Family Photo

Haven't had a successful one of these in years, and not sure we did here, but needed one to send to a friend in India, so thought I would share..

CSAS

We are camping out/checking in this week for CSAS - Chattanooga School for the Arts and Sciences. Described by someone I know as, Getting to send your kid to private school for free--we have eventually learned to accept the few reasons given for camping out to get our son in there as acceptable, though we still may consider Battle Academy or Normal Park.

Here are some answers we gave to the essay questions on the application form:

1. How do you view your role as the parent of a child in a Paideia school?

Our role is to support our child, his classmates, the school and other parents as we watch our child learn and grow. We are looking for a school where parental input is welcomed and expected and we want to play an active role in our child's education.

2. What do you picture your child doing in a Paideia school?

We want our son to love learning. This, we believe, comes from being encouraged to explore his interests, to be introduced to new ideas, and to be a part of an engaged, respectful, learning culture. We want him to do lots of different things that we didn't get to do in school--more than just book learning.

3. Share your attitudes regarding how children are taught in a school that may sometimes exclude textbooks and lecture?

We LOVE the idea of a school that reaches out to young minds in non-traditional ways. We want our son to be smart, but more than that, we want him to become a caring, compassionate, and capable citizen.

4. What would you consider a discipline policy for your child to follow in class?

My child should be able to respect diversity of people and ideas and should held accountable for his actions. Discipline and respect are central to learning and we would be comfortable with a zero-tolerance policy regarding violence. Our son should be able to control himself or be able to be controlled with minimal redirection.

A school policy of respect for others, for school property, and for learning should be prevalent.

5. How would you discuss with your child after they attended a seminar in which beliefs or opinions are presented that are in opposition to your own?

We consider ourselves very open-minded and tolerant, though we do have strong religious beliefs ourselves. After hearing an opposing idea we would welcome the idea of discussing these viewpoints with our son, helping him discover his own positions on the issue, and to encourage him to always look for evidence to understand the matter further and to ALWAYS keep an open mind.

"I would like to have seen Montana.."

No longer will I have to repeat this line from Sam Neil in Hunt for the Red October, for now I've seen a bit of the state, Glacier National Park and Yellowstone in Northwest Wyoming. We had a great trip with the grandparents and hope to go back to see more of each park someday soon..
Picasa Web Albums - chris - Montana - DSC_0602.JPG

New House photos

Well, here are some photos of the new house before we began fixing it up. Should have some new photos up soon for the before and after, but if you can't wait take a look:

Family Fun Weekend

Even though we haven't picked strawberries or ridden in a carriage downtown yet, we're having a great Willis family weekend!

Florida vacation?

Other than our dog chewing up my sister's carpet in her newly-purchased condo, we've had a great trip. Heading home tomorrow, but here are some snaps of our memories:

Buying this house..

..that is, if we can sell our current house. But, if all goes well, this blue house (soon to be dark gray) will be ours--hopefully in time for a ginormous birthday party for Jackson this August. We'll see!

Lots of work to do now on our house, plus having to keep it clean for showing. Ugh! Anybody want a bargain on a slightly used, dirty house?

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Family photo

via PhotoBooth

Long time no blog..

Well, after 3 months or so of not posting, at least anything substantive, I thought I would break the silence. Everything is going great for the Willis family with no major sicknesses or unfortunate events, so that's good. Jackson is huge now, very stubborn and opinionated and also incredibly sweet. Kerry is slowing working her way up the corporate ladder at BCBST and I am doing the same ol' thing here at UTC. I jokingly refer to my difficulties at home as being tedious and depressing with my students, but the truth is that I couldn't possibly be any happier or more blessed.

School is moving along for me, though somewhat slower than my classmates since I'm not taking any electives yet. If I start my dissertation this summer I may be out by 09. Made my first B in the program this semester. Hopefully I'll be more on top of my game next semester.

Nothing much else going on right now. Catching up on movies and tv shows I've been missing, hopefully doing some pleasure reading over the holidays. Suggestions?

Played Hide and Seek with Jackson for about an hour last night and it was about the most fun I've ever had.

Good post on "Gentle Fathering"

Check out this guy's prosaic family snapshot: http://litterateur.chattablogs.com/archives/036919.html

Blogging Hiatus

Though it may seem like I've taken a month off from blogging, I've actually been storing up a huge backlog of stuff that I'm going to be dumping here for the next few days. Have been extremely busy though. Here's what's happened:

My parents are moving! From Morrison to Cornersville. The new congregation my Dad will be preaching at seems very energetic and friendly and ready to work, so my folks will be happy there.

My grandmother's and uncle's houses were hit by the tornadoes in West Tennessee 2 weeks ago. The damage can be seen below. Her house had all the glass blown out of the windows and Uncle Gene's house was completely destroyed. Everyone is OK, but still pretty shaken.

Other than that I've been super busy with school, I wrote an article I plan to submit to a journal about the curriculum of museum schools, and I've been managing to have awesome family time and enjoying my son. Oh yeah, I practically did everything for this as well.

I guess that's it. Like I said, stay tuned for more.