homeschool curriculum | homeschoolers | character trait

Quotes
Alexis de Tocquerville, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams,
James Madison, Edmund Burke and Thomas Jefferson

What ever homeschool curriculum you use, I believe you will find the following quotes most valuable when teaching American History.

Alexis de Tocquerville
“America is great because she is good. If America ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.”

Benjamin Franklin
 ”Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters. ”

John Adams
“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate  to the government of any other. ”

James Madison
“To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue and the people ,is ato miracle idea.”

Edmund Burke
“Society cannot exist unless a controlling power upon the will and appetite is placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.”

Thomas Jefferson
“The price of freedom is eternal vigilence.”

These quotes open a wide range of discussion opportunities with your children about the things that matter most in their lives. As Benjamin Franklin also wrote: “There is no happiness then but in a virtous and self-approving conduct.”
Benjamain Franklin’s The Art of Virtue, p.35

i invite you to visit our web page on how to enrich your homeschool currlculum.

     Homeschool Curriculum and Keynesian Economics

The chances are pretty high that you have not thought of, or even had a reason, to teach your children about Keynesian economics. I didn’t encounter Keynesian economics until I was in an economics class in college.

The idea behind Keynesian economics is that governments can stimulate a sluggish economy through deficit spending. By pumping more money into the economy, people will have more money to spend and the economy will rebound creating enough federal revenues through taxes to offset the deficit.

Interestingly enough the  idea has more or less worked in the past, largely because of rapid population growth and a robust economy driven by technological advances.  It did stimulate the economy in many cases, but our leaders found other uses for the increased revenues than paying down the debt. Now, in our current economic crisis, Keynesian economics is not working, and in fact, is making the crisis more severe. In subsequent posts,  I’ll be talking more about this important issue.

For the moment, I simply want to focus on why it is important for you to understand its implications for you as a homeschooler and what you need to be teaching your children at a very early age.

In essence, as a nation, we will be passing on to your children and my grandchildren a financial burden they may not be able to bear.  My generation, and yours as well, has had neither the will  or the wisdom to effectively deal with the problem.  And, all indications are that many of the rising generation are pretty much used to getting what they want without having to worry too much how to pay for it.

So, where will they get either the will of the wisdom if we simply teach them think and do as we currently think and do? The answer is that we need to help them develop emotional, social and thinking skills at a much higher level than frankly, most of us possess. Skills, not likely found in whatever homeschool curriculum you may be using.

I invite you to visit our webpages Homeschoolers and Homeschool Curriculum to learn  more about what we are doing at Choiceskills to help children develop these skills and I invite you to become a ongoing part of the discussion by subscibing to this blog and sharing your own ideas.