That may sound strange coming from me, since twelve years ago I wrote Discover Texas, a Texas history curriculum for home school families. The explanation is simple: I did not want my children to hate the study of their state’s history. I wanted them to share my husband’s absolute love of Texas history—a love I did not understand until his eyes misted with memories as he told me stories of great adventures—of dreams and goals and meaningful struggles—that his mother, who also loved history, had told him. His father’s occupation required travel, and sometimes the family would go along. He recalled hunting for arrowheads, scrambling over ruined landmarks, and reenacting battle scenes with his brother.

If I had been introduced to history in that way, I would have loved it too. Come to think of it, my third grade teacher let us build a teepee on the playground. (Bless you, Mrs. Cathey!) We used a tea-dyed sheet wrapped around broomsticks and decorated it with tempera-paint handprints. I remember to this day how the Plains Indians lived.

The trick, it seems, is to teach state history in a way that is memorable and meaningful.

Making history memorable

Back when I hated history, the people in my history textbook had one thing in common—they were all dead. I had no connection to them, so they were not important to me. However, the first time I hiked to a rock shelter where some nameless tribesman had left his handprint in red paint, a human link connected me to him like an echo through time: “I was here. Remember.”

I cannot remember one word of any lecture I ever heard in a history class, but as a child I loved the historic homes in our town and noticed that they did not have indoor plumbing. The pictures in my textbooks were black and white, with shades of gray, but when my family attended a play in which scenes from history were reenacted, the story of history came alive!

If you are like me, most of the education you received in school was passive—which is possibly why I sometimes had the vague notion that education was something inflicted upon me. My presence was required, as well as my cooperation in reading textbooks, taking lecture notes, and quietly watching the occasional documentary as a rare treat. Yet, studies prove that we remember only

• 10 percent of what we read,
• 20 percent of what we hear,
• 30 percent of what we see (pictures and other visual images), and
• just 50 percent of material presented in a passive manner (a movie, exhibit, or demonstration).

However, retention jumps to between 70 percent to 90 percent when learning is active, when we

• join in a discussion,
• share with others what we have learned,
• enact a simulation or dramatic presentation, or
• experience something for ourselves!

One of the beauties of home schooling is that we can teach in ways that are not practical for tightly scheduled classes with scores of children. We can adapt our teaching methods to engage students in learning more, doing more, and thinking more so that they become participants in their own discovery of knowledge. They will remember and understand far more because they have experienced it firsthand.

Of our five senses, we tend to rely most on sight and sound. Inside the classroom, we give visual learners a book, and we lecture audio learners. In the act of seeing and hearing, the stimulus originates at some distance from the student who receives the data. By contrast, when we experience something firsthand—when we smell the gunpowder; taste the campfire supper; feel the textures of flint and cactus, cotton and camel hair—we actually come in direct contact with what we are learning about, and the information becomes a part of us.

We Live in the Middle of a Field Trip

Field trips provide an opportunity to connect with the people who made history–to walk where they walked, to experience a bit of their lives, and to gain an appreciation for their goals and challenges. We participate in their drama, and we talk about what we have learned with others who are excited to share their own observations.

You do not have to travel far. Start in your own community. The Texas Historical Commission has an online atlas of all the state historical markers (http://atlas.thc.state.tx.us/). The Texas State Historical Association (http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook), Texas Highways magazine (http://www.texashighways.com/), and Texas Parks and Wildlife magazine (http://www.tpwmagazine.com/) all sponsor wonderful, FREE websites full of ideas, as does the Discover Texas blog, “News Around Texas” (http://www.discovertexasonline.com/blog/). If you have more time, an extended Texas vacation can be loads of budget-friendly fun with a purpose.

“… and a course in good citizenship”

While many social studies courses can be used to satisfy Texas’s requirement that home schools include “a course in good citizenship,” I hope you will not overlook Texas history as an exciting option. A study of state history provides an opportunity to impress upon our children the way history touches us where we live–the relationship of past events to our contemporary lives. For believers, this connection is all the more vital. Personal choices have broad consequences, but God is sovereign. History is truly HIS-story—God revealing Himself in the affairs of men and working out His purposes through time.

Few of the people we learn about in history ever intended to become famous. Most did as we do. They went about living their daily lives and, at some point, found themselves faced with a decision. They may not have realized that their decision was significant when they made it, but their choice affected lives beyond their own and became their legacy.

It is that relationship of cause to effect, choices to consequences that forms the basis of character development and makes us good citizens. That’s not a bad thing for young people to consider. For all of us, really. Who knows whether we have come to the kingdom for such a time as this? (Esther 4:14)

The post Discovering Texas appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

We bought a peach tree. When the nurseryman came to plant it for us, he pulled out his pocketknife and cut it back severely. I thought he had killed it. Surely his pruning was too severe. “No,” he said. “The tree needs to direct its energy to putting down good roots. Once those are developed, it can draw up resources to put out leaves and fruit when it’s time. If it tries to make leaves and fruit too early, it will not be able to sustain them.”

Then he staked the trunk of the tree with three soft ropes lashed to pickets. “Leave these in place for three years,” he instructed. “Adjust them as the tree grows, to make sure they give firm support but aren’t so tight that they’ll cut into the bark.” After three years we were to remove them. “If you leave the supports on too long, the trunk will never develop the strength it needs to stand firm on its own. It will be weak and dependent on the ropes.”

This is my theory (and you are free to disagree). When children are little, they need a rather small world so that they can grow rooted in God and family. They will need the resources of a loving family and a faithful Heavenly Father when they go out into the larger world. Trim early involvement in too many activities and too much socialization until they have the spiritual strength to sustain godly behavior. We do want them to be good witnesses and bear fruit for the Lord, but that has to be the overflow of inner strength.

When it comes to discipline, put a few firm—but gentle—guidelines in place early. In our house, there were only three major offenses: disrespect, disobedience, and dishonesty. Everything else was a childish mistake that could be discussed, but those three rules were non-negotiable. It was never okay to dishonor parents or intentionally make someone else feel bad about themselves. It was never okay to deliberately disobey, and it was never acceptable to lie. We adapted the house rules occasionally as the children grew, but the boundaries were always clear. In that way, we bypassed many discipline problems. Once in a while a child will test the boundaries to see if they are really there, but there is a lot of security when he knows in advance what is expected. It frees children to enjoy clear consciences and builds good self-images when they have done well.

When the time comes, do not forget to remove the ropes. That can be scary, but if children only obey because we force them, how will they learn to answer to God for themselves? I have seen many loving parents be lenient when their children are young and then panic and cinch down with restrictions during the teen years. That is a recipe for rebellion. Instead, we put firm boundaries and clear guidelines in place when our children were young and gradually loosened them as our children developed character and proved that they were trustworthy. Their teen years were not without mistakes, but that was a time when our adolescents could try things on their own while they still had the safety net of good counsel at home.

The nurseryman’s advice seems to have worked. Our children are now young adults, firmly rooted in their faith, bearing fruit in every good work, and standing firm in a real faith of their own.

The post One More Lesson from the Garden appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

We were living in Germany when we began homeschooling, so the whole idea of a “kindergarten”—literally, a garden of children—took root with me. Europeans are great gardeners, devoting consistent time to their window boxes, garden plots, and vineyards. I learned many lessons about tending children by watching them steward their gardens.

1. Just as you must work with the land and climate you have, you must work with the personalities and family situations God has given you. Children are not blank slates. They come into unique families as unique individuals. The Word says to raise up a child in the way he should go, but when interpreting that verse, it makes a great deal of difference which word you choose to emphasize. Are we to raise a child in the way he should go—squeezing him into an idealized, pre-ordained mold? Or are we to raise a child in the way he should go—studying him and praying diligently for the Lord to show us His purposes for this child’s life?
2. What you sow, you will reap. I love that poster that says, “If you sow criticism, they will learn to condemn. If you sow love, they will learn kindness,” etc. That is so true, but there is more to it than that. If children see that God is their parents’ top priority, they will learn that He is the most important thing in their own lives. If you sow enthusiasm for time spent learning, working, and living together, they will value these as well. If you resent the responsibilities of parenting, your children are unlikely to treasure family time.
3. If you sow nothing, the world’s forces will sow wild seed when you are not looking. You must consciously instill the values you want to see from the earliest age, or the wild seeds of cultural norms and media-supported values will spring up. When worldly values, undesirable attitudes, and poor behavior appear like tares among the wheat, we see that our enemy, Satan, sowed seeds while we were not looking.
4. Pull weeds while they are small, before they have a chance to form deep roots. The best time to uproot undesirable attitudes and behaviors is when you first notice them. If you catch the weed early, you do not have to pull as hard and can usually correct the situation much more gently. If you put it off, you will have to dig it out later or do heavy pruning! Ouch!
5. A little consistent attention is more effective that infrequent intervention. One of the greatest blessings of home schooling is the opportunity to steward our children with daily diligence. If we spend larger amounts of time with them in close communication, we are more likely to spot opportunities to nurture potential and weed out problems.

It is really true that great oaks from little acorns grow. To make sure that we end up with children who will stand strong for God and His purposes, we must make sure that we do not despise the day of small beginnings but instead steward the most precious resources God has given us.

This article is the second in a series of three. The first article, Fear of Loss, Hope of Gain appeared in the November 2009 issue of the THSC REVIEW magazine. The third article, One More Lesson from the Garden, appeared in the August 2010 issue.

The post Tend Your Garden appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Twenty-four years ago (has it been that long?) we had no children. I was taking courses toward a master’s degree, and one of my study partners homeschooled her young son. I had never heard of such a thing. The family was not Christian; they homeschooled for academic reasons. Though I found her son’s unrestrained behavior hard to handle, I was impressed with his eagerness and range of knowledge. I remembered having that same delight in learning when I entered school myself, but by about third grade it had nearly been driven out of me by the restraints of the system. Whether one struggled or was bored to tears, the system ground on at the same lock-step pace. Hmmm … could home schooling preserve a delight in academic excellence?

When our children arrived, I was like someone planning a garden. I must tell you that I have never had any interest in raising children. By that I mean that it was my goal to raise adults; children were the raw material with which God gave me to work! Whenever I saw “fruit” I admired—teens who were bright, polite, and spiritually exemplary—I paid attention to the “seed” that had been planted. Time and again I learned that these were Christian home schoolers, and I wanted a harvest like that.

Academic and moral excellence were the things I hoped to gain by home schooling. What loss did I fear? I hoped to avoid the heartbreak of watching my children succumb to the snares of this world—drugs, alcoholism, promiscuity, rebellion, and godlessness.

I did not realize it at the time, but one of the secrets of setting and achieving high goals is to “begin with the end in mind” and to hold on to that vision when the going gets tough. I believe one of the best things young parents can do is to pray earnestly about the priorities God has laid on their hearts. Write those down! It will serve you well on discouraging days to remember the things that are worth diligently pursuing.

This is the first of three articles.  The second article, Tend Your Garden, appeared in the February 2010 issue of the THSC REVIEW.  The third article, One More Lesson from the Garden, appeared in the August 2010 issue.