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Homeschool Evaluations Completed! Then Why do I Feel Like Such a Failure?

/ Anne (Grace is my Superhero) / 2 Comments

The end of this school year was awful!  It was not what I had wanted it to be, and I felt like a failure.

I was homeschooling two elementary students and my special needs daughter with my preschooler always present.  I also had a son catching the bus early to a private school, plus a middle schooler and a high schooler doing cyber at home, plus two adult children going in and out. 

                I love being home with my children and I enjoy homeschooling. I am thrilled to investigate new wonders or to travel to storybook worlds with my children. My joy is complete when they are thrilled right along with me!

                We started in the early summer, so we took our laid-back time.  We enjoyed field trips, reading books, and doing whatever we wanted. How I adored homeschooling then!

                In the fall we settled into a good routine with the Pledge of Allegiance, prayers, Bible reading, flashcards, workbooks, and reading out loud to each other. The children were excited to have new workbooks, and they worked happily beyond what I assigned each day.

                However, as the year went on, we got a little tired.  I should say that I felt exhausted, and the children felt bored.  We took a break from the normal routine for Christmas and studied Swedish customs, food, and Kristen, an American Girl from Sweden.  In early spring I took a week and a half off, hoping that I would regain my joy and strength.

                The problem was life kept on going with all the same errands and doctors’ appointments to attend to.  I love being at home with the children.  I despise giving up that time to get the necessary things done.  Somehow, I had scheduled more appointments than usual right before our evaluations this year.  Other events popped up and accomplishing days toward our required 180 became like feats of great strength.

                “It will be fine.  It always works out,” I kept telling myself. 

Still, I felt so overwhelmed that some moments I could hardly remember the next thing I should be accomplishing. A wild mob of other tasks were on my calendar and on my mind, taunting me ruthlessly.  Every time I had to leave the children with their workbooks to tackle another pressing concern, I felt like a failure.

                “This is not what homeschooling is about!” I would lament. “It is not about workbooks and crossing off days.  It is about a love for learning, a love for God and each other.”

                The love was growing cold.  I was stressed out and my children were noticing.  My children were not excited about school anymore and I was noticing.  Were they learning anything at all?  What about that travel video I wanted to watch with them that we never got to?  Had they remembered all the states in the US, or had they forgotten them already?  Annalise just flew through her 1 grade math, but why couldn’t she remember her addition facts?   Was school doing any good for Ashlyn as she remains at a preschool level year after year, or should I just graduate her already and admit defeat? 

                These questions were plaguing me one morning, about a week away from our evaluations.  I felt like a horrible teacher and a very un-fun mom.  Courage (who was completing 3rd grade) turned to me and said, “You’re the best mom ever!”

                He had been saying this a lot lately.  He had even taken up the habit of making it a song, “You’re the best mom ever!”  He would sing out raucous notes while bounding through the house.  I hadn’t given it much thought other than, “How am I supposed to think around here?”

                But just then I stopped and let the moment sink into me.  Courage truly thought I was the best mom ever.  He was sitting next to me smiling and hugging me ferociously, and I finally just relaxed and received it.

                I felt the Holy spirit Remind me, “You are not a failure.  Your children love you. And they love me. What could be more important than that?”

                As I began compiling all the homeschool logs and workbooks and writings and field trip pictures, I began to remember the joy again.

The Joy of exploring Virginia for the first time on vacation.

The joy of butterflies and kids’ games in the sunshine at Paulus Orchard.

The joy of listening to Dr. Dolittle on CD for the first time, and then the second, third, fourth….

The joy of learning about the ocean and then taking our very first family beach day.

The joy of celebrating Santa Lucia day with our own Annalise as Santa Lucia.

                I was still feeling nervous about the evaluation.  We really hadn’t accomplished very much in my mind.  No large projects or epic masterpieces.  But as our sweet, wonderful evaluator looked over our logs she said, “My, you have been busy this year, haven’t you?”

                It was a busy year!  But only what was done in love had any value.  As I look back, I can say that MOST was love.  Perhaps next year ALL can be love and joy! 

                I figure I have a month to soak in summer and God’s loving kindness before I need to plan and begin again.  Perhaps I will feel so refreshed that I will finally be able to write that article that was alive and active in me two years, “I was a Homeschool Dropout, what I learned that allowed me to begin again with joy.”

                Blessings to all you homeschool moms!  Your love and faith are never in vain, and you are not a failure!

I Found the Words of God on a Coffee Sleeve

/ Anne (Grace is my Superhero) / Leave a comment

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I had just written the rough draft of my last article about the passing of my neighbor, Sandy.  I had a heavy heart, feeling that I had failed God and failed Sandy.  Writing the article had evoked deep emotions in me, and I was still trying to sort them all out.  It was a dark Wednesday night, and I was attending a meeting for those helping with the annual Women’s Breakfast at my church.

The women’s ministry at Life Center is always planning lovely events.  The goal is that every woman who attends would experience a special touch from God and hear his voice personally.  Each time there is a creative way to give a personalized, encouraging word to every woman.  There have been ribbons, medals, bracelets, necklaces, compasses, mugs, purses, and book marks given out.  The item contains some sort of message (such as a scripture verse, a single word, or phrase) and has been prayed over.  Every one of the gifts that I have received over the years has been special to me.  The scripture that I received at the Women’s Conference last March sustained my faith through the events of the past year.

At the meeting, each of us got to pick a coffee sleeve with something special written on it.  I randomly picked a sleeve that had “Matthew 10:42” nicely hand written in black pen.  I looked up the scripture on my phone and it read:

“And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is my disciple, truly I tell you, that person will certainly not lose their reward.”

I thought, “Oh that is nice.  I certainly give out lots of cups of water to my children.”

But then a new thought broke into my own, with a brilliance that I have come to recognize as the Holy Spirit.

It was a thought of Sandy and the times I brought her soup.  God was telling me that I would have a reward for the small acts of kindness I had done for her!  I felt so humbled and in awe of a God that would reward me even though I had fallen short of my goal of introducing Sandy to Jesus.

What a good and generous God I have!!!!

The next day I got into my van to drive to the grocery store.  I turned on the New Testament CD that was already in the CD player.  And guess where the CD started that day?

Matthew 10:42

That Saturday was the day of the Women’s Breakfast.  I arrived early to welcome women to the table I was hosting.   I was praying that everyone would feel loved and blessed.  I encouraged each woman to pick a coffee sleeve when they went to get their coffee or hot cocoa.  I had the opportunity to pick a second one for myself.  When I read the words, again I wanted to cry!  My heart was so full of the goodness of God.

“Writing a New Chapter”

I love to write and have been working on this blog for a year and a half now.  I would love to write a book someday…lots of books in fact!  But I tell myself that it doesn’t matter if anyone else notices or even likes my writing.  I am doing it for myself and my children, so we never forget the marvelous things God has done for us.  Sometimes I feel rather silly, spending so much time writing down the little details of my life.  Yet I feel the words are like fire in my bones that won’t let me go until I write them down.

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Here God was telling me that the writing was from him!  And that I would be writing about a new chapter.  Our lives could sure use a new beginning!

This “word from God” was confirmed a few weeks later in a most unusual way.  Each year I choose a foreign country to study at Christmas time.  When all of my children were homeschooled, we would take a break from the normal school and learn about this country.  Then we would incorporate the Christmas traditions and food of this country into our own holiday celebration.  We have studied Sweden, Germany, Russia, Spain, and Italy.  Each year, one of the resources we used was the World Book series on Christmas around the World.  The books always contained interesting facts but were very dry reading.

This year, even though I am only homeschooling my special needs daughter, I chose Ireland.  I just love to learn about other countries so much, I couldn’t give up the tradition.  As I read the first few pages of the World Book called Christmas on the Emerald Isle, I was struck by the emotion and passion in the writing.

“On Christmas night, there is another custom – the telling of stories.  The oldest member of the family gathers everyone around the hearth or table and recounts the story of Mary and Joseph.  The tales, of course, don’t stop at Bethlehem.  There are yarns about the family, about the famine, about the great heroes and villains of Irish history…While the Swedes have 25 versions of the Cinderella story, the Irish have 311 and are still counting.  Christmas night is not, or course, the only appropriate time for storytelling.  Any occasion will do, and the Irish have a story for any and every occasion, for every event of life…By extracting the meaning from every event of life and turning that understanding into a parable, the Irish preserved their culture and taught their children a sense of history, justice, and identity.”

My heart burned within me as I read these words.  That is what I wanted to do!  I felt that God was saying that my passion to write was there for a reason…because he had put it there.

It went on to say, “If life was short and bitter, the memory of that life was not.  Filled with victory and joy, the memory became a living thread that passed through the consciousness of generations of Irish men and women. As long as the stories survived, the lives and events that inspired them survived and had meaning.”

I must have a bit of the Irish in me… and in the midst of trouble and sorrow, the goodness of God keeps overwhelming me…and giving me stories that I just have to tell!