Twelve Days of Homeschool

Thanks to Sandee Rodriguez for the heads up about this fun video version of "Twelve Days of Christmas" as sung by homeschool moms. No further comment is needed, the video speaks for itself! Merry Christmas!

This is pretty hilarious for homeschool moms.

"We're Done!" - but I didn't think it would feel so weird

Now that we are done homeschooling, I canceled our HSLDA membership. But I confess I am having an unexpected response to this "final" email from HSLDA.

I have depended on HSLDA e-lerts to bring important issues pertaining to parental rights and homeschooling to my attention.

I have actually used the text of e-lerts as blog posts when I was in a hurry to get a particular message out.

It is going to be odd to not receive the Home School Court Report, or have access to all the great materials available on their website.

But we really are done. Now I will find out if I know how to write about anything besides homeschooling.

Why don't people believe it can happen here?

The New American reported on the new education law that effectively banned homeschooling in Sweden and made any kind of alternative to government schooling illegal.

OK, so the picture is German, but the principle is the same.

FTA: "The Kingdom of Sweden took a dramatic turn toward totalitarianism with the adoption of a sweeping new education “reform” package that essentially prohibits home schooling and forces all schools to teach the same government curriculum. The draconian 1,500-page law — deceptively referred to by the Swedish government as “The new Education Act - for knowledge, choice and security” — was approved by Parliament last week amidst strong criticism and opposition. When it goes into effect next year, the entire educational system will be transformed, and alternative education abolished."

Particularly in countries where the UNCRC has been adopted, this is definitely the wave of the future.

There seems to be a particular antipathy toward religious instruction, as explained by Education Ministry press secretary Anna Neuman. “[Religious schools] can’t make any children to pray or confess to the God, but they will still be allowed [to exist].”  So what she is saying is that there will be no more difference between "religious" school and a government school.

Swedish homeschoolers are considering leaving the county.

Surprise! Homeschooled Students Do Well In College

A new study quantifies what homeschoolers have known in their hearts from the beginning: homeschooled students not only succeed in college, but actually outperform conventionally schooled students.  They also graduate in larger numbers than do other students.

So much for those accusations of "isolation" producing unwashed,  uneducated, socially inept young adults.

As recently as twenty years ago, colleges were still skeptical about whether homeschooled students were suitable candidates for a four-year degree program. Today, the vast majority of colleges have a specific admissions policy for homeschooled students that usually includes a portfolio of work, standardized test scores, and reference letters.

The study found that homeschooled students had higher first-year GPA's than other students. Moreover, homeschooled students had higher composite ACT scores. Though their math scores were  a little lower, their reading, English and science scores were much higher than those of students in any other category.

The study, entitled Exploring Academic Outcomes of Homeschooled Students, was based on a college in the Midwest with 11,000 students. Approximately 1% of the student body was homeschooled.

This is good news for homeschooling families. Not only does it confirm what they already suspected, but the study was not done by a homeschooling advocacy group.  Now, I personally do not have a problem with the National Center for Home Education or the studies they have conducted - but for those outside the homeschooling fold, a study by an independent party may be more persuasive.

Pat yourselves on the back, parents, for producing intelligent, hardworking, high-achieving, well-rounded future leaders in America!

Are you an extremist?

"So the question is not whether we will be extremist but what kind of extremist will we be. Will we be extremists for hate or will we be extremists for love?"-Martin Luther King

I posted this on Facebook earlier this week as I contemplated the end of my homeschooling journey.  While my son still has things to finish up, it can be argued that he is done with "homeschooling," as we have always done it.

I actually began thinking about extremism when I did my regular Google search on myself to be sure nobody is saying terrible things about me, and I came across this gem describing me as a Right Wing Extremist, apparently based on my Twitter account. That wasn't the only thing they got wrong, and if you went to that page it doesn't say that anywhere, so I am not sure exactly why it says it here.  But it did get me thinking about what it means to be an "extremist" and if there is really anything wrong with that.

When we first started homeschooling, we could have been described as "extremists."  We were motivated by a desire to shelter our children from The World, and to train them up as Bible believing Christians. We gave them a lot of opportunities to socialize with other children, but we did strictly control the quality and quantity of those interactions. We even homeschooled year round - From July 5 to Thanksgiving we had "9 week on/one week off" rotations, then taking off from Thanksgiving till January 2. Then more 9 week rotations until mid-May, and off again until July 5.  It worked well for us for a variety of other reasons, but it also gave us a reason not to be available in the summer when neighborhood kids were at home, and for them not to be available when we were off during everyone else's school year.  We preferred to spend time with other homeschoolers.

Actually, I was the one who preferred to spend time with other homeschoolers. It was tiresome to have to defend the way I lived all the time.  Remember, this was 15-20 years ago, when acceptance of home schooling was a lot different.  We were only the second homeschool family in our town.

Ultimately, we were motivated by love.  As we were both raised in non-Christian homes and had experienced many trials and sorrows during our own forays into the world, we wanted to give our children a foundation based on the truth of Word of God instead of on the winds of public opinion. A foundation that would help them avoid the snares that entangled us, and the heartache they caused.

Over the years, we began to relax our standards as the world changed, and the church changed. I got careless. I began to be concerned about whether they would be "irrelevant."  I opted for controlled exposure to media and other worldviews, and NEWSFLASH - kids are no more able to resist the siren song of the world when their exposure is "controlled" than when it is "uncontrolled."

My daughter just wanted to be like all the other kids.  My son, who preferred solitude, was glad to be able to stay home. They both got their wish. 

As for me, I agree with Dr. King. The question is not whether we will be extremists, but rather, what kind of extremist we will be.  There are plenty of things happening in higher education that we should be extremely concerned about.  You can read here about the Christian counseling student at a Georgia university who has been told she has to "change her beliefs" and submit to diversity and "sensitivity" training, or be expelled from school.  There are many others who have been thrown out of colleges around the country for refusing to affirm homosexual behavior.

Don't assume your children are strong enough in the Lord to withstand this kind of pressure to conform. Particularly when they are facing the prospect of being called haters or homophobes. Or facing the prospect of being saddled with paying off student loans for a degree they may never receive if they will not bow down.

If you are extremely concerned  for the future of religious freedom - or for that matter, freedom in general - in this country and have the nerve to say so, they will probably call you Taliban, teabagger, racist, or who knows what else.  If they know you are a Christian, they might add "Jesus freak", or perhaps "religious wingnut" to the mix.

Be an extremist - someone who is extremely, wildly in love with Jesus who talks to Him like He is real, and act as if you believe He can really answer prayer. Academic excellence is important, but what good is it if getting into that college of their dreams results in the shipwreck of your child's faith? Leading your children to Christ and helping them develop a living relationship with Him is imperative.  Jesus once said (in quite another context), "You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former."

Do Homeschoolers Ever Really Retire? Part 1

Prompted by questions from my homeschooling author friends Cheryl Carter and Donna Spann, I have been pondering this question for over a week. Responding to my first post after a six month absence, in which I talk about the "end" of my homeschool journey, they asked me to explore two angles of homeschool "retirement":

Cheryl brought up the Lifestyle angle, and whether it is possible to retire from a way of life.  The question here became whether homeschooling was really only about "education" in the sense that most of us consider that concept, or whether even the word "homeschooling" carries within it the germ of many other ideas: political, theological, family values, freedom, independent thinking, close family relationships, imparting values, civic responsibility...right now I can't think of them all but I am sure there are others.

Donna mentioned the Titus 2 model of the -ahem- older women teaching the younger, and how this would have been so helpful for her at the beginning of her homeschool journey, and how it would smooth the way for new homeschool moms. The question became whether homeschooling moms and dads who are the repositories of a wealth of information about what it is REALLY like to homeschool should ever retire, or if they should continue to be active in the homeschool community in some sort of advisory capacity.

Both of these are very interesting questions - you can see why I have been mulling for a week! Over the last week have had an opportunity to go back and reread some of the older articles in this blog and remember how I felt at times in the past.

At the very least I have given up the idea of abandoning this blog. Going back into these old articles reminded me of just how much I love to write, and just how much I love writing about homeschooling.  I remembered our first homeschool conference in 2000 at Sandy Cove, where I met these ladies for the first time.

It was amazing to be in an environment where I didn't have to answer the questions,"Is that legal?" "Why do you do this?" "What about socialization?" "Are you one of those religious fanatics?" "But will your kids know how to get along with other kids?" There was an immediate sense of community, even family.  I know that idea is bandied about by every group nowadays - from internet marketing programs, to fans of sports teams, to my personal favorite - "Facebook family" - but there really was an immediate connection. It was a place where I didn't have to explain myself on any level.

Part of it may have been that so many of us at this conference were "pioneers" - not the REAL pioneers of the early 1980s, but the second wave, whose first year of homeschooling was in the late 80s or early 90s, who had a real sense of what it had cost to be a trailblazer, and remembered when it was not so easy to homeschool.

Part of it may have been that this particular conference is primarily Christian homeschoolers, and the instant connection was that bond that believers in Jesus Christ often experience that transcends every other difference they may have.  Probably the most special thing about this particular group is how Christians from every possible spot on the denominational and theological spectrum set aside our differences for a week and enjoy a time of fellowship like no other, as we focus on our shared love for Christ and our families, and our dedication to homeschooling.  This year will be our eleventh homeschool conference.

As homeschooling goes more mainstream, and more people that we once would not really have considered falling under the homeschool umbrella (like "K-12" online students, who I think are actually considered public school students) become part of the community, I wonder if this "family" feeling will continue into the next generation of homeschooling parents. How do we bridge the gap between the online charter school kids and the homeschool kids who live in the log house, bake their own bread with homegrown organic wheat and wear matching jumpers?

For me, and many of "my generation" of Christian homeschooling moms, homeschooling was really a mandate from God rather than a "choice". I wrote about that several times in earlier posts in earlier years, notably in "Except the Lord Build The House...". But homeschooling now for some families is more about convenience than sacrifice. This is not an indictment of those families, just an observation. I wrote about that a few years ago in a post called Outsourcing Meets Homeschooling.

What do you think? Nowadays there are as many flavors of homeschooling as there are homeschoolers. Is homeschooling a "lifestyle" for you? Or is it one of many acceptable choices? Do homeschoolers ever really retire?  I would love to have your comments!

Redeeming Email Forwards

After my last post,  I have been mulling the question posed to me by a couple of homeschool mom friends, which is "Do homeschoolers ever really retire?"  So quite a few days have passed, and I still really don't have a response clear in my mind.  So here is something else while we are waiting.

I get a boatload of email every day.  Since I have been marketing online for more than a decade, I am on many marketing mailing lists. 

Many. 

I also have about a dozen email addresses where I receive hundreds of pieces of marketing mail of various kinds. Most of this mail you would probably consider spam. Most of it actually is. But there is some that you probably would consider spam that is legitimate mail for me. One person's spam is another's bread and butter.

Then there are the 477 notifications from Google Buzz, messages from Facebook informing me that people have liked or commented on my link or activity, or that someone has suggested that I become a fan of [insert name of fan page], or invited me to [insert event], messages from Twitter that someone has followed me, messages from Qwitter that someone has unfollowed me, requests for contacts from Linked In, and newsletters relating to social media.

I also receive a variety of newletters about health and wellness, and a fair number of political newsletters and emails. I also subscribe to a number of things via RSS that download into my Outlook.

I thought it might be fun to share a sampling of what I receive.

From my Digg feed (which now numbers 1184 unread):

13 Great Nerd Movie Scores by Folks Other Than John Williams

John Williams is obviously the Greatest of All Time. Everyone knows it. But there are some new composers and some old vets who also deserve their share of recognition.


View article...

From my marketing mail:

No Sponsoring Required, Residual Income, Join Free Today!!!

Susan, Our Marketing Plan Gives You A Unique and Powerful Way To Passively Earn A Generous $363 Without Referring and Without Having To Pay Any Monthly Fees!!

Six Phone Prospecting Phrases That Could Be Costing You A Fortune

From My Political Email:

Prom Ruling Affirms ACLU Agenda
Executive Order just "cover" for Pro-Life Dems
NY Man Arrested, Jailed for Praying
Hope and Change - The Constitution 

On the personal side, probably about 1/4 of the mail I receive consists of forwards of various things. Some bring tears to my eyes, some make me laugh out loud, some inspire me, and some I don't even bother to open.



I thought this one was worth sharing as we move into Holy Week.

'Excuse me, Are you Jesus?'

A few years ago a group of salesmen went to a regional sales convention in Chicago.They had assured their wives that they would be home in plenty of time for Friday night's dinner. In their rush, with tickets and briefcases, one of these salesmen inadvertently kicked over a table which held a display of apples. Apples flew everywhere. Without stopping or looking back, they all managed to reach the plane in time for their nearly-missed boarding.

ALL BUT ONE!!! He paused, took a deep breath , got in touch with his feelings, and experienced a twinge of compassion for the girl whose apple stand had been overturned.

He told his buddies to go on without him, waved good-bye, told one of them to call his wife when they arrived at their home destination and explain his taking a later flight. Then he returned to the terminal where the apples were all over the terminal floor.

He was glad he did.

The 16-year-old girl was totally blind! She was softly crying, tears running down he r cheeks in frustration, and at the same time helplessly groping for her spilled produce as the crowd swirled about her; no one stopping and no one to care for her plight.

The salesman knelt on the floor with her, gathered up the apples, put them back on the table and helped organize her display. As he did this, he noticed that many of them had become battered and bruised; these he set aside in another basket.

When he had finished, he pulled out his wallet and said to the girl, "Here, please take this $40 for the damage we did. Are you okay?" She nodded through her tears.. He continued on with, "I hope we didn't spoil your day too badly."

As the salesman started to walk away, the bewildered blind girl called out to him, "Mister...." He paused and turned to look back into those blind eyes. She continued, "Are you Jesus?"

He stopped in mid-stride, and he wondered. Then slowly he made his way to catch the later flight with that question burning and bouncing about in his soul: "Are you Jesus?" Do people mistake you for Jesus? That's our destiny, is it not? To be so much like Jesus that people cannot tell the difference as we live and interact with a world that is blind to His love, life and grace.

If we claim to know Him, we should live, walk and act as He would. Knowing Him is more than simply quoting Scripture and going to church. It's actually living the Word as life unfolds day to day.

You are the apple of His eye even though we, too, have been bruised by a fall. He stopped what He was doing and picked up you and me on a hill called Calvary and paid in full for our damaged fruit.

Please share this, {IF you feel led to do so}. Sometimes we just take things for granted, when we really need to be sharing what we know....Thanks.

I am glad he stopped what He was doing and picked me up and paid in full for my damaged fruit. I had plenty. I can only hope that people catch a glimpse of Him in me as I go about my daily life. My goal is that one day people would "mistake me for Jesus."

Do people mistake you for Jesus?

Martin Luther King Day Activities and Resources for Homeschoolers

Monday is the holiday commemorating Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday, even though his birthday is actually January 15. In fact, had he lived he would be exactly 80 years old.

There are a number of excellent resources for kids and for homeschool families who wish to study Dr. King in greater depth. Education World has a comprehensive list of resources primarily intended for classroom settings, but that can be adapted for use by homeschoolers, including timelines, audio and video, quizzes, writing, role-playing, and reading.

This example activity is meant to occur in a classroom setting with a group of children. So many homeschool families are ethnically and racially diverse already. There is a good chance you are part of a mixed race family, or have adopted children of other races and cultures. Larger homeschooling families can adapt this activity according to their number and ages of their kids, or several families can get together and try this. You can choose to divide the children up any way you like. The point is to give them an opportunity to experience discrimination.

Not that homeschoolers do not often experience a form of discrimination anyway, but it cannot compare to the racial discrimination that occurred when I was growing up.

From Education World:

Citizenship/role playing. This common activity is used in classrooms everywhere -- but it's one worth repeating from time to time! The activity helps students understand the concept of "discrimination." For this activity, divide the class into two or more groups. Some teachers divide students by eye or hair color; some invite students to select and wear badges of different colors (purple, green, and other colors that are not related to skin color); and others isolate students whose first names begin with the letter "b," (or whichever letter is the most common first letter of students' names in the class). For a class period or for an entire school day, one group of students (for example, the kids who have blond hair, those wearing orange badges, or the ones whose names start with "b") are favored above all others. Those students receive special treats or special privileges, and they are complimented often. Students who aren't in the "favored" group, on the other hand, are ignored, left out of discussions, and otherwise discriminated against. At the end of the period, students discuss their feelings. How did it feel to be treated unfairly, to be discriminated against? Invite students to talk about times when they felt they were judged or treated unfairly. How does this "experiment" relate to the life of Martin Luther King, Jr.? (Source: Kidsphere listserv)

FamilyEducation.com also has a list of resources and activities that families can do together.

Using Educational TV in your Home School

This was originally posted here on July 11, 2006.

There are many resources available to home educators on educational TV. From PBS flagship station WNET Channel 13 to the myriad small stations located around the country, quality programming is alive and well on PBS, and the Discovery family of channels - Discovery Channel, The Learning Channel, Animal Planet and others. You can find information on the web sites of these networks what shows are available, when they begin for the new school year, when they can be taped, and what the fair use regulations are for each show.

I have been using educational TV in my home school since the very beginning. "Science Rules!" Bill Nye the Science Guy was THE educational show to watch when my kids were small. Fast paced, funny, and highly informative, Bill Nye taught me more about science than I learned in school, and helped me teach science to my own kids as a home schooling mom.

OK, I confess that part of my continuing attraction to "Bill Nye The Science Guy" is a certain nostalgia for simpler times when my children were small. I probably have over 60 episodes on VHS that I drag out and watch even now with my son, who is now high school age. While I am enjoying the memories, he enjoys understanding the jokes now that he did not understand in elementary school, and especially the reworking of classic songs to fit the science topic du jour - songs that he did not know in their original versions at the time. His favorite memory, though, is the voiceovers of announcer Pat Cashman, whose offbeat (and usually hilarious) comments were sometimes the most memorable feature of a particular episode.

That sounds like it has nothing to do with whether Bill Nye delivered good science content, but it is actually the secret of this show which had a successful run from 1993-2002. In the same way that "Sesame Street" provided some humor for parents that included clever send-ups of shows that the children didn't really understand, Bill Nye often drew humor out of fragments of older shows and songs that the kids probably didn't appreciate nearly as much as their parents or teachers. His parodies of old commercials, and clever use of what appeared to be old newsreel films was often a springboard for me to share something about my own childhood with my kids when they would ask me "what that was supposed to be about?" The music videos were always amazing in the way they related the song to the topic, even down to using vocabulary that mimicked the rhythm and rhymes of the original song.

And lest it seem that the only good thing about this show was the off-topic humor - nothing was EVER really off-topic on this show. Every "commercial", every song, every experiment, every random moment (Naked! AAAAAAHHH!! Mole Rat!) was somehow related to the topic. It was like a unit study on steroids, utilizing the very best of humor, music, action, hands-on experiments, "historical footage", technology and repitition of key phrases to cement the material in your mind.

When my daughter was in the 5th grade, my mother became gravely ill and I packed up the kids and went across the country to take care of her. During that three month period, and through the grief of her subsequent passing, not to mention the stress of packing up a lifetime of memories and putting my childhood home up for sale, I was in no condition to home school effectively. In my opinion, the year was basically a waste, and I was sure that we would have to spend the better part of the following school year making up for what we missed. But that summer, when it was time for my daughter's annual assesment via the California Test of Basic Skills, she scored far above grade level. In fact, she scored in the 99th percentile in science, having done little more than read a few library books and watch scores of daily episodes of Bill Nye and "The Magic School Bus".

Of course, for those who are concerned about evolutionary content, Bill Nye flunks. Even the intro depicts the fish crawling up on land and morphing through various-sapiens periods to become Bill himself.

Bill Nye made science fun for all ages, but was a kinder, gentler show than "Brainiac", which has a lot of the same academic strengths, but has a lot of very inappropriate humor for little children. In fact, Braniac does not meet any of the criteria found in Phillipians 4:8 - "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things." It would be nice to see a kid's show again that was smart and funny without relying on that sort of shocking, in-your-face humor that characterizes the style of today's young writers.

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The Proverbs 31 woman had a home business

We have talked about whether you CAN work and home school - but you may be wondering if you SHOULD?

The Proverbs 31 woman had time to purchase fields and plant vineyards with her earnings, work vigorously, provide food for her family, oversee profitable trading, make bed coverings and sell homemade linen garments, AND faithfully instruct her children. Nowhere does it criticize her for trying to do both.

Now it is certainly possible that in your personal circumstances you will decide that God is not calling you to work at all, but to be a keeper of the home. Or you may feel that you do not have the energy or self-discipline to teach your children at home. Only you can know what He is asking of you, and you should do that. But I do not see that Scripture precludes working from home, even for a mother with children. He will not ask you to do anything that He will not also empower you to do.


10 [c] A wife of noble character who can find?
She is worth far more than rubies.

11 Her husband has full confidence in her
and lacks nothing of value.

12 She brings him good, not harm,
all the days of her life.

13 She selects wool and flax
and works with eager hands.

14 She is like the merchant ships,
bringing her food from afar.

15 She gets up while it is still dark;
she provides food for her family
and portions for her servant girls.

16 She considers a field and buys it;
out of her earnings she plants a vineyard.

17 She sets about her work vigorously;
her arms are strong for her tasks.

18 She sees that her trading is profitable,
and her lamp does not go out at night.

19 In her hand she holds the distaff
and grasps the spindle with her fingers.

20 She opens her arms to the poor
and extends her hands to the needy.

21 When it snows, she has no fear for her household;
for all of them are clothed in scarlet.

22 She makes coverings for her bed;
she is clothed in fine linen and purple.

23 Her husband is respected at the city gate,
where he takes his seat among the elders of the land.

24 She makes linen garments and sells them,
and supplies the merchants with sashes.

25 She is clothed with strength and dignity;
she can laugh at the days to come.

26 She speaks with wisdom,
and faithful instruction is on her tongue.

27 She watches over the affairs of her household
and does not eat the bread of idleness.

28 Her children arise and call her blessed;
her husband also, and he praises her:

29 "Many women do noble things,
but you surpass them all."

30 Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting;
but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.

31 Give her the reward she has earned,
and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.

Making Math Fun with Dr. Mommy

No, not with Saxon, though there are people who swear by it. If your child loves workbooks or can work independently with answer keys, perhaps Saxon will work for you. Its method of building on material previously learned is excellent.

But "fun" would not be the first thing that comes to mind when describing Saxon. My kids hated it.

Today's Homeschool Hacks post contains great advice from Dr. Mommy of the fantastic Dr. Mommy's Homeschool Tips about Making Math Fun.

Where were you guys when I was slogging away at math worksheets 20 years ago?

Oh, right. There was no widely-accessible internet for me to find you. And no vast array of homeschool products and manipulatives to help me.

Happily, that was then and this is now. If you are interested in specific blueprints to follow in the teaching of specific subjects, Dr. Mommy is a great resource.

Carnival Atmosphere

"Step right up, and see for yourself the most exciting trend in education since free public schools!"

Run, don't walk, to The Carnival of Homeschooling - Women's Independence Day Edition if you want to experience a fantastic selection of blogs of all kinds relating to homeschooling. If you are not familiar with home schooling, this is the place go and see what all the excitement is about.

Our carnival barker and hostess is Renae of LifeNurturingEducation.com, and this carnival is commemorating August 18, 1920, the ratification and final adoption of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote. She includes a very informative timeline on the struggle for women's suffrage, for those who are interested.

On Friday, Moms In The Right also posted about women and voting. In this post, she gives us a glimpse into the Night of Terror, that occurred on November 15, 1917, when the warden at Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia gave an order unleashing the guards on the suffragettes imprisioned there for the unspeakable crime of picketing the White House for the right to vote.

Talk about a carnival atmosphere. Only the carnival was in a Stephen King novel.

My mother was only two years old when women won the right to vote. My grandmother was 26. I don't believe either of them ever missed an election. They understood the sacrifices that had been made, and they passed that on to me.

My mother got up off a sickbed in November of 1994 and had people practically carry her to vote in November of 1994 before she died the following March. My grandmother's last election was the June primary before she died in September of 1985.

In the June primary this year here in New Jersey where I am an election board worker, our district of over 1,000 voters managed to attract 30 Democrats and 32 Republicans, 90% of whom were over the age of 60. Two of the seven total voters under the age of 25 were homeschooled.

I wish I was kidding.

There is an interesting statistic in Homeschooling Grows Up, a report by the National Center for Home Education about behaviors of adults who were homeschooled, that says 76% of those 18-24 have voted in a state or national election within the previous 5 years, compared to 29% of the general US population, and a staggering 95% of those 25-29 have voted versus 40% of the general population.

No doubt many of those were women whose moms passed on to them an understanding of the blood, sweat and tears that went into our being able to vote.

So, step right up! Find out more about the kind of schooling that produces informed, engaged citizens!

Discover homeschooling!

Lessons from the Hot Place: Smashing Idols

I planned to take advantage of our off-topic day to commend to you a series of Bible Studies on idolatry that are posted this month with videos at The Ramp:Lessons From the Hot Place. Though as I have been writing this, I am discovering that it isn't totally off topic, as you will see. So I have saved it for today instead.

Author A. W. Tozer once wrote, “Let us beware lest we in our pride accept the erroneous notion that idolatry consists only in kneeling before visible objects of adoration, and that civilized peoples are therefore free from it”

Isn't that the truth? How many of us sit smugly thinking that any discussion of idolatry doesn't apply to us because we don't have statues in our homes?

Let's get down to basics. An idol is anything that takes the place of God in our hearts. OK, so maybe your computer or your television doesn't actually take the place of God in your heart, but does it consume so much of your time and energy that you have no time left for prayer and worship or time in God's Word?

This is a particular challenge for work-at-homeschool moms, or even moms who just do one or the other. I can recall homeschooling consuming my days - and nights - when my kids were younger, as I obsessively planned lessons and activities, graded papers, and worked with them individually memorizing math facts, or states and capitals, or doing book reports. It choked off time for housekeeping, time for my husband, time for myself, and time for...God?

Hmm. Without God I couldn't do any of it, and yet every year I would have a period of time where I burned myself out, cracking the whip and focusing on academic excellence to the exclusion of everything else.

Then there were the days - way too many - that I became absorbed in some facet of internet marketing: working on a website, blogging, or talking to prospects on the telephone, and this consumed my time and energy and choked off time for housekeeping, time for my husband, time for myself, and time for...homeschooling...and time for...God?

Idolatry. It isn't just for the heathen anymore.

Do you have Time to Home School?

You just spent eight hours making reports, filing papers, fielding phone calls, and placating your boss at the office. So, when you get home, do you rest?

Not really.

There’s a dinner to prepare, stories to share with your husband, and doing homework with the kids.

Such a scenario is — and will still be — typical among working mothers, who balance the countless demands of career and home 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The problem with this is that the children are the ones who are always at the losing end.

Why?

Because parents - especially mothers - who are always busy with their work, tend to take for granted that the institutional school will provide the best education for their children. Sometimes they don't realize their children are falling through the cracks, or being bullied, or are being taught subjects that are in direct opposition to their religious faith.

However, in today’s changing world, some parents realize that sending their children to school is no longer necessarily the best way of providing the education that their children need. That’s why they have opted for home schooling, in order to provide the kind of learning that they want for their children, in the kind of values-laden environment they wish to promote.

In home schooling, most parents devote their time and try to provide their children the best education at home. They know that they are the ones who can provide the most appropriate teaching approach for their children because they know their children best.

However, it does not necessarily mean that parents have to devote more time to home schooling than they would to their other chores at home.

It is true that home schooling requires time to come up with the teaching approach that your children need. It is also through a committed schedule that you can identify the methods you need to employ in order to teach your children well. But it does not mean that you have to give your whole life over to teaching your children through home schooling programs.

Because home schooling uses the “one-to-one” teaching method; hence, it needs less teaching time than the typical classroom setting. You do not have to teach to the broad middle ground of a classroom, which usually leaves behind the slow ones and bores the bright ones. You can tailor the amount of material and its difficulty to the exact level of your child's ability.

So, the amount of time to be allotted in home schooling will still vary depending on the many factors that may affect the progress of the teaching process.

Here is a list of some factors that should be considered in order to decide what is the proper amount of time needed in home schooling:

1. Learning style of the children

There are instances wherein the children’s learning style might affect the time requirement in home schooling. For instance, if your child is a visual learner, he may be able to grasp concepts more quickly. An auditory learner can benefit from tapes that can be played over and over without you having to be there repeating the lesson. You may require more time on the front end setting up a project or other object lesson that will engage your kinesthetic learner - and then find that he learns fastest of all and retains more of what is taught.

However, if your child needs more time to grasp things that are being taught to him, then you have to devote more time in explaining to him or her the concept of the subject matter you are teaching. The good news, of course, is that you can take all the time you need without holding up the rest of the class.

2. The type of methods used

There are various teaching methods available for home schooling. Each has its own teaching approach. Many parents have chosen computer based curriculum or online academies to reduce the amount of preparation time and administrative tasks required. Others spend more time doing a unit study, which is a program that integrates a topic across all disciplines. There are unit studies that are already prepared for you including lesson plans, and then there are unit studies you can build yourself. They require much more preparation time on the part of the teacher, but for certain types of students they are far and away the best method, enabling far greater retention of the subject matter.

3. The number of children within the family

If you have several children who are at different grade levels, this is another area where a unit study can help you, because you can present the same material to several children at different grade levels and use it to achieve various objectives. It is NOT true necessarily that you must spend longer hours teaching a larger group of students. The older children can solidify their knowledge of the topic by reading aloud or teaching the younger children. They can even be trusted with small administrative tasks as they become more responsible.

I think it is actually easier to have several children just a few years apart than it is to have only two who are many years apart. It is taxing to try to teach a young child to read AND an older one algebra. When you have a high schooler and a preschooler you are working with completely different types of courses of study.

4. The age of the child

Younger children need more teacher interaction than older children, but you can also work with them in short bursts rather than trying to make them sit for hours on end. Some young children grasp concepts quickly, others are daydreamers who need to be carefully monitored. There really is no hard and fast rule about how the age of your child affects the amount of time you need. By the time you children are older, if you have been home schooling any length of time, you have already taught them time management skills and shifted into the role of a coach who doesn't have to be sitting with them all day.

It is fair to say that even a mom who works outside the home can do some home teaching with an older child, but justice will probably not be done to either work or school unless your child is a self-starter. But you CAN work and home school if you are willing to consider working at home - either via telecommuting, or having your own home business.

Next time we will look at some work-at-home options.