Choices

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Welcome to the 22nd edition of A Living Education E-zine. The longer I am alive, am married, parent & homeschool my children and walk my daily Christian journey, the more I realise that life is all about choices.

In each of these facets of our lives we can make good choices or bad choices. I hesitate to say “wrong” or “right” as this can often be related to an issue which is individual to your family, where you live and what God is doing in your lives.

Recently I realised that I had made a poor choice related to an area of training my children. This is not an area that would cause mortal damage but was an area that could have certain repercussions in their lives as income earning adults. When I was ready to hear from God, He came and showed me the error in my choice as well as an alternative.

As I pondered the way He had waited for the right moment, I realised how He had been exposing my heart on this issue for a good few months before “crunch” time. When I noticed that He had patiently been waiting for me to be receptive to His word I realised too that this is how I need to be with my children.

I tend to often want to rush in and fix everything, or I see one area in a child’s life and want a quick fix solution for it when the root is so much deeper than just this one flaw.

Therefore this time has been a time of choosing to emulate my Father in heaven and train my children as He trains me – patiently, lovingly and by choosing a time when their hearts are ready to hear.

Charlotte Mason

I have spoken about Nature Study before in my ezine’s and have a few pages dedicated to it on my website. Nature study, like any other aspect of homeschooling is a choice whether we want to include it or not in our children’s curriculum. Homeschooling our children, when it is life and relationship based, lends itself to a natural type of nature study as our children delight in the plants and animals they see.

Yet there is another type of nature study which moms need to choose to do. Packing a nature study bag, heading off for a good spot or a location related to what you are currently studying opens up a wealth of learning experiences.

Sometimes we just go to walk and will casually discuss what we find, other times we go with an objective to journal, draw and classify. All of this time outdoors, is time well spent. Read more...

Family and Sibling Relationships

South Africa has been having massive power cuts due to a problem that was not attended to almost 10 years ago. This has caused some 70 000 people to loose their jobs on the mines. This is a staggering statistic in our country where the unemployment is already high. Each South African has been asked to do what they can to save electricity from buying insulation blankets for geysers, doing cold washes for clothes, not using tumble dryers and so on.

My husband decided to take it one step further and purchase us a real American Barbecue – what the stores here call a Patio Entertainer. This is great for our family as our power is off most days from 4 – 6.30pm which is smack bang during cooking time! But now we have a gas cooker :-))

It took a while to convince me that the cost was worth it but as I watched my husband and sons work side by side putting it together and cook our first meal on it, I was so thrilled that I had not stood in the way of this experience.

Tackling a big job like this together often tends to bring the worst out in some people. Patience has to be exercised, especially when you have different age levels and personalities working on the project, and sometimes it is in these situations that patience is often taught to us as we choose not to grumble, rush or yell at another person. A few years ago, a project like this would have been a challenge in our home, but due to God’s work in all our hearts over the years we have known Him it went off relatively smoothly. Yes, building healthy family relationships is a long term job!

Organizational Tips

Every Sunday I ask myself a simple question: “What can I do today to make my life a little easier this week?” Every evening I ask myself a similar question: “What can I do tonight that will save me time tomorrow?” For my children I often prompt them with a question along the same lines. This may be packing their specific items for an extra curricular activity or making sure their pencil boxes are in order for the next day.

If we have an outing the following day I ask my children to have their clothes laid out and their backpacks packed. I make sure that I plan for these on my meal planner too but having the correct food to pack as well as planning an easy dinner for that evening.

What can you choose to do on a Sunday or weekday evening that will have a positive effect on your week ahead?

Your Marriage

There are so many things that woman are exposed to through websites, books, support groups and email that tells you how your marriage should look. I recently saw a chat group entitled “Woman married to their best friends”. I thought on the surface it looks good – but on looking into the posts of the women I was deeply saddened for the woman who would “not fit in” because her husband is working 24/7, or is unsaved, not supportive of homeschooling, not equally yoked in other issues related to lifestyle choices or just not "their best friend"...what then?

Women who have not learnt how to discern what God’s truth is for their own lives will easily begin to measure their marriages to these sorts of standards. “A good father reads the Bible to us all every morning/evening” or “A good husband prays regularly with his wife”.

These are just two examples of very damaging perceptions woman can have about their husbands and they begin to measure their husbands according to this yardstick. So when you are reading, participating in discussions or receiving emails perpetuating one type of marriage model, do be careful to make the choice not to compare your husband to others. Rather pray for God to mould your marriage after His design.

Quote

“In this time of extraordinary pressure, educational and social, perhaps a mothers first duty to her children is to secure for them a quiet and growing time, a full six years of passive receptive life, the waking part of it for the most part spent out in the fresh air.” Charlotte Mason

Living books

Have you ever wondered what the difference between a good books and living book is? This is my definition for our home: A good book is a book that grasps my children’s attention due to high quality language and relevance to their lives and interests. A living book in our home is classified for content which has a high moral standard, ability to stir up ideas and thoughts and transports us to another time and place. Living books are also books that make us feel like the author is in the room with us, telling us a story. Some of our favourite good books are found on my website for all different categories of reading.

In terms of curriculum that falls into the spectrum of living books we have found three such resources all of which we have used and can personally recommend. For science we have thoroughly enjoyed Jeannie Fulbright’s Elementary Apologia books and her 5th book on land animals has just been launched.

For geography we have used Ann Voskamp’s A Child’s Geography to “go into all the world”. Last year we used Explore His Earth and this year we are being thrilled with the Holy Land studies.

As Sonlight is our backbone for our history studies we have enjoyed a wealth of great literature. In Year 6 & 7 they make use of Susan Wise Bauer’s The Story of the World as the narrative backdrop for world history for older students. For younger students we have delighted again and again in VM Hillyer’s A Child’s History of the World, bar the first few chapters.

Homeschool Curriculum For Life News!

The upgrades on the site are moving along slowly as time is very short in our home at the moment. When visiting homeschool-curriculum-for-life.com please don’t be dismayed if there are two templates for the next while. This process is causing me to be sure to choose to tend to other more important things before the upgrades and exercise patience in that I cannot do what I want to do quickly.

I hope to do a lot more work on the conversion during this first term holiday, which starts on the 21st of March. During the holidays we will also be doing some travelling to places related to our current South African studies. So far we are visiting a game reserve, Khoi cave & village, Dias Museum Complex, Cango Caves and the Elephant Sanctuary.

Take care until next time,
God’s richest blessings to you as you homeschool,
Wendy

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