Today was a really good day…because I held myself together :-)  and it wasn’t that big of a struggle!!!!!

We finally got up this morning about 10:00am.  We ate breakfast and the children were instructed to clean their rooms, really clean them and then take care of their personal hygiene by taking baths.  This took until about 2:30-3:00 for them to finish.  I know God has done a work in me b/c just 3 weeks ago I would have been so stressed and would have begun rushing them to finish, and then stressing them.  But I kept telling myself there was no rush and God was in control of our day.  I had all these plans in my head about what I wanted to accomplish as far as bookwork today…but I stayed relaxed and just let the day unfold.

When dh went to work about 3:00pm we sat down and did our long-awaited History lesson from MWOG.  We are on the Creation link and we finished up the principle GOD CREATED THE CONTINENTS FOR A PURPOSE.  We finished labeling and outlining the last 4 continents(we started this in Nov 2007) and we perused the World Atlas of each continent.  My dc seem to like this book, it has very colorful pictures of the people of each continent, how  they dress, each country’s flag, what they export and what region of the country/continent the exports come from…they especially love reading about what kinds of animals live in each continent.  This lesson took a while b/c my dc started telling me about movies they had seen that reminded them of what we found in these continents.   We even got into a discussion about evolution, that it is a theory, and how it goes against the bible and that the bible is our source of what is true….it was a really good time we had together.

My 8yodd then asked if they could have lunch(about 4:30pm) and she proceeds to fix lunch for her brothers…to my amazement.  So since I saw she had everything covered I went downstairs to workout.  After my workout, I saw they had cleared the table and so I brought out a bag of books for them to read thru and told them that while I shower they were to have reading time and for my 8yodd to read to her brothers if they asked her to.  I heard not one fight or bicker.  They seemed so content that I was able to spend time stretching in my room after my shower(since I had forgotten to stretch right after my workout).

After my stretching I sat on the living room floor with them and read some poems to them from THE HOME BOOK OF VERSE FOR YOUNG FOLKS.  We read and laughed at those until dh came home for his lunch(6:30pm) and they were all ready to eat again by 7:00.

After dinner I put 3yo in the tub and told 8yodd to begin her independent reading and I gave her a choice of autobiographies to read.  She chose Christopher Columbus…As I’m trying to wind everyone down for bed she reads one chapter and asks me can they make a boat in her room so they can sail the seas like Columbus???

Oh well,   I guess that’s what I get for letting her read an adventuresome story right before bedtime….I get sailing adventure at night!!!!!

So I”m gonna close this out now and go read the bible with my 6yo and then prayerfully everyone would have had enough of their booster shot of “mommy love” tonight and drift on into sweet, peaceful, dreamy sleepy bliss!!!!!

My dc announced to me and dh yesterday evening that they had a surprise for us. My dc are 3, 6, 8yo. So me and dh (remained patience with the mess we knew we’d have to clean up or at least oversee them cleaning) walked downstairs only to be met with cries of HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!! We were directed to sit down at the makeshift dining table made out of their toybox and the lid to the toybox was the tabletop. The dining area they made consisted of chairs from our computer table and one pink chair with fringes from my dd’s room. The toybox was covered with one of our couch “throws” for the table cloth.

My eyes were met with bowls of prepared food which were the following: Chef Boy R Dee Spaghettios, Marshmallows, Ritz crackers and raw “diced” tomatoes and baby carrots. My dc served me and their father first as we spooned the desired amounts of each dish onto our plates. My dc then served each other.

Dh commented to the children this was a wonderful surprise, them throwing us a surprise New Year’s Day party like that!!  They chose the food and everything, even warmed up the spaghettios in the microwave and brought it downstairs to the party to await our arrival.    So after everyone was served we then went before the Lord in our first family prayer for 2008 as me and dh thanked the Lord for these our children and for their servants’ hearts to want to serve us and each other. Dh prayed blessings upon each one of them and my heart swelled with love, devotion, and thankfulness to God for working patience out in me…for breaking me the way He did….so that I could see the blessing of His miraculous power working in the lives of my children. You see impatience would have just seen a mess that had to be cleaned up and while I would have eaten the morsels of food they ‘cooked’ my mind would have been on how tired I was and how I longed to lay down and how this was just prolonging my relaxation….but I didn’t feel like that at all.

I continue to pray for and thank God for what little bit of discernment I have to see the almost imperceptible ‘movings’ of His Spirit. I long for more discernment and more patience and more of learning how to live and conduct myself in God’s agape love.

So that was our 2008 New Year’s Day Celebration and I thank God for it!!!!!!!!!!!

It is now the first day of 2008 and for the first time in many days and weeks (even months) I woke up bright and early (before anyone elese in the house) with a lightness in my spirit. I have not blogged very often the latter part of 2007 but today I feel I want to share how our lives have been going and what God has been doing.

Around the 3rd week of November I decided to stop all ‘formal’ lessons and let me and my children just “be”. I had been having a hard time with homeschooling and my dd’s attitude reflected that she was having a hard time too. Our quarter ended the first week in December so we trudged along the last 2 weeks in November and covered our “school” material to my satisfaction and then took a break. It was a scheduled break for the month of December. When our quarter ended the first Friday in December I finally cried out to the Lord that I didn’t want to homeschool anymore!!!!! What!!??????!!!! I was sick and tired of my dd’s attitude toward “doing lessons” and I was felt like I had given all I had to my dc and could not give anymore but they kept demanding and needing me and I felt like I could not put up with another day of homeschooling. I knew the only other option was putting my dc in public school so that made me press into God even further and harder in prayer to find out what was wrong with us.

The long and short of what I realized is that God was taking me thru a breaking process. My flesh had to be dealt with. My impatience needed to be done away with and I needed to learn and grow more in knowing how to walk and live in the Love of God. I realized God was doing something in ME…that I was the problem and NOT my dc. I realized(not too long ago) that God had been trying to “break” the rule of my flesh for the longest. I ate, slept, and breathed “breaking”(didn’t know it at the time, though). It was my first, middle, and last name!! And that has been in several different areas - the most recent has been in letting go and learning that it’s ok not to be “in control” of everything and everybody that way I thought I should be and in opening up my heart(and my time) more to my children….

I had a conversation with my mom about it and she relayed something to me that my dad said he observed. He said that dd wants u as a mother and not as a teacher. That was a giant wakeup call and began my quest in realizing that I’m not a teacher first but a mom…who is mentoring her children when I sit, when I lay down, when I rise up(according to Deut 6). That is what God commanded and that is how He wants it to flow…. God had been trying to show me a “better” way, and easier way which is the Way of Trusting in Him!!! Obviously, I had not been trusting in HIm to the degree I needed to b/c I was stressing myself and my dc out..:-)

After I came thru that trial God began to whisper to my heart about just being a family and for me to begin to connect with my daughter. I could tell she had things on her 8 year old mind that she was not talking about. She’s always been very obedient but still had this attitude that would infuriate me at times.

So that began my quest of stopping all lessons and start loving. I re-read many of my homeschooling books trying to find out how to do this. THE JOYFUL HOMESCHOOLER helped to put me back on the track of realizing that I’m a mom and not a teacher first, also. So I started just being a mom and concentrated on us just being a family and it feels sooooooooooooo good and sooooooo much better. My daughter said to me one night while lying in my bed almost nose to nose with me about me being a regular mommy. I asked what does a regular mommy do. She said a regular mommy loves her children and let’s her children love her. How awesome and convicting and confirming was that!!!

Things have improved so nicely around here AND my children, on their own initiative, have begun to take their own initiative on certain things.

My 8yodd started teaching herself division. I explained the concept to her with pictures and with living math books and she has taken off from there. To my utter surprise I found out that she has learned her 3 times tables. I never taught it to her and to my delight I found that she has figured out her own way(the way the makes sense to her) to calculate and remember her 3 times table. In our quest to just ‘become a family’ again, right before bedtime, I would giver her her math book from Ray’s arithmetic and told her to study the 1’s , then the 2’s and then the 3’s times table. We are now working on her knowing her 4’s times table. She has also requested that we do more art. One morning she woke up and it had snowed during the night so looking out the window was a beautiful sight that morning. She didn’t even ask to watch tv. (I try not to allow much tv) and I guess because of that she found something else productive to do. But I heard her taking to herself about the snow one morning before I even got up that morning and by the time I got up and got breakfast going she had drawn a picture of what she saw outside our living room window and it was a tree with a squirrel climbing up with the snow falling. Talk about nature journaling!! I found some paint by number kits at this dollar store of sorts and bought about 8 kits for .99 each. These kits are a little more complicated than what I know of…u have to mix colors to get the correct shade on the picture. What a terrific art medium and lesson!!!

My 6yo ds has asjked me to start teaching him his phonics again. We used to drill the phonograms from Spell to Write and Read Spelling program. He has learned to read from that program. He is now asking me to spend time with me by himself at bedtime and wants me to read and pick out words for him to read. One night I chose a reader I had and he read thru it so quickly and fluently I was amazed. Again the awe I was experiencing is because this progress I see in my dc have come during days and weeks of no formal lessons but just giving me, my children, and our homeschool to God. We’ve just been living life and if they ask to do something we do. There are times I would initiate some work or activity for them to do but not much.

My 3 yo ds, of course, wants me to “TEACH ME, MOMMY”. I’m also noticing my 3yo is giving me more kisses now that I don’t have to ask for anymore. He grabs me around my neck thruout the day and tells me “MOMMY, I YUV YOU”. And I’m finding all of these things are occurring without me telling them to do it or my prompting anything.

I’d like to share some things I believe God has given me recently.

The first thing was Deut 6:6-7…

6And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: 7And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up

This speaks to me that we are to bring our children alongside of us as we live life and they will be mentored and learn from us…there will be an impartation of our spirit into theirs…but is comes thru relationship with them..a good, solid, loving relationship with them…one where they can trust us to love them unconditionally…one where they don’t have to keep pulling their hearts back in because we stomp all over them I am still seeking God as to how to implement this in our home. At this point, I am leery about implementing the schedule we had going and I am learning from the Lord that a more ‘gentle’ approach is more in line with the Spirit of Christ(especially for young children). Also, what I see here is the principle of discipleship. We are to disciple our children in the knowledge of God..teaching them to love God and encouraging them to enter into their own relationship with Him…that comes first…in order to do that thought they need to know how to read(so they can read their bibles) , how to manipulate numbers so that they can walk in the dominion that God commanded in Genesis.

The second thing that I was reflecting on was that I’m trusting the Lord that my children will know what they need. I wondered if Jesus learned carpentry from sitting in carpentry class or from working alongside his father Joseph. I”m sure Joseph mentored Jesus and taught him as a boy and beyond the physical skills he needed in working with wood and crafting things. Jesus learned carpentry skills in a natural setting, in it’s proper environment

Also, the scripture came to me one day of Psalm 1:3-—

...And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water THAT BRINGETH FORTH HIS FRUIT IN HIS SEASON.…….

Eccles 3 says that there is a season and a time for everything and every matter under heaven.

And also Eccl 3:11 says that God will make everything beautiful in his time.

There is also a scripture in Psalms that says My times are in Your hands.

Psalm 31:15

My times are in your hands; deliver me from my enemies and from those who pursue me.

I believe our children’s times are in God’s hands. Each child develops at his/her own rate and time…they will bring forth fruit in their season…at the time that God says is right for them…and it will be beautiful b/c God is the One doing it. So I’ve had to completely let go of national standards and grade level expectations because my children will ‘get it’ when they get it. Some babies walk at 6 mos. others at 18 mos. and others still later. We don’t make a baby who walks at 2 years feel like they are stupid. We don’t put them in special needs class .. we loving wait and pray for them to develop to where they too will walk.

I realize another thing God was doing in all the “breaking” was “breaking” the bondage in my thinking of being enslaved to the homeschool regulations in our state. In our state we have to document everything up the gazoo…but I’ve found freedom in Christ re: that b/c learning is still happening in my home without be chained to lessons and textbooks all day. The house is still able to be clean b/c we pitch in as a family as I “mentor” my children in learning how to care for a house and how to make it a home.

So as these tender plants live in the soil of our love..only as we, as more mature plants, abide in the soil of God’s love… and as we keep tending and watering and praying and trusting God we patiently wait for the flower of understanding to bloom.

Proverbs 2:6-7 says

For the Lord gives skillful and godly Wisdom; from His mouth come knowledge and understanding. He hides away sound and godly Wisdom and stores it for the righteous (those who are upright and in right standing with Him); He is a shield to those who walk uprightly and in integrity

—so God is the One who will give them the understanding of anything they study and of anything on a test. We are required to test in certain grades here in our state and report the scores to the district. If they scores fall below 33rd percentile our homeschool is on probabtion. But I’m trusting God with that.

And then finally Isaiah 54:13 says that God will teach our children...even starting from verse 11 it such a blessing to me b/c I was sooooooooo tossed and afflicted and had NO comfort or peace for a while as I walked thru this processing

One more thought: The key to our children budding forth their fruit in their own season and their leaf not withering is that they get and stay planted by the rivers of water which is God and HIs Word as we teach them. I take this as a promise that as I keep my children saturated with the Presence of the Lord in our home and teach them His Word and teach them to love Him and each other then they will develop beautifully in God’s timing for them.

I see now why the Lord impressed upon me earlier to change the focus of this blog…because it is not about Biblical Principle Approach, although I teach my children biblical principles…it is not about any one approach that we can put a “label” on. It is about God and how He directs me(us) to disciple our very unique and individual children and household. It is about following Him in our efforts to offer back to Him godly seed. It is about HIS WAY and about being in a ‘place’ for Him to reveal what HIS WAY is for each of us as we walk out this journey and HIS WAY may not mean we do the same things or teach the same way for the next 365 days. It is about being sensitive to mid-course changes and the gentle nuances of the Holy Spirit as He ultimately teaches our children and as He shows us how to minister to their needs…for they are constantly growing and changing and their needs differ depending on where they are in their development and on what is happening in our family. It is about God and God alone.

And so begins our New Year and our New Start in our homeschooling being led by God…as we will always…LOVE HIM 4 EVER

I wanted to share one of our math lessons that we had last week and how it ‘materialized’. 

This was supposed to be a lesson on patterns and the principle we were to reflect on at the conclusion of the lesson was that OBSERVING GOD’S PATTERNS IN MATH.  I had told my children that God has placed patterns in HIs math principles(patterns in numbers, shape, etc) and that we need to be able to see the patterns in life.  I decided to read the story about THALES in MATHEMATICIANS ARE PEOPLE TOO VOL 1 .   I DID NOT PRE-READ THE STORY SO I DID NOT KNOW WHAT IT WOULD BE ABOUT and providentially enough this particular biography was on how Thales observed patterns to help him sovle a problem.  What a great lesson that was, for me at least!!!!  I was thrilled!!!!!!!!!  I then gave my dc the assignment to look for any patterns they see as we go about our lives. 

Ok, that evening we took the dc to Burger King….God sure knows how and when and where to teach!!!….and in their Kid’s Meals the toy was a suffed animal, a bat.  We then went to the gas station.  I got out the car to pump gas and as I was getting back in the car my dc were talking so loud I told them to quiet down and my 6yo son said MOM WE FOUND A PATTERN!!!   and he shows me the underside to this stuffed animal, it was a bat and there were patterns in the bone structure that go thru the bat’s wings!!  I was thrilled and thanking God that He was the One who showed them this and that He was showing me that He was in this lesson all the way!!!!  Isn’t that just wonderful????  Isn’t HE just WONDERFUL??!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I congratulated them on their find and marveled at how God really presented that lesson..how He got involved in it Himself!!!!

We are studying the following ‘ideas’/principles/truths in math along with studying some of the mathematicians in math history while we try to incorporate teaching math from real life(when we are not using our Ray’s text

THE PRINCIPLES THAT GOVERN MATHEMATICS WERE MADE BY GOD -

We find our biblical support for this in Col 1:16-17 -For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.

Since we can’t SEE the principles of combining objects(addition) nor of separating objects from each other(subtraction) we can classify the principles of math as ‘invisible things’…we can see the effect of the principles of addition in action when we join 2 objects with 2 other objects we get 4 objects.

MATH IS A TOOL THAT HELPS US TO CLASSIFY AND CATEGORIZE WHAT GOD HAS CREATED - based on Gen 2:20

So here is where we learn and discuss that man has devised a way to ‘label’ God’s principles and the patterns man has found in numbers, shapes, and in the natural phenomenon of earth(gravity, equations for higher level math), and whatever else(science).  Man came up with labeling 2 objects with the number 2 and 1 and 10 and 39,000, etc. 

MATH NOTATION IS JUST A DESCRIPTION OF GOD’S PRINCIPLES OF MATHEMATICS - this one sort of relates to the previous one

OBSERVING THE PATTERNS OF MATH WILL HELP US TO SOLVE PROBLEMS - Here we read a short biography of Thales.  I did not pre-read the story before reading it to my children but providencially enough, this biography from MATHEMATICIANS ARE PEOPLE TOO VOL 1 was a story about how Thales used the patterns he observed in how the his shadow was cast on the ground and the position of the sun to figure how tall a certain pyramid was.

THE COMBINING/MANIPULATION OF NUMBERS WORK BECAUSE GOD IS HOLDING ALL THINGS TOETHER - based also on Col 1:16-17

Here I discussed with my children why is it that the sun stays in the sky?  What would happen if one day the moon was sitting in the ocean and the grass was floating in the air or if we were floating out in space?  Why doesn’t that happen?  (because God is holding these things together)  So it is with 3+5.  It will always equal 8 no matter what country u are in, no matter what day it is, if you are at grandma’s house.  What would happen if we wake up one day and 3+5=23,994.87 and the next minute it equals 3+5=0 and next year 3+5=2…would you know how to keep track of how many toys you have or how much money is in your piggy bank?  Well, everyday and everywhere we go 3+5=8 , why? (because God is holding all things together so that His principles are the same or consistent.  It blessed me to realize in this study how big God is and how much He cares for us.  We discussed that God could be holding His principles that require mathematical descriptions FOR US…so that we could make sense of this world and so that we could walk in the dominion that He wanted Adam to walk in, and so that we could KNOW HIM.

WE CAN SEE THE NATURE OF GOD IN MATHEMATICS

We just finished discussing last week what CONSISTENT and FAITHFUL means.  The lesson was based on the previous example of numbers not changing.  It took them some time to ‘discover’ or reason that if numbers are consistent then so is God…that if numerical principles come from God then there is an aspect of the numbers that must be like God.  Just like my son has my nose or my dd has my dh’s eyes…(after me asking many WHY questions) they reasoned that is because they come from me and their dad.  Well so do mathematical principles come from God.   When we did come to that conclusion I took them to Hebrews 13:8 to ‘confirm’.  Another idea we discussed is if God is FAITHFUL and so consistent in holding this universe together and is able to hold numbers and their patterns and principles together then surely He is able (and willing) to hold my little life together and work all things for my good as I give my life to Him !!!!!

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Just a note:  The study of math was for us a dead subject.  Even though I was teaching the concepts in math to my children, it was dead to me and boring.  I began to pray to God for how to bring the life into math.  Our other subjects were alive but math was not.  I really believe He led me to two resources that showed me how to teach math from BIBLICAL PRINCIPLES.  Of course if you want to bring the life into something you MUST bring God…but from all the study I had done thru the NP Math guide and even GACE I was still missing ’something’…there still was no ‘aha’ moment…or I should say I had ‘aha’ moments but they were not lasting. The NP math guide and GACE gave me the principles that govern math but did not go as far as I needed into seeing how God was in the mundaness of learning and drilling addition facts.   Now everytime we drill of number facts we can know and be reminded that these equations work because God is holding them together for them to work.  Even when u look at the fact that Jesus took 5 loaves and 2 fish which should have been enough food for several people those 7 pieces of food fed over 5,000 people!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  So God can make 2+2 equal anything He wants it to equal but for the most part He allows it to equal 4.  He allows it to be consistent because HE IS GOOD, HE IS FAITHFUL AND HE WANTS US TO USE IT AS A TOOL TO GOVERN OURSELVES IN HIS EARTH, AND FINALLY HE SOOOOOO WANTS TO BE KNOWN!!!!

Anyway, the resources are:

BEYOND NUMBERS: A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO TEACHING MATH BIBLICALLY by Katherine Loop and

MATHEMATICS: IS GOD SILENT by James Nickel

deidra

This year we are studying from MIGHTY WORKS OF GOD: SELF GOVERNMENT. I did not write my own HisStory lessons this year…but I did want our principle this year to be SELF-GOVERNMENT so I felt this was an appropriate time to check this resource out and use it. I really like it. It gives several principles to discuss with your children for each chapter. I love how Mrs. Smith explains the concept of self-government, the concept of history being God’s story or HisStory, how she defines and explains government being direction and control. These lessons come in very small “sound-bites” if you will…very simple…nothing overwhelming to you or the child….but yet these topics are ‘heavy’ with meaning and application. I’m so grateful for this book because I don’t know if I’d be able to explain these difficult concepts and then offer such comprehensive reflective and reasoning questions. Even though the lessons are simple the concepts are not. The lessons conclude with an assignment to record the principle in the child’s notebook or print out an activity sheet. Most of the time the child just has to record one sentence. I just add on additional questions for my daughter to answer and write about, if I see the need. I sometimes add in my own application(if God gives me one) and my own questions for reflection in addition to what’s there. Some people may feel it is too simplistic but I love the freedom to be able to add on additional activities if I so desire or additional writing prompts. There are days when what is there is sooooo sufficient depending on how our day is going and how tired we all are. It is perfect for us for where we are right now!!

Some of the principle we have disussed and learned about so far are:

History is His Story

Studying History will help us to recognize God’s Hand as he works in the lives of men and nations.

God commands us to remember all H has done for us as individuals and nations.

Government is direction and control.

If I govern myself well, I will not need others to control me.

God has a plan for civil government.

Another incredible math resource that pointed me TO James Nickel’s book MATHEMATICS: IS GOD SILENT is BEYOND NUMBERS by Katherine Loop.  This gave me such a fresh and new perspective on Col 1:16-17 and how it applies to mathematics….and really that verse applies to all other areas of study as well.  You can read about Katherine’s book here.

It reinforced and enlightened me on how to teach math biblically; what to keep in mind and how to teach and see God’s greatness in your study/teaching of  math.  Katherine encourages you to keep God’s goals in mind teaching biblical math(and enumerates what they are).  Of course, other math resources are listed at the end of the book with her commentary.  I came across this book at a very crucial time in my re-education.  I know God led me to it.  This is another keeper!!!

This math resource has been such a wonderful blessing to me. God has used it to shed light on some very important factors in my biblical re-education. The one breakthrough that I consider to be the most important is that I’ve finally understood that one’s philosophy of education is based on your worldview. One’s worldview is religious(or can I say ’spiritual’) in nature…either you believe in God or you don’t and I’ve finally realized what FACE is trying to do in having a person go through the SDS; also what J. Rose does in GACE by talking about ‘thinking governmentally’ and the Christian idea of man and government and the Christian idea of a child….all of this terminology composes a person’s ‘worldview’. Your worldview(what you base the decisions and actions of your life upon…the foundation of why you feel you existence is, what meaning there is to your life) will determine completely your view of all areas of life, including education.

So for the Christian it becomes imperative to establish a BIBLICAL worldview. These questions (and others) need to be answered from the Bible, either directly or indirectly.

Part 1: The first chapter lays the foundation for what will be covered in the rest of the book…and that foundation is Jesus Christ…just as it says in scripture:

For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ(I Corinthians 3:11)

The remaining sections of chapter 1 define worldview and how one’s presuppostions determine worldview. It then details the components of a worldview :

1. Metaphysics- the study of reality or the study of the nature, structure and origin of what exists. There are 3 subcomponents of metaphysics…they are:

• cosmology - the structure of what exists; i.e. how the world works
• cosmogony - how the universe came into being
• ontology - the nature of the kinds of things that exists

2. Epistemology - the study of the nature and limits of human knowledge; what does it mean to know something? How can we know what we know?

3. Ethics- the study of right and wrong attitudes and actions.

The components of a Biblical Worldview are contained in scripture. I won’t go into much detail about how Mr. Nickel describes the biblical worldview…I’ll let you get the book or you can study this out for yourself but I’ll document these scriptures:

For metaphysics:

• Genesis 1:1 speaks to the subcomponent of cosmogony
• Col 1:16-17 speaks to cosmoglogy
• Acts 17:28 speaks to ontology

Psalm 36:9 speaks to Epistemology
Leviticus 20:7 speaks to Ethics

These are just SOME of the many scriptures that one can find in the bible to establish godly thinking and mindset. This mindset undergirds all other expectations and though processes that we will have about life.

I absolutely loved Chapter 1.Chapter 2 - From Adam to Christ - begins the documentation of the historical flow of mathematics ; to discover that man uses the tool of mathematics either independently of God or in relationship with God and the outcome of these 2 ‘worldviews’.  This history continues until chapter 5
Chapter 6 - Talks about how mathematics Works

Part 2: Chapter 7 - talks about Objectives that the Christian educators should hold in view when teaching biblical mathematics

Chapter 8 - Pedagogy and Resources -

The books concludes with Timelines for the historical flow of mathematics along with the bibliography and indices .

This is one great resource. I tried not to give too much away as I would not want to spoil anything for anyone wanting to buy the book but hopefully I gave enough to whet your appetite.

I especially wanted to share what blessed me most about the book. This concept and clarification of worldview and how to arrive at a biblical worldview…that the bible GIVES us GOD’S VIEW…hence a biblical worldview…. has made many things come into clearer focus for me. It has confirmed for me that the Bible does indeed hold the answer for every area of life. It may not be a direct scripture that speaks to an area of study but there is inherent in the scripture underlying principles that can be deduced from scripture. God has marvelously ‘hidden’ the treasures of wisdom in knowledge in Christ…in His Word…it may not be ‘obvious’ but it is there and He will show us the infinite applicability of His Word. It has helped me to see that all of life is contained and is based upon Jesus Christ and Him crucified and that God has something to say from His Word about ALL of life(because He is The Source of All of life). It has helped me to understand more and more that in our quest for GOD’S TRUTH, we can study nothing(academia included) without it being rooted in the knowledge of God and has helped me to enlarge my vision of God of just how big and how great and how wonderful He really is; how all-encompassing He is..how He does indeed fill EVERYthing in EVERY way…making all things complete.

Ephesians 1:22-23

22And He has put all things under His feet and has appointed Him the universal and supreme Head of the church [a headship exercised throughout the church],^(A)

23Which is His body, the fullness of Him Who fills all in all [for in that body lives the full measure of Him Who makes everything complete, and Who fills everything everywhere with Himself].

I am teaching Bible by using the layout/format in the NP Reading Curr. Guide. They have it broken down into 4 headings to coincide with 4 quarters in the year. I’ve gotten behind and I’ve given up keeping up with their schedule but I press on b/c we have been enjoying our study, at our pace, in our own wayt!!

1. The Immediacy of Christ
2. The Old Testament History
3. The Wisdom Lit and Prophets
4. New Testament History

Under THE IMMEDIACY OF CHRIST

I have chosen the following to teach for our first quarter:

• Prophecies of Jesus birth
• Birth of Christ and childhood
• Death and Resurrection
• Christ’s example of self-gov’t in being obedient to parents, His temptation and triumph, obedient all the way to death
• crucifiction and ascension/How He brough salvation

Now for resources I’ve chosen to use the coloring/activity sheets from Calvary chapel. These serve as both Bible study pages and BAR-vocabulary from the word find…looking up scriptures for the crossword puzzle, and other supplemental independent and oral reading for my 8yo. The principle we reasoned to when we studied the prophecies of HIs birth was GOD PROMISED TO DELIVER MAN FROM SIN. We started with Isaiah 9:1-7(from the Calvary chapel activity sheets) and talked about the state of man according to what Isaiah 9:1-7 stated. I asked many WHY questions and then asked the same questions another way just to ensure they understood why God sent a deliverer. This was a most blessed time. I could see in my dc’s faces that their hearts had been touched by the fact that Jesus took their punishment. He didn’t deserve it and He did nothing wrong but He loved them so much that He took their punishment…that we were the ones born into sin and Jesus became that sin for us. How wonderful it was even for me to remind myself of this. Then we went to Isaiah 53:2-12 and reasoned to the same principle that this was God giving a message to his special servant, the prophet Isaiah about His promise to send a Savior.

Our next series of lessons Gabriel visits Mary(Luke 1:26-38 and other referrin scriptures) and The Birth of Jesus(Luke 2:1-7) all reasoned to the principle that GOD IS A PROMISE-KEEPER; GOD KEPT HIS PROMISE TO SEND A SAVIOR TO MANKIND….(and if God kept His promise back then then surely He will keep His promises to us) as we witnessed the evidence of the Savior being born thru the scriptures.

Much of what we talked about in our lessons God gave me on the spot or the morning of the lesson. I did not plan on teaching these principles..they came as I kept looking over my lessons and even in the midst of teaching some of them a principle would pop into my mind and then I’d steer the lesson for us to reason along those line. My lessons were all nicely laid out but I’m learning to stay loose and I have to keep in mind that this is God’s lesson not mine. I am supposed to be allowing HIM to teach not me. So I find I get less and less upset when my schedule/lesson does not go as I plan and many, many times I feel somewhat uncomfortable with a lesson I have written and instead of just forging ahead like I used to do, I am learning that that is God gently nudging me and so then I have to stop and listen and pray. I’m learning as I stay humble and sensitive to Him many times He will change my lessons, give me principles I had not thought of and the lesson goes so wonderfully…..wonderfully b/c then I know I’m in His will with these lessons.

I also try to think of these principles as TRUTHS… I ask the Lord what TRUTH about Him should I be teaching my dc in this particular lesson.

We officially started our lessons the last week in July so we have now finished our first 6 weeks…and I feel sooooo behind!!! I have not accomplished(academically) what I set out to accomplish in my schedule but we trudge along day by day getting thru our daily schedule (which I think I need to revise). Most days I get the skill areas done and am able to do some History and Science on alternating days but not like I want it..but u see therein lies the trap I fell into that I MUST stay out of….making MY plans, setting MY schedule and NOT relying on the Lord. At the same time that I go thru these feelings of inadequacy and feeling like I’m not accomplishing what I need to we have the smoothest flow in our homeschool this year!! I am learning in so many ways to just TRUST THE LORD…with EVERYTHING!!!!!

I‘m learning to trust Him with our daily schedule. When I made my plans back in July and set our schedule I had Bible, Math, Orthography, Oral Reading, English, Music, History, Independent Reading, PE, Read Aloud scheduled for everyday for 2 children. That proved to be too much. My dc didn’t complain though…I was just tired…several nights we finished up at 10:30pm…granted we didn’t start until 1pm…I know I know…..so I think that schedule was overkill…this is my first year hsing 2 children … so now what I plan to do is to do the skill areas(Bible, Math, Orthography, Oral Reading) with each child on alternating days…so 6yob will be on Monday, Wed, Thurs….8yog will be on Tues, Wed, Fri. or something like that. I even try to be sensitive as to which child I work with first in the week. 6yob may not be on Mondays every week but whatever day I work with him, I work with her the next day. On days where I’m not working with one child I have a folder that I fill up with independent work they can work on without me so much…we are all in the same room so if they need me I’m there but I try to gear these assigments to where my involvement is not so intense so that one child can work by themselves while I work with the other child…. and then for content areas(History, Science) we do every afternoon after our skill areas are done. I alternate History and Science from M-Th afternoons…Friday afternoons are free or they can do enrichment lessons on the computers with Reader Rabbit math or phonics or geography, typing, etc. I try to get in some read aloud time in the afternoon also…doesn’t always happen. We are currently reading Little Pilgrim’s Progress. Also, right before bedtime 8yog has her assigned independent reading to do. I made a log for her to mark down the date for each chapter she reads and she is to write 2-3 sentences about what she read about in that chapter and/or write what she felt about what she read. Music seems to get done without any prompting from me(could that be the Lord orchestrating things, hmmm…) b/c my dc see it as a ‘break’ from our lessons so when we have our breaks I’ll hear my 8yog practice the songs she has taught herself. Then of course her younger brother wants to do everything she does so at some point during the day I’ll hear him playing the pieces of songs that he knows how to play(that she has taught him!!). I have not even started teaching English yet!!!!!!!!!! So where does trusting God come in? I have seen times when if my schedule wasn’t working I would be so stressed. But since God is working in me to trust Him with my planning and our entire homeschool I find that the little bumps along the way don’t stress me like they used to . I decided to make the changes in our schedule and I am at peace about it…thank You Jesus!!! The fact that I have not covered Englislh yet surprisingly is not bothering me either. It will get in there at some point. I’m using SWR and once we start our spelling diictation she will get her grammar activities. I do plan on starting her on the basics on composition writing sometime soon. The one thing that I do wish is that we might start at like 8:00am in the morning so at 12noon I can be done with at least one child’s skill area but I’m finding that our ‘natural’ flow is to wake up late and go to bed late (10-11pm, sometimes 12am) so we are working into the evening. I’ve contemplated trying to change our wake up time but for now I think I’ll leave it alone and keep trusting God with our start time and our schedule…things are getting done … it just seems like it is ever so slowly.

I’m learning to trust God with my the content of our lessons and the EXECUTION of them!! I am seeing such a change in the flow of our homeschool and our daily lessons. I think I may have mentioned before that my dc don’t really balk too much at doing lessons. What makes this year different than last year? The major difference is that God is THE FOCUS… not MORE of the focus but THE focus. I decided to ditch the workbooks(as far as relying on them for my lesson plans) and trust God to guide me in writing my own lessons and in putting my own curriculum together in subjects where the lessons are already written. I am making more of an effort to have a principle or idea that I want to teach. Lisa Hodgen’s post on teaching ideas versus just teaching facts has really put into words what my heart’s desire is. I want to teach God’s truths and principles and I’m doing more of that than I used to. Not that it is an extraordinary amount but there were some days where we spent so much time talking, reasoning, discussing scripture and trying to arrive at the principles and then talking about how it applies to our lives and the purposes for why God set things the way they are took the whole lesson time. This has got to be my favoritest(is that a word) time in our day. I think my dc enjoy it also.  They are always interjecting questions and more questions about God.  These have been some blessed times for us.  Sometimes I think we take too long talking about these things b/c then we end up not recording it in our books or doing any math problems…I’d have to finish up that day’s lesson the next day and give it as independent work(that is how our Independent Work folders got started)…u know what I mean? Another book that has helped me to focus more on structuring my lessons on biblical principles is Mathematics Is God Silent. The principles that are shared in that book can be used thruout life and certainly in other subjects. My thinking has been revolutionized and I have been changed just from what was shared in that book. I see God even more clearer and I find that the fear that I used to be in re: the state and their requirements is fading. But the whole focus of our lessons is different than last year hence the whole flow of our homeschool is different this year. That is what I attribute that to..our focus. The flow is sooo sweet..it’s like we are walking around in warm honey. The Spirit of the Lord is so sweet. Now I don’t want u to think that we don’t have our scolding moments and times of discipline but the times that we do have together are sweet on a whole…and that is causing me to relax more and more in the arms of God. I’m seeing that the more we focus our lessons on God..making Him the reason for why we study what we study and making glorifying Him the end-result of why we live out His principles … the more He blesses us with more and more of Himself. How awesome is He!!!!

I guess I’m saying that even though it may feel or seem like we are not moving along with our ‘academics’ like I had planned I find that we are talking about God and the His truths from His Word more. I definitely do have a peaceful, satisfied, ‘warm-fuzzy’ feeling inside when I think about how we have progressed in our discovery of God and how His truths undergird and shape our everyday life. I was especially blessed to be able to see Him in math(see previous post on The joy of Math). I am pleased with our how and what we are learning about God and how we have found that that does not end with bible study; obtaining knowledge of the Holy One carries over into every subject we study. I try to keep the focus of our lessons not on academics but on knowledge of Him, first and then learning the rudiments of each subject and how to apply to our lives so that we may glorify God. We may reason thru some scriptures on Monday but I find if we do not reference that scripture and our conclusions thruout the week then the ‘academics’ tend to take over, at least in my mind. So once I’ve introduced a principle and scripture we review them and our conclusions of the principles and their application thruout the week briefly before we do math drills, for instance. I do praise the Lord for that and for helping me to document our progress in ‘educationese’ for our state b/c as we all know they care nothing about what we are learning about God

I guess I can look at it like this:

If He can hold all things together like it says in Col 1:16 and keep this universe and everything in it running in sync, then surely He can hold our little homeschool together and keep us on track … HIS track…not my track…not necessarily my schedule…but if I trust Him surely He’ll make sure that my children learn what they need, have what they need and get them to where He has destined for them to be in this life He has given them; surely He will see to their development so that they won’t be lacking in anything…surely He’ll give them understanding in the subject areas they need as I feebly attempt to explain something that I struggle with….surely He will be mine and their Teacher…surely they’ll pass whatever tests they are to take when it comes time,,,surely He’ll save them and bring them into close, intimate relationship with Himself….surely they will proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ and be vessels of character and honor unto God their Maker…. and surely, at last, He’ll bring us all Home to live with Him forever and ever and ever worshipping the Lover of Our Souls….so I MUST trust that God can and will do this for us…and that is what I’m learning to do!!!