Some time two weeks ago, we had one of 'those days'. Since we started homeschooling about a year ago, we've had a few of these - where the whole morning seems like one huge battle and in the end no one wins, or learns anything. That day's episode ended in a particularly desperate and spiteful chastising with the older boy on my part, "Z, do you want to do school with Mummy or not? If you don't want to, you can always go and join the other children in their school next door. " (We have a kindergarten in the next block. ) To which he woefully replied, "I want to go to school with Mummy. " My most predictable reply: "Then you must learn to follow my instructions and listen to what Mummy says!" Not that this conversation got us much further after that...
Part 2 of Why We Homeschool is honestly still in the process of being figured out (which is why I have been taking so long to write it). Homeschooling is really a complex and in-depth decision, an ongoing process involving not just the academic side of things, but the life of our family and the individuals it consists of as we live our lives and continue in the ongoing process of knowing, understanding and loving God and each other.
Yet I am always brought to the main reason why we homeschool, the reason I seem to most easily forget - we homeschool because we are in the business of schooling their hearts and not just their heads. Each of the struggles we've had so far happens when I forget our main purpose and forge ahead with my glorious academic goals, forgetting I am dealing with little persons-in-training. When you homeschool, it is impossible to run away from the humanity of one's household. When the kids choose to disobey me in school time, they are also disobeying the authority which God has placed over them in this home. And vice versa, of course! I am constantly reminder of my own imperfections and failures as a mother through the course of those few hours of school every day (as well as the rest of each day)!
And so I choose to remember the precious moments of that day - the two of them side by side on the sofa, one on the drums and the other on the cymbals, making a joyful noise by singing all the rainbow songs they know after reading Noah and the Ark; my 3-year-old asking for books throughout the day and sitting through picture books I never thought he'd have the patience for. (I have been reading about Elmer the Patchwork Elephant for almost 2 consecutive weeks now, his current favourite bedtime story!)
Tiny steps. And of course, the work that is going on in this Mummy's soul, as I am being tutored everyday in patience and learning to grow in increasing dependence on Him in my most desperate moments. Remembering what matters at the end of the day... that is the much harder work and the one that in my opinion needs much more grace! The rest is easy because He is going to teach them much more than I ever can.
Z's sponge painting of a rainbow |
E learning fine motor skills by transferring pom poms from one container to another. |
My homeschooling verse reminds me, "The Lord Himself will teach our children, and great will be their peace." Isaiah 54 : 13.
Boy, am I thankful for that!
"B" is for Blocks! |
I suppose I will need to eventually write a Why We Homeschool (Part Three). Until then, a scene from this week's school will have to do:
Me: Z, let's play with some blocks! (I was planning to start our session with a patterned block activity.)
Z (emphatically): No, I don't want to play blocks. I want to do school with Mummy!
Not one, but both boys, settle in for some seat work, followed by our letter "B" rhyme, the story of the Tower of Babel, and finally block and sensory bin play.
I think the "why" question would be a perennial one, especially on "those" days. :) Great to have chanced upon another HS blog. :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing your thoughts Felicia. There are many of "those" days and we constantly ask ourselves why we got ourselves into this. But then there are the "other" days when we are astonished at the precious words uttered by our children. We then give thanks and are again encouraged that we have chosen to walk this path.
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