Out of the Box

Photo credit:Hydroponics.com

 For years I struggled to get out of the box, away from traditional schooling with text books. I struggled and struggled with thinking this is the only way my children could get a proper education. I was brain washed by the public school system and did not know how to undo the damage.

I saw my children day after day despising their text book learning and screaming inside their little heads, "Let me out!" But, I couldn't this is the best way for them to learn, what else is there? Yes, we played games and I did my best to make learning fun, but I could still hear them screaming inside their little heads. They would come to me talking about what they were interested in and I blew them off thinking well that is a cool thing to be interested in. Never thinking I could take that love and nurture it through their education. During the early years I was able to be more relaxed with my second child and did gain some new insight. I felt that learning needed to have a strong foundation, like a house, and decided not to start any formal teaching of spelling, English, history or science until the fourth grade. Instead I wanted to give them a strong foundation of math, reading, writing and the Bible. However, I was totally open to any suggestions they had in the way of knowledge and ran with it.

My plans were blown, their father went home to be with the Lord and a year later the Lord blessed me with a new husband and home. We moved from Chicago with everything at our finger tips to the middle of nowhere in West Tennessee. My daughter was about to start her freshman year of high school and was very bitter at the move and location. The school systems were better than those in Chicago and contained a nice number of Christians including the principle who would preach from time to time. There was a little country school for grades K-3rd, my husband knew the principle and the community raved about this little school. My heart broke as I sent my babies on that horrible yellow bus. Now what was I going to do, my middle child was starting third grade and my youngest was starting first.

                                                                                                         To be continued...