Unbouncing Tigger, or The Defect of His Quality

I'm reading The Tao of Pooh, in which Benjamin Hoff uses the Winnie the Pooh stories to exemplify philosophical principles.  And I'm reading Charlotte Mason's second volume, Parents and Children, which is a collection of articles she wrote for the parents' magazine her organization published. 

Tonight my Tao of Pooh reading came from chapter 4, "Cottleston Pie."  One of the points of this chapter is that dealing with things As They Are is better than pretending things are Something They Are Not.  Tigger comes up a lot.  Hoff reminds us of Rabbit's plan to Unbounce Tigger.  The plan failed, and one of Tigger's positive traits became obvious: he doesn't get lost.  Tigger's bounciness distracted everyone, maybe even himself, from noticing his talents.  And when Rabbit finally wins and forces Tigger to promise not to bounce, Tigger's whole character changes, and not for the better.  Everyone misses the old cheery, bouncy Tigger, even if the bounciness seemed overwhelming.

Maybe as parents we tend to be Rabbit, wanting to "unbounce" our children.  Maybe we can't see their talents because we're distracted by the annoying bouncing.  Maybe our children can't see their talents either.  Maybe we're trying so hard to "unbounce" them that we're taking away part of what makes them special and overlooking more important potential.  "For within the Ugly Duckling is the Swan, inside the Bouncy Tigger is the Rescuer who knows the Way, and in each of us is something Special, and that we need to keep." (p. 65)

Last month our Coffee with Charlotte group read and discussed chapter 16 in Volume 2, "Discipline: A Consideration for Parents."  One of the last points in that chapter focused on the necessity of seeing the child as a person, whose good qualities sometimes show up in negative ways.  Many negative traits or behaviors stem from some characteristic that could be a positive trait if directed appropriately, and the job of the parent is to diligently help the child redirect until the positive direction is habitual.  "As the bad habit usually arises from the defect of some quality in the child it should not be difficult for the parent who knows his child's character to introduce the contrary good habit." (p. 175)

What if instead of trying to make our children fit into our vision of Who They Should Be we instead considered Who They Are and thought about how to help them become even better at that?

Success in Imperfection - Part 6 of 6

 This is Part 6 of 6.  Find the other parts here.

Less than perfect *is* success.  Focus on what happened, not what didn’t happen.  Today, this week, this term, this year, what did you and your students accomplish?  Where did you grow?  What new experiences did you have?  How did you improve?  Appreciate the beauty in what you *are* doing.  It’s easy to feel inadequate and worry that you’re failing. 

And of course we have to consider where we need to improve, but first we have to seriously look at where we’re doing well.  So your Year 1 student isn’t narrating beautifully even when you read a paragraph at a time.  But what *is* she doing that she wasn’t able to do at the beginning of the year?  Where can you see growth or forward progress? Where are you seeing small glimpses of success?  Maybe your Year 4 student isn’t adding Latin or taking to Plutarch or the original Shakespeare plays, but is he enjoying one of the literature selections?  Or is he beginning to see the panorama of history just a bit?  Or he’s fondly remembering a book from a previous year that you were sure he hadn’t understood at all?

We often scare ourselves with lofty visions of what our teenagers *would* be learning if they were in school.  Stop that!  The mythical school classroom looms too large in our imaginations; the real classroom is not nearly as intimidating.  Of course we want to offer a rigorous education that prepares our students for life, but that happens through slow and steady progress, mixed with delays and setbacks, bit by bit.  What does your teenager care about that most of her peers don’t?  What opportunities is your teenager getting at home to learn self management?  What subjects are you able to at least *touch* on that wouldn’t come up in a traditional school setting at all?

Oftentimes what looks like failure  is really a success because of our unique situations.

• So my 11 year old draws generic daffodils week after week in his nature notebook.    This was actually much better than what we’ve achieved in the past, so I was happy!  Plus, he’s been doing it with minimal prompting, and drawing is really a challenge for him so he usually won’t even try.  For all these reasons, this is actually a success, not a failure, even though it doesn’t meet our usual expectations for perfect nature study implementation.

• Usually dictation passages come from school readings.  I’ve been comfortable pulling them from other great literature sometimes, but it’s hard to justify using lines pulled from various episodes of a fictional TV series.  However, my son gladly is copying out the Hobbit in his commonplace book every day and already is an excellent writer, so this temporary compromise of using the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition as dictation doesn’t bother me too much.

• My daughter had a concussion last year and her ability to focus has taken time to return.  She’s also working and volunteering and participating in other activities that have great value for her now and in the future.  Our lightened version of a light year schedule is still incorporating great history and literature and theology.  She loves her readings!  We just had to cut back to what we can actually achieve with our current challenges.  This little bit done consistently is still beautiful, and when we can’t get it done we just have to let it go and try again.

Ultimately, are you honoring God in your home?  Are you following His direction?  If you are, then you’re achieving absolute success, even if it looks like failure from a human perspective.  The verse I cling to when homeschooling is hard is Isaiah 54:13:  “All your children shall be taught by the Lord, and great shall be the peace of your children.” 

We aren’t wise enough to plot out a definite course that’s best for ourselves, our family, our community.  No map we lay out or get from even the most expert source can account for the specific struggles and needs of our families.  We study the map, and we “mix it with brains,” but then we must defer to the Holy Spirit because He *does* know which course is best and it may look utterly different than what we would expect. 

If we stay close to Him, then ultimately our imperfection will be the greatest success we could have.

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Success in Imperfection - Part 5 of 6

This is Part 5 of 6.  Find the other parts here.

When you make your plans, plan to delegate.  The first place to delegate is to your kids.  Pass responsibilities to your kids as they can handle them.  This looks different for each child and each home; it will even look different from week to week sometimes.  Don’t fear for their failure.  You want to be wise about adding responsibility, but you also need to let them own the responsibility even if it turns out to be more imperfect than you would like. 

Plan for boundaries to help teach them as they take on these new roles.  They need regular checkpoints where they can see the consequences of their success or failure.  This helps them learn to manage their own work.  But within those checkpoints, give them freedom. 

Some of them will pick up on what they need to do sooner than others.  I have one child who starts his week’s work on Sunday evening and tries to come narrate to me while I’m putting his sister to bed.  He’s usually done with most of his week’s work by Wednesday, even though I’ve added extra work to his already full AO schedule.  Another of my children generally refuses to start his schoolwork until 5 minutes before a deadline.  He’s pretty sure he can knock all the work out really fast, so why should he start on it before he wants to?  The process of teaching him to manage his own work even though he doesn’t want to looks like a detour, like we’re not making progress on our route, but it’s necessary in order for us to reach our end goal, so it’s worth all the difficulty up front. 

Success isn’t simply getting the work done well; it also means learning these life lessons and developing a strength of character, and that sometimes comes at the expense of completing all the work or doing it in a certain timeframe.

Delegating can also mean outsourcing some of the work to another teacher.  If there’s an opportunity to do that and if you think it would be beneficial, consider using an outside course occasionally.  I can’t do everything well--time constraints make that impossible even if I were good at everything.  So if I can outsource an area that takes a great deal of my time and attention, that can free me to focus on another area.  It also gives my kids a chance to see a different perspective from another instructor. 

I’ve appreciated the opportunities we’ve had to do science labs in a group setting run by someone else, for instance. When we don’t have that opportunity, we make do with my efforts, but when we can, doing labs with a group can be a blessing. High school math is another area I’ve outsourced.  I teach algebra and geometry, and then after that the kids who will do algebra 2 and higher take their math at a local university.  They get college credit and a teacher who’s actually focused on explaining that subject, their homework gets immediate feedback, and they have a support group for studying.  It’s been great! 

Most importantly, follow the Holy Spirit’s lead.  Pray over your plans, and listen to the answers.  Keep praying, and be willing to adjust the plans when they need it.  Pray over your children.  You are not responsible for their ultimate success.  That is not a burden for you to bear.  You are responsible for faithfully carrying out what you *should* do, so lay the rest of that burden down.  Pray over the challenges that come up each day, the small ones that soon pass and the big ones that sometimes never resolve.  Pray for wisdom, for patience, for the right response. 

Sometimes we’re not to fix the problem but to show grace through it.  Our kids need to see us respond in love to the challenges, and we can’t do that without relying on the Holy Spirit.  We can’t know the right course without his guidance either. 

In the book Prince Caspian, Lucy has instructions from Aslan, but no one else does.  She wants to follow those instructions, but she’s intimidated by the pushback from the others, so she goes along with their preferences.  This winds up hurting them all.  So often we’re in that same position.  We know in our hearts, we feel it, that a certain course of action is the right one, but we talk ourselves out of it because it doesn’t look like what others expect or even what we expect.


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Success in Imperfection - Part 4 of 6

This is Part 4 of 6.  Find the other parts here.

The map should not rule us.  Plan, but hold plans loosely.  AmblesideOnline’s booklists, schedules, and other plans are such a help!  They give us a place to start.  Sometimes we can work with those plans with very few changes, and other times we’ll find we have to make big adjustments.  When you’re ready to plan, plan for what you think you can realistically accomplish plus a little more.  Give yourself room to grow into the plans.  Looking at the schedule for a new term can seem overwhelming--all those books!  All those new types of work!  And we weren’t getting everything done *last* term! 

Don’t panic!  Take that work, and organize it into whatever template works for you so you can see how it might actually play out in your home with your unique situation. Adjust your expectations down if you need to, but don’t adjust them all the way down to a level that feels completely safe.  Leave some challenge, some room to grow.  That book that seems *way* too hard before the term starts may become a favorite a month into the term.  Even the book that continues to challenge us may prompt us to learn new ways of working through difficult material or to persevere with something that’s uncomfortable.  If we always plan for what we know we can do and do well, we won’t reach as far.

You’ve probably heard the saying, “No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.” No homeschool plan really works out in practice exactly as it looked in pristine form.  You can’t account for the colicky baby, the washing machine leak, the sudden case of strep throat, someone’s bad mood. 

Your plans are a map, helping you see the path to forward progress, but they can’t be adhered to rigidly when the terrain is different than expected.  Sometimes we have to stop and figure out where *we* are and where we need to be and what the best route is to get there, rather than just following the plan, or we’ll end up in a hole we can’t get out of.

When Charlotte Mason’s teachers told her the timetables were impossible to keep to because of all the challenges that come with having actual children with their unique needs, she told them to “mix it with brains.”  In other words, adjust the plan to meet the real needs and circumstances you face--don’t try to force those needs and circumstances into the plans. 

Reevaluate regularly so you can *try again in a new way, *drop what isn’t currently needed, *add what has been neglected.   In the upper years of AO, you’ll really find this is necessary, because the schedules start to contain more work than you *should* undertake--you have to decide what to keep and what to leave out, because only you know what’s best for your situation. 

AO could pare down the plans for you, but that wouldn’t allow you to decide which route is best.  One family may need the slow, scenic route, while another family may need one that’s more direct or includes more challenges.  Being unable to complete every good and worthwhile task isn’t failure.  It’s life.  As homeschoolers, we have way more that we would *like* to do than what we can possibly do.  We have to decide what’s most important so we can focus there, while still watching for opportunities to add in some of what we’ve had to skip.

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Success in Imperfection - Part 3 of 6

This is Part 3 of 6.  Find the other parts here.

How do we measure success?  Charlotte Mason said it wasn’t how much a child knows, but how much he cares, and the connections he makes.  Most of the time, I don’t get much indication of how much any of my children care. I worry just like anyone else about where I’m falling short.  When the kids were young, it was sometimes really hard to find signs of caring and connections.  Somehow my kids never seemed to act out the stories they read in school like I hear about other people’s children doing. 

Now that they’re older, I’m more likely to see connections in a dinner table argument over Richard III.  I’d prefer not to have the argument, but it’s undeniable that the participants both know and care about the history they’ve studied.  My kids normally don’t love their handicrafts, and that’s a subject that gets skipped regularly by at least one of them.  But that one has voluntarily taken up macrame to make holders for planters.  Sometimes a narration will reference other things we’ve learned about in the past, or will include a strong disagreement with the author’s opinion. These sporadic glimpses of caring and connections show me that we’re on the right track. 

Mostly I have to see the success in forward progress, slow and incremental.  So my 11 year old still has unsteady handwriting and can only write three or four words a day, but this is much better than the beginning of this year: he writes in cursive, he’s improving regularly, and he does it on his own.  These are all huge improvements, so they constitute success even if copywork for us looks very different from someone else.  Sometimes doing both a full Shakespeare play and a full Life from Plutarch is too much in a term; we sometimes switch off between the two or spread them over a longer period of time.  If we’re still doing the plays and the lives regularly, slowly is still a success for us.  We’re still getting the feast, just at a pace that we can handle. 

Success is not about how we measure up to our own expectations.  It’s not about how we compare to what we hear about other families’ accomplishments.  It’s not about how completely we implement every piece of a Charlotte Mason education.  Success is about how we persevere in spreading the feast, guarding the personhood, cultivating the love, making forward progress at a pace that isn’t destructive.

Imperfection is reality.  We have to come to terms with the pressure our own pride and insecurity put on us.  We have to put aside the pride that pushes us to achieve visible successes so we can feel successful, pushes us to achieve them *even if* those visible successes are not the right course for us right now.  We have to get past the insecurity that tells us that someone else’s definition of success is what we have to achieve in order to know we’re doing well. 

Charlotte Mason gave us a wide array of sign posts to aim for on our journey, of modes of transport that will help us get to our destination.  Every one of them is good and useful, but not all of them are possible or even desirable in every family, for every child, at every time.  The principles are still true no matter what, but what they look like in implementation changes based on our situation. 

Some of the principles show us where we’re headed, our destination.  For instance, we want our children to love the world around them, past, present, and future.  That’s one of our goals.  Some of the principles tell us how we can legitimately move toward that destination.  Children are born persons, and our path toward the goals must respect our children’s personhood.  Keeping the principles in front of us reminds us where we’re going and how we can safely get there, but it doesn’t tell us exactly how we need to travel along the way.  So we have to make our plans with those principles in mind but also use our judgment. 

A few weeks ago, I needed to get from one activity in a neighboring city to pick up a child at another activity in my town.  I don’t know my way around in that neighboring city, so I thought I would follow someone else who did.  I quickly realized that person wasn’t headed the same direction I needed to go, so I changed course, but by then I didn’t know which way I was going.  I tried to wing it and got lost, so I pulled up a map app to help me get my bearings.  The app couldn’t really get oriented at first and it sent me down a sketchy road to turn around. I went even when I knew I shouldn’t, simply because I didn’t want to stop and figure out where to go.  The path on the screen looked safe enough, and finding my own path seemed unnecessary and time consuming.  I followed the app down a path I had serious misgivings about, and it led me right into a hole.  I couldn’t get out!  I was totally stuck and unable to go anywhere.  I tried to let the map rule me, to listen to the experts rather than my own judgment, and it ended in disaster. 

I’ve often done something just like that in my parenting and my homeschooling.  I read a book or listened to a comment and decided that I needed to change course in order to get a child sleeping through the night or potty trained or reading well or any of a number of lovely outcomes.  But I didn’t stop to consider where I was on the grand parenting map and what was the best route for us to get closer to the goal (or even if this particular destination was a valid stop for us on the way to our ultimate goal).

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Success in Imperfection - Part 2 of 6

This is Part 2 of 6.  Find the other parts here.

Imperfection feels like failure, doesn’t it?  We want to know that we’re doing what’s best for our children, that we’re competent at this job of homeschooling that we’ve embraced, that we measure up, and the clearest way to know that is to judge ourselves and our children against the standard.  But what if our standard isn’t the right one?  And what if we aren’t competent to judge how we measure up because the results aren’t necessarily visible?  What if our expectations fail to account for the true challenges we face?  What if the “right thing to do” isn’t actually best for our specific situation?

My oldest and my youngest both learned to read painlessly and early.  My youngest taught herself by helping me do DuoLingo Spanish on my phone at bedtime every night!  (That’s not an officially approved method of reading instruction.)  When my oldest started Year 1, for her reading instruction time we used the Declaration of Independence because I had a lovely picture book copy of it and it had enough words she didn’t already know that we could do some word building and other CM-style reading work with it.  Sounds exciting, doesn’t it?  My second child had a vision issue that went undiagnosed until she was about 8, and because of that and some other factors she spent about 2 years working painfully through the McGuffey Primer. 

Was that a reading lesson failure?  No!  Actually, in some ways my lessons with my oldest were failures because I neglected to do the spelling portion of the lessons most of the time and so my oldest had to really hit spelling hard through copywork and dictation when she was older to make up for that.  My second child’s lessons didn’t produce the same results, even though we did them even more intentionally and incorporated many of the optional elements that help to remediate reading difficulties.  But she had extra challenges, and we didn’t see much progress until her vision issues were addressed.  And even then her results continued to be different because she’s a different child.

If I measured my success by the standard of “reading fluently by first grade” or some other commonly accepted standard, my time with my second child would be considered a failure.  But it wasn’t a failure!  We did what was possible and healthy based on where we were at the time.  We mostly kept school as a positive experience in the midst of the challenges.  We kept evaluating what we were doing to see if it was the best course right then.  And we kept in mind Charlotte Mason’s principles and her guidance, which saved us from falling into many mistakes that would have been considered the “right thing to do” but in my daughter’s case would have been the wrong thing to do.

Keeping the principles in mind can save us from those sorts of popular mistakes, where something that works for many is confused with something that’s a foundational expectation.  But we can fall into another trap, trying to do everything that’s ever been associated with Charlotte Mason, as if leaving something out or giving something short shrift means failure.  Charlotte Mason never expected any of us to be able to perfectly implement every technique, every notebook, every activity that she recommended, every opportunity for habit formation.  Even her own teachers, in her own schools, with lovely timetables and days structured to help them keep the timetables, couldn’t fit in everything. 

My lists for weekly work for each of my students are pretty long, especially in the upper years, but they still don’t include everything I think we should be doing and certainly not everything Charlotte Mason ever recommended.  And we don’t even accomplish those lists completely every week!  (Don’t tell anyone, but occasionally some thing on the list doesn’t get accomplished at all during an entire term!) And many of the items on my long lists aren’t done “correctly” but are done quickly and simply in order to fit into our crazy life.  They get done, but they probably don’t look anything like what most of you envision if you see that item on a schedule.  And I’m happy with that, because even our simple and quick version of those items is good.  Sometimes we can get bogged down in trying to figure out how *exactly* we’re supposed to do each piece.  We just can’t research everything!  And it isn’t necessary to research everything. 

Sometimes we find we need improvement in an area, and then more digging into the details is needed, but usually a general understanding is good enough, certainly enough to start with.  It isn’t perfect, but it’s moving us in the right direction.  Charlotte Mason success is not measured by how many things we accomplish and how correctly they’re completed. 

Not only did Charlotte Mason not measure success in that way, she warned us not to try to take her recommendations and turn them into lists and rules.  She saw the danger in making her method into a system, like taking a detailed road map showing all the possible routes and turning it into a list of specific steps to get from point A to point B in one particular way, the kind of list you get in a map app.  She didn’t want us to judge ourselves by such a list.  That’s not a proper measure of success.

 In the first place, we have no system of education. We hold that great things, such as nature, life, education, are 'cabined, cribbed, confined,' in proportion as they are systematised. We have a method of education, it is true, but method is no more than a way to an end, and is free, yielding, adaptive as Nature herself. Method has a few comprehensive laws according to which details shape themselves, as one naturally shapes one's behaviour to the acknowledged law that fire burns. System, on the contrary, has an infinity of rules and instructions as to what you are to do and how you are to do it. Method in education follows Nature humbly; stands aside and gives her fair play.

Charlotte Mason Volume 2 p. 168

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Success in Imperfection - Part 1 of 6

This is not a post about how to do all the right things.  This is a post about finding success in the midst of the impossibility of doing things right.  No matter how long you’ve been homeschooling or how carefully you study and work to implement Charlotte Mason’s methods, you know the sting of imperfection.  None of us is doing everything “right”, no matter how we define “right.”  Sometimes it’s hard to figure out what “right” even is, especially when what’s “right” for one somehow doesn’t seem to achieve the same results for another.

I’ve been using Charlotte Mason’s methods in my home for a long time.  My oldest will graduate from high school in May, and we started when she was in preschool.  I take this seriously.  I believe that Charlotte Mason’s principles and even her specific instructions are wise and well founded and almost always I can find a reason for why she suggested what she did.  You might think that means that my home is a picture of all the CM goodness, but you’d be wrong.  So many, many basic elements of a Charlotte Mason education don’t happen in our home or get implemented in non-standard ways!

For several weeks this spring, my 11 year old’s nature study consisted solely of looking out the front door at the daffodils in the front yard and drawing some generic flowers in his nature notebook.
My 13 year old has been using the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition (from Star Trek) as his dictation. 
My 15 year old is doing a lighter version of a light schedule, and we don’t always get that done.

You get the general idea.  My family is a picture of imperfect implementation.  All of us are, really.  If we expect perfection, we’ll inevitably be disappointed.  Besides, imperfection is part of the process.  If we could do perfectly what we’re attempting to do, we’d be attempting too little and shutting ourselves off from growth.  And often God uses our imperfection to teach us about humility and grace and how to rely on Him.  Sometimes our image of what perfection would look like is actually the completely wrong course of action for our specific case, so by chasing perfection we can find ourselves going in the wrong direction.  Instead of chasing perfection, we have to find success in our imperfection!

• Part 2 
• Part 3
• Part 4
• Part 5 
• Part 6 

The Young Man's Guide to Awesomeness

Young Man's Guide to Awesomeness

The Young Man's Guide to Awesomeness: How to Guard Your Heart, Get the Girl and Save the World is a book I've been looking for for years.  Barrett Johnson has written a guide for Christian teen boys outlining, in a direct and serious tone leavened with a healthy dose of humor, the challenges they face in their relationships and attempts to succeed in life and how to overcome those challenges.

The three major sections of the book cover How to Guard Your Heart, How to Get the Girl, and How to Save the World.  Within each section, chapters outline different areas of focus.  In each chapter, the topic is explored within several subsections.  A pithy Big Idea gives a piece of advice.  A body part is highlighted along with an explanation of how that body part affects this topic.  Typical responses or situations are described.  Advice is given for how to respond differently than the norm.  A related lesson from the life of the biblical king David provides an example.  The Take Action subsection gives a short list of concrete steps to take.  Talk About It has discussion questions, and there's a QR code that links to a video.

Johnson's advice and admonitions here are direct and earnest but not overly explicit.  Sex is discussed quite a bit, but in an appropriately tactful way.  The humor in the book will appeal to older pre-teen and teen boys but isn't crass. 

LATCH

Latch: A Handbook for Breastfeeding with Confidence At Every Stage is a straight-forward, encouraging resource for moms who would like to breastfeed. The book is organized by the stages of the process, starting with prenatal preparation and ending with weaning.

*Preparing to Breastfeed
* Establishing Breastfeeding
* Breastfeeding Through Changes
* Weaning from Breastfeeding

The tone is matter-of-fact and supportive, and the author does not make judgmental statements. Moms facing typical breastfeeding challenges will find practical advice along with suggestions for where to go for additional help if that is needed. Many testimonials from breastfeeding moms are included, giving a multitude of perspectives on the process and the types of challenges moms face. I have nursed five children, so I found much of this information familiar, but I still saw some new and helpful facts and ideas.

I would have liked to see more testimonials from moms who had a smooth experience or at least a bit more recognition that breastfeeding, once established, can be a relatively simple and uncomplicated process. Also, proper hydration wasn't emphasized as much as I would have liked, but that may be simply that my own personal experiences have made me overly cognizant of that factor.

This is a friendly, functional guide to breastfeeding. This is absolutely a book I would buy for an expectant friend who wanted to breastfeed or for someone who was experiencing challenges in the process. It's a book I would have liked to have had when I was first trying to breastfeed.

(I received a free copy of this book to review.)

Sacred Search

Whenever I find a copy of Gary Thomas' books Sacred Marriage or Sacred Parenting at a discount price, I buy it.  I love to give these books to other people when they are facing challenges in their marriage or their parenting.  I recently learned that he had written Sacred Search, about choosing a marriage partner, and I bought the paperback and the ebook.  I have teenagers now, and I'm always looking for excellent resources to help them transition to adulthood and the new challenges it brings.

Sacred Search tries to set the focus of the dating relationship on the purpose of the marriage relationship.  Thomas hopes that Christian marriages will become support systems for lives of ministry and training grounds for new generations of Christians who will form the same types of marriages.  From the beginning and throughout the book he reminds readers that Christian lives should be focused on the kingdom of God, and this means that Christian marriages should be focused on the kingdom of God. Therefore choosing a spouse needs to focus on that component of the relationship too.

Thomas covers much more than that, though.  He talks about the pitfalls of infatuation and how to avoid being deceived by feelings.  He discusses many other deceptions that lure people into marriages they later regret.  He suggests considering each person's expectations for the marriage relationship, giving examples of different types of expectations people have and the potential pitfalls of each one. His chapter on premarital sex wonderfully combined mercy with firm warnings backed by information.  He also explains how to develop the relationship constructively and look for common ground.

The intended audience for this book seems to be single adults, primarily.  Most of the book is suitable for older teens, and none of it is inappropriate for most older teens who are interested in pursuing serious dating relationships.  Some of the material isn't as relevant to teens, such as the advice for going out looking for a mate when options seem limited.

I am using this book with my older teen now, and I intend to have my other kids read it as they get to an appropriate age.  Sacred Search helps set the right tone for dating in an intentional way as a means for selecting a life partner who can really be a partner in walking with God.

Day by Day

I don't remember ever considering having children until I was 30 years old or nearly so.  It's possible that the thought crossed my mind, but it wasn't something I dreamed of or planned for.  Exactly why my husband and I decided to begin to plan for children, as we neared 30, I really don't know. Maybe it just seemed like the next phase, just like finishing high school, going to college, getting a job.

So we set out to have children and parent them.  Seems simple, if you've never had any.  And although we had no idea what we were doing, we muddled through pretty well for a few years.  Frequently we found ourselves totally surprised by challenges we faced, and we discovered that our lovely plans for how all of this parenting business was going to go were pretty much useless. But eventually we'd figure something out and move forward, feeling pretty confident.

We exemplify the Peter Principle for parenting.  Instead of being promoted to the level of our incompetence, we had children to the level of our incompetence.  If you have more children when you think things are going well with the children you already have, eventually you add one more child and discover you didn't have things together as well as you thought you did.

By the time our fourth child was born, we realized we weren't managing the older three as well as we'd thought.  Our fourth was desperately needy, with incredible food sensitivities that caused him severe discomfort and kept him (and me) from sleeping or being at peace for days at a time.  Months of extreme sleep deprivation do not enhance a person's ability to cope with stress.  I was done.  We gave away almost all of our baby and maternity supplies, because I was not going to go through this again.

But God had other plans.  God had been real in my life since I was a very young child, and although at various times I pushed Him away so I could pursue my own priorities, I always recognized His presence and eventually came back to listen to Him.  And at this point, when I was finally ready to take control of my life and move on with as much competence as I could manage, God kept touching my heart with a feeling of unease.  I remember praying at the park with a couple of friends one day and telling God that if He really and truly wanted me to have more children, he'd have to convince my husband because I wasn't going to try.  Not long afterward my husband mentioned how nice it would be to have another baby.

I didn't know why God was asking us to have another baby.  We were happy and overwhelmed with the four children we already had.  Deciding to leave this up to Him was hard, and we set out with more fear and trembling than excited anticipation.  Almost immediately I was pregnant. About the time I had finally come to terms with the idea, I learned that the baby had died.  So we endured our first significant miscarriage, one that was far enough along to really be noticeable. Twice more I was pregnant and then not pregnant anymore, and we found ourselves realizing that we really were willing to parent another child, despite our misgivings.  We mourned each lost little one and wondered what God was doing.

The next pregnancy was hard, with physical challenges for me and concern over possible complications with the baby.  For several months, we wondered what lay ahead.  We braced ourselves for various difficult outcomes and tried to envision how we would cope.  The delivery was the most difficult of the five, and our little one spent three weeks in the hospital before she could come home, followed by several challenging weeks as we taught her to nurse.  Our whole existence was more complicated and less comfortable.  Most of our fears turned out to be groundless, but even still this little one required more of us than we thought we had to give.

Christians often say that God doesn't give us more than we can handle.  I think God does give us more than we can handle so that He can show us our need for Him.  Before having kids, I thought I had a pretty good handle on my life.  After each child came along, I struggled, but as I began to get things together I again started to think I had a pretty good handle on my life.  By the time our fourth was a few months old, I was realizing that I did not have a pretty good handle on my life, and I was trying to do my best to regain control when God said, "Let go and see what I will do."  I did not want to let go.  I didn't want to see what God would do.  I wanted to get my life back into the path I envisioned for it.  But God still said, "Let go."

Daily, as I try to fulfill my responsibilities to each of the people in my life, I see how short I fall.  Daily, I realize that I cannot do this.  Daily, I see that I do not have things together.  Daily, I'm confronted with my need for a Savior and my utter dependence on God.  Daily, I see His loving grace.  I have no doubt more extreme challenges lie ahead, and I know I do not have what it takes to meet them.  But God does, and I can trust Him to help me through.

Day by day, and with each passing moment,
Strength I find, to meet my trials here;
Trusting in my Father’s wise bestowment,
I’ve no cause for worry or for fear.
He Whose heart is kind beyond all measure
Gives unto each day what He deems best—
Lovingly, its part of pain and pleasure,
Mingling toil with peace and rest.

Parenting as a Recovering Listaholic

I like lists.  I like calendars and planners and organizers.  I have a stand specifically made to hold my Daytimer (only that brand will do) for which I have a lovely binder to hold my lesson plans.  I love to plan out my day and then check off items all day long.  I have an app that plans out my FlyLady zones.  I have another app that tracks my to-dos.  I feel wonderful when I've accomplished all my goals.

Children, however, do not fit into neat and tidy lists or schedules.  I've seen the books that purport to make children fit into boxes, but I don't own any.  I've glanced at the websites, but it's a bit like an alcoholic stopping in front of the bar on the way home.  I try to walk past as quickly as possible.  Probably those books and websites help those who find scheduling a mystery or a burden.  They inspire *my* soul with a zeal to make my day conform to my plans, and that zeal does not make me a good mom.

I have to lean the other way.  I have to consciously focus on what we have accomplished rather than on what we have not accomplished.  I have to take moments as they come and enjoy them, not overshadowed by the knowledge of what we should be doing instead of what we are doing.  When I make plans and then try to force us to fulfill them, I shut out opportunities I could have had, opportunities that come unexpectedly, and in their place I create lifeless accomplishments no one will treasure.  My children need to see that people matter more than things, but also that people matter more than accomplishments.  It is less important that we get the kitchen clean than it is that we treat others with kindness and respect.

I do make lists.  They help me to target my free moments towards tasks that need to be done.  They help me to prioritize my time.  I do use schedules.  They allow us to know what needs to happen for our important goals to be reached.  But I have to make the lists and the schedules subservient to life, to the real needs of our family and the individuals in it.  I keep my goals small and targeted, and I have to remind myself that it's ok if we don't meet them every day.

What I am learning is humility, and it's not easy.  Humility means accepting that my big goal for the day just blew up because I need to calmly and pleasantly teach a couple of siblings how to resolve their differences peacefully.  Humility means graciously redirecting my goals to account for the overflowing toilet (usually a victim of a child) or malfunctioning washer (most recently killed by Legos).

"Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds."  Becoming "mature and complete" isn't a pleasant process, but the end result is beautiful.

Road Trip Treasure Chest

Today we transformed a diaper box into a Road Trip Treasure Chest by covering it with pages from a worn out picture book.  Inside, we stowed interesting items, bundled in groups of four similar items, which will make their appearance during our next long road trip.  For a long trip (more than 3 hours), every 100 miles we get out a bundle of items.  Each time it's a different child's turn to pick first from that bundle, but each child gets an item from each bundle.  (Unless that child has seriously misbehaved during the previous 100 miles.  In that case, no item from that bundle.)

This provides frequent changes in activities, something interesting to look forward to, and regular opportunities for logical consequences to reinforce helpful behavior.

What do we have in our treasure chest?  I gather items all the time, from stores, garage sales, thrift shops, bookshelves and toy bins at home--anywhere!

• small chalk boards with chalk and eraser
• magnetic Israelites and Philistines with an old cookie sheet to play on
• Magna Doodles
• Etch-a-sketch
• activity books of various kinds
• View Masters with lots of disks
• Playdough
• Colorforms
• I Spy books
• small handheld non-electronic games, like those little mazes with a metal ball to roll around or the ones you fill up with water and press a button to shoot a jet of air
• Mad Libs

When we are not traveling, these items stay in a couple of large plastic bins in the garage.  When we get ready to go on a trip, I pull them out and organize them and choose what to take along.  Instant entertainment!

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Organizing Our Household

I've posted before about how we organize our chores, more or less.  As summer approached I determined to get more serious about organizing our meals (with which the children take turns) and along with that our shopping.  Also, I needed to have a way to keep track of extra chores needing to be done.

Our Household Organizer

The easy part of this is the orange-bordered sleeve with the dry erase marker on the top.  I bought five sleeves like that to use for our school schedule (another post on that to follow) and only needed four.  Inside the sleeve are five sheets, one sheet for each of our zone chore lists.  (The zones are loosely based on Fly Lady's cleaning system.)  When someone needs something extra to do, they can now come look at the list for the zone for that week (which will be the one displayed), choose a chore and do it, and come back and cross that chore off the list.  Once a week I'll clean the sleeve and move the new zone sheet to the front.

The rest of the freezer front comprises my food system.  lol  I took a large sheet of paper and drew boxes for each day of the week.  I had already organized our most-used recipes into categories, enough categories to last for six days of the week (assuming the seventh will have leftovers).  I now wrote those recipe titles on notecards, a different color card for each category.  Those are what you see clipped around the top and left side of the days of the week poster.  Each child has a separate magnet to use. 

Each week, each child selects a recipe from the clips and attaches it with a magnet to a free day on the poster.  Only one recipe of each color may be selected each week.  At the end of the week, all the recipes used that week will go in the Out of Play envelope shown on the left.  Those are not available to be selected until put back into the clips in a few weeks.

Children may also select a recipe for *next* week, following the same rules.  They may not select any further in advance than that.  It's easy to see the color of next week's selection peeking out from behind this week's card for each child, so that makes checking categories pretty simple.

Below all of that, I have a list of lunch, snack, and breakfast ideas.  The lunch list has two columns: one for "bread" alternatives and one for toppings.  That list, plus our dinner list, allowed me to make a "permanent" shopping list because I knew more or less what we'd be eating each week.

Having all this lined out should make life a bit simpler.  I expect the kids to be taking charge of more of this work this summer and fall, and so I needed to set parameters and provide some structure that wasn't as necessary when I was able to just wing it myself.

Teaching Human Development and Sexuality **Updated in 2025**

Obviously every family will handle these subjects differently, which is as it should be.  In fact, each child may require a slightly different approach.  My intent here is merely to share what we have done, not to prescribe what anyone else should do.

A great parent resource is Kevin Leman's A Chicken's Guide to Talking Turkey with Your Kids About Sex.  In fact, with this book alone a family would be in great shape to adequately handle these topics without any other resources.

We generally first approach these topics very informally by talking about babies.  Anytime I, or anyone in our immediate circle of family and friends, am pregnant, I pull out our books about babies.  We especially like Hello Baby by Lizzy Rockwell, which follows a pregnancy through the first day at home with baby from the point of view of big brother, and The Miracle of Birth by Jenny Bryan, which uses acetate overlays to show what is going on inside of Mom as the baby develops.  As we read books like these together, inevitably we discuss eggs and sperm, the ovaries, the uterus--laying the groundwork for later discussions.

Once a child starts to ask more specific questions about how the sperm gets to the eggs, we explain in more detail.  At that point, a great book to use is Before I Was Born by Carolyn Nystrom.  This book explains intercourse in a tasteful way, focusing on God's design for the marriage relationship.  We generally explain the subject ourselves first, then follow up with the book to make sure we were clear about all aspects.

At the same time, children need to understand how their own bodies are developing and be prepared for the changes they will encounter.  We try to do this a little early, because we want to have discussed it before any of the changes actually occur and also before any other children raise them.  So we aim for seven or eight years old to cover puberty issues, realizing that many families prefer to wait until later.  For our girls, we've used The Care and Keeping of You from American Girl (although our edition is an old one--we haven't reviewed the current edition).  We do skip the content on the question and answer pages between each section--those delve into topics we do not wish to cover and provide answers with which we are not always comfortable.  For the boys, we use The Boys' Body Guide by Frank Hawkins.  Both of these books cover the whole gamut of developmental topics with a matter-of-fact tone, without slang or silliness.

A bit later, we're ready to talk about other aspects of growing up, the emotional and relational aspects.  With the girls, we love Beautiful Girlhood by Mabel Hale.  We used the version updated by Karen Andreola, but the original is available free online.  This book, in typical Victorian fashion. explains the struggles and joys and pitfalls and beauties of growing into womanhood in direct but discreet fashion, dealing with young ladies forthrightly but without the coarseness so many modern books embrace.  For the boys, we plan to use Boyhood and Beyond by Bob Schultz.  I'll have to update this post after we've actually used the book with a real live boy!

None of our children has yet entered the teenage years, so we haven't used any resources beyond these.  I have previewed many, though, and have rejected most as being far too descriptive of abuse and transgression.  I do not believe it necessary to include detailed descriptions of awful situations in order to provide guidance and support for children growing into adulthood.

UPDATE in 2025:  I have now graduated four children, two girls and two boys.  Three girls have read Beautiful Girlhood.  I cannot recommend this book anymore.  I really liked the presentation and the topics in Beautiful Girlhood, but what I took from it was not what any of my three daughters picked up from it.  I believe it actually did harm.  I think we would have been better served by working through Ourselves together and having casual discussions, alongside all the great literature we are already reading.  I believe the same to be true for the boys and would not recommend a book such as Boyhood and Beyond.

More than Habit

Charlotte Mason's first volume, Home Education, emphasizes the importance of habits in making our lives run smoothly.  We all operate on lines of habit, either good or bad habits; most choices we make are not made consciously but are made habitually.

We are all mere creatures of habit. We think our accustomed thoughts, make our usual small talk, go through the trivial round, the common task, without any self-determining effort of will at all. If it were not so––if we had to think, to deliberate, about each operation of the bath or the table––life would not be worth having; the perpetually repeated effort of decision would wear us out.  Volume 1, p. 110

 Modern neuroscience actually supports this idea, calling the "ruts" of Ms. Mason's terminology "neurological pathways" instead.

Reading Volume 1, with its emphasis on formation of solid habits, it is easy to lose site of another part of Ms. Mason's philosophy.  Habits were a useful tool, in her estimation, and at the time of the writing of Volume 1 she had high hopes that careful training in positive habits could initiate great societal change.  (By the time of the writing of Volume 6 she had begun to question the usefulness of habit training, although some of her doubts have been refuted by modern science.)  But even at the zenith of her enthusiasm for habits, still more important to her was a respect to the personhood of the child.

Volume 1 does not begin with a paen to habits.  First, Ms. Mason lays out our parental responsibility to our children.  She even calls children "public trusts," but she does not mean, as some do today, that parents have no authority over their children.  She means that parents have a duty to raise their children to be a benefit to the world around them.

Now, that work which is of most importance to society is the bringing up and instruction of the children––in the school, certainly, but far more in the home, because it is more than anything else the home influences brought to bear upon the child that determine the character and career of the future man or woman. It is a great thing to be a parent: there is no promotion, no dignity, to compare with it. The parents of but one child may be cherishing what shall prove a blessing to the world.  Volume 1, p. 1

 Therefore, she asserts, parents must learn what they can about the most effective ways of raising children, so that their efforts will produce the best possible results.

Once the importance of the role of the parents is established, Ms. Mason moves toward identifying the nature of the child, looking specifically at what Jesus says about children in the gospels. 

It may surprise parents who have not given much attention to the subject to discover also a code of education in the Gospels, expressly laid down by Christ. It is summed up in three commandments, and all three have a negative character, as if the chief thing required of grown-up people is that they should do no sort of injury to the children: Take heed that ye OFFEND not––DESPISE not––HINDER not––one of these little ones.  Volume 1, p. 12

 I do not intend here to go into detail analyzing these biblical statements or Ms. Mason's analysis of them, although that would be a worthwhile enterprise.  The point I wish to make is that, even when most hopeful for the benefits of habit training, that training was not Ms. Mason's primary, first focus.  The respect for the personhood of the child and the responsibility of parents towards him received her first attention, as it should receive ours.

Stumbling Block

I've been reminded recently, on several occasions, of how important is parents' role as the gatekeeper for the education of our children. We simply cannot turn our children over to someone else to be cared for or taught without paying close attention and intervening when needed. So often, I think, we assume that since no other parents object then there must not be anything about which to be concerned. I know that in some areas that was my assumption.

For Christians, this is even more imperative since God's instructions in the New Testament regarding children continually warn us not to interfere with their development, not to hinder them, not to cause them to stumble. When we allow others to present them with incorrect theology and biblical interpretation, casual views of God and holy things, or instructions about personal matters that rightly should be handled by parents, I believe we are presenting them with a stumbling block.  

Even when we ourselves are teaching our children, as we are instructed to do, we must be vigilant about the teaching and care they receive from others--we are charged with that responsibility for our own children.

While You Wait

Recently I visited a local health food store, seeking out a particular employee for advice on choosing a pro-biotic for my youngest child.  A friend recommended this employee for two reasons, both because she is knowledgeable about these products and because she "talks to Papa."  I waited quite awhile to speak with her as she was in conference with other customers, but when I had my turn she listened attentively as I described our issues and what I hoped the pro-biotic could help us avoid.  She asked some questions, spoke to the boys with interest (only the boys were with me), and took us to find an appropriate pro-biotic.  Her advice, however, was not what I expected.

"Here is a pro-biotic, and here are digestive enzymes.  These may help for a time, while you wait.  But I can't tell you what to do.  You will have to ask the Holy Spirit what you need to do.  It may be inconvenient, what He tells you, and it may be very difficult, but that isn't really your issue.  All you have to do is agree up-front to do whatever He asks, and then He will take care of making it possible."

The more I mull this over, the more I realize that this conversation really encapsulates the decision I face with every choice in life.  Am I willing to agree up-front with what the Holy Spirit wants, before I even know what that is, and then plead for His answer and once I have it to turn the implementation over to Him?  Or do I want what I wanted from this woman, a neatly laid-out plan with steps to check off, given to me by some wise person who knows all about how things should work?

I did not like the answer in the health food store, and I don't like that answer in the rest of my life either.  But what am I missing out on when I choose to look for my own solutions rather than seeking out God's?  That doesn't mean I have to be inactive.  I can take the pro-biotic and the enzymes to tide me over while I wait, and I can get wise advice so I'll be prepared for whatever course I'm supposed to take, but am I willing to do those things while waiting, open for a course change whenever the Word comes?  Am I willing to prepare myself while asking for guidance and agreeing to follow in any direction, even where I don't want to go?

Getting Started Laying Down the Rails

I did not write this post; it is not about my own family.  I thought this might inspire some of you, so I requested permission to reprint this since the author did not at the time have a blog of her own. This post is reprinted with permission from a Year 0 post by Sarah in AR.

 One day, I was referring to a parenting book for advice b/c I'd been noticing my children's behaviour and obedience weren't what I thought they should be. As I was reading, they included the scripture Prov 29:15, "a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame." Somehow, that verse pricked my heart, as I realized how often I was telling my kids "Just go play while I get my housework done," and then feeling guilty b/c there never seemed enough time left over to work on forming habits or teaching them how to do helpful things around the house..... Well, here was the answer! I was "leaving them to themselves" too often, while *I* tried to do everything myself! As I looked at the answer in the Word, I saw that I should just keep them alongside me while I did my chores, which provided the most suitable time to teach them those things I previously didn't have time for! So from then on, I rearranged my day to include them in helping me every morning, as we clear the dishes from breakfast, empty the dishwasher,  and one wipes the table and sweeps under it, while the other helps me wash the dishes. I'm also working on getting them in the habit of making their beds, getting dressed, brushing their teeth, and fixing their hair after we finish the kitchen (when they are older, they will do that before breakfast, but for now I don't want them getting food all over their clean clothes first thing in the morning lol!).  We also pray together first thing every day, as I thought it would be a valuable habit to serve them well for the rest of their lives!

Of course, the very most important habit to start with, if it isn't already there, is the habit of obedience. This is most easily taught if it is started when they are a baby, big enough to get into things they oughtn't. You tell them "no," and then you must follow through in not allowing them to do whatever it is, every. single. time. When starting new habits, you must choose what you feel is the most urgent to start with, then have a little talk with them (at a non-emotional time, as in, when they are getting in trouble, you don't give them a lecture about how expectations will be different from now on). You get them when they are happy, and just let them know what it is you want to work on, what will be expected, and that you have confidence in them to do it. Then you work on it with them, only giving gentle reminders to help them stay on track. It usually takes several weeks of effort to get a new habit down, and will need occasional work thereafter to be sure it stays in place. After you feel they have the first habit established, then you can add another one of the next most importance, and so on. It does take effort on your part to make sure the new habit is followed through every time, or it won't fall into place, so you may want to give yourself a little more time on the first ones, as you make a habit of habit-training!

The Strong-Willed Child

"Strong willed" is probably a misleading description.  One thing that drew me to Charlotte Mason immediately was her insistence that the child wasn't strong willed--the child had a weak or untrained will.

Better than the term "strong willed" I think is the term "spirited," because that gets more to the heart of the matter.  Spirited kids are intense, in many different ways, and their intense tenacity is what gets them the label "strong willed."  But just trying to bend their will to yours does not help them to manage their intensity--that intensity is given to them by God and can be an asset, but not until it has been brought under management by their wills.  Perhaps they have those intense wills because they will need them to manage their other intensity!

"Raising Your Spirited Child" by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka provides the best insights I have seen into the spirited child.  She helps you know whether you have one, what is going on inside of them, and how you can best work with them.  Effective strategies for a child who is not spirited will often backfire with a spirited child.  Many times, you can tell a child is spirited from infancy.  Both of my highly spirited children clearly were spirited from birth--there was no avoiding that reality.  Trying to work with them using conventional parenting methods has not worked at all, and anytime I fall back into those methods (often because other parents intentionally or inadvertently make me feel like I'm not doing the right things) we have disaster.

Sometimes people suggest food sensitivities as a contributing factor.  Certainly, if you think food sensitivities could be an issue, you should investigate that, but it isn't necessarily an either/or situation.  Spirited children often are more sensitive to the world around them, so that they might be more strongly affected than other people by certain foods does not come as a surprise.  Avoiding those foods may help tremendously, but if they have other spirited characteristics then other strategies will be needed too.

Parenting a spirited child is exhausting, but your efforts are well worth it.  The characteristics that make our job so hard also, when channelled constructively, can be tremendous assets.