I published an article called Coperthwaite on Educating Children on Suite101.com. It’s a summary of William Coperthwaite’s views on the ills of traditional schooling and family life, and the roles of nature, community and physical labor in the education of children. Food for thought, definitely, for the home and unschoolers among you! Enjoy.
Author Archives: kaat
One Local Summer – Week 2
It’s only week 2 of One Local Summer – which now has its own website! – and I already feel the impact of seasonal eating: no more asparagus, and no potatoes and onions yet. But there are still heaps of leafy greens in their prime, juicy young garlic and garlic scapes, and the newly arrived …
Small questions and confessions
Look at this beautiful glass bottle! Clean, easy to clean, quite difficult to break, not too heavy, with a good seal. So useful. Yet it – together with the lemonade that came in it – was only $2.99. Could that really be its cost? Could that really be its value? I still use my electric toothbrush …
iPhone vs. Moleskine, Da Vinci Code vs. Umberto Eco
Two conversations. The Future: Star Trek or Middle Ages? We were noting all those people cueing up in front of the stores to get their hands on an iPhone. – “Idiotic,” I judged, “an irrelevant piece of junk”. – “Sacrilege!” DH countered – he’s not wanting to get an iPhone, he was just defending what …
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One Local Summer – Week 1
Food Photography It’s an art! Who knew? The shopping and the cooking and the eating were fun – that is one of the rules of One Local Summer – but the photographing not so. Dinner  This was our dinner tonight, for the first edition of One Local Summer: I’m a vegetarian and since I was the …
Homesteading for a Happier Child and Community
Dreaming We are dreaming about moving to a new place. For us that means selling this one and buying another one of approximately the same price, which means that, if we want to move, we need to move out- out of Brookline. We’re currently in a 1050 sq.f. basement apartment in a condominium. We adore …
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Spilling Food
(another victim of spilled food) I’m in a quandary. Amie is 22 months old now and eats by herself, with a metal teaspoon and from a small glas bowl – we’ve done away with most of the plastics. She is pretty good at scooping up her food and getting it into her mouth. Still, often some …
Ernestine Huckleby, revisited
Ernestine I will keep on revisiting Ernestine Huckleby, who in 1969 sat down with her family to a meal of home-raised pork in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The hog had been fed grains that had been treated with the pesticide Panogen, which contained methyl mercury. Two months later, three of the children fell ill. Ernestine, just 9, was by …
Suite101 article on Bill Coperthwaite’s *Handmade Life*
I published a review of A Handmade Life, by William Coperthwaite, on Suite101.com.   It took me a long time to write this review, simply because I wanted to do the book justice. And 700 words are not enough to do it justice. There was, for instance, no space to treat Coperthwaite’s fascinating views on education …
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Jigsaw puzzle play with under-two-year-olds
I added an article on Amie’s puzzle skills in the Child’s Play section. Beside a short history of how Amie approached her jig saw and fit-in puzzles at around age 16-18 months (a history that is perhaps representative of other kids that age), there is also a funny VIDEO of her solving some jig saw puzzles at …
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