Why do I Home school?

"And these 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." (Deuteronomy 6:6-7)

As I sit here, the thoughts that are crossing my mind this Spring Break are, "I sure am going to miss teaching my kids this week!" Does that surprise you? Well, it surprises me! You see, when I first began this journey of homeschooling I knew nothing about it whatsoever! I knew I wanted to give it a shot because, "I would miss my girl" if I put her in school. I made this decision in the hight of my joy of being a new parent- little did I know after a few temper tantrums and high spiritedness from my eldest, I would be changing my mind quite a few times. When it did come time to consider schooling I remember standing at a booth in church in North Carolina to register for an upcoming homeschooling training session. I took a deep breath and decided I wanted to walk away, when the lady (who must have known what I was thinking) stopped me and asked if I was interested. I nervously laughed (not wanting to look like I was actually scared of teaching my kids myself) and said "If I teach my kids myself, they will graduate knowing nothing!" She looked at me with a look that said "Poor dear" and then said something that startled me and shook me, she said, "Honey, don't you think the God who gave you your children has the ability to give you grace to teach them?" Well, I knew then that I had to be more careful about the jokes I was going to be making about homeschooling  around serious homeschooling moms from now on! I also decided that I had better make some decisions about where I wanted my family to "be" 15 years from now. I began to take a closer look at my parenting goals and concluded that If I wanted to have children who would "rise up and call me blessed", I needed to do something about getting them there. 

 My ultimate goal in parenting as I've just hinted at at is this: I want to raise godly, god-fearing, loving, compassionate children who knew how to serve  and love others at home, at church, and in their community. The only way I could ensure my best effort in this was to train them at home. I knew that in sending them to public school, their school teacher, as well- intentioned as they might be, could not correct bad attitudes and instill godly thoughts into them. Their friends at school could not train them to love their brother and sister and honor their parents. I desired daughters who would bless the world around them, but in order to train them these things, I had to consider teaching them myself! What was encouraging to me was that this was not an original thought, it came straight from scripture. I knew there was a way to gracefully and lovingly give them a desire for the Lord and raise up kids who LOVE to be together and not grow up to be hard- hearted towards the Lord and others. 

Now I do want to emphasize that I am not blind to the needs many family's face which would keep them from homeschooling. Many are at a place financially where both members must work, Ted and I face the same challenge, and we have had to make major financial sacrifices in order for me to stay at home; but is it impossible to homeschool if that is your desire? Absolutely not! The Lord knows your desire and I would encourage you to make your requests known to him and not give up hope to see that prayer answered. I would also like to emphasize that I do understand that many choose not to homeschool for many wrong reasons, but I would like to make a loving and grace filled plea, have you thought of the impact you are making on your family if you did choose to homeschool? Is homeschooling the solution to growing godly kids? No, children are not guaranteed to be smarter or more godly by teaching at home, but there are many factors which affect our kids out side of home. How are you as a mother actively insuring that the role you play in raising godly kids is a good one? What steps are you taking to guard and train your children? For me, it is to homeschool and train them to cook and clean and be kind to each other and to honor me and their father and to laugh and play here at home, and then to serve at church, to reach out to the unsaved by making meals for their neighbors and inviting other kids over and also to have one- on -one time, reading to them individually and to have "dates" with my kids, to allow them to see how I respond to my husband and to ask for forgiveness when I have sinned against them or my husband; all these things are "training" moments which they will remember and emulate and probably be better at than I can possibly teach them! The next couple of post will be viewpoints from a few other moms- friends of mine whom I asked to answer "why do you homeschool and what impact has this made in your family?" stay tuned...