Don't know about the electoral college. In Australia there's a representative for each local area (not state), and you vote for them - they will be either a major party or an independent. The group with the biggest number of representative gets to choose the prime minister. Sometimes you do feel like your vote doesn't count, as your local area has voted a certain way for 20 years. Ours however changed hands this year which was exciting. But then we have the system where you don't just vote for the person you want, you vote for everyone in order from the person you want most to the person you want least. That way, even if you've voted for an outlier, your second choice is counted. So you can't 'waste' a vote the way you can in the US. It also means there are more smaller parties represented in parliament, like the Greens. It's not entirely fair (the Greens won 10% of the vote but have less than 1% of seats), but it's better than nothing.

Hi, I'm a special educator. I'd create a timetable and block out big chunks of time for self care/food/toilet/dressing etc. Gross Motor: pushing big balls, hitting hanging mobiles or balls hanging from the ceiling inside socks/stockings , crawling through tunnels, crawling over soft obstacles. Fine Motor: fingerpainting (use yoghurt/pudding if neccessary), playdough (use edible dough if necessary), posting items in boxes or bottles, putting egg shakers in egg cartons, building/knocking over blocks, for higher support needs, try giving them mittens or socks over their hands, and putting velcro on toys, so that 'picking up and moving around' is easier. Music Time: sing and use keyword sign language. Use toys to act out songs (eg ten in the bed, 3 jellyfish). Use instruments such as shakers and bells. Interaction Time: Peekaboo using hands, a cloth, a book, a teddy - mix it up. Rolling a ball to and fro (vary 1,2,3 - go! and ready set go! and so forth - mix it up). Roll a car to and fro. Hide a ball or balloon under the kids shirt, they pull it out, you do it again - lots of fun and laughter and flexible thinking needed. Matching Time: match real objects to real objects for some kids, match picture to picture for other kids. Important for communication. Say, "put the cup on the cup!" etc etc. Sensory Time: water play, shaving cream (or whipped cream to avoid chemicals), set toys in jello for the kids to claw out, try tubs with autumn leaves, or a big box full of stuffed toys the kids can lie in. Cover them with soft blankets and pull off. Jump on beanbags together. Always think - is the kid doing it, or is it me? Kids are allowed to say no, and allowed to want to continue the activity past when you think it's all done. I went to one centre where "art" was grabbing a kids hand without permission, shoving it in finger paint, shoving it on paper. That isn't art, that's coercion. Hope that helps!

I am hoping for a consumable xmas as our house is so small. Art supplies, treat food, nice handwash, kindle vouchers, music vouchers.

I replied in the other thread but I don't think you saw it. There has been some good research linking ability in spatial awareness to later maths ability. So being able to mentally rotate shapes, discern background and foreground, and understand perspective are all important for later maths. I am pretty sure someone linked an article fairly recently about it, how a small intervention in the early days could have big payoffs. I used a handwriting program from the UK for my daughter (write from the start, I believe?) which focused on spatial stuff. I was astonished that, for example, in a page of pictures she couldn't tell what was foreground and what was background. It was just so obvious to me. However, we covered tesselations in year ten. That is a bit late I reckon. I would say that playing with tesselations as a little kid, preschool, kindergarten, using real tiles and maybe building up complexity over time would be the most effective.

Ah, ok, Well, one of my suggestions would be a chapter or something on family culture. Really understanding what your family culture is - we read in our family, we make in our family, we find things out in our family, we spend time outdoors in our family - knowing that with all education, what you do is far more powerful than what you say. I think that education quite naturally flows from this.

Wonderful news! I think the process you used is amazing - immersing the whole family in ASL. Thank you for sharing.

Love nature? Read The Hidden Life of Trees. It is magical.

I think we get those double word phrases from anglo-saxon poetry? hearth and home, kith and kin, hale and hearty, I think the nook and cranny fit in from the last 'k' sound. The anglo saxons loved those alliterations, and evidently we do too.

Yes, it has been inspirational to me and I recommend it to everyone. It is sad to me that people feel that children who are gifted should be allowed to follow their interests, whereas the other end of the spectrum has to follow completely adult-directed instruction. I really love the descriptions of the children and young people she worked with who had quite high support needs and yet she was able to find what was important to them.

Wasn't there an article someone posted recently about how early spatial awareness was related to being good at maths and science later on? It was basically saying that spatial awareness is trainable (by doing stuff like flipping tesselations in your head!) and we should be doing more of it. I agree playing with real tiles is the best way to learn how to do it.

Australia or New Zealand? You could homeschool, mild weather, beautiful and no language issue.

My daughter has been doing ballet from around 2 (RAD preschool curriculum), and will probably stop next year when she's six. I am not particularly interested in her doing ballet long term, but I am really happy with the preschool program - it exposes her to lovely music, she is learning to become part of a group and observe her teacher and other students, and she is learning to value what her body can do. I feel like it is just like music lessons, but active - and when I see that at the end of the year, she's able to complete a fifteen minute routine, I realise that they have far higher expectations of what preschoolers can achieve, compared with what her day preschool expects (singing along to a CD for two minutes).

So you're trying to get people to think about their ideal education without the restrictions of tradition? I'd be asking them to think about something THEY learned either as a young person or adult, and how they did so. For example, I've been interested in native bees lately. I might join the fb community group focused on local native bees, where there's discussions between people who might be both beginners and experts. I might enrol in a local course, led by someone who is passionate and experienced in the area, and yet may not have any letters after their name. I might experiment with native bee 'hotels' and devote some time to observation in my local area. I might write up a journal or start a blog about the bees in my area. I might search for some books, read the reviews to find the best one, compare different accounts. To me, a great deal of learning involves community - from the other people who write books to the other people who run courses to the other people who are beginners like me, who might ask questions I hadn't thought of yet. So, I would ensure your thought experiment included a broader question about community than just apprenticeships (even though I am all for apprenticeships), because I feel that community is essential. I like Papert's writings, and I like his constructionism, which is learning by making something that you're interested in, and share with your peers. The making and the peers are an essential part of the learning.

Another few - an international agreement has been brokered to make the world's biggest marine park near Antarctica, in the Ross Sea - currently the healthiest marine ecosystem on the planet. - Australia's newest national park is a migratory bird haven in South Australia, nearly 2,500 hectares - I've always wanted to try basket-weaving and there's a course up the road I've just enrolled in!

This is a thread for reporting good news, small, local, big, international - whatever. I know in my area we've had a sad few days and so sometimes I do need a dose of good news. I'll start . . . BP has decided NOT to drill in the Australian bight after lots and lots of protests. Our local council (govt) has voted to give the local women's cottage rent-free for the next ten years. They're newly voted in so this is a great sign that things may be changing. Megan Whalen Turner has written her fifth book in the "Thief" series, twenty years on, and it's out next year!! can't wait. add your own!

If you have a look at the book "The Whole-Brain Child" by Dan Siegel there's a chapter and even a cartoon of this exact situation, except it's where a boy doesn't want to continue woodwork due to cutting his hand. They advise getting the child to narrate exactly what happened, eg "I was doing gymnastics, I was doing blah-blah move, then I fell, and hurt my back, it really hurt, then mum helped me, and then it stopped hurting". It's a good book if you can get it. The idea is not dismissing what was a very scary incident, but also using it as a way forward - bad thing happened, you got through it, you will get through other things too.

I taught a little girl called "Paige Turner" - don't know if she ended up helping musicians though.

I found it very lonely to start with even though i knew people, because I didn't know 'my people'. I had to start my own group and that has been really successful in finding people who have a similar philosophy to myself - I've made 2 very good friends and we catch up regularly. Here's a really useful guide http://project-based-homeschooling.com/camp-creek-blog/introverts-guide-to-building-community

when we started ttc, we were advised both to get Hep B, so we did that. We were both given the DPT (that is diptheria/pertussis (whooping cough)/tetanus) for free when I fell pregnant (it was free at the time for parents and grandparents of newborns, not sure if that has changed). I then got the chicken pox booster after blood tests showed I might not be immune (even though I'd had it before) I think I had to pay for that, can't remember. I get the flu shot free every year as I'm an asthmatic. Before that, my last shots had been before travelling to do aid work, so early 20s. This is Australia - none of the shots too expensive.

I loved Robin McKinley's Sunshine and Pegasus, but Chalice was paper-thin and Shadows felt like Sunshine-remake. She has had a very hard and sad couple of years so I don't know if we will be getting any more from her. Diana Wynne Jones' later stuff was still interesting but not as good, same with Margaret Mahy. I agree that it would be related to pressure to write, especially in old age. Conversely, I find Tamora Pierce's early stuff unreadable, but I like her later books, the Trickster series and the Beka series. I also agree that some of the HP books could have done with some editing. Not 'lost the plot' level, but definitely some editing.

Do you mean like Robert Burns poetry - Scotch? O my Luve's like a red, red rose, That's newly sprung in June: O my Luve's like the melodie, That's sweetly play'd in tune. As fair art thou, my bonie lass, So deep in luve am I; And I will luve thee still, my dear, Till a' the seas gang dry. Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear, And the rocks melt wi' the sun; And I will luve thee still, my dear, While the sands o' life shall run. And fare-thee-weel, my only Luve! And fare-thee-weel, a while! And I will come again, my Luve, Tho' 'twere ten thousand mile!

We have both Magna Tiles and Tegu blocks - the kids play with the Magna Tiles and very rarely with the Tegu blocks. I've also just bought Brackitz - they're lots of fun too.

My five year old does use Duolingo, but she already had a bit of German to start with and could read well. Some of it isn't kid friendly though, like a whole lesson asking for beer and wine etc! I don't think it's ideal for little ones, but it has been fairly good for increasing vocabulary.

Is this about not finding your people, though? Do you have some friends who are the same as you? I am in an area where I have 2 good friends who are basically the same as me (we will still argue happily about various things without any acrimony), and then there are the next level of pleasant acquaintances who I'd chat about various things with but NOT politics or other certain topics, knowing it wouldn't end well. I did find it lonely here until I found my people - is that what you need?

Australia - Jean Galbraith, Writer in a Valley. Has she read "girls who look under rocks"? eta - another interesting Australian botanists was Louisa Atkinson, the first person to publish an Australian novel. I haven't found any books written about her, but you could research online.