I just wanted to share my philosophy of education. I wrote this up in the early days of studying about this approach. I”ve added bits and pieces as my mind was renewed little by little…

MY PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION

GOD

I feel that my children need to be instructed in the ways of
the Lord. They need to receive
instruction from the Word of God in how they are to live lives pleasing unto
the Lord.

I believe they should also be taught and led into having an
intimate relationship with God as they learn line upon line, precept upon
precept how to submit their will to the Holy Spirit living within them.

GOD’S WORLD

They should also be educated about the world God created for
us to live in. and it’s history(His past workings and dealings in the lives of
individual men/women and nations) so that they may be enabled to obey the
commission given by God to “…subdue the earth…”, “i.e. acquire a knowledge and
mastery over his material environment to bring it’s elements into the service
of the race.” P. 3 NIV Study Bible.

In studying the “academic subjects” of God’s creation my
children need to be able to see it’s origins and biblical purpose in the word
of God. My desire is for them to be able
to research God’s Word(the origin of all things) and to be able to reason from
the scriptures and discern the governing principles that have been established
by God in each and every subject/topic that is studied FOR THE PURPOSE OF
applying what they learn of these principles to their lives so that their lives
would testify of Christ. This will form
a worldview with Christ as the Alpha and Omega of all things; of all of life; whereby
the child will see the Providence of God(or see the Hand of God always present
and active) in “…all things pertaining to life and godliness.”  This will also equip them to govern themselves in a godly manner in whatever station in life they are called to.
Any education that divorces God, His purpose, and His
principles from it’s course of study(curriculum) is a DEAD education; it has no
life, no inspiration, no hope-and that type of education will NOT impart any
life-giving sustenance NOR a love of (excitement about) learning.

It is God’s Spirit that quickeneth or gives life to ANY and
ALL things. The letter killeth

2 Cor. 3:6

Who also hath made us able ministers
of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter
killeth, but the spirit giveth life.

It is the principles of the Word of God, identified and applied (to each life-being a DOER of the word and not a hearer only…) that gives life to the human spirit(internal), then eventually the whole being of man(external)

The LETTER of education is academics without God

The SPIRIT of true education has Christ “…and Him
crucified..” at the beginning, middle, and end of academics…and all that God purposed in Christ realized in the life of every Christian.

…Christ being the
reason FOR there being any “academics” to study at all!!

John 1:1-5

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

The same was in the beginning with God.

All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

My blog has been inactive as far as my posting but I have not been. Behind the scenes here I’ve been in the throes of pulling together my resources for this coming year.

My plans sort of took a turn for the better, I pray(I pray that I’m hearing God right on this one). I’m still using Ray’s arithmetic but I’ve purchased Abeka’s math text for grade 2 to sure up my dd’s foundation in applying the operations of arithmetic to the categories and in learning the ‘rules’ of the categories….those who have read the Arithmetic portion of GACE know what I’m talking about…:-)

I have finally conceded to the notion that I need help in teaching, especially the BPA approach. I don’t have the time to write as much as I want but this past year gave me a good start. I think I was dreaming of the time when I’ll have more time to just study and write lessons but that time is not now…it will come though!

I also purchased the Language text, Spelling and Poetry text, and Cursive Writing tablets (to begin cursive writing) from Abeka. I was blessed by another mom GIVING ME(not selling) the K4 and K5 Lesson Plans for Reading, Phonics, Writing, AND Math!!! Oh My!!!!
Do you think that perhaps God is trying to show me that this is the way I should go for this year?

Once I got into the Charlotte Mason approach(before BPA) I swore I’d never go back to workbook, even though our experience with workbook was a very positive one. (Sometimes though u may need to take a break from it and liven it up) So I’m still a little surprised at the direction I’m going in here.

SSSSSooooooooooooo, now that I have all of this I borrowed another mom’s Lesson Plans for Grade 2 to look thru, (since I did not purchase these) just to see if I can put these plans together myself or if I need to use ‘theirs’. Well, guess what?

I found a posting on Vegsource where a mom was selling the Parent Kit for Grade 2(which includes all lesson plans just for homeschoolers in Phonics, Reading, Writing, Poetry, Language, Seatwork(Homework), Math Games and Charts and the Primary Bible Reader and Reading Handbook———————————> all for $54.

Can you believe it? I almost can’t!! and yes I bought it. Now the only thing left to consider is if I should buy the student texts for my Kindergartener since I was GIVEN the Lesson Plans for Kindergarten.

I think I will….

So that takes care of what I call my CORE subjects. Bible, Literacy (this includes Reading, Phonics, Spelling, Grammar, and Writing), and Math-those are everyday. These are done first in the day along with a morning Read-Aloud period. I won’t say first in the morning b/c sometimes we don’t start until 12 noon or later.

After those are done then we’ll snuggle up with our unit studies of the Chain of Christianity.

I’m so excited b/c I can see all of this coming together in a fashion that I am satisfied with!!!!! Yippee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Over the past year I 4R’d the subjects of Literacy and Math (along with History and some of the 7 Principles of Life-see previous post). So I have all my biblical foundation for my core subjects and biblical principles that I studied out. The FACE guides also give good information on other principles specific to the subjects. So what I plan to do is as I teach the ‘rudiments’ of each subject I can also pull from my study and teach from my biblical principles and insert them into any lesson that we do wherever they fit and make sense. The Principle of Individuality seems to be one that I’m finding many opportunities to teach. Then there are also principles SPECIFIC to each subject, not (just) THE 7.

So I feel I’m on my way. I’m overjoyed that the image I have in my spirit of basing our homeschool/learning and lessons on God’s principles is beginning to take shape and form.

I’m also excited to see that I can use ‘other ‘ resources and still apply my leading ideas and principles to our lessons. These other resources in no way take away from learning that all these things begin and end in God. It’s as MY mind is renewed to be able to discern God’s purpose and principles that enables me to see how to apply BPA to our homeschool…as I understand how to teach the rudiments(beginning principles and facts) of each subject, then the ‘other ‘ resources become my tool and not my master.

One of the rudiments(foundation) of the BPA is the 7 Principles of America’s Christian History and Government. I have been stumped by this for some time and I decided that the best way for me to understand the implications of these principles is to find these principles in the Bible…more specifically in the life of Jesus. Since Jesus is our example I can then more easily relate these principles to my own life (and my dc) and then we can begin to internalize these principles and hopefully it will be easier to see them in other areas of life(externally)…even America’s Christian History and Government … if it should come to that.

I’ve often wondered what is the benefit for my children to be able to identify these principles in the life of the founding fathers b/c I don’t use them as my example. Jesus is my example. I just feel safer starting with studying the life of Jesus and then relating it to our own life.

I’ve become free enough to implement this in our home mainly from talking and reading Lisa’s experience over at Me and My House. This was rolling around in me for some time, even BEFORE I read Lisa’s blog, so when I read about how Lisa ‘renamed’ the principles and related them to other areas outside of America’s Christian History and Gov’t. I knew that is what God was showing me to do in this following study.

Again, the major goal is to apply the 7 Principles of Christian Life(as I call them right now) to our own personal life(internal) and then observe/apply to other areas(external) of life-church/community, civil/local government

Under each principle I have listed one(or two) underlying principles realizing that MANY, MANY lessons will come from each of these. The way I see it, a study of these 7 principles is a lifelong study. This ‘framework’, if you will, serves to help me categorize, organize, and write lessons specific to my children’s lives(and my own) at the place where they are in God and where they need to go in God, first, then allowing God to bring them into His perfect will for their contribution to society.

I plan on making this a part of our Bible Study time; actually when you make God’s Word and Truth the FOUNDATION of every subject, ’school ‘ becomes one great big BIBLE STUDY!!!

1. GOD’S PRINCIPLE OF INDIVIDUALITY - To understand the individuality of Jesus and HIs purpose for coming to earth.

• To understand our own individuality and our purpose on this earth

2. PRINCIPLE OF OBEDIENCE - To learn that the Holy Spirit was given to be our internal ‘governor’…that we are to be governed by God within us and by His Word that has been ‘written’ on the tablets of our heart.


3. CHRISTIAN CHARACTER - To learn that Jesus came to allow us to partake of HIs nature so that we will show Christ to the world by our Christian character and lifestyle.

4. PRINCIPLE OF STEWARDSHIP - To learn that God has given us ‘property’ to steward-our conscience being one of the most valuable…that we are to listen and be guided by our sense of right and wrong(which is governed by the Holy Spirit) in our dealings in life

5. PRINCIPLE OF LOVE - To learn that our allegiance is to God first(internal), then to our neighbor(external)

6. (DON’T HAVE A NAME FOR THIS ONE YET THAT DESCRIBES HOW I SEE THIS) To learn that as our ‘internal government’ (decisions/commitments of our hearts) are submitted to God it will affect our surrounding communities(external)

7. CHRISTIAN UNION - To learn that the prior 6 principles find their outward expression by coming together witH others of like character, faith, and mindset for a common purpose.

My dd’s CAT scores came in and I was pretty pleased with where she placed. She came in at the 69th percentile overall. She did EXCELLENT in her Language categories and even did goood in her math computation which was a shocker! Her math concepts were another story.

I gave her this test for my own information and benchmarking, not that I did not know what she could and could not do but I guess this confirms things for me.

One thing that I know affected her understanding of arithmetic is that I switched gears in mid-year and then decided to take the approach of informal math instruction in the early years so I did not ‘push’ arithmetic as hard as at the beginning of the year. I started playing more arithmetic games with her just to get her to enjoy math again first of all. She had come to dislike it. She really enjoyed the games and I’m so glad I have a book FULL of them!! It is Peggy Kaye’s book entitled GAMES FOR MATH. She has one for reading, writing, and several others.

Another thing that affecter her confidence in taking the math portion of this test is that I gave her no manipulatives. Just a piece of scratch paper and told her to work it out. Now that is not how we had been doing our lessons…she used an abacus and sometimes her fingers but always had something she could count with…we’ve even used numberlines to instill the principle that ALL ARITHMETIC IS COUNTING. ADDITION IS COUNTING FORWARD ON THE NUMBERLINE. SUBTRACTION IS COUNTING BACKWARD ON THE NUMBERLINE. I didn’t know if they were allowed touse manipulatives or not…I should have found this out before I gave the test.

So I think the test ‘proctor’ needed a course in proctoring tests….

And then another thing, I did not do a review with her. I know..I know!!! Bad teacher-mom!! I decided on the test at the last minute and ordered it and then had to have it back within 2 weeks(I know, no excuses!!!) .

Well that is how that cookie crumbled…my poor baby…so that is why I’m so pleased with her scores….no review…switching mid-year in math with approach and philosophy…no manipulatives…..and then taking a timed test….all for First Grade….I think she did ok. At least she came in above the 33rd percentile which is what the law in this state is. I don’t have to report test results to the district until 5th grade…so we do it again next year.

So my baby overcame those odds…good girl!!

Now I must turn my attention to how to approach arithmetic this year. I’m still using Ray’s…I love the approach they take. They don’t rush the child into being able to write math problems but to use manipulatives if they need to and then to gradually transition into not needing manipulatives at all thereby strengthening their mental capacity to memorization of the addition/subtraction facts…this is all on the CHILD’S timetable not an government or standardized test’s timetable…..then moving onto mulitplication/division. I love this but the tests require that they know what 5+2= when they see it on a test. So I’ve decided to use Ray’s approach and integrate, somehow, more traditional mathwork from Abeka’s arithmetic grade 2 series. I feel Ray’s gives good experience in exercising the brain to understand/internalize the operations of math (addition/subtraction) and Abeka would give her good practice in applying the ‘categories’ of arithmetic to these operations(such as learning how to count money, fractions, review of time, linear measurement)…Abeka’s text has it all.

So why was I up at 3:00am this morning wondering if this is going to work? I guess b/c I was starting to worry.

I was reminded of this thought/principle as I sat in the quiet of the morning…that just as I MUST trust God with my dc’s spiritual growth(godly character growth) I MUST trust Him with their academic growth. Just as I sow the word of God into them and teach them about Him from His word and attempting to model a life of obedience to God in front of them so I must just diligently sow/teach my dc whatever ‘academics’ they need/require and leave the rest to HIm. Their spiritual/character growth is His business and something that I can’t touch(even if I tried), so it is with their growth and understanding in math.

Yes, correct teaching, timing, and effective application of what is learned helps the process tremendously and that is what I’ve had to commit to this coming year but I’ve got to stay out of the realm of worry. I’ll do my part and God SAID He will be faithful to do His…

I Corinthians 3:6-7

I thank God for His Word which imparts sooooo much hope. I am just so thankful that He IS Hope. I so appreciate that I can REST in Him and come to Him when I’m feeling burdened… and He promises that He would give me rest in my heart and mind(Matthew 11:28)

So I commit this coming year to the Lord’s care, casting all of my care and burden on Him for He careth for me. I commit my way(my teaching, my methods to Him) allowing Him to change/establish them as He sees fit, and I commit my children and their growth in all areas to Him-not worrying about them but trusting that God will make up what is lacking in me for them…and that despite my failings and shortcomings and mess-ups that He will indeed give the increase… so that He receives the glory

Amen

I just wanted to make very clear(just in case it is a question in someone’s mind-including my own!!!) that I am not PA’ing every subject. That is sooooooo my desire but I simply don’t have time to research and ingest all I need right now about every subject I teach. So I decided to go with unit studies which will incorporate the subjects and info/activities that I see appropriate for a 7 and 5yo. I do not have leading ideas and principles for every lessons that I will teach for every subject. I have managed to provide ONE overall principle and several leading ideas for HISTORY but I’ve got to let that suffice and just present the other info. that we cover in each unit.

I do not even have all the scripture that I would like to have. First off, I’m still a newbie and I must be patient with myself. I’m trusting that as I grow and continue in this vein year after year then my expertise will grow and what I see in my heart and mind will begin to manifest for our homeschool. Secondly, TIME SEEMS TO BE SLIPPING AWAY FROM ME!!!!!!!! Help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have also purchased some ‘resources’ from Abeka-grammar, spelling and poetry, place value cards, even a math book to help me teach the ‘categories’ of math(I’m using Ray’s for the operations), a health and safety book(that covers a requirement here in our state) and a cursive writing tablet(I’m using WRR for spelling, writing, orthography), etc. to help me out to teach the content of each subject and maybe I’ll have time for more 4R’ing if I do it that way.

I also want to purchase 2 books for Art but I’ve got to take it easy on our finances. My oldest 2 just had birthday’s (and that means gifts and parties and the purchase of a pool for all of them), My dh is throwing me a 40th birthday party at the end of July and our stove quit working right on the day of my dd’s birthday this weekend…so that’s $500 right there(jsut for the stove) that’s gotta go out…big sigh!!…God is faithful and if He so clothes the grass of the field which is so temporary will He not clothe me and my family and provide what we need? I’m confident that He will….just need to learn to be patient in waiting on Him b/c He has promised to come thru…

At some point I want to post our scheduled daily ‘plan’ of what I hope to cover each day. I want to do CORE subjects in the morning and then our UNIT studies in the afternoon(or sometime after CORE)

I don’t know how it’s going to work b/c my dc sleep late and sometimes so do I. I love getting up in the mornings with them still asleep(and it’s not the crack of dawn!) and the house still quiet so I’m sort of reluctant to give that up(that is how I’m blogging now, everyone is sleep, except dh).

Oh well, we’ll see how it goes.

OK so the previous posts give u just a ‘flava’ of how I’m planning my lessons. I wanted to break it down into quarters for my readers (and myself)…as I mentioned before:

Quarter 1:
Creation unit

Quarter 2:
Moses-2 weeks

Jesus- 2 weeks(this layout is similar to Moses), ART-The Nativity by Girolamo dai Libri

Paul-1 week(this layout is similar to Moses), ART - early Christian symbols

The Bible in English-1 week (John Wycliffe) and/or William Tyndale,ART- Giotto and his contributions

Christopher Columbus-3 weeks- read his biography, ART - Leonardo da Vinci, GEO - Continent of Europe(Italy), rivers, lakes, etc.

I’m attempting to plan for 2 quarters…I’m taking a 2 week break between the 1st and 2nd quarter and prayerfully be able to fine tune any ‘gaps’ that I see in my plan.

Hopefully this will give u some ideas for writing your own. I still feel like I need more ideas but I know the more I get experienced at writing and teaching and assigning ‘activities’, especially writing activities, word studies, t-charts, web charts, etc. the easier it will become.

I look forward to starting. In the next week or so I”ll go to the library and get whaever resources I need. I’m excited!

Some people would define these terms as one and the same. One lady on Vegsource.com defined unit study as a study of one topic but it includes ALL the subjects which mine do not…so whatever one would want to call them they are what they are….

Link: MOSES UNIT
Governing Principle: God uses men and nations to further His gospel

Subjects covered: History (of Moses)

• Moses individuality
• God preserves and protects Moses in Egypt to fulfill his prupose as lawgiver and leader of first republic
• When it was time God took Moses out of Egypt
• In spite fo paganism in Egypt Moses believed in the God of his forefathers

Subjects covered: Literature (of Moses)

• Identify literary elements in Moses’ story
• ancient writings (hieroglyphics)(??)
• writings of Moses-1st five books of bible(??)

Subjects covered: Geography (of Moses-Egypt)

• Map of ancient Egypt or continent of Africa
• physical geography
• rivers
• lakes
• mountains
• climate and vegetation
• animal life
• people

subjects covered: ART (of Moses-Egypt)

• study how the Egyptians depicted ’subject matter’ in their sculputure/painting
• give assignment on depicting selected ’subject matter’ in art assignment

I plan 2 weeks for this unit. Sometimes I feel this is not intricate enough but I’ve decided not to sweat it. Once I’m in the study other ideas may come up but my objective here is just to introduce my children to the principle(they already know the story of Moses) and do a little ‘expansion’ on the subject and principle.

This is what I have so far. I plan to take the entire 1st quarter on this
one…..I’m going to follow up in another post with the how I have the Moses
link laid out….different links seem to lend themselves toward including
different (or very few) other subjects) from what I can see right now in my
understanding AND lends themselves to different ‘activities’. Prayerfully as I
continue to grow and mature and understand more I can include more. I had many
reservations about doing unit study b/c I did not want the ‘INDIVIDUALITY’ of
each subject to get lost in the unit so that is whyy I’m highlighting the
SUBJECTS of Creation in this unit. I feel that is a good way to start the year
AT THE BEGINNING of ALL THINGS…even the beginning of subjects of study..it all
starts with Creation…As you see this can take off in many directions depending
on what u feel u want to emphasize.

Also, as I’ve been studying/reading I’v come to realize that each subject has it’s own
principles, and so I’m endeavoring to pull those out so as not to lose them
under the ‘Governing Principle’…

Here is the first of several posts on my unit study layouts using the links on the Chain of ChristianityLink:

Link: Creation Unit

Governing principle: God’s Principle of Individuality(this is the principle that will be referred to MOST, maybe not all the time but MOST:-)

Subjects Covered: History (of Creation)
Leading Ideas:

1. What can we learn from Creation? Gen chapter 1, 2, Rom 1:20, etc(these leading ideas develop into lessons which I’ve just begun writing)
2. There is diversity in Creation. Psalm 19:1(define diversity, what does this show us about God?, etc)
3. All that God made is unique and exists for His glory and purpose. Rev 4:11…highlight the creation of man as special and how God feels about us…how do we treat the creation of God(nature and us)…what can we do to help take care of God’s creation(including ourselves and maintain own individuality…this can lead in Principle of Self-Govern)
4. God gets pleasure out of all He created….He is pleased with each individual thing just like He created it..can lead into many areas of discussion
5. Individuality of ’subjects’-All that God made can be ‘categorized’ into ’subjects’ - Here is where I plan to go into each subject addressed in THIS unit and define it, present it’s biblical origin(this is where the NP Lessons come in handy. I’ll use the lessons in this book to present the BIBLICAL FOUNDATIONS instead of writing it myself…it’s already written..AND I’ve already spent money on it!!!!!!!!!!:-)

Subjects Covered: Literature (of Creation)
Leading Ideas/Content:

1. The Bible as Literature- (I’m using NP Lessons and use the ‘foundation’ lessons to define literature and the biblical origin/purpose of literature)

- read Creation story and identify literary elements

2. Individuality of Poetry- introduce Psalms 23 as poetry(NPLit Guide p. 74)

- Individuality of Poets and their Poetry- read Poetry of Creation(NP Lit Guide p. 108-109)

1. “The Voice of Grass”

2. Poems about creation/birds/naturefrom The Home Book of Verse for Young Folks

Subjects Covered: Geography (of Creation)
Leading Ideas/Content: I still need to develop my leading ideas for this content or I just may present it like this depending on my time and energy level.

1. Individuality of the earth (taken from GACE starting p261+)..God made the earth for man

- in the universe

- in the solar system

- terrestrial globe(??? I have no idea what this means or how to present it so I may hold off on this until I study and know what I’m talking about!!)

2. Individuality of continents(begin study each continent-especially as we encounter it in literature or read-alouds)

- land

- water

- atmosphere(for these 3 I plan to just take some books out of the library and study present these concepts using very “BROAD strokes of the paintbrush”, putting on a LIGHT coat until I have the time to go deeper in study)

3. Individuality of Living Things

- plants

- animals(same as continent study)

Subjects Covered: ART (of Creation)-(I’m excited about this one…I was NEVER into art until now…of course, I understand it now!)
Leading Ideas/Content:

1. Primary colors are each uniquely individual

2. Primary colors combine(union) to make more unique colors/shades

3. Color comes from God

4. Individuality of artists and their art work- Each individual is unique and will produce unique things whether from writing(poetry)/music/art, etc.

I still need to chose which artists we will study…I desire to study artists who painted (or sculpted, whatever) scenes of creation or of God creating man, trees, etc…..I still need to research that)

Subjects Covered: Music (of Creation)
Leading Ideas/Content:

1. Notes are unique and have distinct sounds

2. Notes combine to make more unique sounds-melody, harmony

3. Melody forms unique songs to give expression to what is in our hearts

4. God gave us sound/music/notes for our pleasure and for His.