Why We Homeschool

First, I would like you to write down 3 reasons why you started homeschooling.
Next, I want you to think back to when you purchased your first curriculum, what was important to you?
Now, I want you to think and be honest with yourself. Does your homeschool mirror the 3 reasons why you started homeschooling?
I believe there are a lot of us that can say we are caught up in the academics and social lifestyles and we forget why we chose to homeschool. We may tend to skip bible and get right into math because we just want to get through the lessons as quick as possible. We may try to rush, rush, and rush because later on we have to get our children to Karate or we have to clean up because the piano teacher is going to be coming.
Are your days or weeks overwhelming? Do your children “Love to Learn”?
A friend of mine stated that her co-op class of all girls was asked the question “Would you want to homeschool your children?” Would you believe that 75% of them said “No”?
You now have to ask the question “Why?” If you asked your children today “Would you want to homeschool your children one day?” How would they respond?
Are they going to say “No, my mom always complained about how hard it was? She was always going, going, going. She never had time for a board game because she was too tired.” Or are they going to say “Yes, that was the best experience, Mom would take us for Nature walks and we would bring home specimens to study, mom read us some great books about history adventures, and sometimes we would play math bingo.”
What are they going to say? What kind of memories are you imprinting on their minds?
Are you so overwhelmed that it is breaking down your family? Are you signing up for too many obligations? Are you pushing the academics so much that your children are grumbling?
I think some of us have the enemy on our shoulder whispering in our ear “You have to keep them busy, you have to keep them socializing. Oh, and don’t forget you never did English today, you need to catch up.”
I love the way the book “The Well Trained Mind” approaches this. She writes about positive socialization through family based and interest-based activities. Through this she tells us not to be afraid of being alone and slowing down.
“A measure of solitude can develop creativity, self reliance, and the habit of reflective thought. Socialize, but don’t crowd your schedule so full that the child has no time to think, to sit and stare at the walls, to lie in the backyard and watch ants crawl by.”
Are you giving yourself quality time, for you? Charlotte Mason wrote,
“If mothers could learn to do for themselves what they do for their children when these are overdone, we should have happier households. Let the mother go out to play! If she would have the courage to let everything go when life becomes too tense, and just take a day, or half a day, out in the fields, or with a favorite book, or in a picture gallery looking long and well at just two or three pictures, or in bed, without children, life would go on far more happily for both children and parents. The mother would then be able to hold herself in ‘wise passiveness’ and would not fret her children by continual interference even of hand or eye – she would let them be.”
Let us not forget why we choose to homeschool and why we homeschool through this ISP.
Jesus –His Word
Freedom
When teaching the necessary subjects, we have the freedom to spend one whole day in the bible or take the time to go for a walk and enjoy studying God’s beautiful World. And if we have studied for 3 to 4 hours and still did not get to that last subject, it’s ok. We can get to it the next day, without playing the catch up game.
“We can get too easily bogged down in the academic part of homeschooling, a relatively minor part of the whole, which is to raise competent, caring, literate, happy people.” Diane Flynn Keith
I am not suggesting going home and canceling all of your activities. I am asking you to ask yourself “Am I spending quality time with my children in the Lord?” And “Do I give my family, and myself, time to ‘lie in the backyard and watch the ants crawl by?’”
“The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught, as that every child should be given the wish to learn” John Lubbock
Homeschooling is our ministry.
“Commit everything you do to the Lord. Trust him, and he will help you.” Psalm 37:5