Changed By Love

Changed By Love

Following the Lamb wherever he goes… Revelation 14:4

Education is a Life

“Our aim in Education is to give a Full Life. — We begin to see what we want. Children make large demands upon us. We owe it to them to initiate an immense number of interests. ‘Thou hast set my feet in a large room’ should be the glad cry of every intelligent soul. Life should be all living, and not merely a tedious passing of time; not all doing or all feeling or all thinking — the strain would be too great — but, all living; that is to say, we should be in touch wherever we go, whatever we hear, whatever we see, with some manner of vital interest… The question is not, — how much does the youth know? when he has finished his education — but how much does he care?”

—Charlotte Mason

Here’s what I get from this:

Living life to the fullest.

Living life with our children.

Living life intentionally.

“We owe it to them [children] to initiate an immense number of interests.”

‘Thou hast set my feet in a large room’ should be the glad cry of every intelligent soul.

The Lord arranged my education so that I would learn to immerse children in a subject so that they could learn as much as possible as effortlessly as possible.

I follow their interests as much as I can and facilitate their further learning.

My children notice a difference in the way they view the world and the way their public school counterparts view the world. They notice a lack of security and confidence that makes them feel sorry for them. They see that many of their friends feel like they’re not very smart. My son said today that he believes students in institutional schools are afraid to try new things and tackle difficult subjects because they are afraid they will get a bad grade that will stay with them forever and mark them as a failure.

Homeschooling as a Lifestyle

Homeschooling is a lifestyle, not just schooling at home. At least, that’s what it is for my family. We do more than academics in our homeschool. We learn how to relate to others in a loving way.

The fact that we are a homeschool family permeates everything we do. It defines us.

For my children, gaining knowledge is not a separate compartment of life from all other areas. Even in their game-playing, they research and gain as much knowledge as they can.

Everything that happens in life is an opportunity to learn something new.

Tomorrow, two of my boys, ages 10 and 7, are planning to make peanut butter cookies while the others are doing chores. They say they want to reward the others for their hard work.

Another son, 15 years old, took a stand about the language and seductive dress of females in video games, and was recruited into a league of honorable gamers. They saw an article he wrote about a new game in which he praised its cleanness and lack of objectionable material. He was blasted by other gamers defending the filth that has become increasingly common in video games. He responded calmly and maturely and caught the eye of some young men who want to play only games that are decent and hold up a standard of moral decency. When they saw his age, they were shocked at his poise under fire and his boldness to proclaim the truth. They asked him to become a part of their group in spite of his age.

My children care.

KNOWLEDGE OF GOD
“Without knowledge Reason carries a man into the wilderness and Rebellion joins company…Fundamental knowledge is the knowledge of God and while we are ignorant of that principal knowledge, Science, Nature, Literature and History, all remain dumb.”

“The Word is full of vital force, capable of applying itself. A seed, light as thistledown, wafted into the child’s soul will take root downwards and bear fruit upwards. What is required of us is, that we should implant a love of the Word; that the most delightful moments of the child’s day should be those in which his mother reads for him, with sweet sympathy and holy gladness in voice and eyes, the beautiful stories of the Bible; and now and then in the reading will occur one of those convictions, passing from the soul of the mother to the soul of the child, in which is the life of the Spirit.

Bible-teaching, for example, is perhaps the most valuable instrument of education, not only moral and spiritual, but intellectual. The Bible is the “classics” of the children and the unlearned, the finest classic literature in the world. Some of our greatest orators and best writers owe their moving power to the fact that their minds are stored with the exquisite phraseology and imagery of the Scriptures… The children are getting actual familiarity with the text; they are so sympathetic that they catch the archaic simplicity of style and diction, and their little narratives are quite charming.”

—Charlotte Mason

My oldest son has become quite a writer. He has written epistles to friends through email. When I read them, I feel like I’m reading the Bible. I’ve commented on that many times. One time he told me, “Well, that’s what I’ve read the most of – the Bible. That’s why I write like it.”

I let him decide when he was 16 what he wanted to study. He chose his Bible. I asked him to study some math and science and write about what he was studying in his Bible, and he agreed.

He is now 20 years old. Now he is studying the Torah through writings by the Sages and Rabbis. He is learning to read Hebrew. He can speak extemporaneously about many biblical issues. He has thought through many deep philosophical and theological questions. I go to him when I don’t understand something, and he usually has an answer for me. He speaks clearly and fluently. He is confident but not cocky.

I didn’t read straight from the Bible to my son when he was younger, but my husband and I have endeavored to live what the Bible teaches and have placed a high value on the Bible all our married lives. We led Bible studies in our home and talked about the Bible among ourselves.

I finally understood that I needed to put the Bible first in our homeschool after homeschooling for about 10 years. But my son had already figured that out before I did! We lived it, and he became enthralled with it.

Ultimate Homeschool Expo Time Again! UHSE 2011

I just got an email from my friend, Felice Gerwitz. She can’t wait until the membership site goes live she just had to share this article with you today. She is so “excited” about her Ultimate Homeschool Expo resource library. Actually, she is so “excited” that she has just shared a sneak peek into her Membership Site.

You see one of the great things about the Ultimate Homeschool Expo is that everything is ONLINE as more than a convention–it is the ULTIMATE homeschool resource library.

With every online event that Felice plans, she builds a private, exclusive Membership Site that includes everything from the UHSE in one place–it has audios (from all of the sessions and from the bonus gifts that her speakers give to us), ebooks, complete unit study guides, articles, printable notebooking pages, cookbooks, on and on. I can’t believe all of the things that we receive for only $24.95. It is truly ULTIMATE!

She wanted to share an article her daughter wrote. Her daughter was homeschooled K-12 and went on to graduate from college with honors. She is now married, has four children and is homeschooling as well! Can I say, “wow”! I love it when there is proof that homeschooling works! Here is the article, enjoy!

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Why Homeschool? A Homeschool Graduates Speaks.
By Christina Gerwitz Moss
Author, Public Speaker, Homeschool graduate and now Homeschool Mom

Homeschooling for me has always been a way of life. I was homeschooled from K through 12th grade and loved the experience. I decided to pursue higher education and graduated from college in three years with honors. It wasn’t just the opportunities I had but the loving surroundings in which I was able to grow and flourish with love, stability and Christian spirituality. I attribute my homeschool experience as a wonderful springboard for my life and events that took me well into adulthood with fond memories.

My brother and I were not concerned about what other students would treat us as we learned. My brother was “disabled” in the sense of the world, but I didn’t think it was odd that I, two years his junior was on the same grade level. We were free to learn at our own pace, gleaning information on topics that interested us (it seemed) at every turn during school hours or not. I later learned that my mother planned our year ahead of time and often switched topics as our interests became fine-tuned to a particular subject. It appeared to us as if the world was our school and many days we were excited to begin.

We were free to learn at our own pace, and often testing was a form of a game where mom asked us questions and we bunny-hopped, jumped, or skipped to the end signifying completion. When testing became more formalized it still was a contest where we tried to beat last time’s score or asked for special “extra credit” answers that would bring us over the 100 mark. Mom was always sure to comply. My mom didn’t like testing us, but I enjoyed the tests.

Homeschooling my own children was an easy choice to make, especially since I have the loving support of my husband, who was not homeschooled, but had cousins who were through high school. We both want to offer our children a great education both academically as well as with the foundation of Christianity. Homeschooling we both agree will accomplish that desire for our family. I am excited knowing my children will experience the same things that I had growing up, the freedom to talk and discuss deep religious truths, question when those teen aged years come up, and know that my parents never discounted our questions as childish or rude, but listened and directed with love and concern. I also love having a flexible schedule with the exception of offering my young children a little more structure than my mom gave to us. Mom is almost perfect in the proverbial “Mary Poppins” sense, is an icon of the homeschool movement, and well loved…but I can’t do everything just like her! In fact, I learned that from her. She told me to think for myself, stand my ground, and always cheered me on when confronted with tough decisions and whatever live-crisis crops up in life.

I have only just begun my journey with my young children, the oldest turned five in January. With almost a year of schooling completed, I have come to realize what a great undertaking homeschooling can be for the entire family. We have had the most incredible year in terms of growth, enjoyment of each other’s company, and of course the element my mom used, “fun.” We have learned much and had a few ups and downs along the way. Homeschooling is not for the faint of heart. It takes commitment and dedication. It takes a totally unselfish love for your children that supersedes what the world says is “normal” in regard to traditional schooling.

I remember a story recounted by my mom. She had us in a high-end preschool where academics were stressed thinking that was important for my speech-delayed brother. I went along for the ride, so to speak, and made friends easily as did my mother. When it came time for school, mom decided to homeschool my brother and of course, I followed suit. She received a call from a friend one morning (I was too young to remember), who felt “sorry” for my mother. You see, she had rushed through the morning, gotten her child on the school bus, and harried was sitting down to a wrecked kitchen and a cup of coffee before she tackled the day. She told my mom how sorry she was that she was not getting a “break.” My mom recounts, “I told her that I was sitting in bed, with my second cup of coffee, still in pj’s with two kids flanked on either side, pillows fluffed, and reading. We had completed our religion books, Bible, and history. Breakfast was long done and washed and put away, and we would soon dress, do a few more chores before we headed upstairs to our school room to tackle some math, writing and other activities.” This friend didn’t call again feeling sorry for my mom. In fact, we felt sorry for ourselves if we did not complete school by noon so we had the day to explore our world!

For the success of a life-time homeschooler, I believe it is a decision not something to revisit every year. I think it is similar to reviewing your marriage and deciding yearly if it is working out for you! Marriage is a commitment and for my family so is homeschooling. We will give it our all we don’t micro-analyze it looking for an out, looking at what they are “missing” in terms of the school bazaar, fund-raisers, track and field events or the like. We feel it is ordained by the Word of God, and we know, by His grace we will continue with the tradition of raising a mighty people who love and will serve Him in though, word and deed! If you are considering homeschooling I ask you to prayerfully consider what the Lord wants for you, for your life, for your family. Do not look left or right, look straight ahead. If the Lord ordains it He will give you the blessings and grace to continue. Don’t take my word for it, take His.

Christina Gerwitz Moss is a Christian, wife, and homeschool mom of four precious blessings and she is the daughter of Jeff and Felice Gerwitz, (Media Angels). While still a homeschooler, Christina desired to be an author. She urged her mom to write a series of novels. However, her mom turned the tables and urged Christina to try her hand. The results were a mother-daughter team and the highly successful novels are loved by many and sold on many online venues such as Christian Book Distributors. The Truth Seekers Mystery Series was born, three action-adventure, mystery and suspense novels. Christina completed the last one as a college freshman. For more information about the series visit the website at http://www.TheTruthSeekersMysterySeries.com

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Isn’t it amazing when things come full circle? Well, I hope you enjoyed that article and, just think…this is only ONE of the awesome gifts included on the Membership Site. There are hundreds more!

And the speakers for this event are fabulous!

Take my word for it, you will WANT a ticket to this event and access to all of the wonderful resources. Grab your ticket here:

http://www.ultimatehomeschoolexpo.com/UHSE2011.htm

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I’m an affiliate for Christianbook.com. If you want to search for a Christian or homeschool product, please use the search box I have placed at the bottom of the left sidebar.

Oh, yeah, I’m also an Amazon affiliate, so if you want to search Amazon, you can use the search box I have on the right sidebar!

My family and I would appreciate it!

Making the Bible Real to Our Children

How do we make the Bible seem real and relevant to our children?

Treat the Bible like a history book and make it your main course of study. Put it first. Make it such a priority that if you don’t do anything else for school that day, you will be sure to study the Bible. And make sure your children know how much of a priority it is.

Lay a foundation of Old Testament (Torah) study. Then when that foundation is firmly in place, dive into the New Testament. For my children, that has meant that we have studied the Old Testament for about 10 years. We are just now starting a systematic study of the New Testament.

Over the years, we have studied Genesis very thoroughly. The Lord kept taking me back to it, over and over again. We read Genesis: Finding our Roots by Ruth Beechick.

We read stories by Gene Edwards that go into great detail about the Creation and the Exodus and then the rest of the Bible. These were The Chronicles of the Door, which my friend, Lydia, let me borrow. I used Heart of Wisdom to develop study techniques using Bible handbooks, maps and timelines to bring more life and fuller understanding to our studies. Through HOW’s Adam to Messiah, I learned to consult Bible dictionaries and encyclopedias, especially the Victor Journey Through the Bible

to flesh out the details of Bible stories. I also used Diana Waring’s materials to add some archaeology and other science books to fill out our studies. She gives lots of ideas for supplemental books that help with Creation Science and research about early civilizations.

We read through the whole Bible last year, but we didn’t have time to study it. We just read the assigned pages each day in The Narrated Bible, which took a long time each day. Of course, some discussion happened, but not like it would when you read a few verses or just one chapter.

By reading through the Chronological, Narrated Bible (the Daily Bible) we got to see how the whole Bible fits together. It seemed like a seamless story instead of unrelated chopped up stories the way it can seem if you skip around and study one thing, then another, out of order. It was very helpful to me, too.

No Sunday School lessons that make the Bible stories seem like fables or fairy tales

When we talk about the Bible with our children, we need to convey to them our belief in the truth of the Bible and our reverence for it. Our dependence on it for guidance from the Lord should come through as we live our daily lives with our children.

Bible videos have been good tools to help my kids learn the basics of the Old Testament stories. They have learned a lot from Superbook and Veggie Tales. We can use those as springboards for further discussion. That’s what makes the stories come to life and validates them as more than just fables. If we as parents speak about them as real events and real people, then our children know that the Bible is true and important and real. If they see us patterning our lives after what the Bible says, then they know that it’s something that they should take seriously. If they only hear about these stories in Sunday School and then never hear about them again, the Bible will seem separate and detached from real life. And they won’t value them or think about them on a deeper level. They will discount them as Sunday School material. It will have no impact on their lives.

I went to Sunday School once a week when I was a child. Then I spent five days a week in “real school” that seemed far more important to everybody. I got the impression that what I learned in school was important. I was graded on it and tested on it, and people acted like it was vital that I work really hard in school to learn all I could. But I never felt like it mattered much to other people if I learned what the Bible taught. And much of the information I learned at school contradicted what the Bible teaches. It certainly didn’t reinforce my Bible learning!

I did learn a lot about the Bible, because I had some Sunday School teachers along the way who motivated me with prizes to memorize verses and to learn how to find my way around the Bible. There were a few who really seemed to take it seriously. But nobody took it as seriously as “school”.

As your children get older, go into more depth about the meaning and the lessons we can learn from the stories and teachings of the Old Testament. Apply the lessons to daily life. For example, when your child acts jealous of a sibling, remind him of how Cain killed Abel and how Joseph’s brothers treated him. People often do really bad things out of jealousy. We need to guard our hearts against jealousy. That’s a good lesson to learn early on.

These stories should be treated like history.

The stories of the Bible should be seen as lessons for us in how God interacts with people and what that means for us.

Make the Bible seem real and relevant. Read some fiction based on Bible stories to help them fill in details behind the action and the possible emotions experienced by the characters. But make sure that the author truly believes that the Bible is God’s word and respects it as such. I read Adam and His Kin by Ruth Beechick to the oldest two of my children. I read The Chronicles of the Door by Gene Edwards several years ago. My oldest son really soaked it all in. All along the way, I have been finding novels that flesh out the Old Testament stories. I have found them at the library mostly. I read the trilogy called The Genesis Trilogy starting with The Heavens Before

by Kacy Barnett-Gramckow to the oldest four kids. They got to know Noah and his sons and got a feel for what the world might have been like right before the Flood and right after the Flood. I read a novel about Abraham that I got from the library about two years ago to all six of my oldest kids. I always stress that these are just novels and that the author has tried to imagine what it would have been like. I try to point out what is actually taken straight from the Bible and what is conjecture.

These products help kids learn to apply what the Bible teaches:

What’s in the Bible videos by Phil Vischer

336333: What"s in the Bible? Volumes 1-4

McGee and Me by Focus on the Family
Other Focus on the Family materials – Adventures in Odyssey – we listened together.
Bible story books for children as they enjoy them. If I see any sign of boredom or distaste, I put them aside, and may try them again later.

I am reading The Ark, the Reed and the Fire Cloud by Jenny L. Cote to the 7 year old twins right now. They are enjoying it. They sometimes ask for it. It is from a series she wrote called The Amazing Tales of Max and Liz.

It’s about Noah’s Ark written from the animals’ perspective. It’s very good. It’s long, so it’s taking us a long time to read it. It has over 400 pages.

I didn’t come up with the plan to teach the Old Testament first and lay the foundation for the New Testament. It is the way the Lord has led me. As I look back and see what we’ve done, I realize that this has been His plan.

Along the way, he has provided and led me to lots of helpful resources. Here are some of them:

More Recommended Resources:

Donut Man videos
Missionary biographies – I especially like Christian Heroes Then and Now by Janet and Geoff Benge. Trailblazer Books by Dave and Neta Jackson are good, too.
Superbook has re-done their video series for this generation. It’s very good!
Torchlighters has some good videos. We have the stories of Jim Elliot and Perpetua. I plan to get more of these in the future!

This post was included in the Women Living Well Wednesdays Link-up.

Ultimate Blog Party

Ultimate Blog Party 2011

I wanted to get in on the Ultimate Blog Party this year. I was excited to see that I could link to it under the category of Christian blogs.

Because that’s what my life is all about. Jesus is my Everything.

One of my main messages is that God is faithful through times of testing and hardship. I have written many posts about how God has sustained us through some very tough times of being homeless, being jobless, wandering and wondering across the country trying to follow His leading, straining to hear His voice. I have filed those posts under the category Journey of Fire. Check some of them out if you need encouragement as you go through a time when it seems that God is leaving you on your own, and you are wondering if He’s really even there. Or if He cares about you.

When life doesn’t go the way we planned or thought it should go, it’s good to read the testimonies of others who survived and found out that He really was there with them the whole time. And He delivered them from the shame, humiliation, disappointment and poverty that they experienced during the testing times.

I have written quite a bit about learning how to hear His voice under the category Hearing God. I am still learning, too, but He has brought me a long way.

I’m big on Faith. I believe God is, too!

I also like to tell about our family experiences and share pictures of my kids – ten of them! That makes us unique in some circles. Not so much in others.

And I love to share our homeschool experiences and my excitement about the privilege of educating my children at home.

I try to remain open to the Holy Spirit’s leading and share what He wants me to share on this blog.

I pray that you will be blessed just by coming by my blog today. May His presence surround and embrace you as you seek His face and follow the Lamb wherever He goes.