New Year Jitters

The holidays are upon us. Instead of relaxing with their families and enjoying the season, many moms are pouring over curriculum catalogs and thinking about next year. Budgets need to be made and materials need to be placed on a shopping list so that the best prices can be found when the spring conventions start in March.

The first half of the year is coming to a close. Perhaps you’ll spend some time evaluating how the school year is going. If you’re like some moms, you may be feeling a bit overwhelmed right now. Perhaps you feel some of your resources are not working well for your children. Perhaps you have so many resources you forget to use some of them. Maybe your brain hurts from thoughts of inadequacy. Fear not fellow homeschooler! You are not alone, nor are you the first to experience these feelings.

I have been homeschooling for twelve years and I often still get these feelings. But, I know homeschooling is where the Lord is leading our family, so I trust Him to make it all work out when I can’t.

When I first started homeschooling I didn’t tell my husband how overwhelmed I was because I didn’t want him to suggest putting the children into school. Homeschooling was my idea twelve years ago and I felt I had to prove the benefits of home education to my husband. Of course, back then I was trying to prove a lot to my husband because I was very young and didn’t know how to be “one” with him. These days we are a team–my husband is not my competition.

Do you talk to your husband about your feelings? Have you discussed homeschooling with him? Is he supportive? Even if his role is strictly provider, you would be wise to still seek his opinions and advice.

I’ve also found, through the years, that if I put God first, all the rest of the academics will fall into place. My children know things that I don’t remember teaching them. Even when I don’t have all the answers for their questions, I know where to find them. I know my job is to teach them to do that also–to find the answers to the questions they have.

Do you put God first in your school? In your day? We can do this homeschool-thing with God’s help. If you’ve been schooling for awhile, and you think it may not be working, try changing gears–put God first for the remainder of this year. With Weaver it’s easy. Start with the Bible lesson and move on from there. Put God first. You can do this!

This entry was posted on November 19, 2007 at 8:01 am and is filed under Teaching Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

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