writing? - and there I fall on Peter Elbow's side. However, I do indeed value all SWB's goals, and want to achieve fluency in SWE (not just be able to edit my way there) - I just also believe that I can get there better/faster/simpler if I build on our intuitive knowledge of spoken English, instead of ignoring it as having nothing to offer. Implications for homeschooling: *the basic plan of brave writer plus WWE seems sound *big mod to WWE will be grammar teaching that builds on intuitive knowledge of English - gives words to concepts we already know, and teaches us how to consciously use our intuitive knowledge at will, to achieve specific goals - instead of teaching and practicing explicit rules so much that we internalize them; planned approach - work through Patterns of English, plus some diagramming, plus Whimbey's sentence combining, plus Killgallon, plus Elbow's techniques for training the ear. *biggish mod to brave writer will be a possibly? greater caring/emphasis on correct mechanics. Might not be a huge deal, as planning to do a serious spelling program (most of which do indeed take full advantage of training the ear to hear, in addition to teaching the eye to spell), and the grammar/WWE will address punctuation and conventions in terms of enhancing understanding - not that BW doesn't address that, but I believe it's more in the copy-editing phase, as opposed to practicing it to fluency.

Yeah, it is entirely possible I feel *too* strongly about it to discuss it :shifty. In any case, here's a more measured review that hits the same points I was trying to make: http://www.lcmsyam.org/Index.asp?PageID=11629&BlogFunction=ViewBlog&BloggerID=1020&BlogID=1178 I have been reading more stuff by/about him today, and I have no doubt he's very sincere and passionate. He's just, imo, also buying into the common evangelical paradigm of "Gospel is for getting saved, not for growing in the Christian life" - everything I found by him re: the Gospel was about converting unbelievers, period. For Chan, we all need to hear the Gospel - but because some of us who think we are saved aren't, not because the saved need the Gospel, too. But if you have something of Chan's that says otherwise, I'd love to be proven wrong :). Eta: But in any case, whatever he thinks about the role of the Gospel, Chan wrote a book on living as a Christian with barely a mention of it. And that is just wrong - the Gospel is the center of our Christian life, and for a pastor to neglect it in *anything* he preaches, let alone an entire book, is simply inexcusable.

I was refreshing my memory, in case I'd forgotten nuances.

Taking another stab at this (since I'm not sure my previous try would make sense to another who didn't already get what I was trying to say). My main issue with Chan is that he seems to treat the Gospel as only for getting saved - a just-for-unbelievers sort of thing. We are *saved* by grace, and *forgiven* by grace, but that's the extent of it. Grace is for covering our sins - but it doesn't have anything to do with doing good. Our power to do good comes from something other than the power of the Gospel - Chan seems to suggest considering the magnitude of God's majesty and love, as well as starkly considering the magnitude of what God asks of us, as good ways to deepen our relationship with God, and thus our power to do good. But the Gospel comes in nowhere, because it's job, from Chan's apparent perspective, is done already. But that is *totally wrong*. We aren't just *saved* by the Gospel, we *live* by the Gospel. God doesn't just create faith by grace alone, but He *maintains* our faith by grace alone, too. Grace that is *actively* given through the Gospel: "the gospel, which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing—as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth". The Gospel - the good news that Christ has done *everything* required - is the *only* means by which we are connected to Christ. And God doesn't just give us our only shot of grace at our conversion, fill up our grace tank - rather, He gives us His grace over and over, every time we hear the Gospel - a continual, life-giving stream :). And so by leaving the Gospel out of his exhortation to do good works, Chan might not be promoting salvation by works, but he *is* promoting sanctification by works. Because once the Gospel - what Jesus has done for us - is taken away, there is nothing left *but* works.

Yes, but *how* do we press deeper into Jesus? If our actions - byproducts of our relationship with Christ - aren't up to snuff, what do we do? The only answers I saw in the book emphasized what *I* need to do - *I* need to press deeper, or *I* need to do more. His very assurance of salvation - are we Christians who sin, or unbelievers who are fooled? - is focused on *our* response to Christ. We can know if we are Christians if we have "a posture of obedience and surrender, where a person perpetually moves toward Christâ€. Well, what if I'm *not* moving toward Christ? What then? Chan says I'm an unbeliever. Ok, fine. But then he doesn't even offer the Gospel message?! The one thing even Chan agrees is the only way to be saved! After making people evaluate if they are acting sufficiently Christ-like, and telling them that they probably aren't saved if they aren't, he does *nothing* to help them! Just goes on with his, "Are you *really* sold out for Christ - then *prove* it" thesis. What other way to prove it than by doing works? He never gives an alternative. If you don't already have Jesus, you have *zero* chance to find him in this book. Which is especially frustrating as he works so hard to narrow the "real Christian" club :glare:. He *expects* many of his readers to not be real Christians - yet he never gives them the chance to *become* real Christians. Except by doing works, to show they really *are* true Christians after all :(.

Just went through chapter five, and the problem is that it's all law, law, law, with barely a hint of Gospel. Yes, Chan is pointing out real problems, and he is right that convenient Christianity is full of wrongness and sinfulness. But the only answer Chan gives is that true Christians need to do more and try harder to be who God wants them to be, and if they aren't willing, well.... He gives a whole chapter on the marks of a lukewarm Christian, tells us to soberly examine ourselves. I did - I was convicted - as was Chan's intention, I believe. He then tells us that lukewarm Christian is an oxymoron, that there is no such thing as a non-fruit-bearing Christ-follower. This is scary stuff: what should I do if I worry I am one of them? Well, Chan says that true believers do indeed stumble, but what marks them from the unsaved - "those who do a few Christian-y things" - is "a posture of obedience and surrender, where a person perpetually moves toward Christâ€. How can I be sure I am the latter, not the former? The only answer Chan offers is to do more and try harder. The truly righteous do *this* - and his whole book is one big incentive for those of us who consider ourselves true Christian believers to start doing those righteous things because we *should*. He is motivating us by the Law. He is demolishing an easy, self-centered legalism - but building a harder, more God-centered legalism in its place. Yet it is still legalism. And the Law can only kill - it can only show us where we have slipped up, never if we have done enough. Because we can *never* do enough for God - we can *never* be perfect. The Law shows us what to do - but it doesn't give us the power to actually *do* it. It's the *Gospel* that has the power to change us, to make us more like Christ. It is the Good News that, despite our crappy lukewarmness, our half-hearted attempts to sorta-kinda follow Him, Christ's death on the cross was for *those* sins, too. The Good News that, though we *can't* ever do enough to be a "true believer", we *don't have to* - we are true believers because of what *Christ* has done. *Only* because of what Christ has done. There is no "minimum standard" for being an acceptable Christian - there is only one standard: perfection. And *none* of us meet it. *Ever*. Which is why we rely on *Christ* having already met the standard on our behalf. And so the Gospel-centered response to being confronted with evidence of our sins, our lukewarmness, is to cry out, "Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner!" And we can be sure He will :). The Gospel is for Christians, too. But unfortunately, though Chan pays lip service to the Gospel, not once has Chan actually *given* the Gospel to his readers :glare:. He uses the Law as both carrot and stick, he tries to inspire us through contemplating God's majesty and power and love - but he never once gives us the Gospel, the greatest example of God's love for us, and the *only* thing with the power to change lives. God may save us through the Gospel, but if we are worried that we aren't true believers, Chan assures us that so long as we have the proper attitude - that we are sincerely trying - we are on track. Otherwise, well, Chan never really addresses what to do if you think you aren't trying enough - except to exhort you to try harder. What is that but works-based theology?

Not a fan :glare:. From the title, I thought it was about God's crazy love for us, and I had warm feelings toward it and Chan. Imagine my surprise when instead it's all about how we need to have crazy love for God, or else we aren't doing this Christian thing right. And if we aren't doing the Christian thing right, then we very well might not actually be *real* Christians at all :glare:. Because apparently the key to being a Christian isn't Christ's works, but *our* works. Christ does it all - but the only way to be sure that Christ actually did it all in *us* is if we are properly sold out for God. Look to your works, men, look to your works :glare:. Yeah, the works-based theology is horrifyingly rampant. "Jesus + Nothing = Everything", by Tullian Tchividjian, is way better - in fact, it actually *is* the Gospel-centered, focused-on-the-radical-love-and-grace-of-God book that I thought Crazy Love was going to be.

|------h------|-d----|-b| |---handbag-|--d&b---| |----|----|----|----|----| Handbag = 3 units; dress = 1.5 units Dress and belt = 2 units, so belt = 0.5 units Dress costs 1 unit more than belt, so 1 unit = $20 Total of 5 units, so $100 at first.

:iagree: I have to put my full weight on it, too. And sometimes it takes dh's help in pulling it tight - either my angle is bad for pulling, or it just takes more brute strength than I can muster.

Yes, totally challenge her assumptions. But asserting that her assumptions are wrong because she has had too little experience is not challenging her assumptions, but dismissing them out of hand - and for reasons that have nothing to do with the assumptions themselves, but rather the person making the assumptions. A young person doesn't know as much of the world as do older folks, and so more of their assumptions are, on average, going to be wrong. That doesn't make any given assumption wrong, though. Even children have *some* correct assumptions.

Her experience may affect the odds of her being right, but her experience or lack thereof isn't proof one way or another that this particular argument of hers is right or wrong. "Likely to be wrong" is not proof of wrongness, although it may be a pragmatic reason to not spend much time bothering to consider her argument.

Yeah, it does, doesn't it :think. That people couldn't just disagree with her ideas on their own merits, but quickly jumped to disparaging them based on her youth and new motherhood - go ad hominem fun :tongue_smilie:. Although, to be fair, people go all ad hominem on men, too.

:iagree: Agree with this, too :tongue_smilie:. But it's helpful to realize that it *does* read that way to others, and there are logical reasons why they hear it that way. So that if generic you wants to communicate more clearly, you might want to make what you mean by "mother first" explicit, instead of assuming it is obvious/everyone has the same definition/impression of the phrase - because it is clear there's several different views of what it means in this thread alone ;).

:iagree: Yes, this.

I really don't think the obvious truth that we are all fellow human beings, and thus should treat each other accordingly, is really all so obvious. Because humans like to divide people into "our people" and "not our people" at the drop of a hat, and it's ok to treat the "other" people badly. I mean, that's what's driving the Mommy Wars - the apparent need to divide into us and them - and the "them" are being horrible to their children, so it's not just ok, but a moral duty to point out their failures. I think we could do a bit *more* conscious emphasis on our shared humanity, not less. Constant Vigilance, you know ;) - the important things must be constantly attended too, because they will *not* take care of themselves. No truth is so self-evident that it doesn't need to be constantly brought front and center in order to not be forgotten.

:iagree:

Well, I don't know how much is rooted in modern reality vs. reality of days gone by vs. an idea of reality, but a lot of feminism was/is fighting for that very thing you are taking for granted. Is that because they won? Is it because what they were fighting against never existed? Or is it not as taken-for-granted as you and I think it is (because I've never had my personhood devalued as a woman or a mother either) - that for many women, the battle is still being waged? I don't know. But I have more respect for feminists than I used to.

Well, as a person who chooses to define herself as a person first, here's my two cents about why. For me, it's not so much defining myself as a person, but defining myself as *me*. It may be obvious, but being me (a me who is redeemed by God) is nevertheless my core identity, and it is more than just the sum of all my relationships. I am a mother, and I am a wife - I have many different vocations - but at the core of them all is *me*. And important things, no matter how obvious, can *never* go without saying, or else they will be taken for granted and eventually forgotten. (Or are you content with your dh never saying I love you, because he said it once, and it goes without saying he continues to feel that way until he lets you know otherwise ;).) Also, identifying as a person first emphasizes our shared fellow humanity as more important than our various differences, and that meshes well with my beliefs about equality.

:grouphug: I grew up also needing the last word, too. Is there someone you respect who is able to walk away from that sort of immature "ha, ha, ha, you can't make me" attitude while still clearly retaining their authority - that their calm non-engagement of immature disrespect highlights their power and maturity? Maybe you could use them as inspiration for changing your own behavior - that they are living, breathing proof that you can decline invitations to battle without losing anything that matters. I know that when I am tempted to yell at my dc, "why won't you *listen* to me!", I am answering my own question - why *would* you listen to and respect an authority who only has it by dint of sheer force? I think of the military officers who command genuine respect through who they are, as contrasted to the ones who have to yell and scream to get anyone to listen - and I try hard to emulate the calm certainty and quiet authority of the good ones. It helps me, anyway :grouphug:.

But it's not clear that you agree from what you originally said, especially from the perspective of those who agree with the article. Because the article was speaking against the motherhood ideal that says a woman should not just sacrifice for her children, but should subsume herself in her role as mother (and wife). That her identity *is* mother, or wife, and to have needs outside that is selfish and wrong. But the article goes too far the other way, throwing the baby out with the bath water - conflating selfless love for one's children with losing oneself in motherhood - assuming a zero-sum game in which a woman's needs are set against her kids' needs, and arguing that the woman comes first. But too many responses attack only the surface issue - selfishness towards one's kids - without tackling the root issue of women and kids being set against each other. And so as they assert their primary role as mother, the other side hears that as promoting the "my identity *is* mother", that "my *only* value is in raising children" - that in the zero-sum game of life, they put their kids first and so accept that they, the mothers, lose. And they are happy with losing. This sounds to the article writer as women choosing their own subjugation. There is no room for the idea that women and children do *not* have to be opponents, that it is *not* a zero-sum game, that women can be selfless mothers *and* have a self. And thus the animosity - they hear you say that the only way to be a good mother is to give up your own self entirely, to not be a *person*, but to be exclusively a mother, with no room for anything else - and that sounds like a fate worse than death. The shame is that it's a *false choice* - that there is a third way that values both women *and* children.

Idk, I completely disagree with the article writer's politics, but I do *not* identify myself as a mother first. Or as a wife first. Or even as a woman first. I am *me* - if I must identify as anything, I identify as human, and as a child of God. All the other identities are just subsets of *me* - being a mother *is* an important part of me, but it's not the totality of me, or the *most* important part of me. So I kind of agree with the article that it is kind of sad that women are encouraged to see themselves primarily through their relationships with others - as a wife, as a mother - instead of as a *person* who happens to be a wife and a mother. (The feminist approach of defining a woman's primary identity as a *woman*, not as a *person*, bothers me for the similar reasons.) Still no excuse for people to be nasty about it, though :grouphug:.

:grouphug: Those gps are majorly bullying your dd and the rest of you. I don't know what to do, either - there are so many differing approaches to dealing with bullies, each with potential downsides. But I don't know that just taking it and walking on eggshells, letting them push your dd around, hoping they magically become better people on their own is a great choice, either. One thing that did occur to me is that the book "Boundaries" might be a big help for your dd - give her tools for being the bigger person while still standing up for herself. She can be a good person and rise above them and their bullying without having to be a doormat. My heart aches for you and your dd :grouphug:.

Just read the OP. I *was* that child :tongue_smilie:. And it stemmed from an intense desire for everything to be accurate along with a desire to be right. I wasn't doing it to get attention or to deliberately cause problems (although in retrospect I can see how it looked that way). In any case, my parents were patient with me, and I grew out of it (after several *years* of gentle talks about how different doesn't necessarily mean wrong ;)). Anyway, my way of dealing with child-me now would be to follow my mom's advice for polite-acknowledgment-yet-not-agreeing-or-disagreeing-with-someone's-statement (because I was generally too quick to say "you're wrong"): "You might be right." It's almost always true and it doesn't invite argument - it doesn't require you to say you agree when you don't or require them to agree when they don't - and it's a useful phrase in life. And I would, at neutral moments, channel my dad and try to teach my dc what he taught me about different mostly being different and not wrong, and how 90% of arguments don't really matter and it is better to save your energy and reputation for the 10% that do. And I would try to teach that by example, too - by not trying to win every one of those arguments my child started ;). My parents choose not to engage most of those - and what better way to teach the importance of choosing your battles and respecting others than by doing it yourself :). They were able to let those little things go when I couldn't - a living, breathing example of what maturity looks like compared to immaturity - and a powerful example that has stuck with me.