Why DIY?

This is the fourth part in a series based on this cost/benefit analysis.  Here you can find Part 1:Scoping out the Sequence, Part 2: Making the Grade and Part 3: Unscheduling.  Next I want to talk about this "plus" for us in letting go of our math textbooks:

• I get to create the lessons and activities myself.

I've said this before many times, but I want to stress again that this series isn't meant to be an objective argument against the use of textbooks, or textbooks for math.  It is simply an exploration of why that choice has "fallen for me in pleasant places".  So if you read the above "pro" for going without textbooks and you think "Why on earth would anyone want to create things from scratch when they could be purchased already done?" then by all means, purchase them ready-made and don't give it a second thought!

I have a dear friend who is constantly knitting things for her children.  One Christmas she made her boys really cool real-looking "chainmail" with yarn!  She makes baby gifts (several for us!) and all kinds of other wonderful, cozy homemade treasures.  For the longest time I felt intimidated.  I saw all of the things she was doing and I thought to myself, "This is what good, dedicated mothers do - they knit.  Knitting is such an essential homemaking skill and it is frugal and it is such a wonderful, productive kind of busy.  If I was a good mother, I would do this, too."

I did try learning to knit, but I wasn't very good at it (maybe just because I didn't give it much of an effort) and I was disappointed in myself.  I thought, "My friend is so diligent and has so much good will power and self-control.  Why don't I have that?  Why don't I make the time to do this important thing?"  And then you know what I realized?  She doesn't knit because she's convinced it is a morally superior way to nurture her family or because she has the self control to "do hard things".  (She would probably laugh out loud if she knew that's what I was thinking.)  She knits because she likes to knit.  She knits because it quiets her soul.  She knits because that is where she finds peace and relaxation.  She knits for the joy of knitting!

And that, my friends, is why I love to make up my children's math work myself.  Please hear me. When I say "love" that is exactly what I mean.  I don't mean "I feel frugal," I don't mean "I feel diligent" and I don't mean "I feel educationally superior" I mean "I just like doing it".  When the children are in bed and I sit down with a stack of fresh notebook paper and a spreadsheet (just another thing that I love, because I'm a dork like that) it isn't a duty thing.  It just clicks with how I am wired.

The other day, I needed to make an activity for my six year old in sequencing numbers.  She's been working on place value to the hundreds, so I was going to ask her to order these numbers from least to greatest:

102
201
101

But just for fun, I also included

½

This isn't something most first graders would come across in their math books.  But she has been having fun with fractions recently.  At Sunday lunch she was given two cookies.  She carefully bit off half of a cookie and then held them both up together and said "Now I have a mixed number!"  I knew she could handle ordering a fraction in with whole numbers, and she loved it!  It just stirred my soul to get to make those choices myself.

Have you ever bought a used item of furniture or clothing with great plans to pull it apart and remake it just the way you wanted to suit your particular purposes?  And then at some point, did you come to the realization that using the bits and pieces of the pre-made item had actually become more complicated than scrapping it all and starting from scratch?  Well, that's how it was for me with textbooks.  Even after I had made changes in how we did math, I tried using textbook pages (because I still have four half-used consumable textbooks that are sitting on the shelf).  I was surprised at how hard it was to find one page with five problems that fit what each kid most needed to review.  Making the problems myself was just quicker and easier.

And, just to make sure you don't leave this post saying, "She is so good and diligent.  If only I could be a dutiful mother like her" (pardon me while I laugh myself to tears) I want to assure you that it's not all that complicated.  First, it's only five problems a day per kid.  And secondly, remember, I have  a handy spreadsheet (which I did not create myself) that helps me to pick what kind of problems to make.  It might sound intimidating to just make up five math problems.  But what if I said "Write down a three digit subtraction problem that requires borrowing."  You could do that, right?  That's all there is to my job.  It's just that I love doing it!

For me, it was a huge relief to drop slogging through pages of a pre-made textbook and instead much more energizing to make the problems yourself.  So what's the take-away?  The take-away for you is to know how you "tick" and to understand that using that as one of the factors in choosing how to homeschool isn't selfish or lazy - it's just a smart use of limited resources!

For more encouragement on the freedom to choose the method(s) of schooling that works for you, definitely read Teaching from Rest or check out Julie Bogart (founder of Bravewriter) Scoping about the "divide" between structured and unstructured learning.

And just for fun, head on over here and check out Mystie Winkler's page on your Homeschooling Personality Type.  You know what mine says?  Here are some relevant snippets:

The ENFJ ... loves to put together a plan just right for her family. 

• Strengths: mentoring, teaching, relationship-investment activities like read-alouds and family vacations
• Struggles: people-pleasing, her own intensity, anxiety and inner conflict
• Style: whatever she feels allows for the best development of her children; she will prefer an eclectic approach that follows her gut.

I don't believe that personality tests are perfect or that they dictate choices.  But it was pretty fun reading through that list and identifying some of my friends and their gifts and loves and seeing that there is so much variety in how we each are wired and how we homeschool.  That's a good thing, guys!!

I don't knit, but she does.  To each her own!

Textbooks and Training Wheels

I wrote the very first post for this blog (with the same graphic) early one Monday morning before the kids were up.  I had a crazy plan.  I had been talking to my dad and my brother some about it.  And I wanted to start documenting it from the beginning.  So I started the blog.  I meant to talk about the training wheels analogy at some point.  And I meant to talk about why I would think about going without textbooks.  And then life kinda happened.  And this whole journey churned up a lot of other thoughts to process that ended up as blog posts.  So, here I am again, back to the start to finish what I began.  What does this blog have to do with training wheels?

We had our first homebirth with the birth of our fourth baby.  While part of me thought "I wish I had done it this way all along!" another part of me wondered if I really would have been up for that.  Perhaps, in God's providence, it was the right thing for me to have a few babies in the hospital before coming across the idea of homebirth.  I feel the same way about going without textbooks.  I haven't even finally decided if this will work for us.  But I feel pretty sure that it wouldn't have worked for me from the beginning (though I am sure that there are plenty of moms out there who take off sans-textbook from the word go).  I needed time to get my balance, so to speak, and, honestly, to mature a little bit.  That is why I use the analogy of training wheels.  I'm glad I learned to homeschool with textbooks.  Now I'd like to try without and see if we can enjoy and manage the freedom (and risk!).

However, I want to be very clear that I didn't choose that analogy because I wanted to set no-textbooks as superior to or more sophisticated than using textbooks.  I don't even see it as something that all homeschooling moms are or should be working towards.  It was just that on that Monday morning, our new experiment felt to me like taking the training wheels of my bike for the first time.  Exhilarating ... yet terrifying!

So many times as I read through Teaching from Rest, I felt like Sarah Mackenzie had reached into my own brain, scooped out my half-formed thoughts and composed them into eloquent, coherent sentences.  Here's one example that applies to this discussion:

Whether or not you purchase open-and-go curriculum doesn't really matter.  You can pretty much forget all the heated discussions about whether you are caving in to school-at-home if you use traditional workbooks or a straight-from-the-box curriculum.  I know successful homeschooling families who use textbooks and successful homeschooling families who eschew them.  I don't think that's a relevant debate to be having if you want to teach from rest and become happy, content, peaceful and effective homeschooling moms.

If I have one point to argue about using textbooks, it isn't that you should or shouldn't.  It's just that you don't have to.  I don't yet  know which camp I will land in.  As this point, I think it likely we'll use textbooks for some subjects and not for others.  But either way, this experiment has been worth it, because I now know that I can decide based on what works best for us!

Letting Go

My mother has always been a master of illustrations and analogies.  I can still vividly recall dozens of picture images she used to explain spiritual and intangible concepts to us as children and even now that we are adults.  Once a few years ago at a gathering of young moms, she used the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000 with five loaves and two fish as an analogy for our job as mothers.  There is no possible way we can accomplish feeding 5,000 hungry people (raising our children to godly adulthood) in our own strength.  Instead we must allow him to use our bread and fish (our gifts and resources) to accomplish his purposes.

Sarah Mackenzie uses this same analogy in Teaching from Rest in Part One: Whose "Well Done" Are You Working For? (Please note: Even if you aren't a homeschool mom, please keep reading.  This has nothing to do with homeschooling - really - and everything to do with being a finite human tasked with kingdom work!)

Just like the disciples, I see this huge throng of people to feed - this seeming impossibility.  The shaping of souls and raising of children, the mopping of floors, washing of dishes, bandaging of scraped knees and hearts and worries, the teaching and admonishing and doling out myself.  It's all too much ... I fall to my knees and I cry out to God.  We're a throng of hungry people in the desert, and I'm supposed to feed them. On an ordinary Monday, I am in need of a miracle of biblical proportions.  

It isn't that I have nothing, exactly.  I have my little basket.  I can read aloud pretty well.  I'm good at organizing things on paper.  I can make a decent pot of chili and I know how to push a vacuum.  I love my children with all of my being and I have a real desire to watch them grow to love and serve Him.  I don't really have any idea how I'm supposed to tackle everything ahead of me in this day, this year, this decade when that's all I've got.  It's just a couple of loaves of bread and a few fish. 

Apparently that's all He needs.

As I have contemplated this recently, one thought that came to mind was that the little boy who brought the loaves and the fish had to do something really hard.  Offering his food to the Lord meant letting go of the only thing he had.  He was a hungry person in the desert, too, after all.  He didn't get to hold back on a loaf or two, giving the rest to the Lord for miracle-working.  He had to give it all up.

I don't want to try to read things into this Biblical account that aren't intended to be there.  God doesn't tell us (and if he doesn't, he must have his reasons) how the boy was feeling, if he had much time to contemplate the request or if his parents were there to help him process it all.  The only thing we know is that he gave all his food away, that he (like everyone else) was fed until he had enough and that his letting go was one small part of the unfolding of God's plan.

So what does it look like to "let go"?  Does that mean sitting on the sofa and waiting around for God to work?  Does it mean making no plans or refraining from giving my children any structure or direction?  Does it mean that planning, activity and effort are signs of resistance and rebellion?

I'm still chewing on this thought, still working through what it looks like to trust the Lord with my gifts and resources, to use them to seek first his kingdom and trust that "all these things" will be added unto me.  But one place I have been convicted is my lack of prayer.  (What follows are my own reflections on me.  Apply only as applicable.)

If I'm honest, I have to admit that when I'm up in the morning before the children, I find far more comfort in using a 15 or 20 minute chunk of time to get some laundry started, pay some bills or do something else that gives me a feeling of productivity and a foothold on the day, than I do taking that time to pray.  I don't think that Scripture requires us to pray for 20 minutes every morning or to pray every morning or to pray instead of paying bills or anything specific like that.  However, I do know that my heart usually runs first to "doing" rather than to "trusting".

Sarah Mackenzie writes,

An indispensable part of bringing our basket, prayer puts aside "doing" in favor of "being" and "becoming": being in his presence and becoming more like Him.

It's not that prayer is a twisting of God's arm to enforce the meeting of our desires.  Rather, prayer - handing over my basket to God - is a way for me to acknowledge that it was never mine to begin with and that I'm OK with him using it however he sees fit.  I'll leave you with two more gems from Teaching from Rest ...

Before we attempt to live a day well, teach our children, or tackle our to-dos, first we put the whole thing at his feet.  We beg God to use us to fulfill His purpose, and then we see that every frustration in the day ahead is an answer to that very prayer. [emphasis mine]

We are weary because we forget about grace.  We act as though God showing up is the miracle.  But guess what?  God's showing up is a given.  Grace is a fact.

Why would I not want to start my day by soaking in that truth for a while?