Beginning home discipleship

“Give me the youth, and Germany will rule the World” - Adolf Hitler

(I love how right-on this quote is. We can imprint ANYTHING on a child’s mind.)

I home school for many reasons. One is because, believe it or not, I not only love my children but I really like them as well. I enjoy being around them and take great pleasure in seeing them learn new things.

Another reason is that I want them to get a good biblically-based education. As a Christian, the Bible is my source for truth and I want to incorporate that into my kids’ daily lives as much as possible. I also want to give them a “real life” education.

What does that mean? Well, for starters, real life doesn’t mean only hanging out with people of your own age. I don’t do it, you don’t do it, it’s just weird. We learn from those older than us who have more life experience. We gain leadership skills by imparting knowledge on those younger than we are. It’s just the way life works.

I also want them to learn things that I wish I could have learned to do in school (thank you budget cuts for). Like sewing, for one. I don’t know why I’m so fixated on that one, but it’s a useful skill, dang it! Cooking, taking care of baby, developing a budget and living within your means, speaking more than two languages are all important skills I want my kids to have – without having to tack additional school time onto the 7 or so hours they would go through in public or private school.

This isn’t a comprehensive list. I will add, though, that my desire to home school was greatly influenced by my public school experience. (HATED it). But it was also a desire that I believe was placed on my heart by God. I believed that so much in fact, that I told Ian that if he really wanted to send the kids to school that I supported his decision (he though home schoolers were weird and was pretty opposed to it) and then prayed like crazy that if God wanted me to do it that he would direct Ian that way, too. One week later Ian said, “Honey, I think we should home school.” Thank you Lord!

After a lot of research, we decided on My Father’s World curriculum. It’s extremely affordable, doesn’t take much time to teach and integrates the Bible into every day learning. I’ve also heard some really great things about the curriculum from friends. It’s also very flexible and I can add things in that I think are important, sewing for one. I also love that they start a foreign language in early elementary school.

David Hazell, who owns the company, also has some workshops on CD that have some awesome, awesome information on teaching kids to be mission-minded, occupying pre-readers and becoming a family of eternal purpose. I highly recommend getting those.

Lessons are only 60-90 minutes so I’m going to start off doing “school” Monday through Thursday with Fridays being a day for service. This Friday we’ll be making cards for a widowed friend and maybe do a little science and math in the kitchen while we bake her some cookies.

I want to get Isaac through Kindergarten quickly and start first grade by January. Mainly because he knows a lot of what’s in the package already and because the only reason we didn’t start last year was because his birthday is in December and he wouldn’t have started public school until this year anyway (does that make sense?). However, if we don’t get through it that quickly, it’ll be okay.

My hope is to graduate all of the kids early so that they can go on a mission trip, work, volunteer or whatever before they go away to college (if that’s something that fits into what they’re passionate about doing).

I know this seems weird to some people. Maybe lots. But I’m used to it. It’s inherent in being a follower of Christ. It’s my responsibility to disciple my kids to be followers of Christ; to love God above all else and to love and serve others. It’s not something I take lightly and not something that I expect anyone else to do for me (and my husband). But it can also be fun and I’m really excited to have the opportunity to learn and grow in Christ with my kids.