After graduating from Patrick Henry College, the Coopers’ firstborn, David, is married, and his wife had their first child this month. David works as a senior consultant for Booz Allen Hamilton in Washington, D.C.

The Coopers’ second son, Jonathan, graduated summa cum laud with a degree in biology from Dallas Baptist University. He is currently finishing his third year in graduate school at University of Texas Southwestern in Dallas. He is working towards a PhD in cancer research.

Their daughter Hannah is currently finishing up her sophomore year at Dallas Baptist University where she is seeking an English degree. She plays harp and piano and owns her own harp business, “Simply Harp” (www.simplyharptx.com).

Congratulations to all these fine home school graduates!

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

I have been home schooling now for approximately fourteen years. So, depending on in what life season I find myself or even what home schooling struggles I may be experiencing, my reasons for attending the Convention vary.

At times I have attended simply to hear conference speakers who helped me with new ideas in organizing school schedules, house management, and more. Because we have six very unique kiddos, there were times when I searched through the Convention schedule, seeking out speakers dealing directly with teaching tools, methods, and ideas to help me teach to the learning style and special needs of each child. In the incredibly overwhelming, busy years, I sought out conference speakers and topics that would soften my burnout and re-motivate me to persevere in the important task to which God called me: home schooling.

Not only have my reasons for attending varied each year, but my companions at Convention have varied as well. Some years I go it alone for a time of recharging and rest. There have been several years in which my enthusiasm for the upcoming Convention vacation piqued the interest of a home schooling friend who had never attended, and we turned it into a girls’ weekend of shopping, learning, and laughter. My husband and I have used it as a “date” weekend to spend time together in uninterrupted conversation and to plan for the next school year. Finally, at other times our family of eight attended, registering our family through the entire spectrum of adult conference, Teen Program, and Children’s Program. (As a side note, the Teen and Children’s Programs are wonderful, but you must Early Bird Register, because they fill up fast. We missed the Teen Program one year because we waited too late to register.)

I admit that the Exhibit Hall full of vendors can be overwhelming with so many choices and opportunities meshed together in one location, but consider approaching it prayerfully, asking God to bring to your attention the items pertinent and needful to your family. My husband brings great clarity for me in this area. As we peruse books and curricula, he seems to have a better eye for what will work for our family. Even a friend or family member, whomever you are with, can provide a “second opinion.” What is incredibly helpful about the Exhibit Hall is that it provides a good overview of everything that is available to home schoolers, such as a plethora of curricula; Houston-area choral, band, karate, and sports groups; colleges and universities all over the country; field trip opportunities; and more. Another plus is that many vendors will give Convention discounts and/or free shipping on items ordered.

The THSC Convention has also become a “Convention vacation.” THSC has masterfully created Add-On events for families, so there are opportunities for discounts at varying local venues, such as Moody Gardens. We bought Add-On tickets to the Bob Smiley Comedy Show last year and the Tim Hawkins Comedy Show the year before. These shows were much-needed times of setting aside our serious schedules and concerns of life and laughing as a family—laughing so hard we cried! As much as I enjoyed the comedy shows, the look on my children’s faces and their laughter will be forever ingrained as a treasured memory in my mind.

When my children attend the Convention, we ride the free trolley from The Woodlands Waterway Marriott Hotel to The Woodlands Mall food court for lunch at least one day of Convention. The trolley ride provides giggles and laughter from some little boys who think it is incredibly cool, and it also gives riders a glimpse of The Woodlands area, passing by local shopping and restaurants and the Cynthia Woods Pavilion.

Another fun Convention lunch tradition our family has is what we call the “THSC Picnic Lunch.” Families who choose to bring their own lunch to Convention congregate picnic style in the walkway between the parking garage and hotel. Our boys enjoy watching the cars and activity on the street below, and there is a feeling of family and community as many home schooling families all enjoy lunch together.

If a trolley ride or a picnic lunch in a walkway does not sound attractive, or a walk through traffic is not appealing, there are waterway taxis that run along the waterway surrounding the hotel. These boat taxis will pick you up and “ship” you back and forth between the hotel and The Woodlands Mall for a small fee.

Some additional activity options for Pre-Convention fun include the Riva Row Boathouse, which offers kayak rentals for paddling the waterway, and spray-and-play parks in the local city parks, which provide free fun in the sun and playground time.

THSC Southwest Convention & Family Conference is so many different things to so many people. It is affirming and informative for those considering home schooling. It is knowledge building for those in the thick of their home schooling years. It is encouraging for those who feel beat down by the daily grind, who lose their focus or merely their energy to do what needs to be done, and it can change those feelings of inadequacy by giving you tools of capability. It is family fun and is full of memory making that will last through generations.

Wherever you are in your home schooling adventure, I encourage you to come to The Woodlands, catch a glimpse of the diversity of all of the other families who have also chosen to home school, and be encouraged that you are not alone in this journey. Come and enjoy. I’ll be there.

Pertinent and Helpful Links

THSC Southwest Convention & Family Conference

The Woodlands Waterway Marriott

The Woodlands Trolley

Spray & Play Parks:
Timarron
Sawmill

Kayaking on Waterway

The Woodlands Mall

Boat taxis

Woodlands Waterway (literal waterway)

Cynthia Woods Pavilion

The post Healing Tradition appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Four Angels were named to the All-American Team: seniors Josh Bilello, Kenan Davis, and Dillon Smith and junior Andrew Brechner.

Pictured:
Kneeling L-R: Josh Bilello, Nolan Withrow, Nathan Hall, Jaime Lovell, Caleb Holleman, Jake Preston, Kenan Davis
Standing L-R: Head Coach David Lovell, Jamie Andriot, Dillon Smith, Nathan Shorman, Caleb Pollard, Matthew Fusselman, Jordan Weeks, Andrew Brechner, Asst. Coach Ken Goode

The post Congratulations to Home School World Series Winners! appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Yeah. Me, too. The question is: When you get to that point, what do you do next?

Take a look at a note from a mom who is right at that crossroads.

I am home schooling my two very active boys, ages seven and five, and I am stuck. I think the biggest reason I am stuck is that I taught special education in the public school system for nine years and I just have in my mind how our school day “should look,” and it doesn’t fit, and, honestly, home schooling is really frustrating and I don’t like it. I just can’t seem to break out of that and embrace what works best for us! I also think I have “too many” ideas and things I want to cover and have trouble focusing on what is best.
–Losing Heart

Dear Losing Heart,

I have so been where you are. I understand your heavy heart. When I first began home schooling, I tried my best to make my school look and walk and talk like a traditional classroom. That was my model. I didn’t think it was a way to teach; I thought it was the way to teach—the only way. After all, if it wasn’t, why would teaching schools teach future teachers to use it? Thankfully, I hung in there, and with each passing year, my classroom grew more and more relaxed, less and less structured, and more and more able to follow the gifts and interests of my children.

This is a transition that almost every home schooling mom/teacher must make. We all start with what we know: the public school model. Admittedly, a few continue with that traditional model, but they are rare, and I believe that in doing so, they lose out on the many glorious options available to them and their children.

Here is the bad news: Moms who have been trained as teachers have the hardest time finding new models. You have already expressed this awareness, but you need to know you are not alone in this. It’s hard for everyone. It’s especially hard for teachers.

Keep in mind, the traditional model is not a bad one if you have twenty or so students and even more kids coming up the ranks. When the goal is to process a lot of children through a system, the public school model is not a bad one—but you’ll have to let some other things go. In that system, you cannot follow the strengths of the individual child; there isn’t time. There are too many other kids to consider. It’s an okay system for moving groups en masse through a process. However:

• If a particular student takes an interest in rocketry and all the physics behind it, nothing can be done, because the whole class doesn’t share the interest and it’s not on the lesson plan.
• If a particular student has a gift for writing and would love to delve into Shakespeare and all the unfamiliar richness of that older language, nothing can be done, because the whole class doesn’t share the interest and it’s not on the lesson plan.
• If a particular child shows an early interest in chemistry and would love to play with a lab kit, learning about reactions and properties, nothing can be done, because the whole class doesn’t share the interest and it’s not on the lesson plan.
• If a particular student just isn’t getting multiplication facts and needs three times the usual amount of time allotted to master it, nothing can be done, because the whole class doesn’t share the need and it’s not on the lesson plan.

In a traditional classroom, we move onward for the good of the majority; it makes sense to do so. Holding twenty-five kids back because of the needs or interests of one child does not make sense.

But in home schooling, it is not about the majority. It is about one child at a time.

(Can I get an “Amen”? J)

In home schooling you can follow delights. You can follow interests. You can address challenges. You can do pretty much anything that teaches a child that learning is fun and wonderful and lifelong, so before you give up, I would suggest you try different approaches. How about a unit study that focuses on something that absolutely delights your child?

Bugs? Monster trucks? The military? Firefighters? China? Davy Crockett?

Make models. Collect samples. Go on field trips. Watch kids’ documentaries. Read biographies of people who are into this subject. Role-play. Perhaps most importantly, find another home schooling mom who has already made this transition, and see if you can shadow her in her schooling for a week. Join together for a time. Share the school week or month. Watch what she does differently. Give yourself permission to step away from traditional, even if only for a month.

Should I Teach Subjects in Order?

When I first began home schooling I collected scope-and-sequence documents from around the country: public schools, private schools, expensive prep schools, schools for gifted students, and Montessori schools. I studied them to get a sense of the most comprehensive scope and sequence I could formulate for my own school. As a result, I made an amazing discovery: Other than a few essentials in learning to read, and of course, math, there wasn’t a clear path. Some schools studied earth science in fifth grade, and others studied life science. Some studied ancient Egyptians, while others were learning about Thomas Jefferson. Some learned metaphors and similes, while others were learning about proper citations. For almost everything, there was no clear chronology of learning.

This was a very freeing revelation for me. I realized that as long as they got the same information into their heads by the time they graduated, the method and sequence of how they got it could be completely of my choosing!

I was free to make learning delicious. This thought should liberate you from designing your school based on how it “should look.” Instead, apply a new method.

What would you need to do for your child to say, “That was wonderful! Can we do more?”

There it is. That should be your method. That should be your guide. If you started with that idea and changed just one lesson in your school day, you would see the difference. I suspect that soon you would change another and then another, until, before you knew it, learning in your school would be delicious. And you’d never want to stop.

The post Letting Go of the Teacher in You appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Laurel recently traveled to Houston to the DAR State Convention to receive her award. Approximately 191 Junior American Citizen chapters participated, with some chapters submitting more than 100 entries. The annual contest is open to students in grades 9-12. Laurel’s essay will go on to nationals for a possible scholarship opportunity and a trip to Washington D.C.

Thank you, Laurel, for representing our home school chapter of Junior American Citizens with an awesome essay!

The post THSC Congratulates Laurel Robinson appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

More than 100 students competed in preliminary rounds on the Washington College of Law campus in Washington, D.C. The next day the top 32 advocates, including all seven members of the Texas home school group, advanced to argue in the D.C. Federal District Courthouse. The students responded to intense questioning from a panel of judges during their oral arguments.

This year the Best Respondent title goes to Adam Gonzales and Best Petitioner is Isaac Sommers. This is Isaac’s second win in as many years. Other finalists include:

Joshua Upham – Finalist
Hannah Vecseri – Semi-Finalist
Thatcher Townsen – Quarter-Finalist
Greg Guggenmos – Octa-Finalist
Angelle Halvorson – Octa-Finalist

All of the students also compete in NCFCA Speech & Debate, which has helped refine their reasoning and public speaking skills. They were coached by Robert Sommers and Melanie Corley. Congratulations to these students!

The post Texas Home Schoolers Excel in Moot Court – Again! appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

However, as the learning took place and we fell in love with having our son home all the time, I knew that I would not stay in the category of “one year at a time” but rather, “This is our lifestyle.” That decision right there has made a monumental difference in how we conduct school business in our home.

Most of those families that took their decision on a year-to-year basis are no longer teaching their kids at home. Eventually their open-ended decision marched them right back to public school.

Much to their astonishment, we stayed the course and have the graduate to prove it! I would not trade these last fifteen years for any amount of income or freedom. It has been worth every second!
Speaking of the graduate, let me share my story of this young man, who started out his first official day of school by finding a baby squirrel in the front flower bed. I should have known on that day that this home schooling journey would not be “normal.” Such was the theme for every year since then, and I have grown to expect the unexpected!

Ted was a great student. He was eager to learn, smart, and compliant—all good ingredients for a successful school day. He loved to read, so many of our memories are of the two of us sharing a book on the couch while his little brother napped. I think you could say those were our most treasured moments of schooling.

As he got older, Ted would do any kind of work I put before him. We did a combination of workbooks, unit studies, and computer curriculum, with plenty of hands-on learning and notebooking thrown in for creativity. We had a lot of fun.

Middle school came along, and I started feeling the pressure to cut back on creativity and focus more on preparing for high school. Up to that point I was not a drill sergeant, as far as academics were concerned. We had taken a casual approach to learning and enjoyed many different styles. We also had lived by the philosophy that learning took place everywhere and all the time, and that philosophy gave us the freedom we desired in having our kids at home with us. However, when the end of seventh grade came along, I began to get serious about having a plan that extended to graduation.

The summer between Ted’s seventh and eighth grade years, I began reading Barb Sheldon’s book Senior High: A Home-Designed Form+U+La.This book was a priceless tool as I planned the remaining years of Ted’s education.

I began counting high school credits in eighth grade, and because I had read Barb’s book, I counted everything Ted did as hours or content. Any learning activity that took place, be it reading, music, Tae-Kwon-Do, or banking, was recorded in a notebook and tallied at the end of each year as hours toward credits. I am not going to lie: This was a tedious record keeping system, but it was so worth it in the end!

By the time Ted was officially a “freshman,” he had several high school credits under his belt. However, that compliancy that I mentioned earlier was beginning to fade when it came to academics. My creative son was quickly becoming weary of academics and all he could think about was music!

He would begrudgingly make his way through math, English, and history each day and spend the rest of his day recording, composing, and playing his guitar. At first I did not think much of it—what boy does not want to play guitar? However, after about a year of non-stop music, I realized we were dealing with more than a phase—and more of a gift!

Ted would spend every afternoon composing and recording music on his keyboard/recording system. This became such a time-consuming part of his day that I started giving him credit for the hours that he worked on his music. By the time he graduated, he had more than six credits in fine arts and additional credits in recording science.

Ted had always loved music. He sang his first song in church at the age of four, joined the preteen praise band at twelve, and played in the youth band at thirteen. At age fourteen he joined the official Sunday morning praise band, with which he played for three years. When he was not playing at our church, he was playing at a local Christian private school or at a youth group across town on Wednesday nights. The boy never stopped playing his guitar!

He eventually started asking for recording equipment, so he could record more professional-sounding pieces, and began to develop a vision for having his own recording studio one day. Thus, his future was starting to unfold, right before our eyes!

At this point in our schooling I was faced with the choice of pushing for academic excellence or allowing him the time to work within the area of gifting that was so evident. As a home schooling mom, accustomed to having our “school” under a microscope, it was not an easy decision; there are always those who want to question what your kids are learning and doing in the privacy of your own home. However, how could I deny this young man the freedom to pursue music, when he obviously had a gift for it? I am so glad I listened to my heart instead of to the critical voices inside my head. I truly feel it has made him the musician he is today.

As we neared graduation, we knew it was time to discuss college. I dreaded this topic because, when discussed previously, it had become a sore subject in our home. Ted had no desire for four more years of school. His father, on the other hand, put much effort into getting his own college degree and felt that it was a necessary tool in order to make it in the business world. Those were not pleasant discussions!

Finally, the young man who only wanted to eat, breathe, and play music reluctantly agreed to try CollegePlus. Thus began the journey through college basics and CLEP tests. Yet, even though Ted was studying and passing those tests, his mind was on being the entrepreneur and musician that he was made to be.

In the midst of college courses, Ted was figuring out a way to open his own business—a music recording studio—as he had dreamed of doing for years. He had been recording a few clients out of his bedroom or on location, but he wanted to have a professional venue, where the clients could come to him.

He scouted locations, made the contact with the landlord, negotiated the rent amount, signed himself up as a DBA (Doing Business As), and opened the doors to his own business. I was so proud of him! At the young age of eighteen, he was a proud business owner!

This studio was a great lesson in the world of business and finances. He eventually decided to bring the studio back home due to finances, and he still runs his business effectively by using a church studio that was graciously given to him.

Although I attribute all of Ted’s talents and gifts to the Lord, I firmly believe that home schooling him has made a huge difference in his life. Home schooling allowed him to dream, create, and explore on his own terms. It gave him the privilege of time—time to create, time to dream, time to explore his desires for his life. Because he had the freedom, Ted was able to devote time to things that mattered to him, instead of spending time on useless busy work.

Home schooling also gave Ted the chance to be out in the world, making relationships with people of all ages. It gave him the confidence to connect with people on many levels and in many areas of life. It provided the backdrop for Ted to become the person God created him to be, not a follower of the crowd. He is certainly not following the crowd but instead is carving his way through the maze of life, on his way to fulfilling his dreams.

I will be forever grateful for this privilege we call home schooling. I cannot imagine not spending those years with Ted and encouraging him to use his time to perfect his talent. It was time well spent.

To check out Ted, go to his website at TedSlaughter.com.

The post A Home School Graduate: What Freedom and Time Can Do appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

“Platypuses can’t be mammals if they lay eggs!” My children issue the challenge. I leap. I search in Volume “P.” I find proof! Platypuses are indeed rare mammals that do indeed lay eggs! For some strange reason, this type of exchange just makes my day.

My fascination with encyclopedias began at a young age—when I got my own set, for my own room, at ten years old. Quickly, “A” became my favorite volume because of all the uniforms, weapons, and insignia of the Army. “M” was second best because of Money. (Did you know they used to print $10,000 bills and that Salmon B. Chase’s picture was on them?) Other volumes popular with me were “S” and “N-O.” While other kids were hiding under their covers with a flashlight and a Hardy Boys mystery, I was secretly perusing navy ships and plastic overlays of human anatomy.

Sadly, all that encyclopedia browsing did not seem to give me a lifelong encyclopedic knowledge of everything. In fact, the older I get, the more I know that I do not know much at all. Fortunately, I have also realized that I will not ever know everything anyway, so I am okay with it. However, I do want my children to see me wanting to know things. Enthusiasm for learning can be contagious. Therefore I retain my habit of browsing.

Really, it is like taking a quick tour of the universe, moving at light speed. Just think: where else can you go from reading about the Gutenberg Bible (and seeing a page of it!) to the history of Bigamy, then quickly on to Bigfoot and ending with the Battle of Bighorn all in the span of three minutes? Who needs race cars or rockets when you can zoom through space and time like that?

It is not an uncommon occurrence for me—in the middle of a sentence—to stop talking and walk straight to the World Book Encyclopedia to find a fact to support my statement. For example, not long ago we were in a debate about whether there is a googol (that is a 10 with 99 zeroes after it) of molecules in the whole earth, including everything on it, plus the atmosphere. I said no, there are not that many molecules in the whole earth, but at least one of my children refused to believe me. I attacked the problem with a calculator and a pile of encyclopedias.

To find out the number of molecules in the whole earth, first I had to find out how many molecules there are in one cubic centimeter of earth. So I needed “M” for Mole and/or Molecule. Then, needing to know how many atoms there are in a molecule of carbon (the most common element), I grabbed “C” (and also “E,” for Element, just in case). Then I had to know the mass of the earth, so having “E” handy was a good idea. To calculate cubic kilometers of a sphere with a 25,000-mile circumference required some now-dusty geometric formulae, so “G” was the fourth volume added to the pile. The volume of the atmosphere was tough, but it does not add up to that much, really.

Now, as it turns out, the earth does not even have close to a googol of molecules of matter, so the question became, “How about the entire solar system?”

I got “S.” It was a fortunate thing I started with Sun rather than Pluto, as I quickly learned that the sun has ninety-five percent of the matter in the whole solar system, which made everything simpler from then on. So, how big is the sun? Well, it could hold about 1.3 million earths, so that made things really easy. Thank heaven (and whoever developed the idea of not having to write out all those zeroes) for exponentiation! According to my calculations, the entire solar system would not have a googol of atoms in it! (I believe it is somewhere around 0⁷¹, give or take a dozen zeroes. If someone tries this calculation and proves me wrong, please let me know!)

Of course, by the time I had discovered this awesome fact, I was not only alone at the table but was the only one in the house! I wanted my revelation to be dramatic, so I taped a few pieces of paper together and actually wrote out the 10¹⁰⁰, 10⁷¹, and 10⁹ to show how big the number really is. When I finally found the kids all playing in the sunshine and presented my findings, they were notably unimpressed. One of my children was angered at the very idea of a googol, grumbling, “What’s the use of a number if there’s no way to use it?” I went back to get “G” to find out what kind of crazy guy would name a useless number. (It was the crazy mathematician’s son who dubbed it “googol.”) All in all, it was a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon—for me.

Now, some may claim that I could have done the whole thing faster (and probably more accurately) with the Internet. They may be right. However, there is a richness in the experience of searching through six volumes of an encyclopedia to answer such a question. It is an experience that just cannot be replaced by typing a few words into the other Google. My kids may tease me about my encyclopedia-grabbing habits, but I know they will grow up with a sense of the value—and fun—of browsing, using, and keeping handy a traditional set of actual, heavy, paper, honest-to-goodness encyclopedias.

The post Encyclopedia Dad appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

Yet, we are not just creators and cultivators; we are also consumers, participants, and critics. We live in a world in which others spin stories that are antithetical to God’s story of the world—views of reality that have conflicting definitions of good, true, and beautiful and views about whether there even is a God that we can please.

While only Scripture is trustworthy to show us which of these conflicting stories match reality, we need a tool that helps us navigate life in God’s true story in the midst of the contemporary false ones. Worldview is that tool. It helps us think scripturally about the dominant stories surrounding us at any given time—the stories that compete with the true story of Scripture and threaten to build in us false, ugly, bad habits as we live our lives.

This is the reason for the cliché in worldview circles that “worldview is caught, not just taught.” Our habits and experiences are shaped by the culture—including the stories about the world that nurture us—and these gradually shape our perception of reality, our worldview. Think of the way that television or movies, for example, over time shape the way that we live—how we speak, write, dress, and interact with one another. We very easily conform to the world around us. (See Rom. 12:2a.)

Of course, it works the other way around too: Our worldview shapes our actions, and our actions shape our cultural activities. A specific view of work, for example, compels us to act in a particular way at the office and in turn influences what we create with our hands and words. We are indeed “transformed by the renewing of our minds.” (Rom. 12:2b)

Ultimately, worldview and culture are inseparable. Worldview is participation in culture, and conflicting cultures shape us as we develop our worldview. Worldview is much more than simply principles that we hear and study.

What might all this mean for parents and other educators?

First, we must be familiar with prevailing cultural stories.
Anyone who lives in a house, buys clothing, owns a television, or surfs the Internet is confronted by stories that challenge the biblical story. In God’s true story, the world was created good and was then corrupted. All creation was and is polluted by human sin. God is at work to redeem the world through the work of His Son, Who is reconciling all things to Himself. Human beings, created in God’s image, have a role to play in that reconciliation, and through our culture-making activities, we take part with God in His work. Though the victory was complete on the cross, the work of full reconciliation will not be finished—consummated—until Jesus returns and makes all things right.

Contrary stories abound. One current antithetical story, consumerism, tells us that life is meant for success and that success is found in the acquisition of things that can make life easier and more enjoyable. Therefore, buying and using things—including material “stuff” but also power, people, and entertainment—is the way to the good life.

There are other cultural stories alive and well around us, including postmodernism, scientism, and nihilism, among others. We need to know the content of the dominant stories, because they work their way into all that we do as we seek to live as Christians in the world. We must be conscious of the stories so that we do not unconsciously begin to live them out.

We must be intentional, reading cultural commentary, listening to the news, and asking critical questions about the books we read, the movies we watch, and the people who teach us—all from a Christian perspective. We should read what our children are reading and know about the stories that are told to them. We must sit down with our daughters, look at a magazine or television ad, and ask them, “What is that telling you about what it means to be a good woman? Is that true?”

Second, virtually every current story borrows elements from the true story of creation, fall, redemption, and consummation, so wisdom and discernment are necessary in order to distinguish the good from the bad.
As we interact with culture and create it, we embrace what is true and reject what is false. Doing so requires discernment. This discernment requires living out God’s story, even in the midst of the competing stories.

Often, rather than risk living where these stories intersect, Christians attempt to escape the influence of false culture by withdrawing from cultural activity altogether. Not only is this impossible, it is contrary to our calling. Our culture-building task is at the heart of the human calling. That calling anticipates that we join God in his reconciling work in the whole of creation and come into conflict with the powers at the heart of the competing stories.

Finally, we will ultimately be assimilated into false stories if we live unintentionally—if we fail to live the true story.
The question is not whether we will live based on some story that defines reality; the question is which story will we live?

Note how the “consumerism” story described above is related to cultural ideas about individualism, free-market capitalism, and the American work ethic—all ideas that we esteem, at least to some extent. Consider whether we value these things because we are Westerners or because we have carefully examined each from a biblical perspective. Is the capitalist economy “good,” for example, simply because we are capitalists? Or have we seen that it is good and then pursued it? This is not necessarily a criticism of free-market capitalism but rather an example of how living in the midst of a story engulfs us—unless we intentionally pursue alternative stories.

Our spending habits; our language; our hopeful or cynical attitude toward church, government, or education; our use of technology; and even the way we eat and dress tell us (and others) what stories we believe about reality. My spending habits, for example, reveal how much I have been “conformed” to the consumerism story. It never hurts to stop and evaluate the habits and practices of our home. From where have they come, and to where are they leading us? Which cultural story do they reveal, and into which story do they push us?

Both the unthinking consumption of culture, on the one hand, and faithful culture-making, on the other, are key worldview builders. Our task is to be faithful to be salt and light to the world around us by living and proclaiming the true story—building true culture—and to resist and reject what is false, bad, and ugly in the cultural stories that prevail around us.

Select Bibliography

• Andy Crouch, Culture Making: Recovering our Creative Calling (InterVarsity 2008). Explains the cultural calling of Christians.
• Michael W. Goheen & Craig G. Bartholomew, Living at the Crossroads: An Introduction to Christian Worldview (Baker 2008). Discusses the “living at the crossroads” of conflicting stories.
• J. Mark Bertrand, (Re)Thinking Worldview: Learning to Think, Live, and Speak in This World (Crossway 2007). Discusses the concept of wisdom as it relates to worldview and story.

The post Worldview as Culture, Culture as Worldview appeared first on Texas Home School Coalition.

A worldview is a way of viewing or interpreting all of reality. It is an interpretive framework through which or by which one makes sense of the data of life and the world. – Norman Geisler, William Watkins

It was 1988, the year that Pat Robertson, Jack Kemp, and Pete DuPont ran against George H.W. Bush for the Republican nomination for president. The moderates were out in force at our Republican county convention. However, there were more conservatives than moderates in attendance; I know this because my husband was elected by the convention to serve as convention chairman—over the moderates’ choice of the man who had been elected county chairman. As you can imagine, it was a very tense convention—especially for me.

I was sitting in my seat, minding my own business, when somehow the woman in front of me figured out that I was Tim’s wife. I was later to learn that she had served on the local school board in the past; it did not take me long to realize that she was from the other camp.

This woman turned around and verbally attacked me. She angrily started talking about sex education: “I can’t understand how you people think it’s OK to not teach kids about sex! They need to know about these things and learn how to protect themselves!” and so on. I am sure that I just sat there, looking like a deer in headlights. I was thinking to myself, “I can’t understand why you people think we should teach children about sex and how to do it, and why you don’t understand that teaching them how to do it is going to lead to them doing it more!” Fortunately, a good friend, who was sitting next to me and who was much better prepared for such a discussion, chimed in and took over, allowing me to escape and calm my nerves before I completely fell apart.

I came away from that experience not understanding exactly what had happened. The woman and I had used some of the same words, but they did not always mean the same things. Neither of us could understand what the other was thinking and how in the world the other had come to the conclusions that she had.

A few years later I attended a conference at which the speaker was David Noebel, who was then president of Summit Ministries. It was from him that I first learned about the concept of worldviews. In his book Understanding the Times, Dr. Noebel defines the term worldview as referring to “any ideology, philosophy, theology, movement, or religion that provides an overarching approach to understanding God, the world, and man’s relations to God and the world.” He explains that “worldview” refers to the framework of ideas and beliefs through which an individual, group, or culture interprets the world and interacts with it—the glasses through which people look at the world, issues, and circumstances, so to speak.

I came to understand that situations like I experienced at the county convention happen because two people with opposing worldviews can discuss issues, but it can seem like they are speaking on different planes . . . or maybe even in different dimensions! They can use the same words, but the words mean different things. It is because they start off with different sets of presuppositions or foundational truths.

Though we like to think of America as a Christian nation, the Christian worldview is not the most prevalent in our culture. As we are bombarded by media, advertising, movies—even the government—most of what we see and hear on a daily basis comes from a secular humanist mindset. A major reason many of us home school is we do not want our children taught that ideology. Secular humanism is the prominent “religion” now taught in the public schools and in colleges.

In a time when more than half of young people from Christian homes walk away from their faith when they attend college, it is important, especially if your child intends to go to an institution of higher learning, to give him the tools to recognize from where different philosophies come and to where they will lead. Our children need to know what the Bible says and why that is important, or they become easy targets for those set on indoctrinating our culture in anti-Christian thinking.

Not long after I heard Dr. Noebel speak, I met Jeff Meyers for the first time. He was working with Summit Ministries and traveling around the country, speaking to college students on different campuses. (Jeff, now a nationally known speaker, is the current president of Summit Ministries.) I asked him how many colleges/universities he would say at that time taught from a Christian worldview. His very discouraging answer was that he could count them on one hand.

What can we as home schoolers do to learn about the different worldviews and to make sure that ours is in line with scripture? Is going to church enough? How do we teach our children to think biblically?

When your children are young, teach them to memorize scripture. Begin to help them see how scripture applies to every area of their lives. The reason that one should not hit his sister and that the one hit should forgive is because God says, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.” (Ephesians 4:32 NKJV) The reason our children must be respectful and obedient is because God says that we should honor our fathers and our mothers (Exodus 20:12).

As they grow, teach your children that scripture is the inspired, infallible word of God and the final authority for all truth and practice. As the issues of life become more complex, in each situation go together with them to the Bible to see what might be God’s direction and/or His principles that apply.

When your children are teens, teach them about worldviews. Send them to a camp at which they will learn these principles. (See sidebar for some suggestions.) My children took a course based on Understanding the Times in which they studied about differences between the worldviews of secular humanism, Marxism, Christianity, and others. They learned how to stand against challenges to their faith by those who have philosophies different from theirs.

As Dr. Noebel exhorts at the end of that book, “Go on the offensive! Light a candle. Pray (2 Chronicles 7:14; Colossians 1:9-14). Study (2 Timothy 2:15). Understand the times (1 Chronicles 12:32). Rebuild the foundations (Psalm 11:3). Spread the word. Truth is our greatest weapon. . . . Perhaps most importantly, Christians must shore up our worldview and teach it to young people. We must immerse ourselves and our children in Christian theology, Christian philosophy, Christian ethics, Christian politics, Christian economics, Christian psychology, Christian sociology, Christian biology, Christian law, and Christian history.”

Home educating my children was one of the toughest things I ever did. It was also one of the most rewarding. I wanted to do all that I could do to ensure that the evil one did not snatch away the seed that we spent so much time planting and tending. Giving them a foundational understanding of worldviews and teaching them to think biblically were the best ways that I knew to prepare and thus protect them.

Some helpful Christian worldview resources:

Worldview Academy
A non-denominational organization dedicated to helping Christians to think and to live in accordance with a biblical worldview so that they will serve Christ and lead the culture. Holding more than 20 camps nationwide, Worldview Academy reaches out to students aged 13 to 18 from across the United States and Canada, training and equipping them to understand and apply their faith in Jesus Christ. They also hold church and family conferences for all ages.

Summit Ministries
An educational Christian ministry whose existence is a response to the current post-Christian culture. Part of Summit’s goal is to challenge Christians to stand strong in their faith and defend truth, equipping them to have a positive influence on the society in which they live. Summit’s Student Worldview Conferences are intensive, two-week retreats designed to teach students how to analyze the various ideas that are currently competing for their hearts and minds.

Understanding the Times by Dr. David Noebel
Both the book and the curriculum outline the differences between Christianity and the other prominent worldviews vying for allegiance in Western culture: Islam, Postmodernism, Secular Humanism, Marxism, and New Age. This class will help students clearly understand the tenets of the Christian worldview and how it compares with the tenets of other leading worldviews of our day: Islam, Secular Humanism, Marxism, New Age, and Postmodernism. In book and video curriculum formats; intended for high school students.

TheChristianWorldview.com
An extensive website resource that provides audio, video, and written content from some of the most respected Christian leaders. The Christian Worldview is a nationally syndicated radio program hosted by David Wheaton. Featuring compelling topics, notable guests, listener calls, and sound bites, the program focuses on current events, cultural issues, and matters of faith from a decidedly biblical perspective.

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