The Myths of Homeschooling #3
September 25, 2005
Posted by Dan Edelen in : Best of Cerulean Sanctum, Cerulean Sanctum Series, Christianity in North America, Homeschooling, Judgmentalism Feedback : 12 comments
If you haven't caught the first two parts of this series, they are here and here. Without reading those first, you'll be lost.
Myth #6: It is "more Christian" to homeschool
If you've been a Christian long enough you tend to realize that Christianity has taken a few steps backward in this country in the last thirty years, so it's probably not true that ANYTHING is "more Christian" today than yesterday. This applies to schooling, too, since the plain truth is that I've never met anyone my age who was homeschooled. I'm forty-two-years old, so this begs, "Were there no Christian parents before homeschooling took off in the late 1980s?"
Many of the homeschooling pundits today make it sound like you can't be a good Christian and not homeschool your children. But, wow, that's a huge slap in the face to their parents, isn't it? Since I've never met an individual my age who was homeschooled, most American parents of my own parents' generation were profligate in their children's educations by extension if you believe the pundits. If we are starting to define a Christian home by the fact that the kids are homeschooled, then this must mean our parents were slaving away in sin by allowing us to go to public school. And then there's the Protestant parents who sent their kids to private Catholic schools—now THERE'S some real sinners for you!
How foolish a myth like this is, but how often we hear it thrown out there by well-meaning ministries that never think through what they say.
Schooling options exist beyond homeschooling and none of them violate the essence of our faith. Too many people forget that it was Christians who started the public school system, and those pioneers evidently had no problem violating the supposed sanctity of school at home. Nor were those schools simply for the unbelievers or for slack parents. Good Christian parents sent their kids to public school.
I understand that today's public schools are a mess thanks to entrenched teachers unions and liberals who think along the lines of humanists like John Dewey. Still, there are other choices besides homeschooling, like charter schools, private schools, parochial schools and more.
God has not placed His sole imprimatur on homeschooling. In fact, I sometimes doubt how concerned He is with just how are children are educated and what methods are used in that education than He is that our kids serve Him and love Him with all their hearts, souls, and minds.
Myth #7: Homeschooling protects our children
Our children are not ours; they are God's. When we become Christians, we forfeit our rights to everything we own. We do not even own ourselves; therefore, we cannot "own" our children.
Would God have us build bunkers? Or is our light intended to shine in the midst of darkness? How long can we shelter our children before they must go out into a dark world and live as salt and light?
We miss chances to strengthen our children to stand up in the midst of a fallen world if we try to shelter them from the reality of wickedness this side of heaven. Better for us to teach them in the middle of the fray than to send them out untested with the hope that we covered every chink in their armor.
I'm not convinced a bunker mentality works. That line of thinking is based in fear and not love, in worry and not faith. Good parents will work with their kids to combat bad messages. If we want to train our children to think, what better way than to have them experience lies firsthand. My son and I sometimes turn on TV just to watch the commercials so I can work with him to unpack what is being sold to him. At barely 5, he can now tell me what is being sold, why, and how it is being packaged. If we had no TV in the house, would he be that wise? Hardly. But by exposing him to the world in supervised amounts, I know that he is using knowledge and God's truth to make wise decisions.
My own personal experience is that the truly sheltered, once out from underneath mom and dad's shadow, typically throw off the shackles. When I was at Wheaton College I could tell you which kids were under their parents' constant scrutiny. Once the all-seeing eyes were gone, the result became painfully clear, or to quote the rock band Kiss, "Junior's gone wild."
Myth #8: Homeschooled children are smarter than their peers
I looked for it forever online, but could not find a recent Ohio Department of Education survey that showed that homeschooled kids scored equal to or lower than their public and private schooled peers in the state's mandatory educational tests. Still, I remember reading that report and the statistics that backed up the conclusions and was startled—I expected the homeschoolers to be on par or higher, not on par and lower. With as many kids being homeschooled today—and the constant hype from homeschooling organizations—you'd think that test scores would be rising astronomically, but they truly aren't.
Yes, the National Spelling Bee champion and the National Geographic geography savant are likely to be homeschoolers, but we seldom hear about the many homeschooled kids who are barely above jello in intelligence. I meet kids like that, so they truly do exist. As much as homeschool proponents love to shine the spotlight on the 16-year-old med student who was homeschooled, they're tightlipped on the ones who never make it to college or who tanked the SAT or ACT.
I searched online for any Nobel Prize-winning scientists who were homeschooled and couldn't find a one. And though I did find one page that had interviews with Nobel winners who claimed to hate school, they obviously derived enough out of it to go on to become winners of that coveted prize!
Those are the myths for today. There will be one last concluding post in this look at homeschooling, so stayed tuned.
Until then, I'm breaking into my own series since there have been many questions asked and various comments made about my ability to discuss the topic of homeschooling at all. That was to be expected since any deconstruction of homeschooling is bound to rile at least a few people.
There've been questions as to my ability to comment on this, asking what my qualifications are. I mentioned some in the first post, but I'll go over this in more detail here:
- I graduated Summa Cum Laude from Wheaton College in 1992 with a degree in Christian Education. That degree's requirements included significant analysis of curricula of all kinds. Much of the curricula I scoured through was homeschool-related. In addition, I studied all the educational theorists and teaching styles, so I'm well-versed in both current and historic educational methods.
- I've written countless curricula myself in a variety of Christian and secular environments. I have more than a thousand hours of personal teaching experience.
- Before Wheaton, I taught outdoor education at several Christian camps in Ohio and Wisconsin, encountering numerous homeschoolers. This was my first exposure to homeschoolers and my fascination with the burgeoning movement led to further personal study of the trends within it.
- I've continued to follow all aspects of homeschooling, talked with hundreds of homeschooling parents from all over the teaching methodology spectrum, tracked the most important Internet sites related to homeschooling, read the hottest books in homeschooling circles, and generally have known what's what in homeschooling since 1987.
In short, I'm well qualified to discuss the topic. I've no problem if anyone wants to disagree with my conclusions, but impugning my experience isn't worthwhile.
Someone said that I was fronting for Wendell Berry by advocating "The New Agrianism." Well, I might very well be advocating agrarianism! Honestly, how well educated is a person who cannot feed herself or build himself a house? That used to be basic knowledge, but we've eschewed knowing how to cover the basics of food, clothing, or shelter for such relatively unusable pursuits as calculus, Latin, or Asian history. I'd just like to know why.
I also want to comment on an interesting outcome of this series. I've had both male and female commenters and it's interesting to me that the men seem to agree with my analysis of the current state of homeschooling more than the women do. Can't say exactly why that is, but I find it curious.
Your thoughts, as always are appreciated. And though I might not comment on each comment posted at this site, I do read and consider each one.
Blessings. Look for the conclusion to this series soon!
The Myths of Homeschooling #2
September 22, 2005
Posted by Dan Edelen in : Best of Cerulean Sanctum, Cerulean Sanctum Series, Christianity in North America, Homeschooling, Judgmentalism Feedback : 16 comments
If you didn't catch the first part of this look at the myths of homeschooling, you better click this link and start there or else you'll have no foundation from which to understand what follows.
With that, let's look at more myths of homeschooling
Myth #4: The ________________ method is by far the best way to homeschool kids
Fill-in that blank with "biblical," "classical," "constructivist" or whatever the hottest trend in homeschooling is and I'll bet dollars to donuts that it misses the point most of the time.
How so?
Here's a simple question, "What education is sufficient to ensure your child can eat in the future?" Truthfully, the education most of us received is wholly inadequate to ensure anything so basic as survival. Whenever I hear someone saying that they are giving their children a biblical education, I ask if they're teaching crop rotation and animal husbandry. That's what people in Bible times knew, right?
We've romanticized education to the point that it can provide little to people today. We think of ourselves as educated, but if push came to shove, could we feed ourselves without having to rely on others to provide food for us? Probably not. The farmer in Afghanistan may not know Java, quadratic equations, or the Suzuki method, but he can grow enough food to put on the family table.
When we look at what the people of Bible times were learning, much of it doesn't progress further than a fifth grade education. The problem is that a fifth grader today is never instructed in the things an agrarian society like that of Palestine 1000 BC taught as basic knowledge. They knew how to raise livestock and crops to feed themselves, but we place no merit on that today. To them, we would be fools running around spouting about American history and the value of Latin, but we'd die of starvation, our heads filled with spurious "knowledge."
What was true for people of Biblical or classical times is a whole 'nother set of realities that we have devalued. Do we teach our kids how to slaughter animals, manage crops, interpret the weather and all those other highly valuable bits if wisdom that people long ago used daily to live? Why not? What value is there in knowing that a particular mushroom's Latin genus name translates to "pretty maid of the forest" if we can't tell whether it's edible or not?
The flip side of this is just as painful. The value of certain kinds of educations are in constant flux. Does it pay to teach your child calculus if all the jobs that use it in the United States are fleeing to cheaper markets? What good is getting a degree in history if it's merely used for self-reference? In a global economy that is shifting its priorities constantly, can any of us be smart enough to snag the latest trend and impart it to our child quickly enough to enable them to ride the bleeding edge? Many of the people beholden to the new wave of classical homeschooling education believe with all their hearts they are teaching their children to think by filling their heads with Plato, Shakespeare, and Latin. But how practical is that kind of education? Perhaps the people of Bible times had it right. At least they could put their own food on the table when the day was done.
(As for Christians who are pushing the Latin thing—and I meet more and more each day—I�d like to know how Latin somehow trumped ancient Greek. I understand that Latin serves as the basis for several languages including our own, but with the stark exception of Spanish, Latin-based languages are dying out in the global marketplace. Might as well just learn Spanish. Yes, English uses a lot of Latin, but it uses more of other languages. At least with Greek a child could read the New Testament in its original language.)
Again, I wonder if the way we're educating our kids comes down to our own pride. So much of what I hear from homeschooling parents is a giant case of one-upmanship. We may have to swallow that pride, though. Kids just now entering their school years may find college costing a quarter million dollars for four years by the time they're eighteen. Are we prepared to meet a day when we can't afford to send our kids to college? What then? If we instructed them in a trade that's relatively impervious to the vagaries of globalism, taught them how to raise their own food, and instilled in them a solid Christian worldview, maybe that's the best we can hope for.
But is this what we're teaching?
Myth #5: A parent is a child's best teacher
Baloney.
That may have been true when the sum total of knowledge could be put into a three volume encyclopedia, but it doesn't work today. We live in a time when knowledge is increasing almost exponentially and no parent, no matter how wise, can stay on top of it all. This is true of both general knowledge and specific knowledge. A doctor graduating fifty years ago was required to know far less than a second-year med student today. And with the changes in medicine that occur almost daily, keeping up with the latest medical wisdom is a non-stop job for doctors. For those opening the newspaper, it's also easy to see how general knowledge builds and builds. Expecting any individual human to keep up with it on even a basic level is wishful.
While communities of the past understood that parents were essential in very simple education, almost everyone in that community would also agree that specialists imparted unique understanding that parents could not provide. An island mentality did not best serve their children then, nor will it ours today.
I say "baloney" above because too many parents think they can muddle through as the specialist in every situation with their kids. "Best teacher" often translates into "only teacher." When I hear parents telling me they are learning Euclidean geometry all over again in order to help their child learn, I've got to believe the child would do better talking to people who are experts in Euclidean geometry. The finest DVD or computer-driven curriculum will not be able to answer for parents who think they're experts, but are stumped at the very first question their kids ask.
I hear Christian parents also talking about how they can best teach their child the Bible, but I want to say upfront that Biblical wisdom, even in homes that seem like bastions of Christian thought, is disturbingly lacking. Generally, a fully developed Christian worldview simply does not exist, even in Christian households. (Nancy Pearcey repeatedly laments this reality in her book Total Truth; I would challenge everyone reading this today to ensure they read her book. It's an ugly truth, but it's truth nonetheless.) That's shameful, but it's better to admit our own lacks here than to persist in believing we're theologians and rob our kids of the best knowledge of the Bible they can have. Yes, we must do better in this regard, but experimenting on our kids is not the way to improve our own deficiencies in Bible knowledge.
To those trying to do the job mostly on their own, I say, "Let go." There's no sin in acknowledging that you may not be the best choice to teach your child beyond a couple simple subjects. I applaud the fact that some co-op homeschool groups exist that pass the responsibility of teaching around to adults gifted in different disciplines. Take advantage of that and stop beating yourself up because you were trying to wear a "Superteacher" hat along with all the other dozen hats we force people to wear in the America of 2005.
Stay tuned, this series will continue with more mythbusting so long as I manage to outrun the lynch mob that even now is forming�.
The Myths of Homeschooling #1
September 21, 2005
Posted by Dan Edelen in : Best of Cerulean Sanctum, Cerulean Sanctum Series, Christianity in North America, Homeschooling, Judgmentalism Feedback : 22 comments
Google "the myths of homeschooling" and invariably you get a page defending homeschooling. What you never get is an analysis of the hype that surrounds this most divisive of topics.
At the risk of being shunned, scolded, and potentially stoned to death by an angry mob of Basic Youth Conflicts graduates, I want to talk about the homeschooling craze and the tsunami of myths it's creating. Anyone who desires to cut through the hype surrounding homeschooling is subject to punishment, as if the very act of homeschooling itself cannot be questioned. But all sorts of learning exist; we must understand that homeschooling is just one option in a sea of possibilities.
Before I go on, I'd like to discuss my background. My degree is in Christian Education from Wheaton College. I've vigorously studied curricula used in homeschooling, so I know of what I speak. I'm also, as most people reading this are, a product of the public school system. My mother was a public kindergarten and preschool teacher for many years and was anti-homeschooling. Despite this, she was an outstanding educator and a mother admired not only by her kids, but also by other mothers. Many considered her a "mom's mom." And regarding our own child's education, we plan on homeschooling because of my background and the needs of our child. So this is not a diatribe against all homeschooling or else I'd be a hypocrite, too.
My hope for this mini-series is to slice through the rhetoric that surrounds homeschooling and to honestly examine its strengths and weaknesses. I understand that this is a touchy subject loaded with potential landmines, but many of the issues wrapped up in homeschooling are bothersome and few Christians are examining them honestly. Instead, many Christian families are swept along by the homeschooling tsunami unable to clearly consider all the issues at stake.
Let's take a look at the first few myths:
Myth #1: If you don't homeschool your kids, you're not a good parent
We say it's all about the children, but hasn't homeschooling become a criterium for weeding out the good parents from the bad? Have we not made it a source of pride for those who do homeschool, using homeschooling as a litmus test for labeling others?
No myth does more to generate a class structure within churches than this one. Too many adults are classifying each other based on whether they homeschool or not. To make matters worse, many Christian organizations insist that in order to be a good parent, you must homeschool.
There are numerous problems with this mistaken notion. On a basic level, our 21st century societal structures don't support homeschooling. The work lives of the majority of Americans are dramatically different than in the days of the founding of this country when most children received their educations at home. In those pre-industrial days, both parents worked from home and America was largely agrarian. Both parents equally taught their children, not just one parent as we have today.
At issue here is the fact that few people are questioning today's work situations that take at least one of the parents out of the home all day. By all standards, particularly a biblical one, the idea of having only one parent involved in the schooling of children is a defective method at its core, yet it is held out as the ideal today. The stress of forcing all schooling onto one parent is too much for most people to handle, yet many homeschooling parents labor under the pressure to conform to that defective standard, forced to grin and bear the responsibility like a good soldier.
But homeschooling is not meant to be a lesson in endurance. I suspect that many homeschooling moms—if allowed to vent their true feelings on the issue apart from the pressure they feel to conform to a homeschooling ideal—would say that they are stressed out by having to teach and run a household without the aid of a spouse at home most of the day. Trying to jam the responsibility of two adults into one is more than many can bear, yet they shuffle on lest someone accuse them of not being a good parent because they no longer homeschool.
Homeschooling is harder than most people think. Curiously, the very Christian organizations that are hardcore supporters of homeschooling provide no coping methods or assistance for Christian families who are trying to find ways to have both parents at home—the ideal homeschooling environment—rather than just the one. Little is said about the work environments that exist today that take one of the parents out of the home for most of the day while the other struggles to manage all the requirements of keeping a household running while homeschooling.
Homeschooling is not about guilt, yet many adults who cannot homeschool—or those who do and are buried under the load it entails—feel guilty all the time. It's time we Christians made life easier for both homeschooling and non-homeschooling parants by dropping the "you're a bad parent if you don't homeschool" rhetoric we so easily wield like a club. Many families are struggling and to judge any family by whether it homeschools or not is not of God.
Myth #2: Homeschooling more actively involves parents in their children's educations
There's a dirty little secret behind much of homeschooling. I know folks who will scream bloody murder that what I discuss here is not them, but my experience proves otherwise.
We all know homeschooling parents who brag about the fact that their kids don't watch TV or that they don't even have a TV in the house. Yet how curious it is that so many of these same parents see no problem with setting a child in front of a computer for hours on end doing computerized homeschool curricula. Many parents can't draw a disctinction between three hours of spurious TV viewing and the three hours their kids spend each day glued to some video-driven homeschool curricula, either. That hypocrisy, while astonishing to me, is perfectly understandable given the ridiculously high regard we give homeschooling. It's as if the points are given to any parent who homeschools, regardless of how well they actually school or not.
From my perspective, a kid wedded to a computer or TV for hours on end is not getting a more parent-driven education than a child who sits in a public school classroom. We're deceiving ourselves if we believe this myth. Worse yet, the very parents who howl about public school content rarely take the time to review the homeschool computer or video content their kid is inhaling for hours on end.
Let's be honest here. Homeschooling material that is computer or TV-based is as big a babysitter as commercial TV or the public school teacher. A harried mom can sit Junior down in front of a video on fractions then attend to scrubbing the kitchen floor. I understand how hard it is, but it's the dishonesty that attends this issue that bothers me. Use the computer and TV-based curricula, but understand it for what it is. And don't hide behind the aura of homeschooling if most of what you're doing is plopping your kids in front of a curricula run from a DVD, videotape, or computer.
Myth #3: The educational methodology behind most homeschooling curriculum is superior to the methodology used in public schools
Anyone know who B.F. Skinner is? He's the psychological theorist behind Behaviorism and operant conditioning; you know, training rats to press a lever to receive a reward of food or electrical brain stimulation. Behaviorism has been soundly roasted by the Christian public ever since Skinner debuted his educational theories in the 40s and 50s. Firmly rooted in a naturalistic, Darwinian worldview, reviled as anti-God, pro-Communist, and secular humanism at work, behaviorism is one educational methodology that most Christians oppose.
Ironically, the majority of Christian homeschool curricula are based on behavioristic teaching methods. Even more ironic is the fact that public schools have moved away from behaviorism while Christians have castigated them for doing so, all without realizing what they are are tacitly endorsing a methodology that opposes a Christian worldview.
When I first examined this problem back in the early 1990s, the three most popular Christian homeschool curricula were Skinnerian to the core. Since that time, other methodologies have arisen, but behavioral teaching methods still predominate.
"Unschooling" is growing within some Christian circles, but it is based on the theories of Jean-Jacques Rousseau as expressed in his book Emile. It's surprising that Christian homeschooling parents would want to follow the ideas of Rousseau, an anti-family scoundrel if there ever was one, but such is the reality of our modern educational methods that it's hard to turn anywhere without finding a problematic theorist behind any learning method.
There are dozens of educational methodologies available to homeschooling parents today. All have blind spots and problems. I could spend weeks detailing each one, but suffice it to say that some are better than others and a mix of them might be the best of all. And as for one, the classical education, I will save some insights on that one for later.
Stayed tuned for more in this look at the myths of homeschooling as I tackle the issues of what constitutes an appropriate education today, how Christians are ignoring changes in our culture and how that must alter our educational content, and more.
And please, most of all, go easy on me! I've never seen a burning in effigy that was appealing, especially when that effigy looks a lot like yours truly!
Pushing Words in Music City, USA
September 20, 2005
Posted by Dan Edelen in : Writing Feedback : 11 comments
And now the news from Nashville…
The American Christian Fiction Writers conference was a success for me. Whenever I shared the plotline and ideas in my novel, people responded with plenty of positive comments. I have at least one publisher interested in my novel, plus an agent who is truly excited about the premise. Considering the limited market for new writers breaking into speculative fiction under a Christian banner, those two add up to a major win.
The conference started off well. I met Christy-winner Robin Lee Hatcher over at Write Thinking. She’s a major name in Christian fiction and she’s got to be one of the most gracious people I’ve ever met—extraordinarily kind and warm. Her willingness to put my fears at ease (even before the conference) resulted in a far more relaxed four days than I anticipated. Thanks, Robin! She also introduced me to a fellow blogger, Katy Raymond over at Fallible. We wound up being the two extremes size-wise, something Robin duly noted at her blog.
I met up with several of the regulars over at Faith in Fiction; Dave Long of Bethany House runs that blog. Unfortunately, he got sick and was unable to attend, so Jeanne Damoff, Meg Moseley, Suzan Robertson, and Michael Snyder all picked up where he left off. Meg was a big winner of two awards including the Janet Grant Award for best unpublished author; she won’t stay that way for long. The FiF crowd was a great group of people and I enjoyed every conversation we shared during the weekend.
Nothing gave me more joy than finally meeting Jared Wilson of The Thinklings, Shizuka Blog, and Mysterium Tremendum. He wasn’t at the conference, but he drove down from his home outside of Music City to meet up with me on Friday. You ever have one of those friends that you can pick up where you started and never feel like you skipped a beat? Well, Jared was just like that. We talked like we’d known each other all our lives. It’s crazy how many experiences we’ve had in common; in many ways he’s a younger version of me. Great guy, great time. And like he said over at The Thinklings, we closed a McDonalds. Time flies when you’re having fun. Thanks, Jared! And may God bless all your novels and your blogs.
Randy Ingermanson served as my mentor for the conference. He’s won two Christy Awards and did a fantastic job of being the conference foil. Talk about a guy who can take a mocking and come out on top! Poor Randy was subjected to repeated barbs from the speakers, particularly Brandilyn Collins. Randy was one of the first male authors to join up with what was formerly called American Christian Romance Writers, even though he writes more in the speculative vein. As the trailblazer, he’s made it possible for more men to come on board and the expansion into other genres of writing. Still, we guys were outnumbered about 30:1. There were about 800 people total at the conference, so you can imagine the minority. I must say that being fawned over by the ladies (or was I imagining that) was a definite perk!
The wonderful part of the conference for me was Randy’s positive comments on my writing skills. But even better than that was the fact that he did postdoc work in String Theory at Ohio State. In what can only be the hand of God, my novel’s scientific mechanism behind the fantasy that drives the story is String Theory AND my male lead is a grad student at Ohio State! Finding out about the vanishingly small possibility of that intersection mere days before the conference had me stoked.
Took a few classes. Had to jump out of Robin’s organization class and missed almost all of it, sadly. I will stay disorganized. Deb Raney’s class on rewriting was excellent and managed to overflow the room, too. Kathryn Mackle’s screenwriting class was very well done.
Despite the fact that the conference was superb all the way around, the authors were open and never viewed any of us up-and-comers as competition, and everyone I met was truly friendly, I came away with one thing missing.
I heard many authors there defending their work. I still think that many of us who write Christian fiction are fighting against the perceptions of our fellow Christians, even though Christian fiction is more accessible and accepted today. The intersection of the Church and the Arts has been tenuous for most of the last hundred years and shows no sign of getting better. I would have loved to have heard a keynote that addressed this issue—it’s a big one.
My confession is that I struggle with my calling to writing. I believe it is something I do well, but still I wonder if the Lord would have us writing stories at a time when the American Church is hypnotized by entertainment. I didn’t hear anyone asking that same question at the conference, but I think it must be asked. Many there defended Christian fiction by saying that the Lord taught through stories, but there is another layer to that truth that went unexplored:
Then the disciples came and said to him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” And [Jesus] answered them, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. For to the one who has, more will be given, and he will have an abundance, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. Indeed, in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says: “‘You will indeed hear but never understand, and you will indeed see but never perceive. For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.’ But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. Truly, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.
—Matthew 13:10-17 ESV
The stories Jesus told were veiled to all except a select few. But that’s not how many Christian writers interpret that passage; they view Jesus’ parables the opposite way. My concern: if our fiction is to make truth more accessible and not less, are we truly teaching through stories in the same manner Jesus did?
So that is my only regret: I would have loved to have heard more about the justification for Christians writing fiction today. That’s probably not a popular position among the conference attendees, but I know I needed to hear it. In fact, I think one of the greatest needs in the Church today is for some great Christian speaker with a background in the arts to recover the Christian theology behind the arts and evangelize it to the Church at large.
In the end, I learned much and grew considerably in my knowledge of the writing biz. Anyone out there who writes fiction should consider getting on board with ACFW. I had a blast, networked with plenty of worthy people, and have returned to writing—and blogging—with a new zest.
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I’m Back!
Posted by Dan Edelen in : Writing Feedback : 1 comment so far
Got back from the American Christian Fiction Writers conference late Monday. Went to blog about it only to have a rainstorm take down my satellite Internet connection. The lightning storm that came along for the ride forced me to turn my computer off, so I couldn’t even write the guts of the post. Bad timing all the way around.
Still, I hope to get a post up this afternoon to let you know all about my attempts at selling my novel. Will also tell about all the many fine people I met. All in all, a wonderful time for me.
More to follow…
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