A Call to Spiritual Reformation ch1

As I mentioned, I have decided to post weekly comments on the book by Don Carson, "A Call to Spiritual Reformation", which I am reading slowly but steadily at the moment. You might like to join me in reading it, or simply learn from my comments.
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Chapter One: Lessons from the School of Prayer

Before tackling the direct lessons from Scripture which Carson has learnt through his life, he presents the best lessons on prayer he has learnt from mature Christians.

1. "Much praying is not done because we do not plan to pray."
Carson's argues that we often forget to pray, or don't get around to prayer, simply because we have not set aside time specifically to pray. He suggests we should plan to pray often, even if only briefly. In response to this lesson, I have been setting my alarm clock that bit earlier so that not only do I have time for Bible study, I also have time for prayer. For the past few weeks I have been rolling out of bed straight onto my knees by the side of the bed. That way, I don't fall back to sleep while I lie to myself that I'm going to talk to God lying down in bed... but I don't have to turn on lights or make noise and possibly wake up little kiddilets, either. At the moment I am getting up at 6am which gives me an hour to pray and do my Bible Study before I need to be getting the kids dressed for breakfast. I do need to start winding my alarm back even earlier, though, because Daylight Savings Time will be starting on the 26th and I need to be prepared for the time to jump forward an hour. I know this whole getting up early to pray thing is a lot easier in the summer than winter. Any suggestions for planning a good prayer time for the winter?

2. "Adopt practical ways to impede mental drift."
Carson suggests the purely pragmatic means of saying your prayers aloud (or at least moving your lips to the words you pray) and journalling (writing your prayers down). He also suggests praying through biblical passages, particularly prayers, but really any Bible passage you are reading can also provide a stimulus for prayer. Reflective prayer which is based upon a reading is a great help, in my experience, to deepening one's relationship with God. God speaks to us today through His word, and it is only appropriate that we should respond to His words with our own. However, I haven't prayed consistently through selected Scripture passages in some time (except Psalms 51 and 139 which I read some Saturday evenings, preparing my heart for Sunday) and this is something which I am hoping this book will help me with. (See this article from Tim Chester on our (physical) posture when praying.)

3. "At various times of your life, develop, if possible, a prayer-partner relationship."
Carson is very clear that this person should be of the same sex as yourself unless it is your spouse (if you're unmarried, the situation is different, but even then I would be cautious choosing someone of the opposite sex unless they're your parent). Carson suggests the benefits of this partnership can be twofold: you learn from the prayers of your prayer partner and they hold you accountable for praying. I would like to pray more with my husband, and I know committing to a particular day/time would help us in this. I've talked about it a little bit with Jeff, but so far we haven't found a suitable time. One family discipline at a time, I guess: at the moment we're focusing really hard on family Bible study in our Circle Time.

4. "Choose models - but choose them well."
Carson explains we learn how to pray when we hear other people praying. I learnt to pray when I was a part of a prayer group for a BSF class in Darwin, where I used to live. The discipline of praying for an extended period with other women for a specific situation taught me much which I could then apply to all of my prayer. One of the most precious things I have experienced as a mother is listening in to my children's evening prayers. As parents model prayer to their children, so they will learn. My mother taught me the Lord's Prayer when I was only just old enough to read the words, and I learnt Table Grace from many meals in my parents' home over the years. However, the prayers of parents with their children should not end with the formal, repeated prayers of liturgy and special occasions - although these are a great place to start. I have taught our eldest three children the Lord's Prayer so they can pray with our congregation on Sundays, but Jeff and I also pray with them in the evenings in a less formal manner. I can see that I could be doing this more consistently and with greater forethought, however.

5. "Develop a system for your prayer lists."
Carson describes a few ways of keeping track of what you want to pray about. Whatever system you choose to use, it is useless unless you do actually use it. For example, we just got a list of items to pray for for Jeff's theological college. Unless I place that list where I can grab it up in the morning, I'll never pray for the things on that list. So it's right there under the alarm clock on my bedside table. I would like to start keeping a record of both the things I have prayed for and the things I need to pray for. At the moment, for example, I pray for my husband and children in the mornings, but I don't necessarily give a lot of thought to what I need to be praying about except at the actual time of my prayer. I can see that it would definitely improve my prayer life if I was more intentional in this area. I think I'll probably start with some kind of basic "To Pray" list, perhaps one for each kid and another for Jeff. And another for myself!

6. "Mingle praise, confession, and intercession; but when you intercede, try to tie as many requests as possible to Scripture."
While I was praying with the BSF ladies I learnt to begin with praise, then to follow with thanks and lastly to end with requests... confession was not part of this style of prayer because it was corporate. I do find it difficult to stick just to one genre of prayer at a time, though, and I think Carson's suggestion to include all at some time or times during the prayer is sensible and realistic. Confession naturally leads to thanks, and thanks often leads to praise; supplication often returns one to thanksgiving and vice versa; praise of God often turns one to either confession or supplication. This is the way a normal conversation twists and turns, and so it is sensible for us to expect our conversations with God to follow a similar pattern. After all, prayer is a conversation.

7. "If you are in any form of spiritual leadership, work at your public prayers."
Carson warns that because people largely learn to pray from the examples of others, if those who pray publicly don't put some forethought into their prayers, people will learn to pray badly or not learn to pray at all. Of course, public prayers are primarily for the ears of God, but there is a secondary audience as well (otherwise they would be private, not public), and the audience should ideally be following along with the prayer as it is spoken aloud. The secondary audience of the congregation or Sunday School class or Bible Study small group needs to be taken into account when planning the choice of words and topic (although of course led by the Spirit in this as in all leadership activities).

One final quote, which I think sums up my experience of prayer for much of my life: "... many of us in our praying are like nasty little boys who ring front door bells and run away before anyone answers. Pray until you pray." This is sage advice: the more we pray, the more naturally we pray and the less forced, formal and formulaic our prayer becomes.

There was a lot in this chapter. You might want to take some time to think about how some of this can be applied to your own prayer life. Feel free to leave a comment to let me know if any of this has helped or confused you!
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Next week: The Framework of Prayer - 2 Thessalonians 1:3-12

[Cover image from koorong.]

Weekly Report 2008:37

Last week we kept up with all our academics, despite only having our lessons in the afternoon. That is, except for Friday, when we went to the Colin Buchanan concert in the morning and all (even Joshua) had naps in the afternoon. When we eventually got inside the house: would you believe I forgot to take house keys again?!

On Thursday we went in to have a BBQ lunch with Jeff at college. He'd organised it for the entire student and staff body, something he does once a term or so. it was lovely to get out and chat to friends I've made at college and he also watched the kids while I ducked down the street for a coffee on my own so that was positively delightful! On Saturday we went to a BBQ in Mandurah with his pastoral care group from college and after lunch walked down to the beach together. The kids all stripped down to their knickers and went in for a swim. Due to a small reef creating a lagoon, there was minimal swell and the kids thought they were very clever, being able to go out as deep as their belly buttons or even chests without being pushed over by waves. No photos, sorry!

Literacy
The kids both did four pages in their new Phonics workbooks, covering the multiple letter graphemes "th", "sh", "ee" and "ay".
Joshua finished reading book 6 from the Ladybird Phonics reader set. This week he'll be moving on with more Beginner Books. Anna finished the fourth box of Bob Books readers and will now move on to the Ladybird Phonics ones.
They did reasonably well with their tracework/copywork/dictation: we did three days on the Days of the Week and then they wrote out "Whole Duty of Children" which they have just memorised. Here is Joshua's effort:
Literature
We finished up with Five Children and It and were only one day late returning it to the library, and were able to find the second book in the series (by Edith Nesbit), called The Phoenix and the Carpet at the library so borrrowed it and are already up to chapter 5. While I was there I ordered the third book and have just received an email saying it's ready to collect. The kids have really enjoyed it and also enjoy me telling modified adventures with their names in it as bedtime stories.

Mathematics
The kids finished Lesson 3 and began lesson 4.

Science
The kids loved hearing Swallow Journey by Vivian French, illus Karin Littlewood, which tells the story of one family of swallows from their nesting in England through their journey south into Africa across the Sahara desert to their winter home. I try to look for story books with non-fiction content whenever I'm at the library. I think it's easier for the kids to keep listening as they want to find out what happens to a particular swallow, (or caribou, or...) rather than just listening to bare facts about what the life cycle of an average swallow is like.

That's all for this week. I hope yours went well.

Shameless brag

Some of you might remember four posts I wrote back in August which were eventually edited and submitted as an assignment for a course I was doing at Trinity@Night. The topic was "The Impact of the Gospel on the Daily Life of a Wife and Mother". If you're interested, you can read the posts in order here, here, here and here.

Anyway, since some of my regular commenters gave me so much wonderful feedback, I thought I'd let you know that I received the marked assignment back last week and I got a Distinction (the highest mark possible)! My lecturer commented, "Really good work, I think. You communicate well and your ideas are FULL of the gospel!" So thanks for all your feedback, especially to you Amy and Andrea.

Not only that, but today I got my assignment for the other subject I was doing at the same time, on the topic "How does God's covenant with David in 2 Samuel 7 fit in with 'the story of the Bible'?" Another Disctinction! And not only that, but the lecturer had this comment for me: "Crystal clear, biblical, well-researched answer to the essay question. Have you thought of doing something more challenging at TTC? Say Grad Dip units? Look into it!" This was a wonderful commendation to receive for my efforts.

So I am very proud to announce that I will be graduating from the Certificate in Christian Studies at the same graduation ceremony as my husband receives his Masters of Divinity (well, he still has to pass this last semester's subjects, but I'm not too worried about him.) Hooray for us!

Treasure hunting

This past week Jeff has been sending Joshua and Anna on treasure hunts. Each morning they are given a piece of old note paper with a sentence written on it. They have to be able to read the sentence to find the "treasure", which so far has been two or three small chocolate treats. The instructions are things such as "Look in the blue tub on the kitchen bench", and "Look in Daddy's bottom drawer". It's a literacy exercise, pure and simple, and Jeff has the kids very eager to read their sentence so they can find their treasure each morning.

This morning, Anna told me "I have treasure in heaven."

I replied, "That's right. God is storing up treasure in heaven for you in reward for doing His will."

"I wonder what it is" Anna continued. And then, in a deeply serious whisper, "I hope it's M&Ms."

SugarFish on home vs away schooling

Ruth from SugarFish has written this great article reflecting upon her family's reasons for choosing away-schooling over homeschooling at this time in their lives.

Ruth's kids went to the school which Joshua will be attending next year, when their family lived in Perth. Now they're all in Albany, and after a stint of homeschooling, they have their kids in a small, local Christian school at the moment.

A Call to Spiritual Reformation

I have been reading this book, by Don Carson, for a few weeks now. I am deliberately taking it very slow (only a chapter a week, and re-reading bits) because I want to let everything sink in and be able to apply what I am learning, rather than just thinking "that sounds like a nice idea" and then immediately forgetting it.

This book examines Paul's prayers, recorded in his letters, to see what we can learn about how we should pray and what we should pray about. I know that prayer is a most basic means of communicating with God, and as a Christian I am in a relationship with God. So why would I not want to improve my "prayer life"? Experience has taught me that I have much to learn in this area if I want to be able to talk to God as clearly and comfortably, diligently and delightedly as I desire. So I thought this book would be a great help to me.

Perhaps you might like to get a copy as well and try reading through it with me? I will try to post a comment each Monday, but it might be every second Monday. It would be great if you would respond in the comments, even if you haven't read the book.
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Introduction: The Urgent need of the Church

Carson argues persuasively that the most urgent need of the church of the western world (and particularly so in the US, where Carson lives) is to know God better. He considers other issues confronting the church, such as purity in sexual and reproductive matters; integrity and generosity with finances; evangelism and church planting; disciplined, biblical thinking informed by more/better expository preaching; vital corporate worship and political action. However, Carson argues that each of these challenges would fall into place (or at least be dealt with better) if we just addressed the underlying issue: that Christians often do not know their God personally and profoundly. Carson concludes, "The one thing we most need in Western Christendom is a deeper knowledge of God. We need to know God better. ... In the biblical view of things, a deeper knowledge of God brings with it massive improvement in the other areas mentioned... and much more."

Part of the answer to this problem - a shallow knowledge of God - is found through prayer. Carson declares, "One of the foundational steps in knowing God, and one of the basic demonstrations that we do know God, is found in prayer - spiritual, persistent, biblically minded prayer." So Carson has written this book to examine the foundations of prayer, by examining the prayers of Paul, as he wrote them in his letters to the early churches and their pastors. It is his hope that we may therefore be able to learn from a master.

I'm looking forward to sharing more from this book with you. For comment: What connection do you see between prayer and the knowledge of God?

Next week: Lessons from the School of Prayer

[Cover image from koorong.]

Weekly Report 2008:36

As I mentioned on Saturday, last week all our academics were done in the afternoons, while Abigail and Samuel were napping. I've also begun doing phonics and reading with Anna first, then while she does her penmanship, I help Joshua with his phonics and reading lessons. Then Anna has a little bit of free play while Joshua finishes up his penmanship. This has minimised some of the whining and fighting for my attention. They still do maths together, but they both love it so there are few complaints over maths lessons anyway.(See what I mean? Who else has kids who build numbers with their Lego, or stand up at the breakfast table and show me how they can make a 4 with their legs?)

It is officially school holidays here in Western Australia, but since we took a week off to visit Albany earlier in the term (and most of another week to recover), our family isn't on holidays. Having no academics (other than Circle Time and literature read alouds, which we do year round) in the morning meant we were still able to enjoy participating in some fun activities out and about with friends.

On Monday
I took the kids to the fenced playground at Bunnings so they could play while I enjoyed a coffee at the internal cafe. We also bought 90 cents' worth of 6mm dowel, but that wasn't the point.

On Wednesday
The girls went to the B family to celebrate I's fifth birthday. After I dropped them off, I took the Boys to the David Buttfield Centre for an Anchor Boys event. As part of their devotions on serving God, the Anchor Boys had learnt two songs to sing for the residents during their Wednesday church service. Since Jeff's grandmother lives in this home, we went for a special visit to her as well. Joshua did a private performance of his two songs for her (she was not able to make it to the service), Samuel covered her in little boy kisses and I was able to talk to her about our anniversary and Jeff's latest sermon. I left before she got tired and she had a smile on her face, so I was very pleased I had been able to take the boys. Visiting with all four kids can be too overwhelming for her.

On Thursday
Jeff and I (secretly) went off to take a tour of the private school we are thinking we'll send Joshua to next year. At this stage we haven't told Joshua that we're definitely sending him, and the others know nothing about it, so we organised to leave Joshua with the (other) B family to play with their boys, and then drop the girls with the T family to play with their girls. We took Samuel with us, but then, to mis-quote slightly, "toddlers tell no tales". The kids loved their time with friends and I appreciated being able to take a 20min coffee break after dropping Jeff off for the train, in order to get my head straight before I collected all the kids.

On Friday
Having completely forgotten to send Sam to childcare on Wednesday, I had organised to swap his day to Friday. So on Friday morning we all walked Sam to childcare and I had a lovely chat to another mother as she walked most of the way home with us.
Jeff dropped the rest of us at a nearby shopping centre and then we were in for a treat. At Jeff's suggestion - well, insistence, I was completely against it to begin with - at $10 a pop, I paid $30 for the most expensive four minutes of Joshua, Anna and Abigail's lives to date. They have something a bit like a cross between a jumping castle and a bungy crane at the shops at the moment, and the kids each had a go. They were delighted!
My purse quite a bit lighter, I took the kids somewhere free: the library! While I browsed for books on the animals of Europe with limited success, they listened in on nursery rhyme and story time. What perfect timing we had.
We then scurried back to the shops just in time for the 11am show, a singing, dancing extravaganza of Mr Men and Little Misses, with Mr Happy, Mr Greedy, Little Miss Chatterbox and Little Miss Neat. Afterwards, Anna told me solemnly that "there are real people inside the Mr Men: I think they must have a zip at the back!"
So next we caught the bus home. Unfortunately, it was only once we were on the bus that I realised I had no keys to get into the house. So we went home anyway, dropped Josh over the fence to open the garage door, and took a pram with us to the local shops to buy lunch (Abi's legs were getting tired). Then we caught another bus back to the first shopping centre (where the train station happens to be) and took a train to Trinity to get the house keys, and thankfully, the car, from Jeff.
We still managed to get our literacy and maths lessons done that afternoon, so I am very proud of myself. We did have to order pizza for dinner though, my energy didn't make it that far through the day!

On Saturday
Last week Joshua sold lemons to earn some money and his next plan was to grow and sell carrots. Since that takes more than one week to pull off, this week Jeff told him he could earn two cents for every snail he collected from our back yard. I thought two cents was a bit stiff, but Joshua still managed to earn $1.80!! (For the mathematically challenged, there are now 90 snails suffering from the effects of salt poisoning on our backyard barbecue.)
In the afternoon Abigail announced, "I have to go to L's house. We have to be friends together!" So we tidied up the house a little and then walked three doors down to play with the S family, and another neighbour from across the street, R, who was already visiting. It was a great chance to chat with Mr S and kept the kids from being frantic for another hour or so.

But what about academics?

Circle Time
Jeff did some great storytelling about Moses taking the Israelite people into the desert and what happened there. When I do the stories, I tend to read straight from the Bible with only a few word simplifications, but Jeff does it as a storyteller, not just a reader. The kids are now quite familiar with How Deep the Father's Love for Us and were thrilled to be able to sing it along with the congregation last Sunday. We're learning Exodus 3:10-12a & 14-15a at the moment, one verse at a time:
12 "So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh
to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt."
11 But Moses said, "Who am I,
that I should go to Pharaoh
and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?"
12 And God said, "I will be with you." ...
14 God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM.
This is what you are to say to the Israelites:
'I AM has sent me to you.' "
15 God also said to Moses, "Say to the Israelites,
'The LORD, the God of your fathers -
the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob -
has sent me to you.'
This is my name forever, ... by which I am to be remembered..."

Literacy
Joshua finally finished the sixth book in the fifth set of Bob Books and to give him a break, we moved back to the Ladybird Phonics readers. He read the first two stories from the fifth book without too much problem, which was quite a relief after the struggles of the last few weeks. Anna continued to storm through a book a day from the fourth set of Bob Books. Next week, when I envisage she will finish the box, I'll have to give her some Ladybird Phonics books to read as well or Joshua might get a tad outraged that she has caught up to him already.
This week we did our penmanship (tracework for Anna, mostly copywork for Joshua) in the dotted thirds lined books I purchased from Wooldridges. We have also added in some work from a phonics workbook, Multiple Phonograms from the LEM Phonics program (you can see a sample here). I like that it is an Australian product, and it is providing the direct instruction on multiple letter graphemes that Joshua in particular needs and Anna is definitely ready for at the moment. I have been doing it with Anna at the dining room table while Joshua plays quietly in the lounge room and three times now Joshua has called out "I know a word with that sound" and has come up with a word that not only has the sound (all this week it has been "er"), but also the spelling we're studying that day. On Wednesday, he thought of Ursus maritimus, on Thursday it was earth and on Friday he came up with worthy. I am not sure whether this synchronisation was just random luck or if he has some level of recognition above what I have been giving him credit for. Anyway, when it comes time for him to do the task he has been doing quite well. He can recognise the graphemes in the word lists faster than Anna, yet she can remember what sound each grapheme represents faster than him. Strange, but that encapsulates their individual struggles with reading any word at the moment.

Literature
We didn't finish Adventures of the Wishing Chair but began on Five Children and It by Edith Nesbit because it has to be back to the library very soon. I have been reading ahead myself (I wanted to be sure it was suitable) and am loving it. You can tell it's a good kids' book when even adults love it. So far we're three chapters in.

Maths
We did a page a day with Maths, except on Wednesday, so we've now finished lesson 2 and begun lesson 3. The kids have already both grasped the idea that sums can be written vertically as well as horizontally. The book's way of presenting this, using pegs stuck to a strip of card, and showing it first horizontally and then vertically, makes great concrete sense. I wouldn't have come up with it on my own but it made the transition to vertical sums clear and simple.Science
We did a notebook page on Orangutans and I heard the kids playing at being "Pongo pygmaeuses" yesterday, so something must have stuck. That was all for Science this week, but I collected a few books on Swallows and other European animals from the library so we'll turn there next week.

Arts and Craft
Joshua wanted me to draw him some dinosaurs on Monday. I told him he could do a better job than me so he went off to prove me right. When he had copied several pictures from a book we have, he decided to build one in 3D from our Lego blocks. Some days, this boy just amazes me with what he can do!Class Time
I haven't mentioned our class time for a while but this week we have successfully memorised our home address and the colours of the rainbow in order. Just handy things to know.

That's it for this week. When I write it all down I realise our week was absolutely packed to the rafters!

Dreaming within my means

A few days ago I was driving through Wanneroo to visit a friend and saw this property for sale. If I had a million dollars handy, I'd love to buy it. It has a lovely back yard for the kids to play in!

But I have to be realistic. We sold our first house to finance three years of theological studies for Jeff and I cannot see us ever being able to buy another. Which is terribly sad, but by no means the end of the world.

There are other things in life about which we have to be realistic as well. Jeff and I have been reassessing our priorities and resources over the past week and we've just made a very sad (for me) decision. Next year, Joshua will be going to a local Christian private school for Year 1 instead of homeschooling.

Unless Joshua experiences a lot of difficulty fitting in socially because he hasn't been to an "away-school" before, we will still homeschool the others for the pre-compulsory years. This means I'll essentially be doing Year 1 with Anna at home next year because although she is too young physically and emotionally for five full days a week of institutional school, she's ready intellectually for the academics. She's done fine with the K5 maths along with Joshua and she'll be as good (if not better) at reading and writing as he is by the end of the year as well, I think.

There are a lot of factors in this decision, some good, some bad, some surprising. In part, I think this decision could have been avoided if I had been better organised (or rather, more disciplined in carrying out all the things I had organised to do). A big problem for Jeff is that I haven't been giving the littler kids enough attention and loving care because I have been so focused on the bigger kids' education. There are only 24 hours in a day and homeschooling has been taking more than two of them. I've been doing much of the homeschooling in the morning when the kids' brains were fresh, but this has really cut into my time with Abi and Sam. I didn't realise how much I had been relegating them to a far second place until I spoke to Jeff about it at length. As of this week, all sit down academics has been done in the afternoon after Abigail and Samuel go down for their naps, and it has helped free us up to do family things in the morning.

However, looking forward to the future, Jeff doesn't think homeschooling will be sustainable with (not too far in the future) our four kids all learning together. Part of the problem is that we have chosen to have our children so close together in age. (Not that I regret that at all, but that's another post entirely.) This means that if we were to continue homeschooling for the junior primary years, there would be a lot of individual tutoring needed, while I taught the kids to read and write well enough to do more of their work independently. There are things that all kids would do together (history read alouds, for example), but not everything could be done in this manner. The kids would always need some or all of their maths and literacy done separately, and much of it would need to be heavily supervised. I do wonder how early primary school teachers do it. I mean, they have not just four but 24 or maybe more kids who cannot read. Of course, they don't have to keep up with the laundry and cooking and cleaning and ... (fill in the blank) at the same time as they're teaching.

Another thing that Jeff and I have come to realise over the past week or so is that, because I have been able to do what I wanted with the homeschooling, I haven't been trusting God enough with regards to the spiritual welfare of our children. I have begun to forget that He loves them much more than I do and that He will equip them for the good works He has planned in advance for them to do - regardless of just how much input I have to their schooling. So when we talked about sending them to school, we talked about the possible challenges to their fledgeling faith of sending them to the public primary down the road. We talked about the friendships we oversee them making, and those they seem to be making without any help from us. We talked about me being available to "hang around in the background" while they play with their friends. We talked about raising them to be confident in their faith, so they could fit in with a crowd when it suited them, but shine like lamps on the hill when they needed to. And, after I checked out a few Christian schools online, I thought and prayed a lot about being a good steward of the things God has provided for my use: my money, time, talents and the access He has provided to educational facilities that are not solely within our family and home. While the school we have now applied for a place in is not "at home" nor "classical", it is "Christian", and this last description is far more important to me in the scheme of things. I know I can trust God with the education of my children, as indeed with all things, but unfortunately homeschooling allows me to convince myself it is I who is in charge. And I'm not. It's such a pity I had to learn this the hard way!

It's strange - the only things I thought might be reasons to send our kids off to school were academic struggles or "the socialisation issue" and these haven't been a problem for us at all. Our kids are learning to read well, they can write neatly, they love listening to good books, they know what an "Ursus maritimus" is, they get on well with homeschooling and church friends as well as the kids in our street. But I haven't had time to sit down and play with my baby enough, Jeff is getting sick of having to cook dinner and I am forgetting to rely on my Lord and Saviour for all things.

So this decision is terribly sad for me. We've been planning to homeschool for at least half a dozen years, and I've been doing very well with it (at least from an academic perspective) so far. But, as with never being home-owners, it's not the end of the world.

I am very thankful that we can enrol our children in an away-school where the teachers are all committed Christians and their fellow students will all come from families with at least one committed Christian parent. I am very thankful that I don't have to put Anna into full-time away-school when she's not yet physically or emotionally ready. I am thankful that Joshua will be able to learn art from a teacher rather than a text, since I can see he enjoys artistic activities immensely and is actually quite good at drawing. I remember how relieved I felt at finding a place for Sam on Wednesdays in childcare, and I am very grateful to be able to look forward to a time when, with my children all being educated outside our home, I will be free to help my husband in ministering to our congregation. Perhaps I might lead a Bible study for ladies during the day, teach a Sunday school class, do some more talks for women's and mothers' groups or just sit and chat with the neighbour who's recently divorced and hurting. I might even be able to go to classes at Trinity and learn Biblical Greek from a lecturer rather than out of a book!

Looking on the bright side does help. But ultimately, Jeff has decided this needs to happen and I need to submit to his headship in this matter. So that's how it's going to be.

A letter to the editor

Re: "Rudd set on paying working mums more" by Andrew Tillett, The West Australian Saturday, October 4, 2008 pg16Rudd’s plan to pay working mums more than stay-at-home mothers for their mothering care in the first few months is short-sighted.

Women who choose to stay at home for only a short period of time after their child’s birth experience minimal disruption to their career path and its financial rewards.

Women who decide to have subsequent children before returning to paid employment make a much greater financial sacrifice. They give up an ongoing income flow by not returning to work in the intervening time and also face greater barriers to picking up their career. They are often no longer employable in their previous field, certainly far from able to fit smoothly back into the vaunted career track, and must accept either a lower paid job in a different field or the added financial burden of re-training.

I have decided these disadvantages are outweighed by the benefits to my four children (and the community) of my staying at home. Others may not be financially free to make this choice.

Maternity pay for those who were already established in the previous “job” of stay-at-home mother is essential, if we are to encourage women to have more than one baby. Otherwise the only thing this new maternity leave scheme will do is reward families who choose to have less children – and Australians are doing that in droves already.

Answers and advice wanted

"How do we learn to strike the right balance between our family and home-making responsibilities and our ministry to others outside our homes?"

I'd appreciate any and all comments in answer to this question of mine, which Jean has kindly put out in the public sphere for me on her blog in all honesty.

Edit: See this follow-up post at in all honesty.

Weekly Reports 2008:34 & 35

Our last two weeks went well but there are big changes afoot and I will have to post about them another time. For now, this is a report on the last two weeks (even though it's half way through week 36 now!):

Literacy
Joshua is struggling through the much longer and increasingly difficult fifth set of Bob Books. He is finding the two vowels in combination graphemes (such as i_e and oa) really difficult to keep in his head all at once. I am trying to let him take it slowly but I could see he was needing some down time so in week 35 I gave him incidental reading only rather than persist with the readers. (We're back to them in week 36 though.)
Anna finished the third set of Bob Books in week 34 and after a big celebration, she also had week 35 off from readers as a reward. She's back in to them this week as well. She is doing much better with learning the multiple-letter graphemes. I am so proud of her!

Literature
We all thoroughly enjoyed reading The Wizard of Oz together. It did get tense at times (well, Joshua follows after me when it comes to being frightened by the least thrilling plot devices known to man) but I appreciated the way that the majority of problems were solved within the chapter or the one following (well, except for Dorothy finding her way home, of course, which had to take the entire book or there would have been no story). So even though Joshua was jumping on the couch over some bits, he would always be happy with the resolution at the end of our reading times.
We began to re-read Adventures of the Wishing Chair by Enid Blyton, which we read and enjoyed last year. The kids are liking it and it's a nice simple segue to our next book, Five Children and It by Edith Nesbitt, which has a similar theme of wishes being granted.

Science and Geography
The kids and I have thoroughly enjoyed reading about the animals of Asia and can now tell the difference between an Asian elephant an one from Africa. They can also tell whether a Pongo pygmaeus specimen is male or female. Can you? (Answer at the bottom of the post.) We also enjoyed reading about Siberian and Bengal tigers and checking out the tiger pages on the National Geographic Kids website. We watched the National Geographic DVD on the Siberian Tiger again as well.
One of our favourite things has been reading Asian folktales. In particular, we have enjoyed Children of the Dragon: Selected Tales from Vietnam by Sherry Garland illus Trina Schart Hyman, which has five delightful Vietnamese tales accompanied by a brief explanation of some of the elements of the tale (such as explaining the role of water buffalo in Vietnamese farming life, or the celebration of the moon festival, which was only recently celebrated by the Asian people at our church). We have also enjoyed Chinese Fables Remembered as told by Miwa Kurita, illus Saoko Mitsukuri, edited by Miyoko Matsutani. The two tales in this book have good morals (one promotes kindness and the other warns of the dangers of boasting). These were shorter stories than those in the Vietnamese book but nonetheless very enjoyable.
We completed a homemade atlas page on Asia courtesy of National Geographic's printable atlas site. (I think I am becoming a National Geographic groupie).

Mathematics
Anna is catching on to the idea of addition almost as fast as Joshua now and they had no problem with the lessons on writing addition sums. I am making sure I begin each and every lesson with a concrete representation of the addition sums we are learning about, and that is helping a lot. We're using fluorescent pegs, colourful plastic milk bottle lids, single Megabloks in various colours, and anything else I can think of as counters.

Poetry
We've just memorised "Whole Duty of Children" by Robert Louis Stevenson together and it raised a lot of questions. Joshua was outraged at the idea that children should only speak when someone speaks to them, but I explained it means that they should always respond when someone speaks to them. He was okay with that. Reciting it together was fun, despite my initial concerns that it was too "preachy". I am beginning to love poetry again, but mostly the poems with strong rhythms. I just don't get modern poetry.

Q: How can you tell an adult male Pongo pygmaeus from a female?
A: Pongo pygmaeus is the species of orangutan that is found in Borneo. (The Sumatran species is Pongo abelii.) The adult male has large black cheek pads and a bulging black throat pouch, which are both absent in the adult female.

8 years of marriage

Today was the eighth anniversary of my marriage to Jeffrey.

He came home in the afternoon with four pink proteas and one white one. These are the same flowers I carried in my bouquet those many years ago. I am so touched by his thoughtfulness.And despite the fact that we've spent much of the last week upset and arguing as we struggled with a very frustrating decision (more on that in another post), I am terribly terribly glad that I am married to this man. Jeff is kind and caring. He is strong and clever. He has a deep faith in God and it has made a huge difference in his life, with everyday things as well as with major life choices.

The last eight years of my life has been amazing. We've bought a house, and sold it to move interstate. We've had two boys, and two girls. We've both quit our jobs, me to become a homemaker and him to become a theological student, and he's now almost about to begin a new job. We've travelled overseas, and not just on our honeymoon. (We took three kids under three with us to England and Singapore.) We've taught our eldest children the foundations of reading, but we've also taught them the foundations of compassion and respect. I've learnt to cook without too much complaint, and Jeff has learnt to change pooey nappies without too much commentary. We've both learnt the value of sharing our problems as well as our successes. We've learnt a lot about God, much of it through discussing together what we've read in the Bible or heard from the pulpit. We've had fun with our kids and shared many secret smiles over their cutenesses.

I can only wonder at the possibilities of the next eight years of our marriage. Jeff is (probably) about to begin two or three years of being a "Candidate for Minister of the Word" in our denomination, which will entail more study, although it will be part time, and some more part time work at various churches and denominational organisations. Then (God willing!) he will begin as "Minister of the Word" with his first congregation. Our denomination usually makes placements for multiples of five years (with reviews between), so in eight years' time Jeff could be facing the review at the end of his first congregational placement. I never, never, never would have imagined I would find myself married to a minister. I was a pagan when I walked down the aisle to be married to him. One of the best things that has come from my marriage is that I met the LORD God face to face in His one and only Son, Jesus Christ, and was given the faith to place my life in His holy and gentle hands. Thank you God for the many blessings you have given me through my eight years of marriage to Jeff. Please help me to be a blessing to him as well!

Entrepreneurial adventures

Joshua has really enjoyed attending Anchor Boys this last term. Each night, there is a short devotion, which is part object lesson and part Bible story with application. The entire term their Skipper has been focusing on the idea that, despite being young, they are all able to serve God. The last week of term the topic was "Serving God with our money". Joshua has never really had any money of his own (we don't give pocket money). But full of the idea that if he had some, he could use his own money to serve God, this week Joshua decided to earn some money of his own. He was all ready to collect his earnings as the boys had made simple money boxes in the craft time at Anchor Boys that night.

So he has been collecting lemons from our tree and this Saturday, he and I went door to door down our street, offering "fresh, homegrown lemons" for sale for 20 cents. Surprisingly, not only did everyone who answered their door buy at least one lemon, we also had people give more than the asking price. One gentleman even gave him one dollar extra for his enterprising spirit! (It was a great opportunity for me to introduce myself to a few people who have moved into our street in the last few months as well.) Having also sold a few lemons to some of our dinner guests from Friday, Joshua earned $4.25 in his first week!

During the week Joshua had also made some envelopes in which to place his offering for church. On Sunday morning, we counted his money with him and explained how to work out what was reasonable to give: 10 cents for every (whole) dollar. We explained that God does not want us to give beyond our means and leave us destitute, but neither does He want us to be stingy with money that has, originally, come from Him. So Joshua worked out he would give 40 cents, and selected four 10 cent coins. He then wrote from Joshua to God on his envelope, drew a flower on it as well, placed his coins inside, and carefully stuck it together with sticky tape.
When we got to church on Sunday, there was some impatience! After almost every song or prayer I heard a whispered, "Is it time for the offering yet?" from either Joshua or the keenly watching Anna. When the offering bag finally came around, Joshua was very pleased with himself as he placed his envelope into the bag. And I was very proud of my little boy who has shown his desire to earn money so that he can gift it back to His God.

Streamlining Homeschooling

A few nights ago Jeff expressed concern that I wouln't be able to keep up with the demands of homeschooling as the kids get older and the younger ones join in more. There are just so many jobs to do, even aside from the homeschooling. Being a good wife, mother and homemaker takes time and energy, and I think Jeff is concerned I don't have enough to do everything I plan to do.

So does anyone have practical suggestions for streamlining homeschooling, other than just to buy a complete curriculum? I have some ideas already:

~ Buy some interleaved books from the teacher supply store with appropriate writing lines (I think they use "dotted thirds" in the schools here. I'd rather loose leaf paper than books but I don't think it's available here. The kids can do all their copywork, dictation, narration writing etc in the same book if they need to. Just having this, rather than using printed "notebook" pages which are slightly different for every task will cut down on time heaps.

~ When we want to illustrate our work using pictures from books, the kids can cut out photocopied pictures and glue them into their books rather than me scanning them and printing them together with lined paper as I have been doing this year. This would be good practice for them and help me to keep my obsessive nature under control!

~ History will of course be done with the Joshua and Anna together next year, and Abigail will join them when she drops her afternoon nap around the time she turns 4. I'm planning to use Story of the World and the Activity Guide that goes with it. I don't think we'll be using too much in the way of extra reading materials as recommended in the Activity Guide, unless they get really interested, because I think the main book is sufficient and probably way more than they'd be getting in a school.

~ I need to get a single book program for Science. Jeff's not keen on some of the Christian programs I've checked out, but they seem to be the only ones which provide enough information. The secular ones designed for the schools here are, in my experience, severely lacking in the amount of information they provide. Perhaps I will need to get some books from DK and we can work through them as The Well-Trained Mind suggests. I might have to get it back off the shelf and read through some of it again. But I don't want this to be difficult. Going to the library regularly for non-fiction books has worked this year, but there have been times when I've wished I had all the information together in one place.

~ I need to spend less time on the sticky wwweb. I've just culled my "blogs I read" list (this was really really hard) and also de-subscribed to several homeschooling yahoo groups and gone web-only rather than daily digest with another. I really love that particular group, and have been on it for years, but I do tend to feel obligated to read everything rather than just reading when I have time. I will need to be more disciplined about my blogging as well.

~ I need to stick to reading what I have planned to read and not reading the extra stuff that catches my attention. There are only so many reading hours in the day!

~ I need to go to bed earlier so I can wake up earlier. Days always go smoother when I wake up at 6am and read my Bible before the kids wake up, rather than playing catch-up throughout the day because I got up after them and still haven't spent quality time with my LORD.

~ In order to go to bed earlier I need to watch less TV. Truth to tell, I've been watching a lot of TV lately just to be near Jeff while he watches it (he likes to use the TV to wind down in the evenings). I just need to bite the bullet and realise that my time with him during the rest of the next day will be better quality if I'm in bed early in the evening rather than late at night after sitting next to him on the couch.

~ In all things, I need to be more self-disciplined and just do the next thing.

So, any other ideas? Non-homeschooling ideas that will help free up more time for homeschooling are welcome.

(Image from sxc.hu)

Grimms' fairy tales

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/grimm/

Elements of a fairy tale chart.

Thanks to Trivium Academy for pointing me back to fairy tales!

Tigers of Asia

National Geographic has information on tigers and they have colouring pictures as well.

The Siberian (Amur) tiger, Panthera tigris altaica is found in the extreme south east of Russia as well as some parts of northern China and Korea. It lives in woodlands which are snowy for much of the year.
http://www.amur.org.uk/tigers.shtml
http://www.tigerhomes.org/animal/curriculums/siberian-tiger-pc.cfm
http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngexplorer/0311/articles/mainarticle.html

The Bengal tiger, Panthera tigris tigris has it's largest population in hot and humid mangrove forests of India and is also found in Bhuta, Nepal, Bangladesh and Myanmar.
http://www.tigerhomes.org/animal/curriculums/bengal-tiger-pc.cfm
http://www.tiger.to/aft/info_bengal.html
Some Bengal tigers are "White" - they have a creamy white coat with brown stripes which are not as dark as normal Bengal tiger stripes.
http://whozoo.org/students/deechh/bengal.htm

The Malayan (Indochinese) tiger, Panthera tigris corbetti, lives in Thailand, southern China, Myanmar (Burma), Malaysia, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. They live in mountainous regions.
http://www.tigerhomes.org/animal/curriculums/indochinese-tiger-pc.cfm
http://www.tiger.to/aft/info_indochinese.html

The South China tiger, Panthera tigris amoyensis is the most endangered tiger species, being found in the southern and eastern woodlands and plains of China, but only very rarely seen.
http://www.tigerhomes.org/animal/curriculums/south-china-tiger-pc.cfm
http://www.tiger.to/aft/info_southchina.html

The Sunatran tiger, Panthera tigris sumatrae live only on the island of Sumatra, in Indonesia. They live in mountainous and lowland forests and have the darkest coat of any tiger. They are also very endangered.
http://www.tigerhomes.org/animal/curriculums/sumatran-tiger-pc.cfm
http://www.tiger.to/aft/info_sumatran.html

The Bali, Javan and Caspian tiger sub-species all became extinct during the 1900s.

Narrations from Chinese folk tales

Anna's narration of The Five Chinese Brothers by Claire Huchet Bishop:

The first Chinese brother went fishing. One day he swallowed up the sea. The first Chinese brother got some fish while he was still holding the water in his mouth. He made signs to make the little boy come back. But the little boy did not come back. The first Chinese brother thought he was going to burst. The water forced its way out of his mouth and went back to its bed. The little boy disappeared. The boy got drowned.

He got put in prison and on the day of the execution, he said to the judge, “Would you let me bid my mother good-bye?” “It’s only fair.” So the first Chinese brother went home and the second Chinese brother came back.

The executioner took a mighty blow ,but the second Chinese brother got up and smiled. His neck was made of iron and it could not be cut off. They decided he should be thrown into the water.

On the morning of the execution he said, “Would you let me bid my mother good-bye?” So the second Chinese brother went home and the third Chinese brother came back.

When they were far out to sea they threw the third Chinese brother into the sea. He began to stretch and stretch his legs down to the bottom of the sea, becoming deeper and deeper and deeper, for he was the one who could not be drowned. His smiling face bobbed up and down on the waves. Oh-oh. They decided he should be burned.

The next day of the execution, he said to the judge, “Would you let me bid my mother good-by?” So the fourth Chinese brother came back in his place.

He was tied to a stake and all the people stood around it. They heard him say in the fire, “It’s quite pleasant here”, and the people said, “Bring some more wood!” The fire grew higher and higher and higher and higher and they heard him say, “It’s quite comfortable here”, for he was the one who could not be burned. So they decided to smother him.

The fifth Chinese brother came back in his place.

They made a brick oven. He was put in the oven to smother him. It was filled with whipped cream. They stayed for an afternoon and the night to make sure. In the morning they took him out. He shook his head and said, “That was a good sleep.” The judge said, “You must be innocent.” “Yes, yes, yes!” cried the people.

Now the five Chinese brothers and their mother all live happily ever after.

Joshua's narration of Tikki Tikki Tembo by Arlene Mosel:

One day while the boys were playing around the well and on it, Chang fell. Tikki tikki tembo-no sa rembo-chari bari ruchi-pip peri pembo ran to the old man sitting down with the ladder and said, “Chang has fallen into the bottom of the stone well.” He pumped the water out of him and pushed the air into him, pumped the water out of him and pushed the air into him, until he was good as new.

They had a party to celebrate Chang coming out of the well. Until the ninth moon of the festival, they ran to the stone well with their rice cakes and also played on it and Tikki tikki tembo-no sa rembo-chari bari ruchi-pip peri pembo fell into the stone well.

Chang ran as fast as his little legs could carry him to his mother. He said to his mother, “Tikki tikki tembo-no sa rembo-chari bari ruchi-pip peri pembo... pip pip has fallen in to the well.” “My son speak your brother’s name with reverence!” “Tikki tikki tembo-no sa rembo-chari bari ruchi-pip peri pembo has fallen into the bottom of the stone well.”

He ran all the way to the old man with the ladder and he said to him, “Old man with a ladder, please come and fish my brother out!” The old man said, “You’ve destroyed my dream, I was dreaming of a purple mist. So, your mother’s Precious Pearl has fallen into the well.”

Tikki tikki tembo-no sa rembo-chari bari ruchi-pip peri pembo stayed in the well for so long it was a thousand nights before he got back to proper.

And ever since, Chinese parents always think it wise to give their kids short names, little ones.

[Cover images from http://lili-bee.com/Bookshelf%20Page.htm.]

I love playgrounds with fences

Especially if they have a seat for parents to sit on.

And if you can buy coffee nearby and get a free newspaper to peruse while the children don't wander off, well, that's pretty much my idea of a mother's paradise.

We had a leisurely breakfast at McDs this morning. It was sooo nice.

Happy Bloggy Birthday

Today this blog is officially one year old. Hooray! My first post was very short, unlike so many of the later ones.

I thought for my birthday post I might go back and comment again on my purpose in home educating our four kids.

As you can see under our home school crest, our purpose is "Equipping the children of our family to do the good works which God has prepared in advance for them to do", which is taken from Ephesians 2:10. This verse is referring to good works which God has foreordained for the lives of any of our children who, by the grace of God, become Christians. It is God's workmanship which ultimately will enable my children to do good works, because apart from the regeneration of God they are unable to do any good thing (Romans 3:12).

Therefore, it might seem strange and even presumptuous to plan to have any role in equipping my children for such holy service. Yet it is true in all things, that while God is sovereign, He chooses to work through human hands to achieve His purposes. (For an example, read Judges 9.) And so I home school in the knowledge that God is using me to form and shape my children into the people He wants them to be. They are His workmanship, but He is using me to mold them. They will do good in their lives according to the plan He has for them, but they will do so using the skills, knowledge, understanding and wisdom they gained from me as their teacher. I am thankful that God has chosen me for this task. And a little in awe.

Those days when I think things are difficult and we're not getting anywhere, it helps to realise the real Head Teacher of Equip Academy is the LORD Almighty. I am so thankful and glad He's in charge.

PS Happy Bloggy birthday to Amy at Veritas at Home as well!

(picture from sxc.hu)

Weekly Report 2008:33

Last week went very well, almost completely according to plan. Amazing!

Circle Time
We read stories of Joseph and his brothers and what happened in Egypt. We left out the bit about Potiphar's wife, but didn't have time for it even if it had passed the toddler-level censor. I overheard Anna singing the first four lines of "How deep the Father's love for us..." this morning so the first verse must have sunk in. I do think it's a bit slow for them, they don't seem as keen on it as the previous two or three songs. Jeff has been leading Circle Time a lot lately and I really appreciate his succinct applications and prayers at the end. We're learning two memory verses at the moment: Phil 2:14-16a (to counteract whinging) and Genesis 45:8 "So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God..." from the story of Joseph.

Literacy
Joshua is reading through the fifth (last) box of Bob Books half a book at a time, so he read book 3 and 4 last week. Anna has begun reading from the third set and is steaming ahead having read 1-4 last week. She seems to be picking up sight words (phonetic, but not using rules she's learnt yet) such as "was" and "saw" much faster than Joshua did. I am not sure if this reflects her better blending skill or her greater familiarity with the flow of words in stories. Either way, it definitely reflects her fascination with stories.
We didn't manage to do penmanship on Monday but the rest of the week went okay. I have increased the amount of writing Joshua is doing and it may be a bit to demanding for him. He's doing six lines (large writing, they take up a page with my three lines of writing to copy) or less. He did a fantastic narration of Dot and the Kangaroo on Tuesday. Anna didn't do a narration of it, we just couldn't fit it in. Oh well.

Literature
The kids are loving The Wizard of Oz. We read chapters 6 through to 14 last week, even with Joshua going out to Anchor Boys and Karate different nights of the week.
We picked up some picture books of Asian folk tales from the library on Tuesday and the kdis all adore Tikki Tikki Tembo ("retold" by Arlene Mosel and illustrated by Blair Lent), which I picked out because I remember it from my childhood. I have also ordered The Five Chinese Brothers (by Claire Huchet Bishop and illustrated by Kurt Wiese, who also illustrated The Story About Ping) through interlibrary loan.
The kids can now recite "Toad's Last Little Song" well, and really enjoy it. Even Abigail asks to recite poetry at other times, such as at bedtime. I'm so glad I thought of adding this into our day, because poetry has become a wonderful thing to share together.

Mathematics
We've begun Earlybird Mathematics 2B! We did the first half of the first "lesson", which is quite a long one. We're doing one page a day (three times a week, we do something different on Friday) and it seems to be moving very slowly with single-digit addition, but I am going as slowly as the book rather than let them move quickly because there's no reason to rush and I want to be sure they both get it. So far, they've had no problems with understanding what the + and = signs mean, so I'm pleased with that. We did a lot of extra problems on the magnetic sketchpad and our little white board, which they both enjoyed. Joshua can handle bigger sums in his head, I've noticed. Anna is fine with addends of 1-3 but she struggles if there's a 4 in the problem (mentally, with an image or fingers or whatever she does fine).
I've been trying to do addition sums with the kids when we've been out and about as well, with real objects to add together to help them with more examples.

Science/Geography
We went to the library on Tuesday and checked out a few books on Asian animals and folktales. I couldn't find anything on Pandas to my dismay but did find a book on the Siberian Tiger which we have a DVD about. We spent a day or two looking through the kids' atlases pages on Asia, and read a few books of folktales. I want the kids to be able to identify Indonesia and Singapore in particular because their Grandpa lives in Jakarta (Indonesia) and their Aunt immigrated to Australia from Singapore when she married Jeff's brother, so we have family connections with those countries. Of course, they've heard a lot about China in the last few weeks with the Olympics, so we're learning a bit about that as well.
Joshua and Anna went on a "bug hunt" with Joshua's magnifying glass one afternoon and came back inside having drawn some cute pictures (crayon, hardly any detail) of a spider, a beetle and an ant. Then Joshua treated Jeff and I to a spontaneous narration about insects, including the insight that "ants live in burrow nests underground. They like to burrow in cracks between the bricks. They prefer to burrow in sand, and especially like orange sand." This insight was based on the large number of ant sand piles we have in our undercover area outside, where there is obviously orange bricklayer sand underneath the bricks, rather than the white-grey sand of the yard and sandpit areas. The orange ant piles on the brown bricks are much more obvious than any ant piles elsewhere in the yard. What an investigator!

Craft
Pipe cleaner and plastic spoon insects, with the idea courtesy of Play School, were the hit of the week craft-wise. Abigail loved being able to join in with the tracing page as well. Her efforts were enough to tell me she has quite a way to go developmentally before she'll be able to join the bigger kids for penmanship! (Not that I didn't know that already.)

Outside Time
I have loved the warmer weather and sunny skies of the last week and the kids have flourished in their outside times. I am so glad we can finally get back out. They are settling much better at bedtime as a result of all the time outside and we've had a few more chats with neighbours than usual because they're out in their yards as well.

Evening Actvities
Joshua enjoyed both Anchor Boys and Karate this week. I was greatly saddened on Friday to realise I have another two badges to sew on - one for Joshua and one for Jeff for their Karate uniforms. Somehow it slipped my mind previously... I have no idea how!

A poem by Edith Nesbit

From the dedication page of Five Children and It:

My Lamb, you are so very small,
You have not learned to read at all,
Yet never a printed book withstands
The urgence of your dimpled hands.
So, though this book is for yourself,
Let mother keep it on the shelf
Till you can read. O days that pass,
That day will come too soon, alas!

This is exactly how I feel about so many of our books!

(Image from Dymocks.)

Dealing with whinging

Over the last few months Joshua's whinging has become worse. He does have good and bad days - or rather,bad and worse days - but there has been a steady downward progression. The girls can both be stubborn and everyone has been answering back a lot lately. They are never outright rude but can say things that are very disrespectful, such as "I hate you Mummy", or simply pull their "chook's bum face" and say "No!" They do obey instructions, but it is with much grumbling and downcast face.

I have been thinking a lot about how best to deal with this escalating situation. I know that I do need to start requiring first time obedience, that is, that they come to me immediately when I call their name. But I think I also need to teach them something about the whys and wherefores of this whole obedience thing. Children are told in the Bible, (Ephesians 6:1) "Obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right." They are also told (Colossians 3:20) "Obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord." These verses tell us and our children the what and why of obedience. So we, the parents, know that we should hold this standard before our children. But my children need to know more than the actual rule of obedience. They need to be taught what attitude they should adopt when obeying.

So the children and I are learning the following verses together. Philippians 2:14-16a tells us, "Do everything without complaining and arguing, so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life." (So far, we've learnt up to "without fault".) This verse is helpful to us because it tells us in what manner children should obey their parents (and in what manner wives should obey their husbands, or the inner prompting of the Holy Spirit): without complaining or arguing. No grumbling!

Not only that, but this verse explains why we should do everything without complaining: so that we may be the people God wants us to be, people who are righteous and perfect; according to God's standards, we are to be blameless. Furthermore, as we do things without complaining and arguing, we will shine like stars beside those who do not behave in such a way: the difference will be readily apparent between us and those who are not cheerfully obedient. We will be lights which point people to Jesus. Indeed, our obedience given without complaint or argument will enable us to effectively evangelise our friends and acquaintances, as we share with them the good news of eternal life through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. Wow!

These verses have given us magnificent inspiration for doing all things in a manner worthy of Jesus Christ, who died so that we might be justified before God's throne of judgement. I know that I am encouraged by my own words of exhortation to my children as I have repeated these verses many times over the past few days. And there has been a noticeable improvement in the children's attitudes, especially Joshua's. He has really been making an effort to do things without his usual whinge, and has stopped whinging very quickly when I have reminded him of the verse.

I must admit, I have also accompanied this doctrinal teaching with some earthly rewards: I've been giving the kids little yellow smiley stickers when I notice them being cheerfully obedient. Throughout the day, each successive sticker they get is slightly bigger than the last, symbolising just how good their attitude has been. Each new day, they start again with small stickers. They're competing to be the one child who can get the biggest smiley face of the whole page of stickers. I'm really pleased that this uniting of reward with reason is having the desired effect on their behaviour.

The best thing from my perspective, though, is that I am being challenged and drawn on to a better attitude myself. I too am trying to "do everything without complaining or arguing." You should have seen me last night, cleaning the disgracefully dirty floor (underneath where the washing machine had been up until it was moved to the garage for repairs yesterday). I just got right on with the job. The Holy Spirit is doing a mighty work in me this week!

(Image from Usenet.)

"I look like Livabef"

We're putting Abigail's hair in two side plaits at night now to avoid tangles.

Joshua's comment: "If you brush it, it won't be crooked any more."

Narration of Dot and the Kangaroo

Joshua gave the following narration of Dot and the Kangaroo by Ethel Pedley this morning:

Dot went into a forest. A kangaroo met her and then bounded away and got some berries. And Dot ate them.
She said, “thanks, could I please have some water?”
“Yes,” said the kangaroo, “but the nearest water hole is a long way off so we’d better get started.”
Dot began to get tired. “I wonder why you humans are made so badly,” said the kangaroo. “Get into my pouch. Okay, we’re off.”
Two birds were frightened. They said, “we’re so thirsty!” And they sang a song. They cried. Then they said to the kangaroo, “could you please go a little bit closer?”
She said, “of course” and went a little bit closer and said, “I think you’re safe now.” And a lot of animals came and Dot came and drank from the water.
Then Dot lifted up the kangaroo’s ear and asked, “can we go somewhere else for the night?"
And the kangaroo said “oh, anywhere you like my dear.”
Dot and the kangaroo went to the platypus and Dot said, “I know the Willy Wagtail.”
And the platypus said, “you must go to the Willy Wagtail, he will know your way.”
There was a man who was pretending to be a kangaroo and he chased them. There was a big rock they had to bound over. The dogs went under it in a different way.
The two birds met them and they said, “would you like me to do a call?”
“Yes, please,” she said and it sounded so loud that it sounded like a bunyip and frightened them away.
They found Willy Wagtail. Willy Wagtail sang a beautiful song to them and he said, “humans are nice to me so I’m nice to them.” And he said, “this place is near your home and you can go there.”
So they found Dot’s way and they went home. The people (when Dot came home) were so happy and the kangaroo got her joey back. The end.

It was quite a struggle getting him to be concise in his narration. At first, he wanted to narrate every single thing anyone said. Actually, that's pretty much what he did for the entire narration, now that I think about it. However, he was able to select passages of import to the story line, with my help, and so he did not feel the need to narrate every single episode of the entire book (thank goodness - it's 109 pages long).

I recently stumbled upon this article by Susan Wise Bauer (co-author of The Well-Trained Mind): Tips for Narration. She explains a method for building up narration skills by starting with very short passages and moving to longer ones once the child has demonstrated their capabilities. I think I will try this with the kids' science/geography narrations.

Mothering monotony

I spent one and a half hours today sewing two badges onto Joshua's Anchor Boys uniform. One for the hat and one for the shirt. I'm not a good sewer (I mostly only do buttons) and I don't even own a sewing machine. But I could not have imagined that this would take so long! I'm glad I had decided to give myself a reward for finishing (Guylian chocolates) otherwise I never would have managed it.Yes, I already noticed it's wonky. About half way through the second side, but by then I knew there was no going back.

I now have a much much better understanding of all the work my mother did on my behalf when I was a kid. I was in Brownies, Guides, GFS (Girls' Friendly Society) and also competed at state and interstate badge events for our family sport of Orienteering. It's a matter of irony that the longer I am a mother, the more I appreciate my own mum. (Yes, I already said thank you to her.)

Happy Father's Day Jeffrey

Did you know Emperor Penguin fathers are the ones who look after the egg and the tiny young, while the mothers go off to sea to find food?The mothers are away for an amazing two months before they return and the fathers can go and get their first meal.I am very thankful to my amazing husband Jeffrey for the feats he performs on behalf of our family. Not quite in the order of the Emperor Penguins, but every bit as special and necessary in their way.

(Images from the Australian Antarctic Division.)

Weekly Reports 2008:30, 31, 32

In the last three weeks, we took the middle week off for a holiday at my MIL's farm in Albany and then last week (with another two assignments for me to do for my night courses) we didn't do much. I'm glad we're only doing Kindergarten and Pre-Primary!

Circle Time
We haven't done much for the last few weeks, except finish learning "Consider Christ" and begin learning "How Deep the Father's Love". We have finished reading about Abraham and Isaac and Jacob are ready to move on to Joseph next week.

Literacy
Joshua has finished reviewing the Bob Books second set and we've moved on to the fifth set, of which he has read the first two books. He reads half of these a day and is finding them a much greater challenge but he has kept the skills of using his own finger to keep track of where he's at.
Anna has also just finished the second set (reading through it for the first time) and I am very proud of my big girl. She's going to start the third set next week.

Literature
This is one area we did keep on with at the farm. Over the past three weeks we've read Roverandom by JRR Tolkein, Dot and the Kangaroo by Ethel Pedley (an Australian children's classic from 1898) and begun The Wizard of Oz by Frank L Baum.
Surprisingly, Joshua hasn't complained about two books in a row with a female heroine. He was a bit overwhelmed when we got the animated movie of Dot and the Kangaroo out from the library, however (after finishing the book). It's about a young girl who gets lost in the bush near her home and is rescued by a kangaroo, and through a series of adventures finally finds the way she has lost - how to get home. The movie was really quite true to the book, with only a few stretches, but it ended on a much sadder note than the book. Instead of mentioning that the kangaroo always visited Dot and they remained friends because Dot's father had made their settlement a haven of sorts for bush animals, the movie ended with Dot weeping as the kangaroo left. This was very sad for the kids. I think they cope with things happening in books a lot better than they do on the TV: the visual elements are too confronting, especially for Joshua.

Mathematics
We have finally finished Singapore Earlybird Mathematics 2A. It ended with some lessons introducing addition and the 2B book begins with the same topic so it is great to see there's consistency. The kids are looking forward to starting a new book. Joshua is beginning to be able to do some very simple addition sums in his head (sums to five or less). He has got a good handle on it, and Anna can also manage simple addition when it is presented concretely (with objects, fingers or counters).

Science and Geography
We are finished with the polar regions now. The kids have loved reading and watching stuff about polar bears. We got a fantastic movie from National Geographic through the Sunday Times newspaper for only $2 and the kids really loved that in particular. Actually, they loved the entire series with the exception of the last on Dian Fossey and the mountain gorillas of Africa. That one was just too graphic and gruesome. We'll be beginning a study of China next week, if I can get some good books at the library tomorrow afternoon.

I'm looking forward to next week. Not least because I have now officially finished my two night courses. Provided I pass my assignments, that means I'll be able to graduate from the Certificate in Christian Studies at the same time Jeff graduates from his MDiv. Hooray!

I just downloaded some pre-writing sheets from Donna Young's amazing website. Now I am wondering if the bigger kids would like to use them (I am sure they would, perhaps we will use some for craft time when I am not up to 3D craft) but I am also thinking Abigail might like to join us for some lessons perhaps once a week. I'll see how we go.

Monster under the bed

Last month I found this monster having a nap in Abigail's bed:On Wednesday afternoon, I walked into my bedroom. There was silence - almost. Actually, I could hear the faint sound of snoring coming from under my bed. What could it be? A monster?
This is what I found when I pulled back the quilt:It wasn't a monster. It was my darling Anna, fast asleep!

aka Bob the Builder

Anna giving instructions to Joshua as to where the cushions should be arranged to make a house, according to his drawings plans: