When it comes to homeschooling, everything is just difficult right now.
I've been wanting to get back to writing about homeschool topics this year, but I've been avoiding it for one major reason - I'm feeling like a big homeschool failure, ever since Christmas break. We're not getting through our school days until late afternoon, it's a struggle to keep everyone on task, and yes, there have been tears.
I wanted to start out with a little bit of honesty, because it is really easy to idealize the homeschool journeys of others by what they share online. Then when we hit a rough patch, we are left feeling that we are just not good at this, or wondering if we are doing something wrong.
Our family has been doing this long enough now for me to know that eventually, this will pass. Right now I feel like homeschooling is never going to run smoothly again, that the fun will never make a reappearance. But that's just not true. The fun days come, and they go, and the hard days do too. Perseverance is a virtue, and especially when tackling something as big as your child's education.
At the beginning of the year, I got involved with helping to start a homeschool support group at my church, and one of the first subjects we tackled was finding your "why", writing a mission statement for your homeschool, something that you can go back to on the hard days.
Well, that is where our family is now, right in the middle of those hard days. Maybe you are too, so I wanted to share a little DIY homeschool workshop, something we worked through in our support group.
Below is a link to a free video by Voddie Baucham entitled "Homeschooling With Your Grandchildren In Mind", and it's all about the purpose, the foundation of this endeavor of homeschooling as Christian parents.
You can watch the video here (starting at about the 17 minute mark), and then for a DIY homeschool workshop, answer the following questions for yourself! If you can discuss with a like-minded friend, that's even better.
1. In what ways do you find yourself falling into a worldly perspective when it comes to education? (Focused on good jobs, test scores, something else?)
2. How is discipleship different than assembly-line education? What does discipleship in your homeschooling involve?
3. How do you remind yourself on a consistent basis why we do what we do?
4. Baucham says mankind is “able and obligated to discover all the things that God has created” and to know Him better as the result of that. Does that statement change how you view education? How?
5. In what ways can we apply the Great Commission in our homeschooling - through both evangelism and discipleship?
6. What do you think it looks like to homeschool from a biblical worldview?
7. Baucham says we are to “imitate what God has done through the art of every discipline, to the glory of God.” We imitate Him through the arts of:
-organizing well (philosophy/making goals),
-knowing well (grammar/memorization/reading/history),
-thinking well (rhetoric/logic),
-communicating well (writing/speaking),
-quantifying well (math),
-analyzing nature well (science),
-imitating nature well (art/music),
-living well in light of the truth we’ve learned (theology)
In Colossians 2:2-3, Paul says:
“My goal is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge."
With that in mind, what are some practical ways you can make sure Christ is the center of knowledge in your homeschool?
Colossians tells us that Christ is at the basis of all wisdom and knowledge, and the goal for us as Christians is to keep Him at the center of our homeschooling, at the center of every subject. If I'm not pointing my kids back to Jesus through everything we are learning, then I am missing the point, and I'm not giving them the full "treasures of all knowledge and wisdom". Spending a little less time worrying about "getting it all done", and remembering why I'm doing this in the first place, is especially helpful for me in these dark, winter months.
Do you struggle with homeschooling during the winter?
It's never the dreaded February for me, we always have a harder time in January!
Thank you for sharing! This looks like such a great resource and encouragement. I pray that things begin to turn around for you and your homeschool. Our Lord is such a faithful shepherd and redeemer. May He be with all of you as you navigate the challenges.
Thanks for this, I want to think about these questions. As for winter homeschooling, since the days are shorter, we have to go outside earlier, whether we're done with academics or not. Sometimes we don't even get started with schoolwork until after lunch. That can definitely make it feel slow and torturous! In these tumultuous times, I'm definitely feeling the burden of teaching a biblical worldview. I think it's really the little things that add up!
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