I’m actually a little bit of a cynic when it comes to Christmas stories. I don’t think songs like Christmas Shoes are adorable, I think they exploit people’s grief and emotions. Yet for some reason – partly knowing my children would be asking to read Christmas stories at some point
Continue readingAuthor: christyk
Another Step to Take: Creating Political Change: activism and slacktivism
Yesterday I wrote about trying to be active in lobbying the government even while looking after my children. Writing letters, supporting organizations, learning about the issues, participating in protests and rallies and talking to my local politicians are all things that can fit into my schedule. Yet do they do anything? Are
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Day to day life and looking at the larger issues too
This weekend I took one son to beaver camp. Then later at home we set up our Christmas tree and sang Christmas carols. This morning the boys did some schoolwork and then played lego. My daughter took an early nap. Then with all the children occupied, I turn my attention to
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: safety, efficiency, cost of human lives and work
My children watched part of Back to the Future III a few days ago and afterwards expressed surprise at the amount of walking on train tracks that happens in the show. “Isn’t that dangerous?” they asked and I fumbled to explain how the absolute risk wasn’t that high but that
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Homeschooling Weekly Round-Up Post
This week has been a pretty decent week, homeschooling-wise. Mostly the seven year old did math and writing practice, and the four year old reading and math practice. My four year old made some pipe-cleaner letters, which were actually meant more for math practice than reading/writing practice. I wanted to
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Book Review: Shannen and the Dream for a School
I found a great book. It is a chapter book, about two hundred pages long but with big font and small pages. The story tells of a young native girl who dreams about having a real school instead of the small portable classrooms they have to make do with. In
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Adventures of Baylard Bear and the portrayal of adoption.
I was sent a copy of The Adventures of Baylard Bear by Lucinda Sue Crosby and while the story has its cute moments it has some huge problems. Since I use books to explore life and the questions I have about life, I felt it worthwhile to go ahead and write up
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Tales From a Child of the Enemy
With Remembrance Day (and Veteran’s Day) coming up tomorrow, I find myself drawn back to a book I picked up a couple of years ago. It is a book of poetry called Tales from a Child of the Enemyby Ursula Duba. Ursula Duba was born in Germany at the outbreak of World
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Reasons to NOT Support Operation Christmas Child
It is that time of year, where people are talking about getting together shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child. While I think it is great to try to give extra joy to others, I want to write to urge people not to support this program. Why? Let me count the reasons.
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Message to my American friends. Please vote.
It is election time in the States and some of my political friends are posting on facebook text-in-box images that say that voting is legitimizing whatever government gets elected and that the better thing to do is not vote. I grew up hearing that if you don’t vote you don’t
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: A Handful of Ways to Reduce Poverty
As I was becoming involved with my local Coalition Against Poverty, I found myself surfing the webpages of other poverty reduction groups. The Peterborough Poverty Network has a wonderful poster listing 101 Ways to Reduce Poverty. Many of their suggestions are local to Peterborough, but some of them are relevant anywhere. Some
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Complexities of Affirmative Action
When I first heard about the court case in the USA Supreme Court of a Texan who claims that she was denied access to the further education of choice because less qualified minority students were accepted on the basis of race, my first instinct was to think poorly of the
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: down the rabbit hole
It feels a bit like I fell down a rabbit hole yesterday. I spent part of the day with a couple that might be getting evicted from their apartment. They were given an eviction notice saying they had 10 days to leave. The legal clinic said it wasn’t a legal
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Refugee Rights Day and Bill C-31
April 4th was Refugee Rights Day. Most of us probably didn’t notice that, but its worth looking into what is going on right now with regards to changes to Canada’s refugee system. The second reading of Bill C-31 is going to take place sometime after April 22. When I think
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: Protesting is only the beginning
Yesterday was a rally that I had some involvement in organizing. The adorable picture to the left is of my son as he marched up and down by himself while most people were eating. He was chanting as he marched. “Stop the war on the poor, make the rich pay.”
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: A Plan to Strengthen What???!!
Today I was surfing the internet when an advertisement caught my eye. It was an ad for a contest put on by the Manning Center for Building Democracy. (http://manningcentre.ca/conference/?page_id=379) The Dragon’s Den style contest offers a $10,000 prize for the best plan to “strengthen conservatism, free markets, or democracy.” Yikes! I should
Continue readingAnother Step to Take: The Trouble with Inequality
Driving home this evening I heard a few minutes of a radio show talking about inequality. Someone was arguing that as long as there isn’t a poverty problem, it doesn’t matter if some people are incredibly, incredibly wealthy. The person kept saying that as long as people made their money
Continue reading