Living, Loving, Learning by His Grace

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.