Mission

They were grumbling about the "No Child Left Behind" thing which teaches to a test in the PiP forum and it made me curious about what people thing the best way to educate kids is. This isn't meant to be a political discussion (Politics taint too many things already, why let it spoil education too?) and is certainly not meant as I am posing it as a place to discuss the election-related policies. It's more a question of what is the best way to educate people in their required schooling. It seems to me that the problem revolves more around the fact that schools are designed to be one-size-fits-all because of several factors, among them 1) It's easier (and thus cheaper) 2) Teachers tend to be people who prefer more predictability than average (This is an over-generalization, not true in all cases, but fairly accurate on the average.) 3) We decide we want more ____ and we orient the standard to that. (The blank changes with the vagaries of the social perception of what will be needed in the future - right now I think the magic compass is pointed towards health care based on discussions with kids in their first two years of college. We occasionally hear about the need for engineers and scientists as well. Whatever it is, it's seems to be primarily based on the short-term view of the world.) 4) A desire for testability - results must be proven. 5) The mandatory teaching of certain skills are highly valued by our society and must be taught - such as reading, texting and arithmetic. I am well out of school, although I usually take college classes to keep my mind spinning. But I have no flipping clue what is being taught in the required portion of education today. I suspect it is vastly different than what (and how) I learned. (Naturally, the way I was educated at the starting level was definitely the best way and it makes no sense to me that it was ever changed. I'm sure you'll find this to be true in your case as well, but since it has...) What'll it be? How should we do it? Any thoughts? (I know, it's a huge topic. Play with it. Be nice and avoid the temptation to parrot the political eyewash.)

Why? I wasn't surprised when the Republican oil baron was the front runner and oil dropped in the weeks following the election, the rose right after. But does Obama have any ties to big oil? (He says, knowing full well the answer is all these guys have ties to big oil, and other big business.) Ours is not to question why. If my prediction comes true, I have doubts that who gets elected is relevant to the fact that it will go up. Kinda' like my expectation that the stock market will settle down measurably within the weeks following the election. (It actually has more to do with uncertainty than anything.)

Those pesky statistics projects! I did one on the pub about two years ago. My first question is almost the same as yours and may actually be of use to you, especially for members who are no longer around. I posted it in two places on the forum: http://pyracy.com/index.php?showtopic=10210 http://pyracy.com/index.php?showtopic=10209 I'm attending 3 events this year.

As in...explaining 18th century surgery and surgical tools? (Among certain other things...)

Well, Bucky's off to Key West to play with Harry and the Bone Island Buccaneers next week. I guess they're doing some kind of Halloween-Pirate thing. I never got a shot of the finished skeleton inside the gibbet, but I got lots of photos of the thing in development. So if you want to see that, check it out, see my web page: http://www.markck.com/images/Piracy/Gibbet...ed%20Pirate.htm He should be in Key West by Friday...lucky Bucky.

How much will you bet that the price will go back up within weeks of the election?

Some things never change. Got this in my email today [link removed]: "n A Spy-device that lets you watch trough the clothes. ky7" And, from Popular Science, 1965: (Notice that both have typos in them...although you might be able to argue about "An hilarious..." It is my understand that "an" is primarily used in front of a word beginning with 'h' only when the 'h' is silent or the speaker is snobby. ("An historical" seems to be one of the exceptions, although it is proper either way from what I understand.))

You don't have to look very far to find examples of pirates being cruel to other pirates. Blackbeard turned it into something of an art. As for cat's buried treasure...you go hunting for it.

I am certainly no expert on soap, so I looked it up. From the Wiki entry on Soap: "Lye Reacting fat with sodium hydroxide will produce a hard soap. Reacting fat with potassium hydroxide will produce a soap that is either soft or liquid. Historically, the alkali used was potassium hydroxide made from the deliberate burning of vegetation such as bracken, or from wood ashes." Unless I misunderstand it, it sounds like soap can be made from a chemical that comes from ashes. However, it also sounds as if the only component required was the alkali produced from the ashes -- although how this was used in the soap is not explicitly explained on the Wiki page.

It looks like this: (My feeeet!)

Hard tack. On one of the week long canoe trips I made years ago, we used rocks. Many of the islands we camped on were basically rock, so you couldn't drive stakes. Plus it reduced the amount of weight when you had to portage, because you didn't carry the rocks with you, you found them at the campsites. (This presumes there are enough decent-sized rocks laying around. Unfortunately, I don't recall this specifically being the case at Fort Taylor. And coral is too light to do the job. Still you could bring your own if you're driving.)

There are the two short PiP Videos Aminijiria (Jack) made last year: http://s68.photobucket.com/albums/i36/aman...01revamp3-1.flv http://s68.photobucket.com/albums/i36/aman...capeattempt.flv

Heads up! Someone told me airline tickets were really cheap right now, so I plugged in a flight corresponding to my flight dates and...it would have been quite a bit cheaper ($410 RT vs $540 RT) for me to fly direct in to Key West if I had booked now than when I booked in March. (And that was before all the gas price nonsense occurred!) So if you've been waiting, you may do well to visit your friendly net purveyor of airline tickets and check the prices for yourself. For the heckuvit, I looked up Salt Lake City to Key West leaving Dec. 1 and returning Dec. 8 and came up with a lowest fare of $547. (From Expedia.) Hint, hint.

I could hang it on my porch, but it'd probably get stolen. And all door-to-door salesmen are a nuisance. If I want to obtain something (including a voter's registration or a political candidate), I'll seek it out myself.

I'll be there, although I won't be eating the pig.

Looks like he's part of an assault team! (Surprised by James Bond and some goofy underwater gadget, no doubt.)

That almost sounds like jet fuel pricing to me. Say, since jet fuel has gone down too, shouldn't they axe that stupid luggage charge? (And that answer is: No.)

That's what they tell you, anyhow. Actually, curiously enough, I just found out a little about the Federal gas taxation gig yesterday. I was talking to a Michigan Senator and he explained that the whole national gas taxation thing works out to the advantage of states with roads that allow for better East-West or North-South national travel. Ergo, (if I understood him rightly) if you live in a state in the middle of the country, you get more than a dollar back from the federal gov for every dollar paid in. If you're a state on the edge the country, you get screwed. As it turns out, MI gets $0.90 back for every $1 paid in. So we are also an ATM for the inside states. (Lesson: never let the federal government decide how local money is allocated. Of course, the genie is out of the bottle now and the federal government almost never gives up power it has managed to stea - er, procure from the states.)