Pruning the Dead Branches

Thought about and searched for this tonight ...

Spurgeon's Morning and Evening: Morning for April 29th

"Thou art my hope in the day of evil." --Jeremiah 17:17 

The path of the Christian is not always bright with sunshine; he has his seasons of darkness and of storm. True, it is written in God's Word, "Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace;" and it is a great truth, that religion is calculated to give a man happiness below as well as bliss above; but experience tells us that if the course of the just be "As the shining light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day," yet sometimes that light is eclipsed. At certain periods clouds cover the believer's sun, and he walks in darkness and sees no light. There are many who have rejoiced in the presence of God for a season; they have basked in the sunshine in the earlier stages of their Christian career; they have walked along the "green pastures" by the side of the "still waters," but suddenly they find the glorious sky is clouded; instead of the Land of Goshen they have to tread the sandy desert; in the place of sweet waters, they find troubled streams, bitter to their taste, and they say, "Surely, if I were a child of God, this would not happen." Oh! say not so, thou who art walking in darkness. The best of God's saints must drink the wormwood; the dearest of His children must bear the cross. No Christian has enjoyed perpetual prosperity; no believer can always keep his harp from the willows. Perhaps the Lord allotted you at first a smooth and unclouded path, because you were weak and timid. He tempered the wind to the shorn lamb, but now that you are stronger in the spiritual life, you must enter upon the riper and rougher experience of God's full-grown children. We need winds and tempests to exercise our faith, to prune away the dead branches of self-reliance, and to root us more firmly in Christ. The day of evil reveals to us the value of our glorious hope. [emphasis mine]

 Tonight I am giving thanks for pruning.  It's never fun.  It's never easy.  But looking back and seeing some of the things that have been dropped (or ripped away?) from our homeschool as of late, and how much healthier we are, how much more good fruit is coming from those few things we are left to focus on - even from the things in which I play no direct part except observation and delight - I am in awe at the beauty and sovereignty of my God.  Would I ever have made these choices and changes if we weren't under "duress"?  I don't know.  But I see where we are now and I am glad.  I am at peace.  At least tonight.  And so, tonight, I give thanks.

Singing in Sorrow

A friend mentioned that she's been taking great comfort in Psalm 13, so I've been reading over it today, too.

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David. 

How long, O LORD?
Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day?
How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?
Consider and answer me, O LORD my God;
Light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death,
Lest my enemy say, "I have prevailed over him,"
Lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken.
But I have trusted in your steadfast love;
My heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
I will sing to the LORD, because he has dealt bountifully with me.

He truly has dealt bountifully with me.  Even when I "have sorrow in my heart all the day" that doesn't change his steadfast love.  It's still worth trusting.  Light up my eyes, Lord.  Help me to sing.

Little Points of Light

Sometimes when I read blog posts or look at pictures that show the amazing things other homeschool moms are doing with their kids, I hate those moms just a little bit.  I imagine that they are better than me and that they look down on me.  I want to argue and defend myself and explain what life is like here right now and beg them to be understanding and to know that I'm really doing the very best I can right now, here in this moment.  Foolish, right?

But what if that's not why moms share things on social media?  What if it isn't to prove they are better than everybody else?  What if they share things for, well, for the same reason that I do?  What if life is hard.  What if there are lots of scary, dark corners and lots of messy problems.  What if there are many moments of discouragement, frustration and sorrow.  What if there is a fight against bitterness, resentment and ingratitude.  And then, in the midst of that, a spot of light breaks through the darkness.  A little point of light like the tiny points of light I could see through the paper my son pierced over and over with the point of a compass.

And it is such a relief, such a moment of refreshment and feels like an oasis in the desert.  And you just want to share because you are overflowing with joy that, in the midst of this chaos, the baby has yummy, chubby legs.  And the four year old curled up and fell asleep in the fort his brother made for him.  And your daughter is teaching herself to knit.  And your first grader drew a picture about mixed fractions when you didn't even realize she was listening in to that discussion!



And so, on that very note, could I share?  Things are hard here.  Energy is at a premium.  Days are hit or miss.  Weeks ago my husband had asked for the day off yesterday so that we could go to Colonial Williamsburg during their "homeschool days".  We had to pay for the tickets in advance.  But energy is a limited commodity these days, so we really couldn't know until the morning of whether we would actually be able to go.  Yesterday it was freezing cold and wet.  But thankfully we were able to do our Saturday stuff yesterday and move our reservations to today.


And today, there was energy in abundance.  Like a rainbow after the rain.  A mercy I don't deserve, the Lord granted the perfect day for our little homeschool bunch.  So may I share it with you?  It isn't impressive.  But it just felt so good to be able to make this happen today with my kiddos, and I am tearfully rejoicing as I thank the Lord for his favor and blessing.

In the gift shop with my three costumed characters.

As you walk the foot path from the Visitors Center to the Revolutionary City, these little "notes"
in the sidewalk take you backwards in history.  Luke read this and then explained to his sisters,
"You didn't have to pay taxes!  And there were no police!"

Authentic Colonial Animal Cracker Snack

The Cobbler's Shop

Of course, Sutherlands have to try out the Colonial Board Games.

Standing Guard

Race to the Finish

This is the fifth 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, Part 3: Unscheduling and Part 4: Why DIY?.  Next I want to talk about this "plus" for us in letting go of our math textbooks:

• I'm not bound up by a need to "finish" a purchased curriculum,  or "get  my money's worth"; no need to weed through and pick out which parts of a lesson to do.

Yes, I have hang-ups.  Yes, I have first-born perfectionist tendencies (though you wouldn't know it to look at my house!).  Yes, it somewhat bothers me to purchase something and then leave it incomplete (more on that in a moment).  But that's not really the pivotal factor in this benefit for us.

We all want to make sure we cover our bases in teaching our kids any subject, but especially one as central (in our world, at least) and developmentally sequential as math.  How does one make sure she covers all the stuff she's "supposed" to cover?  Well, the simplest way to achieve that is to let someone else (usually someone who has a lot more background in the subject) do the research and planning.  You purchase a textbook.  When you've covered all the things in that book, then you move on to the next one.

Sure, you can take a textbook and pull it apart and mix it all up and use it differently.  But unless you are committed to finishing everything in that book, you need some other system for keeping track of what has been covered and/or criteria for deciding what should be covered and what should be omitted or saved for later.

As I mentioned above, it does somewhat bother me that we've got these half-used textbooks on the shelf.  But I got myself into that situation on purpose.  I wanted to experiment ... but I wanted to experiment with a safety net.  I figured that if we tried this system for a couple of months and it didn't work, we'd just pick up our textbooks again.  I also figured that I wanted a few months to test the theory before convention came around (for us that's June) and I needed to decide whether or not to purchase new textbooks for next year.

At this point, I am so enjoying what we've been doing here that I don't see myself wanting to go back to the textbooks.  In fact, I've been letting the kids use up the pages doing "school" with each other in their free time.  I thought that perhaps they would come in handy in case I was in a pinch and I needed something quick to pull out and give the kids to do.  Here's why that hasn't been an inviting option (yet):

• There are tons of problems on a page.  Deciding what to have the kids do takes some work in and of itself.
• If I'm there and I don't have 5-A-Days prepared, I can just put some problems up on the whiteboard, everyone can do them on their dry erase "slates" and we're done.  (If I really want to, I can even open up the spreadsheet and track as we go.)
• For days when I am going to be out (such as to appointments with the orthopaedist!) there have been so many things I've wanted the kids to have more time to do that it isn't a problem to leave them with other activities, like snuggle number!

So, in summary, the real benefit behind not having to "finish" a textbook stems from the fact that we've un-linked progress tracking from textbook scope and sequence.  We keep track of what we've learned, mastered and practiced elsewhere, so we are free to use or not use whatever we want from the textbook - and many other sources as well!

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!

Unscheduling

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

• I can school without the parameters of a "school year" or a "work week".

Textbooks are designed to be used by schools and to meet the needs of a school schedule. And so they should be; this is not a criticism.  They generally plan for students to have 32-36 weeks of lessons and to complete lessons five days a week.  They intersperse new material and review material to round out the appropriate amount of assignments needed.  But couldn't a family use a textbook and still choose their own schedule?  Absolutely.  Here are some of the ways I've adapted our various subjects to fit with our own schedule.

• Our on-line History program has 32 topics with 5 "lessons" per topic (4 lessons and a test).  We do the test along with the fourth lesson so that we have four days of history instead of five per week.
• Our Latin textbook has 32 chapters of material, but interspersed along the way are review chapters.  Sometimes we skip the review chapters or sprinkle the review material in with other chapters.  Also, we often don't have a chance to complete all of the activities per chapter since we don't school 5 days a week.
• Our Math textbooks contain 170 lessons each.  In some grade levels, the textbook authors expect you to have a test (in a book you purchase separately) either every 5 or every 10 lessons (presumably every Friday or every other Friday).  I've never used the test materials and we've been skipping over those lessons that are only review with no new material presented.

So yes, you can use textbooks and make them work on most any schedule.  In other words, if I were trying to compile an objective list of reasons why one ought not to use textbooks, this one wouldn't really fit.  And even in a list of my own personal cost/benefit analysis, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that it was a secondary benefit rather than a driving cause.

See, in my imagination, our school culture would look something like this.  We would be a home where learning was part of the normal activity of the household.  We would study a variety of topics and read a variety of things.  We would wholeheartedly engage with what was in front of us, explore further if we wanted to, read extra, do some more problem solving or spend another day on it if needed.  And, when we had a need or an opportunity for a break, we would take it.  And when we had refreshed ourselves through a break, we would get back to the business of learning whatever was next.

And yes, this is doable with a textbook.  But when (for other reasons as well) we moved to going without the math textbooks, a wonderful benefit was realized in terms of the increased freedom to break when we need to and begin again when we are ready (which, at this point, has mostly included sick-days and broken arms!).  Perhaps, in the final analysis, this "benefit" speaks more to my own personal hang-ups over loose-ends and tidy finishes than to any objective characteristics of textbooks.  But if what we're doing is an individual cost/benefit analysis, personal hang-ups carry weight, too!

Making the Grade

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

• I can school without the restraints of grade level and (related) comparing my children to other children around the same age.

As I mentioned here, I was stopped dead in my tracks by this quote from Andrew Kern of the CiRCE Institute:

 To what level has my child mastered this skill?  And what is next?  Nothing else matters.

We are only a couple of weeks into this experiment, but already I am thankful for the release of focus on grade level and what each child "should" be doing or "should" have covered at this point.  In some cases, I have been astonished to realize that younger children were perfectly capable of grappling with concepts I intended only for older siblings.

Other times I realized that, though a child had successfully completed problems on a given topic many times, she didn't really understand the concept and I was thankful to have another pass at it as we learned as a family.  In one case, I decided to simply make a note of a concept that I felt she wasn't ready for (though she had completed many such problems in her current and previous math book) and come back to it later.

If we discuss a concept as a group and someone is not developmentally ready to comprehend it, then there isn't really anything that can be done at that point to force them to "get" it.  In fact, (as I have witnessed before) "forcing" the issue is what leads to my strong math thinkers "hating math".  Sure, if you work within the outlines of a grade level, you can control at what age you present the material to a child.  But you still can't control the age at which they master it.  

I can't quite predict how this will play out long-term.  To what extent - especially within the context of our culture - is it realistic to push aside concepts of "grade level" and move forward based on my children's developmental preparedness only?  If one of our students doesn't make it through calculus by age 18 does that mean this approach is flawed ... or that that child wasn't developmentally ready for the material and wouldn't have been ready under any system of instruction?

Perhaps my comfort and confidence with this approach will have a lot to do with whether I perceive my children to be getting "ahead" or "behind".  If this method primarily enables the younger ones to explore and master concepts they normally wouldn't have encountered so "early", then perhaps I will feel confident in our choice ... and less so if it leads to mastering concepts "later".  Hmmm ... that would be ironic, wouldn't it?