Category Archives: mothering

as weird as you are: what homeschool really is

Posted on by March 10, 2022

Homeschooling has always been misunderstood, but 2020 didn’t do it any favors and now there’s even more confusion.

The fall of 2020 saw an unprecedented number of families transfer their kids from public and private school to homeschool. And this fall has been the same, for many of the same reasons; even more parents this year want to make the move to homeschool.

as weird as you are: what homeschool really is

It’s a bold, brave choice that requires a family to make significant changes, and it can be overwhelming. That has never changed; the overwhelm has always been there whether it was last year, this year, or sixteen years ago, when we started.

But this year I’ve noticed one difference: Many parents who wish they could get their kids out of public school have washed their hands of homeschooling because they feel like they tried it last year with the forced lockdown, and it was miserable.

So let me clear something up real quick. This is important:

If, because of lockdowns, you were forced into schooling at home, schooling online, or doing a ton of assignments with your kids that their school told you to do, then I hate to break it to you, but…you didn’t homeschool.

I hope that’s a relief to some of you.

Just because your child did assignments at home doesn’t mean it was homeschool.

If they were still registered with another school and doing everything that school told them to do, a repeat of that experience is not what you would be signing up for if you chose to (really) homeschool.

Because homeschool is not checking off a list that someone else assigned you. Homeschool is not hours and hours in front of a screen in zoom meetings or other online classes. Homeschool isn’t just doing the same things you would do at school, but moving the location to your kitchen table (or the couch, or your bed).

Homeschool is none of those things. So if you were given that impression last year and it left a terrible taste in your mouth, I am so sorry. No one can blame you for saying “We tried homeschool last year and we hated it” because we would hate it that way, too.

But we can show you what it really ought to be. And that should give you hope, especially if you wish there was an alternative to the indoctrinating mess that many public schools have become. If you are tired of the CRT and other agendas, the unhealthy mask mandates, the disregard of parental rights, and you want to make school about education again (whoa, what a concept!), let’s talk about what homeschool really is.

And right from the start, I admit that I can’t give you the full picture. Because homeschool is different for everyone, and that is the beauty of it. It is for you and for your kids, not for a predictable system so they will all go in different and come out the same after being squeezed to conform to a mold they may never fit into.

But here are some basic principles:

– We read. A lot. Out loud and quietly, to each other, to younger siblings, to older siblings, to Grandma, to the cats if they will listen. So many books, so little time. When someone’s sick, audiobooks work in a pinch.

– We do stuff: Projects and hikes and visits and crafty things and cooking and watching videos and I can’t even tell you what else. At home and elsewhere, on our own and with others, and we’re not limited to a 7 am to 3 pm schedule.

– We talk to each other, to extended family members and friends, and others. We discuss what we’re reading and learning. We visit people and talk on the phone, and we’re not segregated into only talking with those in our own age group, economic group, neighborhood, or gender.

– We try and fail and change things up, and try again. We’re not stuck with the math program that we hate. We try new language arts programs that might be a better fit. We don’t read the dry textbooks that put you to sleep.

– Our curriculum and schedule work for us, not the other way around. We are not a slave to the checklists and to-do lists (and neither are our kids). We adjust our school schedule to our lives instead of adjusting our lives to our school schedule. A new baby is born, or someone gets sick, or some major catastrophe occurs? We learn about basic skills and caring for each other for a few weeks, and the algebra and language arts can wait. There will be time to pick it up again when things settle down. We are flexible when we need to care for each other, help friends, do a major home repair, or get involved in community projects. So much that needs to be known is never learned in school…but it can be learned in homeschool.

Some of the most important learning is not academic, so don’t be afraid to go there.

So friends, if you want to homeschool this year but don’t think you can for a dozen or more reasons, listen to me:

You will be a terrific teacher for your kid. You’ve already been doing it a long time.

You can teach your kids. Yes, it’s hard sometimes. Yes, you’ll be sanctified. But you can go slow, read the books you want, do the activities you want, partner with friends, take advantage of online resources (they cover every subject or topic you could imagine), and make it your own. Make it for them. Make it for your freedom. Make it for their future.

We have all these preconceived ideas about what school should look like, and we feel like we can’t fit the mold. So, newsflash:

There was never meant to be a mold.

School is supposed to be as weird as you are. Go ahead and quote me on that.

____

Need a quick resource for more info? HSLDA has a terrific site right here, with everything you need to know (legal, local, academic, and otherwise) to get started.

prayer like clouds: when we notice things in a different light

Posted on by May 20, 2021

I’m not proud of it, but lately my domestic abilities are extremely…how do I put this? Minimalist. I don’t rearrange furniture, I don’t buy cute décor, I don’t keep up with style blogs. I suffer through necessary cleaning like everyone else. And now that Vince and I both work at home, our oldest kids do most of the cooking.

prayer like clouds: when we notice things in a different light (shannon guerra)

The only household chore I truly enjoy is rearranging books. But thanks to seven kids who never reshelve anything (insert strict librarian scowl here), I get to do it almost daily.

Vin knows I love moving books around and he recently left one of his new books to my disposal. It was light brown, clothbound, and he said I could put it wherever I wanted. So I looked around, pondered, and dragged the piano bench across the library. Then I stacked the new book on a high shelf with some of his other books.

He didn’t notice for a couple of days. Then one morning he found it and protested, announcing “it doesn’t go there.”

“What do you mean, ‘it doesn’t go there?’” I laughed. “You said I could put it wherever I wanted.”

He threw up his hands in exaggerated despair. “I trusted you to respect the book, and you put it way up there! It’s a beautiful copy about the War of 1812. And I didn’t expect you to put it on a stack, sandwiched between a book by Ted Koppel and an old copy of The Silmarillion!”

The nerd is strong with this one. As you can see, he is a closet book rearranger, also.

That was in the morning. By the afternoon we’ve reached the part of the day when I am at my desk to write, and the ideas and motivations are just…poof, gone. I sit and stare. I open and shut files, open and shut my journal. Look at my notes. I rearrange things on my desk, and somehow it’s not any neater after a few minutes of doing so. And I sit and stare some more.

prayer like clouds: shannon guerra

Yet on Sunday night when I was getting ready to take a bath – on the wrong day, at the wrong time, and in a place I don’t have any writing material whatsoever – all sorts of ideas just flooded over me.

The creative thoughts are supposed to come when I’m conveniently in front of my laptop, or at least have a pen and paper handy. But it almost never fails; the creativity flows without effort in the most unexpected places. The expected place requires work, and concentration, and discipline. Which looks like a lot of sitting and staring.

I don’t think it’s Murphy’s Law so much as it is the need for fresh oxygen to stir up new thoughts, creating opportunities to observe and notice new things. Up here in my office, in spite of all the windows, the view doesn’t really change all that much: The desk is a mess. The floor is lined with throw pillows and crates of books and yarn. Usually there’s a few blocks or toys scattered all over. And out the window, trees are trees.

But…not really. It’s spring and the leaves are unfurling outside. The aspens are covered in millions of pale green stars that flash and twinkle in the breeze. Sometimes the sky is classically blue, but on this day it was cloudy and dramatic, steel grey, shot through with shafts of sunlight against chartreuse new leaves. My favorite. Or one of my favorites, at least.

And there, noticing life around me, I have a few sentences to write about. They string together and start to accumulate into something substantial.

That night I drove to Bible study, and prayer came the same way as I sat and stared, driving down the highway. It came out in small phrases, thinking of what we needed for the night: Good conversation. No one feeling awkward or out of place. Everyone to be at ease, comfortable in their own skin. More concerned with encouraging each other than with impressing each other.

Sometimes they were real sentences, and sometimes they were just one-second thought prayers: Safe driving. Peace in hearts. Healing. Truth. Just sentence fragments, because God knows how to fill in the blanks better than I do.

And I wondered about the weight of those instant prayers. Do they really do anything? They feel so effortless, just thoughts directed at God.

I turned off the highway and drove up the hill, noticing the patchy clouds in a grey sky. And His answer was right there: Some clouds are darker and heavier than others, some will drop rain sooner than others, but all carry a measure of water.

They all accumulate, contributing to the provision for those who are thirsty.

And, hey Love – answering prayer has never been about your efforts, anyway.

This is abiding, the thought-life directed Godward. Unpolished, unpretentious, unrehearsed. Our incomplete thoughts at scattered intervals, strung together and brought back to Him in surrender. Some of them are intercessory, filling the cloud for someone else. Others are internal, our own thoughts and concerns and desires, and they condense as Living Water that washes through us, irrigating our hearts, and bringing wholeness.  

For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven
    and do not return there but water the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
    giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
    it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
    and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

– Isaiah 55:10-11, ESV

That night in our small group of women, we sat around a long table with steaming tea in paper cups and discussed the book we’re reading together. And we’re learning so much just from the reading, but we go so much farther when we hear each other’s perspectives and questions. We ignite thoughts in each other we didn’t know were there if they hadn’t had the chance to come up in conversation.

We notice more when we put our thoughts in different places. I didn’t know I thought that, until I said it out loud.

I didn’t realize that was true until I typed it out.

On the way home, rain spattered the windshield and rinsed the highway. It soaked the ground, and the leaves will be bigger tomorrow.

I thought trees were trees – that is, until the sky changed color behind them and they shook in the breeze, demanding me to take notice.

keep it: the only way we maintain good times for future generations

Posted on by January 18, 2021

Over the last week with few exceptions, I’ve posted nothing on social media except scripture. I haven’t wanted to add to the noise. He has good things to say about this season, and that’s what I’ve wanted to focus on and draw attention to.

keep it: the only way we maintain good times for future generations

It’s been an interesting experiment and a good move for me, sort of like a fast.

Fret not yourself because of evildoers;
    be not envious of wrongdoers!
For they will soon fade like the grass
    and wither like the green herb.

Trust in the Lord, and do good;
    dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.

– Psalm 37:1-3

It’s been Psalm 37 all week long. But if you’re paying attention (I know many of you are) you know that really, it’s been Psalm 37 for much longer than that. The events over the last few weeks, and even leading up to election week in November, weren’t huge surprises and they’ve been in the making for a long time.

Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him;
    fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way,
    over the man who carries out evil devices!

Refrain from anger, and forsake wrath!
    Fret not yourself; it tends only to evil.
For the evildoers shall be cut off,
    but those who wait for the Lord shall inherit the land.

– Psalm 37:7-9

On January 6th, we took the day off work and prayed. And then we went to church and prayed. Our pastor talked candidly about the risk of civil war, and I’ve thought many times about how we are facing this blend of civil and revolutionary war – civil because it is among our own countrymen, but revolutionary because of the cause and the nature of it.  But our pastor also talked about the grievous things it could mean for our kids and future grandkids, and I had not fully considered it in that vivid light.

Then one of the elders prayed, and he repented for his generation that allowed so much of this to happen. They were comfortable, he said; things were easy. And they took advantage of it, and the generation that came after took the ease and comfort for granted.

It made me think of this saying that I’ve been hearing a lot over the last year:

Hard times create strong men.

Strong men create good times.

Good times create weak men.

Weak men create hard times.

And it’s so true, I know it is, but surely we must be able to break the cycle. Because if we can’t, everything seems so hopeless – why should we work to create good times if it only results in weak men who ruin it for our great grandchildren?

Or worse, there’s that other argument we hear all too often: Why bother bringing children into the world at all?

But then, the same week, I also read this:

“What sort of world is this to bring them into? That’s another consideration.”

“A very cowardly consideration, dear. A mere shirking of responsibility. It’s a heavy responsibility, of course, a double one, responsibility for the children themselves and responsibility for the world they must live in. But I know of no better incentive for the building of a decent world than the possession of children who must live in the world you’ve built.”

– Elizabeth Goudge, Pilgrim’s Inn

God creates a beautiful, strategic curriculum for our lives: The warnings and repentance, the prayer and the challenge. And I realized again that we are not headed for war; we are already at war.

We always have been. But we lose ground every time we forget it.

What hasn’t changed is that we are occupying the land of a cleanup operation: We are in the middle of a spiritual war in a physical place, and it manifests itself in both ways. We see the spiritual and physical aftermath all around us.

So even when we get back to “good times” – the corruption is revealed, the fraud is overturned, the guilty go to prison (hashtag: we’re gonna need a bigger Gitmo) – we still need to remember that we are at war. We are always at war. Our hearts and culture are the battleground, and never more so when it looks like things are safe and easy.

We are still occupying and stewarding the land, on mission, until He comes.

There are quiet victories and struggles, great sacrifices of self, and noble acts of heroism, in it…done every day in nooks and corners, and in little households, and in men’s and women’s hearts – any one of which might reconcile the sternest man to such a world, and fill him with belief and hope in it, though two-fourths of its people were at war, and another fourth at law; and that’s a bold word.

– Charles Dickens, The Battle of Life

People’s hearts – ours, and those around us – are always and still the battleground. Hearts and identities and relationships will always need wholeness and fullness, in good times and bad, and that is where God wants to stake His claim. We till the soil regardless of the weather and circumstances because strong men create good times, but strong men can also create strong children. And those strong children will continue to inherit the land.

There were still children in the world, and while there were children, men and women would not abandon the struggle to make safe homes to put them in, and while they so struggled there was hope.

– Elizabeth Goudge, Pilgrim’s Inn

When the Constitutional Convention closed in 1787, Benjamin Franklin was leaving Independence Hall when a woman asked him what kind of government they had just designed. His answer was, “A republic, if you can keep it.”

And that is still our challenge today.

Turn away from evil and do good;
    so shall you dwell forever.
For the Lord loves justice;
    he will not forsake his saints.
They are preserved forever,
    but the children of the wicked shall be cut off.
The righteous shall inherit the land
    and dwell upon it forever.

– Psalm 37:27-29

In good times or hard times, we are still loving our kids and teaching them. We are still learning more and growing. We are still passing on values and standards and true education. We are still in the Word and abiding in prayer. We cannot let up and grow soft when times are easy, and we cannot let go and become calloused when times are hard.

The only way we do that is to remember that the war is never over – it is always raging in the spiritual battleground. We are not only meant to inherit the land, but to keep it.