Every now and then, we are placed, I believe divinely, in a warm and comforting space in our homeschooling experience where everything just seems to fit together. That’s where we are right now, and it’s so reassuring. In history, we were reading about King James commanding the Bible to be rewritten, a conversation which adds a “real life” feel to our Bible study. Our son brought up how our study of astronomy is a constant reminder of what God is doing in the scientific world (my words, not his). We’re reading the book of Matthew and talking about how the Jews knew God’s law, but didn’t know God’s love. Meanwhile, apart from school, we’ve had to deal with some flesh-like bickering, which led to the memorization of 1 Corinthians 13. Finally, as a just-before-bed read aloud, we’re enjoying Summer of the Monkeys by Wilson Rawls, great fodder for talks about the “wild” west and so many turn-of-the-century events (the transcontinental railroad, mountain men, the growth of America). The same lessons are recurring—unplanned and unexpected opportunities to really seal knowledge into their hearts and minds through the power of repetition.
What I described above is an academic product; the other component of this time of “fitting together”, and perhaps more important for our goals, is our enjoyment of each other as family while we read. I was blessed to hear Sally Clarkson lecture about the value of reading, and one of her touch points was the power of reading to build strong bonds of relationship. A few days ago, I read to our toddler while the older kids enjoyed breakfast at the table. I got so tickled as I read One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish, and my two “intellectuals” had quite the dialogue about why a Wink’s fur is pink just because it likes to drink pink ink. Hilarious!
God bless, and enjoy the day!
