When we choose to homeschool our children, we are choosing to disciple our children, not merely educate them. Do you find this a burden or a blessing?
Elisabeth Elliot said “This job has been given to me to do. Therefore, it is a gift. Therefore, it is a privilege. Therefore, it is an offering I may make to God. Therefore, it is to be done gladly, if it is done for Him. Here, not somewhere else, I may learn God’s way. In this job, not in some other, God looks for faithfulness.”
Perhaps you are finding the job of mothering and homeschooling burdensome today, let’s help you lighten the load.
We have found in our years of homeschooling, and consulting with hundreds of homeschooling parents over the last 20 years, that there are a few things that can make homeschooling moms feel overloaded and overwhelmed.
- A curriculum with a tight schedule
- Lack of family team work in chores
- Children who baulk at learning disciplines
- Too many outside commitments.
When parents address these issues, by bringing the right amount of adjustment, the load lifts. Homeschooling is not done in isolation of the rest of life…it is important to have the right structures in place so that as many of the issues are dealt with, which then allows a smooth flow to your days.
Let’s deal with each item above:
Tight schedules do not allow for the natural ebb and flow of a home and keep families beholden to a rigid framework that will probably not work when there are interruptions, illness, unexpected character training moments and others. They also tend to squeeze out the love of learning and being together because everyone is simply marching from one subject to the next on a clock.
Rather, set anchors for your day (meal times or baby feed times, afternoon commitments or sports) and let your school day flow around these. If you know that you have about 3-4 hours every morning to do the 3Rs followed by a rotating period for history, geography and science then when those things are done, you can spend the rest of the time reading or exploring information together.
Chores are not just about getting a job done. So much more is taught by getting children to do things in the home, plus it means that by the time you start your desk time you know that the kitchen is clean, the house picked up, animals fed and washing on the line!
If you find it simpler to just do it yourself, we would like to challenge you to not rob your children of these 5 vital skills they learn which will carry them through adulthood and the parenting of their own children.
Service to others above themselves. In a world that says “me first” and “love yourself” you need to offer your children the truth that it is better to serve than be served. Use our Free printable chore charts to help you train your children better in this area.
Training in doing hard things. Everywhere we go products and people offer the easy way out. But as adults we know that its often hard to keep a job, raise a family and pay the bills. Doing chores will prepare your children to do hard things.
Do what you have to do, so you can do what you want to do. When we teach our children to do their chores before they play or do schoolwork, we set them up for future life as adults where they will not neglect homes, meals, spouses to gratify themselves, but rather tend to the these things before “going out to play”.
Launching skills. When your children leave home one day, you will be at peace knowing that they have learnt to cook meals, clean, shop and manage their finances having learnt those skills at your side chopping and peeling vegetables, mopping floors, handling pocket money and pushing a trolley at the shops.
The growth of their characters. When people are under pressure you can see what their characters are truly like – it’s like squeezing a tube of toothpaste and seeing the colour of it which is normally hidden by the plastic container. Chores offer you a chance to see what is going on in your children’s hearts. And a chance for you to see what happens in yours!
If you are constantly fighting a battle of the wills when it does come to desk time you need to assess what the root cause is. Here are a few introspective questions:
Does my children fight me on everything? If so, you need to spend much more time training your children to obey you as the parents and less on maths, reading and writing. If just at school time, are you expecting too much or too little? Or is it just at school time? Are you using textbooks and workbooks so all learning becomes in endless dry facts and filling in missing answers. Perhaps it may be time to bring some delightful learning into your home.
Lastly, there is nothing that disrupts a mother’s peaceful demeanour more than having to spend the afternoon driving from one event to the next, then rushing home to make dinner and do chores.
We don’t want to put a number on it, but we do find that if more than three afternoons a week are taken up with sport and extra murals, both children and mother become a little frazzled and the load to carry heavier.
Of course it is good for children to be physically active and perhaps partake in art classes, but do try to hold space for them by simply being at home for a few afternoons a week. This is good for you and them.
Consider again the quote at the beginning of this article, perhaps a mindshift needs to be made to see that homeschooling our children is the job given to us to do and we can do it knowing that it is a place of blessing for ourselves and them.
We will grow in patience, kindness, goodness and self-control if we allow God to do the work in us through the mothering and homeschooling experience.
And when we clear out the issues that are tripping us up in achieving this, like mentioned above, the burden is light and the way a blessing.
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