Public School vs Homeschool

Unfortunately, I have noticed in the last couple of years, that homeschooling is as hot-button a topic as any other parenting decision. When I was pregnant, the raging debate was natural, unmedicated birth vs medicated birth vs c-section. Now, all these years later, does it matter? No, because we move on. The next debate is breastfeeding vs bottle feeding. Then attachment parenting vs traditional parenting. Cloth diapering vs disposable. Co-sleeping vs cribs. Homemade baby food vs store bought. Natural foods vs processed. Organic vs not-organic. Vaccines vs not. The list goes on and on and on and one would think that by the time our children reach preschool, kindergarten, grade school, middle school or high school, we would learn that every family is individual and makes the decision that is best for the family, right?! It appears, not so much. The hostilities on both sides of the "Public School vs Homeschool" debate are huge!

There are so many educational choices for parents today, that we should be grateful for the diversity of decisions parents can make to educate our children. You can choose public school, private school, charter schools, virtual academies, public online academy, coops, immersion, homeschool, unschooling........ {taking a breath} It is no longer "just" public school vs homeschool. It's so much bigger than that and we should be excited as parents by all the options that are available to teach our children! Choosing one way over another does not mean we love our children less, same as choosing to bottlefeed instead of breastfeeding means we don't love them. Or eat organic. Or not eat organic. Or cloth diaper. Or disposable diaper. Nor does it makes us a better parent, choosing one option over another.

I have noticed one difference in the schooling debate that, I believe, may very well be unique to schooling verses any other parenting decision. It seems that in almost all other debates, the moms are the ones who are the most emotionally-charged and can be the hardest on each other. That is not true with schooling. Moms are passionate, but so are dads. Dads can be as passionate and emotionally-charged about the education of their children as moms.

Our family went about homeschooling very gradually. I had toyed with homeschooling Austin from the time he was in 3rd grade, but was never confident enough to do it. I didn't do a lot of research on it, because it was just a thought and something I knew I couldn't really do. More of a pipe-dream really. By the time Aidan was in preschool, I knew I didn't want him to go to public school when he got to kindergarten, but still was a little uncertain if I could seriously educate him and how it may harm him socially (ha!). I prayed about it and had found plenty of scripture to back it up (will get to that in a moment), but my husband was not on board. Because I strive to be submissive, which for us is actually that we both agree on decisions, and that Steve has the "ultimate" decision, I was willing to wait on him. My prayer had to become that God would work on Steve's heart and move him towards that decision. That decision came when Austin was a freshman. By that time, we knew we would homeschool the others, but that we would wait until Austin graduated, so I could fully focus on his education. God moved quickly by the time Aidan was in 2nd grade and, by December, we knew we would be homeschooling all of our children the next year.

For us, it was never a decision we made lightly, and it was something we searched scripture and bathed in prayer. If it was only our will and not the Lord's, we would fail miserably. One scripture that was very important to us, and I am sure is important to many homeschooling families (but is definitely not exclusive to homeschooling, as it was important long before we did homeschool), is Proverbs 22:6 "Train a child in the way he should go; even when he is old, he will not depart from it."  Another important scripture about seeking the Lord that came to us was from Poverbs 3:6 "In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight." Another important verse for us was Acts 5:29 "But Peter and the apostles answered, we must obey God rather than man."

In these verses, we found comfort knowing that we would be training our children the way that we saw the Lord guiding us to do so and in a way that was appropriate for our family. But to do that, we first had to submit to God to make that clear to us and have our hearts open to whatever He directed us to do, and, if that included homeschooling, it would be counter-cultural and we would be obeying God and not just "going with the flow" of public schooling. Which would be difficult in some aspects, but God does not ask you to do something that He has not equipped you for (Hebrews 13:21 "[He will] equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen."). He is always there to guide us, if only we seek Him.

There are many other verses about educating your child. How you discern it for you and your family is how the Lord reveals it to you. For us, each of the following verses directs us to educate our children at home ourselves.

Deuteronomy

11:19 - "You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise."

4:9 - "Only take care and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children's children..."

6:5-7 - "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your  might. And these words that I command to you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit down in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise."

Isaiah 28:8-11 "To whom will he teach knowledge, and to whom will he explain the message? Those who are weaned from milk and those taken from the breast? For it is precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little."

Psalm 78: 5-7 "He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which He commanded our fathers to teach to their children, that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children, so that they should set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments."

2 Timothy 3:16 "All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work."

Colossians 2:8 "See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to elemental spirits of the world, and not of Christ."

Ephesians 6:4 "Fathers do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."

God showed us that each of these verses was, for us, about teaching our children at home, where we are able to choose the curriculum we desire to teach our children, and rely on Him. But not a single one of those verses says anything about only homeschooling. All of these same verses may be taken differently by others and speak to how they are to raise their children generally and not specifically to the education of their children. To us, it speaks to how we are to raise our family in general, which includes their education. Each of us has to rely on God to discern His will for their own family. God has made each individual person unique and each family unique with unique purposes in life.

Finally, a few verses for all of us. We all are created by God and it must break His heart to see such division among His followers. We need to remember Who we serve and why.

Colossians 3:23 "Whatever you do, work at it heartily, as for the Lord and not for men."  God wants us to do whatever we do - stay at home mom, homeschooling mom, work at home mom, working mom, divorced, single, married, everyone - to do it for Him, and not anyone else. If we do that, we are doing exactly what we are designed to do. Serve God in everything that we do, all the time.

2 John 1:9 "Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son."  We are all to abide in Christ and the teaching of scripture - homeschool, public school, private school, coop, unschool, charter school.....

I am closing with 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 because I feel like sometimes we forget that we are all created by God for His purpose ultimately and we all must have love for each other. If we do not have love, how can we possibly love anyone else? How can we at all realize that we are not all cookie-cut people who are exactly the same and expect everyone to only do what we do and if they do not, they are wrong or don't love their children? When we love as Christ first loved us, we are able to see each other for who they are in Christ and not judge each other so harshly. Every single parent makes decisions constantly for their children that are based on what is best for their children. We all need to learn to respect each other and not think that one choice is "better" than another. Because it's not. Every decision made by parents for their children guided by the Lord, is the right decision for their family. Parenting is hard. Let's all come together and not divide ourselves so much, in every aspect of parenting. The Lord has given us fellow believers to have for fellowship here on earth...let's not lose that and divide it further!

1 Corinthians 13:1-8a;13
"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient and kind, love does not envy or boast, it is not arrogant, or rude. It does not insist on it's own way, it is not irritable or resentful, it does not rejoice at the wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. ... So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love."

General Ramblings

So much has been going on in our home lately! I started a class called "Perspectives on the World Christian Movement" that has been amazing, but also very time consuming. A few people in our church took the class last year and then this year, worked very hard to organize it for the class to come to our town. It is an international college class. I always wondered if I could go back to college and now I can say with almost certain confidence that I don't really think I could right now for sure! I am learning a lot and really enjoying it, but it is a lot of work! There were three levels to take: audit, certificate, and credit. I figured I'd take it for certificate - I had no idea what I was signing up for! The timing is definitely not the best with starting homeschooling, having lots of little people at home, etc. - but I am enjoying it. I'm trying not to stress to much and I am learning I am far more of a perfectionist than I ever realized. It is absolutely heartbreaking when I turn in an assignment and "only" get 18 or 19 correct out of 20. I need to get over that - and quick! It brings about a huge amount of stress - both while I am doing the work and again when I get it back.

The triplets turned four!! (I still haven't done their birthday post - I'm getting to it!) They have their family birthday party this weekend and are very excited to see everyone. 

We began homeschooling earlier than we had anticipated. We had planned on beginning at the end of the second trimester so that Austin could get two trimesters at school finished. Originally, I wanted to pull him after Christmas break, but we decided not to. If I was ever unsure of God's plan in all of this - and I think in any huge life decision we always question whether God really told us to do this or not - I no longer do. Through a terrible situation at school, God made it perfectly clear when his perfect time was to pull Austin. We began a few weeks ago. The first week went awesome - albeit a little frustrating for me to see where he really was at. The last two weeks have been rougher. I think the change has been difficult (as all changes are for Austin) and it is, no matter how much we all wanted it, a major life change. We are adjusting and making our way and I have finally come to the point where if it takes him a little longer to graduate, then that is OK.

I have been upset with the lack of knowledge of Austin and the massive amounts of indoctrination he has gotten in his time in public schools. Austin has always been a "strong" student, intelligent, honor roll, high IQ, etc. I am now questioning the standards by which a school grades and passes students. I would understand a subject with "gray areas" being different in my grading criteria vs theirs, but not a solid, fact-based class. Austin has always struggled with Algebra and I knew he would at home. What is so extremely frustrating to me is that he passed algebra - with a C average. As a parent, that tells me that he had an average understanding of algebra and it would be reasonable to expect him to move on to Algebra 2. Thankfully, they have placement tests, so I had him do that over Christmas break. He got 3/20. WOW. I still thought maybe it mostly focused on things he hadn't quite gotten to yet. When he began at home, we started in chapter one and I was going to test him out until we got to a chapter he couldn't understand. Turns out that was chapter one. In his pre-test he got 4/20. After going over it with him, watching the DVD, doing the practice questions and finally the assignment, he took the same test again and got 78%. Seems like a huge improvement. I still don't understand why he passed in the first place. All of his classes have been the same - this was the most concrete example.

Physical science has been a struggle because he's been so indoctrinated by evolutionism and has never spent any time on creationism. As Christian parents, we always said our children would be "different" and it was OK they were in public schools because they had a strong foundation at home and knew the beliefs and were taught those beliefs. We discussed the things they talk about in school - evolution, among other things - and why that conflicted with our beliefs. I really thought he understood it. And he does, to a point. But one glaringly obvious example was the question "It is not biased for a scientist to not study a theory they do not agree with." He said true!

I could go on with example after example of ways I feel he was failed by them in the last nine years in just the few weeks we have done this, but ultimately it isn't even about that. It is more clearly about God using this entire situation to bring clarity to our decision to homeschool everyone - not just Austin. I had read a book lately and thought that maybe it was radical (I loved it) but after just a few weeks, I now realize just exactly how true it is and that it wasn't radical at all. And even if it is, am I not called to a life of radical obedience to God?? Are not all Christians called to such radical obedience?? We are!! Part of that radical obedience is my responsibility to raise and educate my children - and not leave it up to government run schools to do so. If it seems radical to homeschool - it may be because it is! If I am honest with myself, of course my children are getting a secular worldview in the public school system. They are there 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, year after year. How could they not? I even used the excuse that we are in a "Christian" district with "Christian" teachers but none of that matters. What matters is that I have, for far too long, abdicated my responsibility to raise my children the way the Lord has called me to. 

Now I know. And, like in Perspectives, once you know something, you must do something about it. The sin is to do nothing.

A New Creation

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away, behold, all things have become new!" ~2 Corinthians 5:17

As we embark on our homeschooling journey, which began a little sooner than I had planned, I am reminded of the awesome transforming power of God. I had planned on beginning in the end of February, but God took a terrible event and made it His and perfect and within His plan for our lives. I love when He does that!

As I look back over my life, I can see where God has transformed me and I stand in awe of His greatness. When I get anxious about the decision to homeschool or start to doubt whether I can truly take on something so huge, I need to stop and praise the One whom it is all for; who knew long before I was knitted in my mother's womb, exactly what He wanted for me and my family; reminding myself to be anxious for no thing. Because without Him, I will fail. And it is a huge undertaking, but I have been called....chosen....by God to do this for my children. Awesome.

Twelve years ago, I tearily sent Austin off to preschool, completely oblivious to what would happen in his life and, frankly, wouldn't have even cared at that time what he would be taught. I knew that everyone sends their children to school and had never even heard of "homeschooling." He went off to preschool, I cried, but I considered it a right of passage. Kindergarten came and it was a little harder to send him, but I still didn't even begin to question anything about what he would be taught or that it may conflict with our beliefs. At the time, I was a Christian, firmly rooted in my faith. I believed that a part of my responsibilities were gone. I was no longer the one with the greatest influence over him - his teachers and his peers were. I was no longer the one who spent the most time with him - they had seven and a half hours a day, 5 days a week with him. Even when difficulties started to surface, I never questioned taking him out and certainly never thought of homeschooling.

God had begun to nudge me about homeschooling by the time Austin was in sixth grade. Austin was begging to be, I knew all the reasons we should and could argue in favor of homeschool with the best of them, but I was still buying into the lie that I couldn't do it. By eighth grade, I knew I needed to be homeschooling not just Austin, but all of our children, but Steve was still not convinced. My prayer began that God would soften Steve's heart towards being a homeschooling family ourselves - he already agreed with all the reasons we should do it. I needed God to show me through Steve that this is what we, as a family, are called to do.

God transformed Steve's heart far quicker than He did mine. By December, Steve agreed that we needed to homeschool Austin and began looking into curriculum. We met with the school and AEA to discuss whether dual-enrolling Austin was an option or if we would have no involvement. Steve went into that meeting waivering still whether it was a good idea to revoke our consent to Austin's IEP that we had fought long and hard for. I prayed over the meeting and throughout the meeting, and halfway through, Steve told me to hand over the papers to completely revoke our consent to special education services. I watched my husband fight for his children - all of them - in that meeting in amazing ways. God can truly move people and it brings tears to my eyes to watch the power He gives each of us and the words only He can give us, at exactly the time when we need them.

I stand in awe of watching God's perfect timing in homeschooling for our family and the ways he has continued to work through and in our lives - in all areas of our life. I am amazed at what can happen when we step aside and relinquish all control of our lives over to God and stand in complete submission to His will. God will work in mighty ways if you let him. He will direct your path, if you allow it. And He will make His every plan for your life totally and completely clear - in His timing.

If you had asked me twelve years ago if I thought I would ever be homeschooling, have six children, live in a small town, I would have thought you were insane. Today, I am so excited to look over the last twelve years and the amazing ways in which God has transformed me for His purpose, and how he has prepared me for the journey ahead.

How has God worked in your life? Are you willing to give it all to him?

"Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." ~Philipians 1:6