I’ve come to learn, but not always trust, that if we seek God first in our lives and, specifically, in our day our experience will be better than when we plan our day on our own. Why? Our attitudes change. Our minds are open to His purpose for us. Everything we do reflects the bigger goal and we learn to be who HE has planned for us to be. Ephessians 2:10 says that we were created as God’s workmanship and that He already has things planned for us to do. What do we need to learn to do those things? One gift we have as homeschoolers is the flexibility to allow our kids to follow life according to their passions. Ultimately, our passions motivate us more than any person can.
There are days I trust this and there are days that, although I know this, I panic a bit. I may compare my children’s handwriting to those of their peers and judge them, as if this were the measure God would use to judge their success. The truth is, that to force handwriting when a child is running in another direction is counter-productive to the learning that COULD be achieved if you watched God work and did what he commanded you to do.
I'll show you an example of how a day went that didn't include my forcing my children in a direction against their interests. I did have a list, a neat list of well rounded activities for an entire week for each kid. On it was our study of creation, history, science, Latin, handwriting, math, piano, reading, you get the picture. Here’s how the day really went....
Breakfast... Pancakes. We talked about conserving and rationing as we shared the last 1/4 cup of syrup between us. With our pancakes we listened to one of my favorite hymns of all time on YouTube, “When I Survey the Wonderful Cross”. Next, we grabbed the postcard of the books of the Bible we’re working on memorizing. I’m a bit of an evangelist, so I gave them a pep talk on the importance of knowing what God’s word says, focusing on how science and the world CAN work together with God's word to bring people TO faith and not away from it. After explaining their responsibilities as Christians to lead the world and not follow it’s ways, they ran off and saying they wanted to read their Bible all day.
So, rather than lose them upstairs I got out a selection of new Bible study books for them to pick. They wanted to talk more about evolution vs. creation, so they picked a Kay Arthur for Kids study of Genesis 1-2. In this, I got a discussion in about reading comprehesion (who, what, where, why and when), writing a good title, drawing a picture describing what they understood about the lesson and then we read Genesis 1-2, taking turns reading aloud. It’s now 9:30, we started breakfast at 8:00.
My 10-year-old son is a very passion driven child. I had a choice.. I could stifle his now flaming interest in studying this more by getting math out or ask him where he wanted to go with it. He said he was going to write a paper disproving evolution. (Ambitious I thought, and in faith continued to encourage him.) I know I can learn more when I'm passionate about something, so, therefore, would he. We scrapped the list.
He went to the bookshelf and grabbed books to support his work. I looked at his selections and sat him down to talk about what a hypothesis is, since he was jumping into a large field of study. His eager brain needed a bit of focus and he actually saw it my way! This also led to a discussion of a source list and the importance of multiple sources in a debate. We talked about how debates work and how, if he wants to use this information to lead others to his side he needs to make sure all things point back to the hypothesis.
Now, imagine the difference between a conversation with an interested (even driven) child and one who is being “assigned” something and knows he must do it. Today I was blessed to work with a driven child. His "ADHD" like mind was fully engaged. He continued researching for three hours, listening to guidance as if he knew it would make a difference. For you homeschool moms who have tried to force learning, as I have on occasion, this can truly be a Kleenex moment! (Please note: I am not a believer in labeling kids with ADHD, but use this adjective because it seems to be connected with this driven, passionate personality type and many would medicate my child.)
Meanwhile, I forgot about the 8 year old. I track him down and he’s been reading the Bible aloud to his rabbits and is not ready to stop yet. When he drifts upstairs we get out “Night of the Moonjellies” and enjoy a good story together. We do have a 3-year-old, but at story time he is too busy listening to the Star Wars soundtrack and having adventures with a little one inch Lego man. He takes off.
I made some bread for dinner and put chicken soup ingredients in the crock pot. We had a little lunch and after that watched a video on the forces of water. This is also not on the list, but part of creation. A friend called and invited the kids over. There they spent the afternoon drawing a map of Europe and other imaginary countries. At home, the drawing continued into the evening as I read the last few chapters of “Trial by Poison”, a biographical adventure about Mary Slessor, missionary to the area which is now Nigeria.
I am writing this, because these are my favorite days. Sadly, it wasn't always like this. There have been days I have fallen prey to the incredible societal pressure to do things according to some systematic educational model. I write this to encourage you and myself. God knows what your children need to learn. Seek him first and he will direct your path. There are days I will need to reread this when I feel defeated, when I don’t know how I’m going to accomplish “educating” my children for many more years. Those are the days I've talked to some parents who are worrying about choosing the right curriculum or read an article on getting kids to sit and follow your plan. We must all remember that God knows what they need to know and while intelligent plans can make for good order, sometimes you just need to scrap the plan and open your mind to a way that accomplishes more!
Did we further our character and grow our faith?