linkies

[ewt]

Time for the linky linky again.


Concerned about UK passport shenanigans and the National Identity Register? Don't despair. Move to Canada.

This is really hard. My home is in Britain, my friends are (mostly) in Britain, I have made a life here... but I'm having a hard time with some of the fucked-up stuff the government is doing. The NHS is being screwed over (have a look at Dr. Crippen's blog for a GP's side of the story), the education is bad enough that I've already decided that if or when I have kids I'll be home schooling them - okay I might do that in Canada too but it wouldn't be because I felt the standard of public eduction was too low - and incompetent bureaucrats are getting a lot of power, which means sooner or later the only way to NOT get screwed over is going to be bribery. Or just being invisible from the system entirely; inconvenient if you want health care, say, or income support after an injury prevents you from working the only black-market jobs you can get. I doubt I'll ever be able to afford land or even a flat of my own here.

I can't just transplant my life back to Canada at the clap of a hand - moving countries means starting over. Also I'd really hate to leave my partners behind, and it isn't fair to ask them to move for me. I don't think I'm going to be applying for British citizenship anytime soon, though. Sure, it would let me work in Europe, but... well. Maybe people will come to their fucking senses and get the Lib-Dems in by the time I finish my degree.

On a lighter note, someone set us up the bomb. At least this is down to incompetence rather than anything malicious. Whee.



Bah. All linked out now.

Comments

[doseybat.livejournal.com]

I would never home school my children. The most important point of school as far as I am concerned is to teach normal social functioning. Not learning a few facts here and there is less vital and can be caught up later if the child is so inclined, and if not I wouldnt really care.

I do not know much about the system in Canada but its not all bad over here imo.

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

Being put in a group of people all the same age to within a year for several hours per day is hardly 'normal' social functioning as per the standards we have for the rest ouf our lives... in reality we need to be able to get along with people who are older and younger than ourselves, too.

[doseybat.livejournal.com]

in reality we need to be able to get along with people who are older and younger than ourselves, too

Agreed. But the social skills necessary for dealing for people of different ages are pretty much the same as the ones you use for people your own age. A standard British state school would give you a randomish sample of kids from your area, from families of different social niches you would not normally socialise with. Which is excactly whats needed for learning to deal with people who are not like your family and friends.

[yady.livejournal.com]

It's not impossible to arrange that for your children without school, though. Sports clubs, scouting and such come to mind, as well as simply sending them outside to play and inviting people with children (of any age) over for visits. (The parents may be your friends but the kids aren't necessarily friends of your kids...)

[karen2205]

But the social skills necessary for dealing for people of different ages are pretty much the same as the ones you use for people your own age.

Not always - younger people are meant to 'respect their elders and betters' which requires a different set of social skills from those used with their peers.

In any event the children who will have the most trouble with social skills are those who have an Autistic Spectrum Disorder (and some children who have a langauge disorder). Those children won't pick up social skills by osmosis the way other children do ie. to a child with ASD it may not seem wrong for him to be sitting at his desk when the other children are on the carpet waiting for a story, and need to be specifically taught social skills by a speech and language therapist.

[karen2205]

There are other ways to teach socially acceptable standards of behaviour and allow/encourage children to make friends/deal with relationships with their peers than by forcing them into classes of 30 or so for 6 hours a day from the age of 4-16. I wouldn't home educate my children, because of the conflicts between being a parent and being a formal (rather than an informal) teacher. I would want them taught by professional teachers with me doing the things 'good' parents do and fostering a love of books and learning and making the most of everyday opportunities for learning.

Kids who are home educated don't usually spend 6 hours a day at a desk working through books alone or with a parent standing over them; they get a much more varied curriculum with some skills being taught in the course of everyday life (ie. how much maths and science can you learn by cooking?), the time to go on many more educational visits than kids at schools have and the time and energy to do lots of 'extra-curricular' activities (and it's here that kids get to meet and make friends with their peer group; children who aren't tired from a whole day at school could do say Brownies/Cubs one night, a dance class another, a drama class another, something sporty another and so on, which would be far too tiring for kids who spend the whole week at school. In areas where there are a number of families who home educate there are often home education circles that allow the children to get together to do subjects/activities that are best done in groups. For teenagers studying for GCSE it's possible to hire tutors in specific subjects. This can also be done for younger children ie. music or swimming lessons. A young person wanting to do GCSE/A level could also go and do specific courses at a local college. The time devoted to academic study is usually more profitably spent because the work can be guaged to the child's current level more accurately than is possible in a class of 30.

Generally the parents who home educate are good, responsible, committed, aware parents who have consciously made the decision to educate their children in this manner, so there's usually little danger of children growing up without learning the skills they need for adult life.

I'm now sounding incredibly pro home-education - it does have its downsides (ability to learn in a class situation is important for going on to do A Levels and degree courses for instance) it more or less requires, at least with younger children, one parent to not work which reduces the family income and in doing so possibly affects the dynamics of the relationship between the parents, there's less inherent structure to the year, which is one of the good things about home education but too little structure can be as bad as too much, unless parents employ tutors or organise events with other home educating parents there's fewer people for the children to learn from and it's nearly always better to be exposed to a range of opinions than just one or two, homes tend to have less space/equipment for messy play type activites so kids will miss out on things like this unless parents make other arrangements.

It's not what I would do for my own children but it's certainly a valid choice.

[arkady.livejournal.com]

Seconded.

I also know of several sets of homeschooling parents who basically team up together and effectively have their own small private school; different members of the group are responsible for teaching the children different subjects. The children are well socialised, and they go on group outings to various museums etc. yellowrocket has told me of one such group she knows in Wales, and it all works extremely well for them.

I am seriously considering it as a viable option for my daughter Freda when she is born.

[yady.livejournal.com]

Hm. It seems that if I'd want to move to Canada, all I'd need to do to be let in would be to improve my French a bit and maybe get a it of working experience under my belt...

(Not that I intend to move anywhere really, but if I ever would, Canada seems like one of the saner places to go...)

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

Yeah. Moving there is easy if you have any skills.

[yady.livejournal.com]

And this is not based on skills even, just on having a degree and speaking English and a bit of French...

I should probably do some proficiency test in English some time. Just in case.

[owlfish]

Give or take that to emigrate to Canada from the UK on a Skilled Workers visa and with no job offer, the backlog for processing applications right now is *three years*. Easy, but slow. With job offer, 6 months is what I last heard it'll take.

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

Meep that's a long time.

Maybe some of the provincial placement programs are faster? Or getting 'family sponsorship' sorted out... but eeep.

[elmyra.livejournal.com]

In the meantime, I'm looking at getting British citizenship. Ho hum.

I can see where you're coming from. I rather think it'll get worse before it gets better. For a start I'm having trouble seeing how the Conservatives won't win the next election, and that terrifies the hell out of me.

Have you considered International Baccalaureate schools (there are some British state schools which offer the IB)? (I really don't believe in home schooling...)

[purplecthulhu.livejournal.com]

The current stated conservative policies are a lot more civil liberties friendly than anything labour has said for years. That means a lot to me. They are also saying fairly sane things about the NHS and some aspects of education. My suspicion is that they've decided to stop being right wing loonies and give getting elected a try again. This worked for labour in the mid-90s, but they've rather gone off the rails now.

My own favoured result for the next election would be a hung parliament with the Lib Dems holding the balance of power. Hopefully they'd force a change in the electoral system to a more proportional approach which would ensure that we never get the kind of elected dictatorships Blair and Thatcher had. This would be a Good Thing - I suspect one of the reasons Canada has a lot of sane policies is that large majorities are very rare in their electoral system.

[elmyra.livejournal.com]

No. David Cameron's stated policies (where there are such) are more civil liberties friendly, and sound vaguely sane. The majority of the party membership and core Coservative voters would rather be seen dead than get behind those policies. The Daily Mail is >< this close to throwing its weight behind UKIP.

I'd like to give Gordon a chance actually. And I'd like to see the Lib Dems pull themselves together and get into the headlines for something other than the age of their leader and the fact that Lembit Opik is dating one of the Cheeky Girls.

[purplecthulhu.livejournal.com]

In much the same way that Blair forced saner policies on his party (for his first term at least) Cameron can do this to the conservatives. Also their thirst for power is now great enough to force sanity on them. I'd be happy to see the Mail go for UKIP, at least their neo-fascist tendencies would be in the open.

I think Brown is likely to be as bad or worse than Blair on civil liberties, but he should be given enough rope to hang himself. I'm not sure if Blair will allow that.

Definitely with you on the Lib Dem front! Its the way I've voted for the last several elections.

[fwuffydragon.livejournal.com]

I did most of the International Baccalaureate when I was in Australia. It's a much better course (I think) than A-levels, and I really enjoyed it. Having done both, I feel in a good position to have an opinion on this!

It means that you can leave it a little later to specialise and end up with a wider grounding AND YOU HAVE TO LEARN A LANGUAGE! It's a fantastic course and one that, as/when/if I have kids, I will definitely be considering as an option for them.

[elmyra.livejournal.com]

I did IB in Vienna. Having been through six different education systems at various stages in my life, I'm a total convert to the IB.

I strongly disapprove of specialising at the age of 16 - it produces people who have never done anything beyond maths, maths and some more maths on the one hand, and people who "don't do science" on the other. And they upset me. ;-)

[mr_magicfingers]

I'm looking at either Canada or New Zealand for the future. Unfortunately, although I'm skilled, my useage of the degree is insufficient (need 5 out of the last 10 years) and I quit the oil biz 8 years ago. It's looking like my only option is marriage.

Still, 3 months driving across the place this summer/autumn will confirm in my head whether to concentrate on there or NZ.

[pfy.livejournal.com]

I expect I could get into Canada with no trouble if I brushed up on my French a bit. I have never been there, but I absolutely loved the northern US when I visited.

Public services here are becoming expensively crap, as far as I can tell. If you can afford private education/healthcare/etc, things are fine (so long as you ignore the fact that you're still paying tax to fund the useless version of same), but if you're actually dependent on the State for anything, good luck to you.

I am expecting that everyone will decide they've had enough of the current bunch of incompetent control freaks and will vote 'anything but Labour' at the next election. Mind you, I hoped for that last time.

I can't see house prices growing at this rate forever. We already have people getting together with complete strangers to buy, taking on >25 year mortgages, borrowing >100% of the cost of the property, borrowing five times their salary, and so on. It all seems pretty desperate. I can't see how house prices can keep increasing faster than salaries for much longer.

[elmyra.livejournal.com]

I'm just not entirely convinced that "anything but Labour" is a good thing. Ho hum...

[pplfichi.livejournal.com]

Considering Cameron was in charge of all those liberal policies the Tory's had in the 2005 general election I would have to agree.