As you may well know my husband and I made a decision two years ago to homeschool our children. Well, to homeschool my son. We are giving the option of public schooling to our daughter, but she has continually said that she wants to be home with us. I find that endearing.
Many people choose this method of education for a variety of reasons. Ours was neither political nor religious, just that we knew our son needed more of a challenge. So here we are. My kids are always on the move going through material not always covered at their level or in this manner. But honestly, it's hard. Well, it is for us. Many people choose to do online schooling from their home, not us. Others give workbooks and have their kids read a bunch and then it seems like their always on a field trip. Well, that is a bit more like us. We made the decision that what we were going to do had to be for the best for our children. But like I said, it's hard. Writing lesson plans can be extremely fun when it is interactive learning. Unfortunately for myself, my son knew too much already and so we basically had him testing out of material for a while with me teaching little things here and there. Not fun at all. He and my daughter both love workbooks, but I feel they don't get as much out of it. It's busy work. Desk job. Bleh. Don't get me wrong, workbooks make teaching so much easier. But I want more. We're coming up on "purchase curriculum" time. A tremendous spending effort to maximize my children's education. Last week my son and I dove into civil rights in a way that couldn't be done in public school, and definitely not done through workbooks. We took original texts and documentaries and turned it into discussions, vocabulary, free reading, essays. Oh the possibilities. It's in those moments that I see just how smart my kids really are. It isn't in the texts or workbooks. It's in real life. It's the countless moments or connections and realizations that I can see their brains firing up and taking in life. Early on in his life, I taught Caleb how to bake cookies. (Science and Math rolled into one!) It was those early workings of fractions and distributions that I saw my son come alive in learning. My daughter has been quite similar. The connections they draw are remarkable. Why do we not encourage this more often? Well, I suppose that's what we're going for with the choice to home school. How about us as adults? What about us as Christians? We have been given raw materials - the Bible and the Holy Spirit that should be consuming us like a fire. Yet we cling to the institution of education - Church or worship gatherings. We go to countless workbooks to test and challenge our knowledge. We meet with others weekly or not. And of course we have our field trips, I mean retreats. How often do we home school ourselves? Do we dive on in to the Word? When was the last time you locked yourself in the prayer closet and prayed for an hour or more? I'm not saying that corporate worship is bad. We are to gather together. We feed each other and hopefully serve each other with love the way Christ did. I'm not against retreats or groups or workbooks or devotionals as a whole. I'm against that being the only way we decide to grow as Christians. I refuse to believe this is the best we can do! These other resources should not be our main source of connection to God. We should be our main connection. Last week I shared some on the abortion issue. The main point was that we as Christians are upset that the world is doing worldly things. How do my children draw the best conclusions? They dive into real life experiences and connect the book work to life. That is what so many Christians are missing today. We either have institutionalized busy workers or home school hippies taking field trips and nothing more. We need to put it all together. We need the firm foundation of the Bible rooted deep within our souls as we go on into the world making connections between the Word of God and what is happening around us. Take a field trip - to grow not to socialize. Go to worship gatherings and worship while sitting next to someone, not alone in a row of seats. Join a group study and really dive into your relationship with God and others, and then go into the world and apply the knowledge. Lock yourself in your room to pray. Stay and fuel up in prayer and praise. Then attack the world the way it is attacking you and everyone else. Become home schoolers for Jesus. Please.
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May 2023
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