Should I take this Path?

When I began my homeschooling journey, I was confident that this was the path I was to take, yet I needed help. I needed to know the basics, like what do I teach, where do I find curriculum, and why are there so many different choices - which is best?

I wasn't even sure what questions to ask, but I needed answers. It took months and months to learn the basics that many homeschoolers take for granted as common knowledge. It took years to understand what curricula and philosophy worked for us and what didn't. It took even more years to understand why. 

It is my hope that I can save you the years of research I undertook and provide you with information that will jump start your journey, if you are just beginning, and smooth out the rocky path, if you have been on the homeschooling road for a while.

The first question you must answer is, "Should I homeschool?" In this article, I will attempt to give you the low down, the truth...the real mcdeal, so to speak.

 

A Journey Worth Taking

 

I've had the privilege to meet so many new homeschoolers that have just begun their homeschool journey. Most of them find homeschooling a delight. As they spend each day with their children, they begin to catch a glimpse into the little windows of their hearts and see things they didn't know were there - good things and not so good things.

What is so precious about this is that we really do come to know our children the way God intended for us to know them. God did not set up schools where children would depart for hours from the very people to whom He gave them to be reared. Education was intended to be done at home from the very beginning, as was the training of our children's hearts. God's perfect order has been disrupted by the institution that came in to replace God's intention and design for homes and families. That order was disrupted so long ago that now we have to read books and take classes on parenting and discipling our children because we weren't parented or discipled properly; and we weren't parented properly because our parents weren't parented properly, and on and on it goes, all the way back to the preindustrial age - when families actually spent time together and usually educated their children at home. After industrialization, the home became second to the institution of school. Long ago, most every child was either home educated or only went to school during certain seasons. Most of a child's waking hours were spent at home with the family, where generations passed on what the generations before had been passing on for as long as anyone could remember.

If we don't have lengthy amounts of time with our children, we will likely miss the nuances that betray what is really happening in their hearts, what they really believe. If I only had a few hours every night with them, when we were both worn out from the day, I may not know what their wrong beliefs were or what their right beliefs were. If I did know, would I even have the time and energy to thoroughly correct them?

Homeschooling affords us time and energy to properly parent and educate our children. Because I spend my entire life with my kids, I know them so well. I know the exact areas where I can trust them to always make the right choice, and I know the exact areas where they need more training.  I know their hearts. When I see misconceptions, we can work through them during the morning devotions, pray through them, and explore what the Bible says about them. No big hurry. We've got time.

One mom describes her experience when she brought her children home to school them. She was astonished when she realized that, because they had been in school for several years, she didn't even know - really know - her kids. Could not really knowing your children be God's plan for the family? No. Sadly, it's really no wonder children are in the mess they are today.

I believe homeschooling is so right. It is the model God set in place. It's a return to the ways of old. Isaiah 58:12 says, "...you will restore the foundations laid long ago; you will be called the repairer of broken walls, the restorer of streets where people live.

I pray you will find joy in your homeschooling journey.

 

As you take this path, seek always what God's perfect plan is for your family. Oftentimes, we can begin to feel weighted down by the sheer burden of being our children's source for an education. This should not be. The same God who called you will equip you and show you the perfect way your children should go. Benjamin Franklin and John Adams were both homeschooled differently because they had different purposes and paths to pursue. Seek to know what your children's purposes and paths are; don't just follow the crowds, burdening yourself with elective courses that weigh you down and rob you of your joy. When you follow God's ideal plan for your school, it won't feel heavy or burdensome. It will feel light.

I have a question: Have you ever asked yourself, "Am I doing enough?" Why does every homeschool mom ask this question? I believe the problem is that when you are doing enough it feels too easy. So you think, I'm surely not doing enough. It can't be this easy. Certainly my child is not learning enough or getting enough knowledge. I need to fill their brain with more, more, more until we are so challenged, so overloaded with information that  we simply can't fill another minute of our supposed school day with anymore. When we're really doing quite enough - homeschooling is as it should be: wonderful, joyful, pleasant, and peaceful - with children learning exactly what they need to learn - with time on their hands to pursue other things, other subjects of interest - with time to contemplate what they have learned, what they want to learn, to contemplate their relationship with the Lord - with time to draw nearer to mom, siblings, a good book, the Bible - with time to learn to cook, time to learn a new skill, to build something unplanned, unscheduled, something NOT in their books - something creative, expressing who they are. That's what life is like when you're doing enough. But you see, the question we should ask - the real question we should ask is, "Am I doing too much?" Am I homeschooling out of fear? Have I fallen prey to the counterfeit for God's best and followed someone else's plan? What can I cut out? What can I put away?"

If homeschooling feels hard to you - you're doing too much. And just like with medicine, too much is not better. Too much will have repercussions. Too much will bring consequences you don't really want. Too much brings burn out. Too much robs your family of the joy and relationships that were meant to develop and flourish at home.

God's call on you to homeschool does not forestall His promise of peace. His promise to give us rest is not void. If we are not experiencing rest as we homeschool, we need to sit down and reevaluate. We need to come to Him again, and seek His ways and wisdom.

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest."

Matthew 11:28