Monday, February 20, 2006

This Is How It Was, 2006 – The Suburbs of Washington, D.C.

The faces in my classroom – how can I explain what I see?

I work with groups of homeschool students, ranging in age from ten to eighteen. The younger ones don’t remember what the world was like before 9/11. But the high school students do remember. Furthermore, these older students are news hounds and follow both national and international developments.

Here in the D.C. area, air cover and Norad drills occur with some frequency and can come at any hour of the day or night. Sometimes we know in advance of the drills, sometimes we don’t. And occasionally the military jets and helicopters roar overhead during class. If the noise is prolonged, I see the worry on the faces of my students. They look to me and to any parents present for affirmation that they are going to be safe. If the roaring goes on long enough, someone makes a cell-phone call to the outside, just to be sure.

Right after 9/11, the older students, especially the boys, would puff up and brag, “We’re going to beat the enemy. We’re going to kick them back.” But now, none of the students talk like that any more. The realization of the enemy’s strength and persistence has set in. And I see that realization on the young faces in my classes. Sometimes their faces don’t look so young. I see furrowed brows and worry lines, and eyes too old.

Since Ahmadinejad has ramped up his rhetoric, the mood in my classes – especially in my American government and American history classes – is solemn. Second-semester classes began in January, and this second semester my students are subdued, not their normal selves. They haven’t given up hope, but they are wary of what the future holds – their own futures and the future of the free world.

I reassure my students as much as I can. But I won’t avoid discussing the difficult facts of world developments. I won’t lie to my students, and I won’t utter meaningless platitudes. We talk openly of the Global Jihad and of how, in the past, other totalitarianisms have been defeated by sword and pen. I try to communicate both hope and reality, but sometimes world developments make that balance hard to attain.

The faces of my students remind me of how important the future is and of what’s at stake as the West faces the Islamofascist attacks upon and the Islamifying subversion of Western civilization. And even during class, I am always listening for the sound of scrambling jets, especially when the day holds a cerulean blue sky like the one we had on 9/11.

14 comments:

elmers brother said...

AOW, interesting perspective. I fear the fight may last several generations .

John Sobieski said...

You're lucky. In a growing number of our classrooms, our students are taught about the beauty and inner peace Islam can bring. Susan Douglas and the CIE have been busy, busy bees cleaning up all those erroneous textbooks in the US. Yes, we are allowing Muslims to document their history from an American and Western perspective. Isn't that something.

Always On Watch said...

JMJ,
Glad that you liked my post. You've brought up several interesting points.

I bet if you had a class discussion about ideas to counter these threats, the class would just light up and be energized. Course, you would probably get flack from the parents once they heard about it.

As John Sobieski mentioned, I am lucky. As a homeschool teacher, I have the full support of the parents! In fact, the parents follow my blog and actually send me information and ideas to use therein. Oh, I'm sure that some parents don't care for some of the discussions I have, and I've lost a few families because of my outspokenness. But most of the parents are doing their own part in this war--some in the military, some supporting the evangelical missions field, and all keeping their children out of the tainted public schools.

It's been a while since we had the-what-to-do-to-combat-Islamofascist-threat discussion, though we often had that discussion up until this semester. But this semester, world events (Hamas's election, Ahdmadinejad's threats) have depressed all of us.

I think I'll open up the discussion you mentioned--might revitalize them.

What would be your take on, once these kids are a little older (young adult - military age), some of the computer techies (although in their generation most are by definition just that) being willing to try to do their part on the internet in the GWOT?

Based on what some of our graduates are doing now, some will be entering the military (One is at West Point right now!), some politics, some law enforcement, some teaching, some the missions field (These are Christian homeschoolers, most whose minister has been screaming about the threat since Saudi started funding mosques in the 1990's). Only a few of my homeschoolers are the techie types. Those who have gone on to large, public universities find themselves opposing their pc professors, but those in smaller, conservative colleges find more support for their politically incorrect convictions.

You make an excellent point that I can discuss with my classes how these students can do their part! I'll emphasize the importance of abrogating the nothing-we-can-do-about-it mindset in my classes this week and see what the reaction is.

Always On Watch said...

Elmer's Brother,
I guess that I'm ever the teacher. I see most of life through a teacher's eyes and often take advantage of "the teachable moment." Sometimes I scrap the lesson plans and teach what needs to be taught at the moment.

I agree that we are in for several generations of trouble.

Always On Watch said...

John Sobieski,
My groups of homeschoolers are very politically incorrect. I am, too, so we're a good fit. Hehehe.

Even though we're careful in selecting texbooks (We never use the major secular publishers because of the influence of Susan Douglass and the CIE), I still find that I have to correct some of the material.

But our books are pretty good. For example, in the American history textbook we have a lot of information about the war with the Barbary pirates. And I bring in my own information as well, of course. I also encourage my students to read Robert Spencer, Trifkovic, Mark Alexander, as well as some others who don't take the pc position. Homeschoolers are generally avid readers and often read materials I suggest, especially over the summer.

If things work out, I'll be teaching world history next term. Won't that be interesting?

I'm sure that I wouldn't last long in a public-school classroom. But I am reaching a small-by-comparison group of young people, and I don't discount the ripple effect.

Since graduating, a few of my students have had "run-ins' with Muslims, on campus or in the workplace. These students contacted me as to how to counter what they were dealing with.

I'm sure that there are others like myself--parents and contracted teachers--doing the same as I do. Maybe the numbers are small, but often truth-tellers are in the minority. But being in the minority doesn't mean that we can't have an effect. I always try to keep that in mind.

Always On Watch said...

Last week, one of my uninformed parents mentioned that Islam is a religion of peace. When I pointed out to her that the Medinan verses supercede the Meccan verses, her jaw dropped. I hope that she followed up on what I told her.

What was somewhat amusing about that incident is that one of the students already knew exactly what I was talking about. There's some hope, huh?

Mark said...

Excellent blog, AOW!

I'm sure you convey to your students the importance of being resolute and firm and tough with the enemy. All qualities sadly lacking in today's world.

Lucky you! You seem to have exemplary students there!

Always On Watch said...

Mark,
Yes, I am lucky. The money isn't great, but money isn't everything. In fact, one reason I left traditional education is that I could no longer compromise my beliefs.

I'm sure you convey to your students the importance of being resolute and firm and tough with the enemy.

As the Southern saying goes, "Ya better believe it!"

Always On Watch said...

Eyes,
I like the suggestion to teach counter-measures. Do you have a gun class? I think next year when you teach history, you should teach the value of the 2nd Amendment:>)

I don't have a gun class, but many of my students are members of the NRA. We frequently discuss the importance of the Second Amendment, and the students themselves have brought up that the individual's right to bear arms is a protection against terrorism.

Sure, those of us connected with the homeschool movement are few in number. But some private schools are on the same truth track. Therein, with the truth, lies the hope. Remember that "the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world."

BTW, where I meet with my homeschoolers recently put in security cameras. I wonder if the facility has received a threat of some type. Could be, as the organization which owns the building is quite pro-active politically and provides shelter to Christian converts from Islam.

Cubed © said...

You guys understand the "secret weapon" of winning this conflict--information, knowledge of the ideas that promote the conflicting viewpoints and the actions to implement them.

Our people are clueless; our centralized, government-controlled system has long been seized by the enemy (read: The postmodernists), and now has complete control over what our kids are taught, that being everything under the umbrella of PC.

You who are homeschooling, be it on a large or small scale, are virtually our only chance. You can go down to the nearest book store and avoid the Whitewash Islam Textbook Publishing Company and buy trade books instead.

You are the last bastion of free enterprise in the realm of ideas.

I do believe there are more of "us" than "they" would have us believe, but that's us, our generation. We have to let the future understand the nature of what it is that we are trying to hold onto, and what Islam and the Postmodernists are trying to take from us.

If we fall into another Dark Age, it will take a very long time to climb out of it.

I look at what's going on today, everything from bombs to dawa to borders to ports to a population made politically correct sacrificial lambs to an unspeakable fate, and I always think of that line from a song sung by Arthur in Camelot, the one that says of Camelot ". . .a bright shining moment. . ." and I am sometimes so afraid that it will become our epitaph.

You all are our last line of defense.

Always On Watch said...

JMJ,
Good kernel of a lesson plan there. I'll print and save.

Always On Watch said...

JMJ,
In response to your EXCELLENT idea: I would like ask everyone to mention what they currently do as an occupation as well as what expertise they have in this world.

Teaching (language arts, history, debate/public-speaking, Spanish, Latin), research, editing essays (I specialize in teaching composition), organization of ideas expressed on paper and in public-speaking, curriculum research (I used to be a principal at a private school), access to a variety of books which give different ways to expose the ideology of Islamism and give me ideas how to reach people of different persuasions (Christian, Jewish, atheist, agnostic), interest in medical anomalies especially neurology.

What do I do for fun? Drive my Mustang GT convertible with the CD blaring rock from the 70's and 80's--top down, of course. I also enjoy reading Stephen King, but nothing he can now write scares me as much as the world situation today.

Always On Watch said...

Cubed,
the "secret weapon" of winning this conflict--information, knowledge of the ideas that promote the conflicting viewpoints and the actions to implement them....I do believe there are more of "us" than "they" would have us believe, but that's us, our generation. We have to let the future understand the nature of what it is that we are trying to hold onto, and what Islam and the Postmodernists are trying to take from us.

YES, YES, YES!!!

I refuse to give up! To the persistent and those in the right goes the victory. I will not believe otherwise.

Dag said...

I'm invited to submit my basic c.v. here. I'll have to wait until I can phrase it properly.