Silence and Solitude

It's unusual for a homeschooling mother to say that she makes regular space for a discipline such as silence and solitude.  For all of us there are pressing needs to attend to, plans to outline, materials to find, children to guide, meals, field trips... The list could go on and on, unless we are intentional about pressing pause.

We think a lot about who we are teaching to but many days we lose sight of who we are teaching from.  We teach out of who we are and, for me, that means I teach from that point where the gospel transforms me with grace and truth.  If I try to teach from any other place, I grow weary.

And so I take a day every couple of months to practice silence and solitude.  To talk with the God who gives me life and breath, creativity and skills. To listen to what the next steps may be.  To pray with intention and thought.  To read and consider the passages that affect me.  To come to new understanding and take steps toward transformation.

The hardest part about taking a day for silence and solitude is first deciding to do it.  Some mornings as I rise early amidst sleeping boys to gather my materials I question the necessity of my plans.  There are other things I could and should be doing.  Indeed, there will always be.  And I believe that God works even while I daily accomplish, but having your best friend beside you all the time is different than looking her in the face and really hearing her.  And so, I push myself to go so that I can hear.

There is a retreat center near my home that allows me to rent a dorm room for a day.  This takes me away from all distraction.  Though I nearly convince myself that I could accomplish much devotional writing, my laptop stays home.  I cannot have that pull to go any other place. I make myself exist with little.

I begin the day in my journal, longhanding a list of what’s on my mind and heart: struggles friends are having, uncertainties about what’s next for me, unanswerable questions I’ve been asked, temptations and tendencies I can’t seem to move past.  Doing this allows me to move beyond the circumstantial in order to get to a place where I can see and sense God’s presence.  I then present my list to God in prayer and ask, “What to YOU want to do today?  Which of these will we address, or will you take me somewhere else?” 

Other days I simply ask, "What do you want me to hear?"  And throughout the day when I'm unsure where to go next, I just go back to that question. 

I bring materials that make me think more deeply about the truth of God; books with questions that pull me out of myself (a raging introvert) and more toward the person he's creating me to be.  

For a portion of the day I dive deep into a particular scripture:  the whole book of Titus, reading John for the sense of the greater story, or looking up verses about perseverance.

Incorporating the physical connects the mind to the soul and opens up new ways of seeing: walking and whispering aloud nearly always provides clarity.  Adhering photos to an album gives room to think and pray for the people within them.  Using my camera to observe the details of creation gives practice in counting gifts.  Practicing physical postures of prayer takes my thoughts to their deepest importance.

When I'm hungry I eat, but only after I ask, "Is this really what I need, or am I escaping from something hard?"  When I'm tired of sitting, I walk.  When I'm tired of walking, I rest.  And at the end of the day I try to determine: 1. What did I hear? and 2. How will this time away affect my time back with people?  Our time with God should, to some extent, change us and benefit those we love and serve.  I am refreshed and challenged.  I shouldn't go home and assume everyone else feels the same.

When choosing books to bring, I select only those that I'm currently working through.  I often begin one a few weeks ahead so that I can be in the thick of it, struggling to appropriately place it in my life. I believe in working from where God already has you.

I encourage you to give it a try.  Once a year, twice a year, once a season.  Make yourself available and see what becomes of you.

These are some of the titles I easily suggest.

• Invitation to Silence and Solitude by Ruth Haley Barton
• Spiritual Direction: Wisdom for the Long Walk of Faith by Henri J. M. Nouwen
• The Divine Hours: (any of them) by Phyllis Tickle
• The Artist’s Rule: Nurturing Your Creative Soul with Monastic Wisdom by Christine Valters Painter
• Praying in Color:  Drawing a New Path to God by Sybil MacBeth
• Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster
• The Reflective Life by Ken Gire
• The Courage to Teach by Parker J. Palmer
• The Religious Potential of the Child by Sofia Cavaletti

Forty's Final Hours

My husband had a brainstorm recently that he confessed to me last night as he took me out for my birthday dinner and shopping.  He said he's just noticed that I get to have back to back introspective days.  Because New Year's and my birthday are so close together (my birthday is tomorrow) he imagined that I must spend a good deal of time each year pondering the old and dreaming up the new all at once.  Love that man.  

Yes, I do.

I spend so many hours at this time of year wondering, 'What could be better?' 'How can I tweak me?'

'How can I create a life that's productive, more satisfying, more purposeful, more congruent?'  As if my prior life were none of those things.  Making new goals as if the old ones had no effect.

But each year builds on the next.  Had I not been my prior person, I would not be my present person. Is there nothing about past me that I can be honored to have been? Is future me so amazing that I cannot be satisfied with and active about present me?  Who knows?

Having spent a good amount of time this year thinking about gratitude and finding God in good and hard, I realize that perhaps this year,or this half of life, I don't need to push so hard into 'what's next' but rather lean into 'what is.'  Where I am, who I am, why I live and breathe.  As Richard Rohr says, "The first half of life is about discovering the script.  The second is writing and owning it." 

So, until the script for this current production is written I think I need to focus here and now; take what I know and what I am and make use of it.  Looking ahead at positive change... that's all good, but at some point we have to stop forging and take a look around.  We'll never arrive at the destination, but the journey is always with us.

And so this is my year to lean in.    

Lean in to the middle grade dyslexic son that struggles to spell.  Let's work through it with the tools we have because searching for the right thing has left me doing barely nothing to address his real needs. 

Lean into the adolescent boy at the cusp of manhood as he manages new emotions (of fear mostly) and dreams.  I can lean into his heart, his fears, his identity and he can know that he's not in those places alone.  

Lean into the active kindergarten son who just wants to play a game with me.  He needs more 'yes' moments.  

Lean into mentoring and let it change me, being aware of my impact as the words leave my mouth, but saying the hard stuff too.

Lean into the women who join me in mentoring others.  I support them and feed them the wine and the bread.

Lean into the hard work of developing a new Bible study leader, teaching her discernment and dynamics.  And the harder work of letting her fly.

Lean into the fact that I do have a voice because there is character behind it.  No integrity, no voice.  And the voice needs to be God's voice, not mine, which means the character flows from him as well.  Which means practicing spiritual disciplines with that in mind.  

Lean into God rather than just his blessings or just his revelation.

Lean into marriage.  May there never be another period of disconnect.  May we continue to partner and support and love and touch.  Lean into his amazingness and our impact as one. 

Lean into random moments of influence among all my interactions.  God will work if I trust him to be there.

Make conversations go deeper.

Heal relationships.

Press harder into justice.

Pursue and create beauty.

Practice grace and love the grace-giver.

This birthday more than others I recognize that my life is not my own.  It was bought with a price. Why did Jesus do that?  In return I should offer a life that means something to him.  Not a fragmented life of half-finished projects and unfulfilled resolutions.  But a pursuant life.  One that works with God to continue and complete the work he's begun.  Because that work, he says, is good.

This year, I don't want to discount the goodness of that work, prior and present.  This is my memorial year and perhaps my year of feasting.  I have feet; let me move them. They already know where to go.

Time Alone with TED

My husband is off to Q Portland 2011 today. Our whole team of TNL pastors are attending the conference and I look forward to the energy and inspiration they return with.

Since we at home are on Spring Break, he took my youngest two sons with him to Oregon so they could play with my parents for a few days. My oldest is in school and I stayed behind in Denver to care for him and hang out in the evenings. The two of us began our morning at Starbucks for some hot chocolate -- good start before I dropped him off at school. He hopped out of the car and said, “Go have fun, Mom!”

So, what do I do for fun? I bet you can’t guess.

I came home to watch TED lectures online. Call me whatever you’d like, but I’ve always wanted to just sit and absorb some of these ideas. Today’s the day!

I watched this one and was inspired:  Dan Pink on the surprising science of motivation.   If you don't want to spend 18 minutes watching it the gist is this, "Rewards narrow our focus and restrict our possibility... they only work in a narrow band of circumstances." While he wasn't taking it this direction, this applies to education as much as it does to business. The rewards we offer our kids for completing a task, a lesson, a project are typically extrinsic and unrelated to the actual task. i.e.: "If you memorize the Bible verse/poem/Gettysburg address you can pick something out of the treasure box."  This creates a situation where my son's mind can actually only focus on the reward. The task becomes a secondary and much smaller slice of his focus, so he'll forget the Bible verse once he gets the reward. There's no connection, no buy-in on his part. I might feel like a cool mom-teacher, but he didn't actually learn anything.

Dan Pink also said, "If/then rewards destroy creativity." And I'd have to say that based on my experience, this is unequivocally true. My sons will do the minimum it takes to get the reward; and the product won't be colorful, personal, or though provoking. If I want my child to truly engage in something, I can't hold a "carrot" out for him hoping that he'll be inspired. He'll only focus on reaching that carrot when what I really want is for him to experience the journey to new knowledge.

Inspiration begins within. Dan pointed out that "unseen intrinsic drive matters." For instance, letter grades are essentially a carrot. If you answer everything correctly, you get the carrot. You don't want your grade to fall, so you continue to answer correctly. In this instance, answering correctly doesn't come out of a bubbling well of inner passion. It's only a means to an end. In order to think creatively you have to develop something else in the process besides its end.

Some studies are showing that these extrinsic motivators actually make productivity and creativity decline. So what are we left with? Pink says this:

1. Autonomy - the urge to direct our own lives.
2. Mastery - the desire to get better and better at something that matters
3. Purpose - the yearning to do what we do in the service of something larger than ourselves. 

This is the good news for homeschoolers. At our very core, I think we agree that these are the goals we strive for. As much as my son in a classroom wants to learn toward mastery, his mastery will stop at the end of the school year. -- I remember being in middle school and throwing out all my folders at the end of the school year. The school even provided the big trash cans in the hallways.  But my son at home can keep pursuing an idea, a craft, a problem, until his thirst is quenched.  Mastery is a big buzzword in homeschooling because that is our goal.  Grades are not. Autonomy is what we hope to move all of our children toward as they grow in maturity.  But if you release a little more to their direction, they'll have more to actually take on.  And if you align what they are learning with their own individual purpose, that God-given bent that is different for each of them, you'll have an inspired, passionate student (who will naturally move toward autonomy and mastery).

Take this final portion of your school year to re-examine your methods through this lens.  Is what you're trying to accomplish in agreement with these three areas in the life of your child?  If not, give everything a tweak.  Give them 20 minutes to do anything they want, read or study anything they want, build anything they want and see what they move toward.  Throw a problem out for them and see how they'd solve it.  Or give them a project day where they can take anything from your study that week and turn it into something tangible, self-directed, self-created.  It may just be the thing that they remember forever.  No treasure box necessary.

What do You do for You?

"What do I ever do that's just for me?" This is a question that most moms wrestle with from time to time. And once we've asked the question, we begin to wrestle with the validity of the question.  "Is it okay to even think about what I need to do for me?"  We have to be able to answer, "yes" to the second question, before we can even be real with the first one.

I have a few patterns that I repeat frequently:

Go to the gym three times a week.  I am a creative person not an athletic one.  In fact, the history of my intentional physical exertion prior to now could be bullet pointed like this...

• 20+ years ago: marching band for three years of high school.
• 17 years ago: weight training for a semester in college with a goal of fitting into my wedding dress.
• 9 years ago: walking the neighborhood with the toddler in the stroller and the baby strapped to my back to sweat off some baby weight.  

I did seek out a gym membership in college once after my grandmother died of heart disease.  But you can correctly guess that fear of a cholesterol-laden death was not quite the motivator I needed ... and I was already in the best shape of my life.  But, as is true for everyone with age,  I recently began to see negative physical changes.  Couple that with a downturn in my emotional well-being and I had the means and motivation I needed to make room for purposeful, challenging, regular exercise.  The emotional and spiritual effects of working out have been amazing.   And so I will press on.

Volunteer in my church within my giftings and never outside of them.  This is a life-giving activity for me.  My husband gets paid to work for the church.  I don't.  But the fact that I still do it outside of a paycheck is a good clue that this is the work that excites me.  If you ask me to plan an event, I'll likely say no.  If you ask me to organize volunteers, I'll likely say no.  If you ask me to work in the children's ministry, I'll for certain say, "no." But, if I get to do what I feel passionate about doing -- which, as of lately, is leading book groups, connecting moms, exploring scripture together, mentoring, extending justice, and supporting marriages -- I'll be there with the energy of a thousand burning suns.  

Accomplish school planning and prep in the morning and not at night.  Why?  Nighttime is when I recharge.  I put the boys to bed and then I read and journal.  Oh man, I look forward to this time all day sometimes.  If I spend all the quiet hours of the evening reviewing curriculum and cutting out letters for my preschooler I. will. burn. out.  I am not so new to home education that I don't have a large "tool box" to pull from.  And so, I fine-tune my sketched-out lesson plans in the a.m., collect some online resources and we're off and running.  

In addition, there are a few things I do for myself occasionally:

Take two or three days a year to spend in silence and solitude.  This one is new in the past two years and my introverted self rejoices whenever I get to type one of these days into my calendar.  I take an inspiring book -- maybe one with probing questions at the chapter ends --The Message, my journal, a writing notebook, some notecards, a pen and my lunch and I go off to a retreat center to rest, pray, seek, walk, chew, and write.  The day is completely unplugged, quiet, and wrapped in nature and mystery.  I have one coming up in June...

Take Mother's Day off from mothering.  I imagine this might send shocks rippling through you, but I actually leave my family on Mother's Day.  Way back when my very young Active Alert / Inflexible /ADHD/Explosive/ODD son had the hardest time with special days, I set myself up for disappointment thinking he could treat Mother's Day with a sense of specialness.  After a couple heartbreaking years, I gave myself permission to let those expectations go.  My understanding husband then began to take my children to worship without me on Mother's Day and I would go for a walk through the fields near our house, work on photo albums, or take a nap and before they came home I'd leave the house and treat myself to lunch, shopping, writing in a sunny spot or maybe a movie.  I come back a refreshed mother... one who was so appreciated as to be given the day off.  

Have coffee with friends.  I sometimes get this mixed up with ministry, but I try not to.  There are coffee dates that are really counseling dates in disguise.  And then there are coffee dates with friends who genuinely want to catch up with you.  You can tell these because they ask me very little to do with homeschooling methods and they aren't probing to find out the backstory of stuff going on in the church.  I'm talking about coffee with friends who can offer true give and take.  I seek these out at least monthly if not more often.   

Attend a conference that has nothing to do with homeschooling.  I attend an annual home educator's conference as well but I view that weekend as more of a "teacher inservice" time that's attached to my work. This year I'm looking into attending a conference on life-mapping, another on spiritual formation and I'm actually signed up for one regarding mentoring.  I look forward to finding new avenues that help me become the me I'm intended to be.

Your habits may look very different from mine, but you may want to explore the idea of repeating something daily/weekly or with more regularity as well as incorporating activities that only happen seasonally or annually.    Just having coffee with friends once in a while isn't enough for me.  So, I've found a way to balance the schooling, family, ministry and friends that helps me recharge with a mind toward wholeness.  

I'd be interested in finding out what other things you do just for you.

Teaching Boys About Women

B and I are doing a little overview of history right now.  It's a loose and interesting unit with a few goals:

1. To give him a sense of being part of something bigger.  As we work through our timeline cards he gets a real understanding that the world was already in process long before he arrived and, God-willing, it will be different as a result of his being here.  
2. To open up a sense of his own purpose. We're putting his personal timeline alongside the significant events of the past decade and we're doing a little talking about how those events may have affected how he lives.  When we put ourselves among important things we begin to share in that sense of importance. 
3. To give him an introduction to just a few of the major players of the past.  Really, we're just scratching the surface here.

As we go through this little survey I'm taking the time to tell him stories of strong women in history.  So many of the curriculums focus on the ingenuity of men and only highlight a few women.  While men have been busy driving the bulk of humanity's advances, their wives - at the very least - were raising the next generation of history makers.  That's no small deal.  Many women did more than that and while the vast majority of their contributions went unnoticed, there are many whose stories can be learned.

So, I'm teaching them to my son.  I want him to see men and women as intellectual equals and not as competitors.   By excluding women from our history telling we teach through silence that the future is left up to the men.  I'm not comfortable with that silence.

I'm taking him through two books that are appropriate for his age:

They Led the Way: 14 American Women (Scholastic Biography Series) by Johanna Johnston.

The Courage of Sarah Noble by Alice Dalgliesh

We're also talking about some men:  ;-)

Men of Science Men of God by Henry M. Morris

But mostly we're talking about B, his family history, how the world changed during the lifetime of his grandparents and will continue doing so during his own.  The question is, what condition will he leave the world in and how will he treat the people around him?

How to Stop Homeschooling

What?! You mean there are people who actually do that? Yes. There are.

In fact, globally, homeschoolers are not a homogeneous group. There are families that homeschool one child while sending another elsewhere for their education. Some school them at home all the way through high school and some choose to encourage their children’s education through outside mentors, teachers and classes. There are benefits to every way depending on your family make-up, tenacity, personalities, health, locations, hardships, goals, freedoms, worldview, needs, and support. But when a family comes to a point of wanting or needing to stop their homeschooling efforts there is little support out there for them.

Families who choose to desist schooling at home are not failures. They have not “given up.” They count the cost of stopping just as sincerely as they counted the cost of beginning in the first place.

I know this, because we are one of those families. In the fall, my oldest son whom I’ve homeschooled “from the beginning” will be going to a small charter school that, I believe, will challenge and enrich him in fabulous ways. Our younger two boys will continue to learn at home. There is a peace about how our family is developing and the opportunities God is giving us. But I feel a bit of the sting from the homeschooling world for our choice. Even so, I’m proceeding in the way I believe my family should go.

If you plan to stop homeschooling, I am here to support you as you find your new legs. Here are a few tips to think through as you process all of your thoughts and emotions.

1. Give attention to your hesitations; explore them. God speaks to us in all different kinds of ways. If you honestly can’t say you love homeschooling anymore, if you’re consistently frustrated, if you’ve tried changing curriculums, plugging into a support group, exploring your family’s learning styles, taking care of yourself, and if you’ve held onto homeschooling loosely so that God can do with it what he will, then keep listening. If the thought of doing this for one more year inwardly gives you pause, those hesitations are telling you something.

2. Find a new solution that meets all of your family’s needs. Will the new structure cater to your child’s learning style and personality? How will the schedule disrupt your family’s day-to-day routine? What adjustments and preparations will need to be made if you’re making a change? Consider everyone’s needs (including your own). If you feel like you’re sacrificing someone’s needs for the needs of another, keep considering other alternatives. This is a whole-family shift. Don’t force it, but welcome the change when it reveals itself.

3. Let go of the voices in your head that said you were “supposed” to do this forever. The only mandate we really have is to love. Only you can know what God specifically wants for your family. God will often move us in different directions and take us through hard experiences. But if we stay in an ideology out of fear of the unknown then we remain slaves to that ideology. We should be constantly re-evaluating every year whether we do so with the intent of stopping or not. If stopping is where you peacefully land, then bravely let it be.

4. Make a choice you can justify. Not only will you have to live with your choice but you’ll also find yourself answering the new voices that will ask, “Why?” Let your rationale for stopping be as sound as your reasons were for starting. Include your kids in this so that you understand each other’s needs. Homeschooling served its purpose for a time. Don’t be ashamed of that. Starting in a new direction should be done so with a resolute foundation.

5. Consider who you are outside of being a homeschool mom. If you are not going to continue at all, you will encounter a mammoth identity shift. Be comfortable, even excited, about who you will become. No one is encouraging you to abandon your children. Even as we daily walk beside them we are always living out our God-given identities, both as their mother and as His daughter or son. Continue confidently in your own journey of “becoming.” Your children will continue to take notice.

6. Stay involved. Stay really, really involved in your child’s education. Continue to be supportive, cheer your child on, help, pray and serve. Studies are clear that children whose parents are highly engaged in their education will have greater success.

Remember, you are not giving up; you are just changing paths.

It is my prayer that these thoughts would be well received by those who are desperately looking for grace in their decision. I pray that it spurs all of us on to encourage one another toward love and good deeds. I wish you peace in your next steps.

*originally published here.

Methodology from Jesus

I'm a huge proponent for reading aloud to your kids from day one until they move out. There are so many wonderful benefits for for them in this one simple, cozy act. One of the biggest is to give them a working context for future knowledge.

As I was reading through Matthew in The Message I was delighted to hear that Jesus' rationale for story-telling is spot-on with mine. (I love that the Almighty agrees with me on this).

The disciples came up and asked, "Why do you tell stories?"
He replied, "You've been given insight into God's kingdom. You know how it works. Not everyone has this gift, this insight; it hasn't been given to them. Whenever someone has a ready heart for this, the insights and understandings flow freely. But if there is no readiness, any trace of receptivity soon disappears. That's why I tell stories: to create readiness, to nudge the people toward receptive insight. In their present state they can stare till doomsday and not see it, listen till they're blue in the face and not get it."

I read to my kids in order to give them a building block for the knowledge yet to come. If I read Plantzilla by Jerdine Nolen to my 7 year old before we study plants, his interest is peaked because it's a very cool story. We can then talk about cilia on leaves and he'll understand where the name Plantzilla came from (plant + cilia). He'll also be prepared for his Creeping Charlie to get out of control one day because he knows some plants will just do that.

Likewise, if I put spiritual lessons into story form they can grasp the story simply for what it is while they are young. When their hearts and minds are ready to take in the deeper truths of the story, it will make so much more sense.

Jesus: creating readiness in a homeschool near you.

A Day of Classes

...can take over your life.

Tho it's not my first reason for homeschooling, I do this thing because I want to be in control of my kids' education. I want to customize it. I want to build up their weaknesses by using their strengths. I want to be able to say, "That's enough" when I can tell they're are mentally checked out. I want to cross out rows of math problems when they "get it" and just do enough to keep them fit.

Under the guise of "enrichment" I enrolled my kids in a one day a week program for homeschoolers. And the homework from just that one day a week took over our life this week. I don't know if my kids felt pressure, but I sure did. All those overachiever, people-pleasing feelings came rushing back to me this week as I tried to not only implement the lessons I had planned for our family but to also incorporate the lessons these other teachers imparted to us.

It drove me nuts.

You can be sure I'm doing some deep thinking about this.

We're in This Together

My post is up at Heart of the Matter today: How NOT To Talk to a Teacher. It seemed important after I began to evaluate all the conversations I've had with folks who are classroom teachers. Of my friends who are/were classroom teachers:

• One has completely lambasted homeschooling.

• A couple have accepted that I teach them at home, but have reservations.

• Some recognize what I do as a legitimate option but believe strongly in the institution too.

• A few looked at me in awe when they found out I homeschooled and said, "Wow. I could never do that."

• Most have strongly encouraged me in my endeavor and regularly ask me, "So how it is going?"

• One is no longer a classroom teacher because she pulled her kids out so she could teach them at home.

I'm okay with all of these responses. The relationships are more valuable to me than the differences in educational philosophy. Sometimes, however, homeschoolers can be a bit insulting toward classroom teachers -- though I've seen it go both ways. (Most of the ugliness I have seen happens in the blogging world.) It will not serve us well to build walls up. Assuming the worst in one another will not get us anywhere. This is just a gentle reminder.

Read more here.

Year Round or Summers Off?

Darcy at Heart of the Matter posted on the site today and I responded to it.

Her question was: I’d love to hear the decision making process you took to determine your schedule. Do you school or not during the summer? Why?

Here's my reply:
We don't do academics year round. We take summers off for a few reasons:

a. I need a mental break -- I tend to wear this homeschool mom hat too tightly and my world revolves around it. I need to be free of it completely so that I can enjoy other things, and my kids, without "we have to get school done" hanging over our heads.

b. I sign the kids up for everything that I can afford -- swimming, archery, VBS, sport camps, chess, etc. These things are offered in abundance during the summer and not so much during the school year so we take advantage of these other learning opportunities.

c. I don't want my kids to be unapproachable to traditionally schooled kids. If we school during the summer then they may not get the invites to lake days and campouts because people assume that they have to "do school." Likewise, we can't be salt and light to the world around us if our schedule won't allow us to interact with them.

d. Kids grow in every way during the summer. I am acutely aware of their growth and take it all into consideration as I plan our path for the next year, purchase curriculum, etc. Having an extended break gives me room for extra clarity in making these decisions.

e. I haven't experienced that my kids need much by way of review in the fall. I've actually seen them grow in their abilities. For instance, my reluctant reader needed to have all the pressure taken off and during the summer he found the desire to give reading a shot. My oldest has explored his own interests during the summer, writing his own newspaper and finding entrepreneurial pursuits. We participate in the library summer reading programs as well (as many as we can find!).

With all that said, I admire families (i.e. moms) that can school all year long. Homeschooling is definitely diverse and beautiful.

So what do you do? Comment here or go to Darcy's post and tell her!

School on the Road

The thought of driving across America in an RV is probably the most romanticized homeschooling dream ever invented. While we have never even come close to trying it, we have attempted on various occasions to do school on short trips in the car. You might think, "Aren't we lucky? Public school kids never get to do THIS!" (Check that rationale --- homeschool kids are actually taking their work with them on vacation. How is that a good deal?) So, it's understandable that J has a fairly large aversion to school in the car. And I think these are the reasons why:


1. School work is not any easier on a road trip than it is at home. It's more difficult to write, reading might actually make a child queasy, and thinking mathematically is impossible when there are snowy hillsides to gaze at mile after mile.


2. School work in the car is typically busywork. They can't fully engage in a project in the car so I tend to resort to bringing along more workbook oriented activities. Truthfully, I don't know if they necessarily learn anything from them; they just complete them. If they don't like them at home, why would work pages be more appealing on a road trip?



3. I can't learn alongside them. In fact my body begins to hurt from turning around to offer help so many times. This frustrates them as much as it frustrates me. If I'm not helping, then I'm sitting in the front seat reading my own book while my son sits behind me figuring out how President Harrison helped the country to thrive. It doesn't seem like a great deal to a kid.

What do you see as the cons of school on the road?

Thoughts From an Unexpected Place

I had the chance to go hear Shane Claiborne tonight. I happened to have my homeschool filter on at the time and so what I heard I heard most loudly as a mother and a home educator. My other roles were vying for attention as well, but I kind of needed to make peace with the filter tonight. I don't think he expected to address a homeschooling mother's dilemmas, but he did because I chose to listen in that way and it's pretty cool what came out of it for me.

Here are some thoughts that everyone there heard tonight:

• Jesus doesn't command anyone to worship but he invites them to follow and as they begin to follow they begin to worship.
• Christianity is not spread by force, but by fascination.
• Jesus didn't come to make bad people good but to bring dead people to life.
• As a peculiar people we have the opportunity to live with creativity.
• We do this (not to become somebody or create something) but so that people can taste and see that the Lord is good.
• The person who is in love with their vision for community will destroy it. But the person who is in love with the people around them will create community wherever they go. -- Boenhoeffer

Regardless of how others will take these ideas and run with them, I'm personally praying that these thoughts will revolutionize my homeschooling and my parenting as I continue to dwell on them. More invitations, less commands; more fascination, less force; more life, less behavior modification; more tasting; more loving; less destroying.

Hard things for a mom to hear. Good things for a mom to do. And a better teacher/inviter I'll be.

Identity (This and That)

Sometimes we have days (o.k. weeks) when we think:
“Is this all there is?”
“I’m a homeschooling mom. But I have two degrees and years of ministry experience [insert your own resume here]. Isn’t there something more than this?”
“I think I’d also like to do that.”
These days like to piggy-back on one another until we finally start seeking out other outlets to make us feel fulfilled and useful -- maybe even important -- because that looks so much more appealing than this.

When I hear other people’s stories… “I’m the volunteer coordinator for a major Christian non-profit,” … “I’m a nurse,” … “I’m a stay at home mom, but I work part-time from home.” … I start to think, well maybe I can do more than just this one thing. If I can do this then maybe I can also do that.

I let this little question get the best of me once and I dove into something that I thought would give me increased joy. It turns out that it wasn’t even comparable because while that added to my task list, it didn’t add to my character. After that was revealed to me as an unfortunate mismatch, I found new life in my “this”… more patience for the time that learning can take, more tolerance for the noisy toddler, more peace with why I do what I do, more creative ways to make my this distinctive, customized and infused with the essence of our faith and worldview. This is more about being than doing.

Still, I am a person outside of homeschooling. There are parts of me that are distinctively me, things that my kids don’t easily enter into, core values that I’m continually pushing toward and layers that I’m continually peeling away. Rather than exist in a continuous line I’m finding that I exist in radiating circles… I think Rilke called it “widening rings.” Before we can enlarge our identity we need to be comfortable with the identity we already have.

Thomas Merton said, “If you want to identify me, ask me not where I live, or what I like to eat, or how I comb my hair, but ask me what I am living for, in detail, and ask me what I think is keeping me from living fully for the things I want to live for. Between those two answers you can determine the identity of any person.” (The Man in the Sycamore Tree)

What is your “that?” And has your that ever derailed your ever widening this?

What Emergent Means Here

It's a bit of a double entendre really. Can I coin the phrase "triple entendre" because there's really three things that come to mind? First a definition: Something that emerges comes into view, arises, becomes. That's very descriptive of our homeschooling. Our strengths are discovered and allowed to rise as such. Our style changes, fluxes, emerges. Our methods come about from trial and discovery. Learning happens in different forms with each passing month. And, as a result, I notice that my kids have a more well-rounded point-of-reference than they had before.

Secondly, the word "emergent" has been used in the field of education for quite some time. For instance, emergent literacy is the development of reading skills over time in the life of a young child. (Read to your kids!) Emergent in this field does not refer to a new way of doing things. It's a recognition that within each child lies great potential and purpose that's just waiting to burst forth. Similarly, Reggio Emilia schools have a very appealing emergent philosophy that builds upon the interests of the child and I think that our schooling mimics many facets of this philosophy... painting broad goals but giving freedom for students to determine how to reach them, observing students closely to guide the implementation of those goals, and involving community in their overall development and performance. Therefore, emergent is an educational term indicating that who my children are and who they are becoming will come from them not from me. I get to help shape but not dictate.

Lastly, our family has crept away from some faith practices of modernity and has delved into the world of "messy spirituality." Though still quite Christian, we have re-evaluated many of the practices of our spiritual heritage, kept what seems most like Jesus and have dispensed with a little that just didn't make sense. As the conversation increases about the difference between the two, I'd probably fall more in line with the word "missional" rather than "emergent" but missional simply didn't say all that I wanted it to say here.

I just thought maybe it was time to elaborate a little on this. It's not completely refined, but this is the gist of the blog.

Ditch Your Second Hat

I was talking with my sister-in-law today and she asked, "How do you switch between being Mommy and being teacher to your boys? How do you get the respect a teacher would get when you're also the mother?" She is a former preschool teacher who is homeschooling her 4.5 year old daughter now so I can see why she's asking this question. I think it's something we all struggle with in the beginning. But we don't have to.

My answer was simply that you don't switch back and forth. Just be her mother who is taking time to teach her as you are going. You're not being a teacher sometimes and a mother at other times. You're simply being an intentional mother all the time.

My mother took time to teach me to sew and cook and balance a checkbook. She didn't sit me down at the table and say, "I'm going to transform into your home economics teacher now so you need to relate to me differently." She just showed me how things work and now I can make a shirt and cook a meal and make money come out of a rock just like my mom can.

I think that's how God designed the relationship to be. The world has done a good job of making parents think that they aren't qualified to be their child's teacher, but God says otherwise:

These are the words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up.

Now this passage is talking about teaching children of God's work in their past and present and not about social studies and economics, but that's not my point. My point is that God sees parents and teachers as the same thing. Parents are teachers from the moment that child is born. You teach them the most important things in life and when you think about it you get to teach them the things that are the hardest to for the children to grasp! The ways of God, speaking a native language, how to make right choices, building good relationships, the importance of sharing and putting yourself last. Oi! If we can do the hard stuff then Algebra should be a piece of cake.

I sit my boys down at times during the day for learning activities and I just am who I am. When they write me notes they say, "I love you because you teach me stuff." And I'm cool with that. You should be too. Take off your other hat and let it go.

A Helpful Phrase

Have you ever heard the phrase, "You only have to be a day ahead of them" ?

I'm really milking that one lately.

We started our study of Nate Saint last week. It was a hit-and-miss week of school at home in order to get the co-op ready to begin. I had only planned to do Mr. Saint for 3 weeks... turns out it will take us four weeks to read the biography. So, I'm a little behind there.

So, now I'm inserting more social studies. This means that after Jake does his daily reading he needs to do his daily reporting (which happens in various forms). Because I'm behind a bit in this planning I resorted to an old stand by -- chapter questions. I suppose it won't kill him to answer some basic questions about what he read. But I'm having to read up on Ecuador the night before to find some good questions to ask.

Just a day ahead.

That's all I have to be.

Whew.

Changing Our Process

In mid to late August we all go through this denial process, "Summer can't be over yet." "I didn't accomplish all the things I had hoped." Most of what I had hoped to accomplish was a great deal of school planning AND preparation. The planning you can do on a hammock somewhere with a calendar, a stack of blank lesson plans and the table of contents from your curriculum. I did accomplish that as far out as Thanksgiving.

The preparation is the thing that takes time: finding pages to use, picking projects, gathering supplies, designing the process for the whole shape of the day, etc.

But then I read Holt's book and when I combine his ideas with echoes of some Charlotte Mason philosophy I read two summers ago I decided to let go. This makes preparation somewhat of a struggle. Which projects will they want to do? What if I spend 20 hours designing some cool incentive process that they hate? What if I'm convinced we should do more art but they hate glue and paint? When we study Nate Saint, what if they don't want to spend a week on the Amazon and would rather learn about short wave radios?

I have some things sketched out. I know what B needs to hit in math and language arts and I have some of his reading books (old Ginn readers that I read). I also have his math curriculum and a critical thinking series to do with him. I have curriculm for J to follow in Math, Latin, Typing, Penmanship, and Writing -- three of them are media based. We'll do more reading aloud, less Bible ("Mom's lecture"), but more study of specific verses/passages. This is an even year so we're skipping formal spelling and vocab, but we're going to try notebooking.

But as far as the actual social studies and science lessons, projects, points and details -- I'm leaving that up to them to take us where they want to go. I have suggestions at the ready but I'm forcing myself to keep them suggestions and not turn them into assignments for this whole first four weeks. Giving them more freedom to learn what they want to learn will hopefully provide them with knowledge and applications that will put them on the path toward transformation.

It feels unsettling and chaotic but I'm excited to see what we all end up learning.

The Rare Political Observation

I'm not saying anything more here other than the fact that I just really appreciate this.

On Responsibility for Education

McCain: If a school will not change, the students should be able to change schools. John McCain believes parents should be empowered with school choice to send their children to the school that can best educate them just as many members of Congress do with their own children. He finds it beyond hypocritical that many of those who would refuse to allow public school parents to choose their child’s school would never agree to force their own children into a school that did not work or was unsafe. They can make another choice. John McCain believes that is a fundamental and essential right we should honor for all parents.

I Don’t Know How You Do It

You know who you are…you year-round homeschoolers. How do you look at these sunny days and squirt guns and even remotely link them to geography and spelling words? I just can’t do it.

Remember that report Jake and I were going to plug away at? Yeah, haven’t even touched it. Which is a bummer for him. He seriously got cheated out of the experience. Ah, well. He did get some experience in researching.

Something about summer screams, “Unstructure your life!” And even though we have things planned, camps and cookouts and camping trips, we have mornings to sleep in and tickle the baby, we have after-dinner time to walk to the playground and we have hours while the little man naps to do nothing. I think we really need to “schedule” more “do-nothing” time.

Turn off the tube and let the kids explore the stuff of the backyard and relationships and creativity. Catch up with friends whose email you’ve neglected. Dream up what comes next in the fall. And if you can do it all on a sunny deck, you’re the better for it.

Emergent Homeschool #3

{See my prior posts in this brief series for my atypical rationale as to why I'm using this book, which is totally unrelated to homeschooling, to influence my now-public philosophy on how I missionally teach my children at home.}

We've used the word contextualtization in church ministry settings over and over and we argued for and against it in seminary again and again. But I think it absolutely applies in the educational world as well. Here is the definition of contextualize from dictionary. com:

–verb (used with object), -ized, -iz·ing.

to put (a linguistic element, an action, etc.) in a context, esp. one that is characteristic or appropriate, as for purposes of study.

Also, especially British, con·tex·tu·al·ise.

Origin: 1930–35; contextual + -ize
—Related forms

con·tex·tu·al·i·za·tion, noun

2008, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/contextualization

In essence it is the idea that we can keep the message the same even when we must deliver it via different methods to different people groups. The book uses this simple definition,

"relating effectively to the needs, concerns, and interests (material, political and otherwise) of the people to whom we are ministering." The Shaping of Things to Come by Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch, p 83.

In my perspective, we've rounded this corner in church ministry, but I'm seeing contextualization used more and more in schools as well. In the educational world there is macro-contextualization (such as when a class of like-wired learners engages in a message in a way that is different from the next class of like-wired learners) and there is micro-contextualization (delivering a message to an individual learner based on his or her learning style -- how they best take in information). In homeschooling we deal with micro-contextualization.

In sharing the story of Jesus with someone we need to take into account all of their prior experience and knowledge in order to help His story connect with their own. Naturally, in our home teaching we have the freedom to infuse the content with our spiritual worldview, but we (I) have to be sensitive to our (my) students and realize that children have a "still-developing" worldview. For instance, one of my children is totally on board with Jesus, the other is not. So, as I teach I point out proofs because that speaks to my unbeliever, and I point out blessings because it speaks to my young believer.

Contextualization works for non-gospel messages as well. Academics can be contextualized. The facts remain the same, but we use changing methods. I use two different math curricula for my two sons as a way of relating to their interests and needs: one needed hands-on learning with less distraction on the page, the other needed a feeling of accomplishment and constant review (spiral learning). So, I have taught them both to add, but in very different ways.

Children are natural learners and yet the knowledge they obtain must be appropriate for their developmental stage. Those who are committed to reading aloud to their kids know that when we do so, we introduce them to places and experiences that their life path won't take them to. That way when they do learn about arctic explorers they know a bit about the barriers in that environment even though they live in Yuma, Arizona and have never experienced it themselves. We read aloud to provide them with context.

"...context is the stage where all comprehension takes place. 'It is the reality that ties together and therefore shapes all knowledge...' " ibid, p.87

If they have no context to refer to, they cannot grasp the new knowledge.

Education is a constant putting down of layer upon layer. The lower grades are all about introduction, they are not about making our children into trivia champions. We are layering for future learning. Once a child, for instance, understands that there are different types of plants then they can learn the parts of each one. Once they master that they can learn about the food chain and later the symbiosis between green living things and human living beings. Only then can they grasp the vast importance of agriculture, food supply, conservation and other related higher thinking. It's all about their first years, their first layer of introduction. Once the foundation is there we build upon it and in their higher grades they experience the meaning in new contexts.

We make an assumption when we school at home. We assume that we are helping this child take off on a life long journey of learning. We assume that we are not the end-of-the-line when it comes to knowledge. We are simply laying down the layers as it is appropriate for each child. They will take over their learning process gradually. If they do, then they will not likely abandon it at graduation because we have spoken to them in their immediate context, sped up the experience or slowed it down, related the information visually/ auditorally/ kinesthetically/ tactally. We've said, "Remember when we learned about...?" or "Remember when our family did..." and in so doing we've given them an unfailing foundation for what is yet to come.

We didn't treat them like cookie cutters, label them, pressure them to perform, or overlook them. We performed our task of educating with the whole child in mind -- his traditions and schedules, tendencies and personality, friendships and family connections, likes and dislikes, fears and aspirations, hurdles and victories, abilities and opportunities, nature and nuturing -- it's all a part of his context into which we speak all the words of life and Life.