Story of the World, Vol. 4, Chapter 26 covers the Great Depression and Hitler’s rise to power. The two may seem unrelated, but Susan Wise Bauer makes the case for how America’s woes kept Americans too focused on themselves to really care about European politics.
FDR and the New Deal also feature in the first story about the Great Crash and came of it. It was an eye-opening experience for the kids, who do not know the meaning of lack, of course. I told them I had a friend whose grandmother lived through the Great Depression. To this day, that grandma still buys two of everything she gets at the store.
Most people living in the US and Canada, not to mention Western Europe, have no idea what it means to go without enough food in one day.
Please do not send me emails about all the homeless and hungry in the western hemisphere. I know they exist. I see statistics about 3 out of 5 American kids who go to bed hungry. It makes me sad, but it also makes me mad.
It should not be this way. Lack of education keeps people in this vicious cycle of poverty and producing more children who continue the cycle.
Call me idealistic, but I believe education is the key that unlocks all the doors in this world. With every year that goes by, I want to homeschool my children even more than the year before. If you want a job well done, do it yourself, they say. Sure, there are limitations to this maxim. I just feel that my children’s education is too important for me to leave it to people who do not love them as much as I do.