home educating – everything He gives

another school year begins

August 30, 2019August 30, 2019 MarthaKimballLeave a comment

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I have been trying to get this post up for two weeks now but we have been busy getting our “school legs” back under us again, and also I’ve not been feeling well with full-body hives all over since Tuesday morning of this week (honestly made me feel really strange). So, here I am with a post at long last, and a good long one for you today, too!

We are wrapping up our second week of school today, and it has been good to back in this rhythm, finding our way once again through what always feels a bit like new and unfamiliar territory. This is our fourth year homeschooling. Phoebe is in 3rd grade, Noah is is 1st. I’m not doing any formal schooling with Philippa or Wren, although Philippa is participating for the first time in our weekly co-op (Classical Conversations) in her own class so she is getting some instruction here and there. However, there’s no real pressure or expectation on her yet. She’s only 4 years old and I’ve always erred on starting my children later than earlier, longing to give them as long of a childhood as possible to explore and wonder without busying up their day with book work. Philippa can join in and do whatever work she finds interesting but when she tires of it she happily trots off with Wren. I see a new little bond forming between the two younger girls as they begin to have longer morning stretches playing together while the older two are engaged in work.

Every year this endeavor becomes both more comfortable and more daunting. Children grow and change, their needs, weaknesses, and strengths fluctuate and we keep a close eye on where help is most needed. While I gain more understanding of my little learners and myself as a teacher, there are always new wrenches thrown into our best laid plans and the home dynamic changes as the littles grow and interrupt in different ways. I understand now why older more seasoned homeschool mommas told me at the outset 4 years ago that I would need to be prepared to be more tired than I ever imagined. I can feel that now and we aren’t still that far along. Truly, this is such a monumental task. Teaching to multiple ages, keeping a close eye on their progress, adjusting as needed, juggling the work of being both their mother and teacher–it truly is far harder than I imagined. I am learning so much about myself, and also my understanding of “education” is really shifting and morphing, coming from a traditional public school background. I studied Outdoor Education in college, which falls under the umbrella of experiential education. I fell in love with that major because I found it to be so effective, teaching and learning experientially. I am thankful for that background which helps just ever so slightly as we find our way along this arduous journey. I never imagined giving so much of my life and mental energy to this work, but I do truly love it, even despite the many days and moments where I feel totally overwhelmed and under qualified. I don’t know where this journey will lead us, but I feel confident we are in the right place.

And so we embark on another year. Even as a child, I loved the beginning of a new school year, the fresh supplies, the excitement about growing older and discovering new things. I try to fill our children’s hearts with that same eagerness, purchasing some fresh supplies, filling our morning basket with new books, showing each of them what they’ll be tackling this year and asking them what they hope to learn as well. I love dreaming up a few field trips or ways to bring learning to life. I love surprising and delighting them.

Occasionally I get questions about what curriculums we use and I always hesitate to answer because I guess I feel inadequate in a lot of ways and it feels vulnerable to open our little humble home school to others opinions. I also feel like there’s a lot of temptation for us mommas to compare ourselves to one another and measure ourselves against one another, which is never the goal. However, if those specifics can be helpful to someone, then I’m happy to share. I’m still learning and fumbling my way through this in so many ways, and nothing is done perfectly. We have many frustrating moments, and there are tears and arguments had by all. Such is the nature of being together 100% of our time.

I have always used The Well-Trained Mind by Susan Wise Bauer as the backbone for our curriculum choices. We have also always done one day a week with our classical community (Classical Conversations) which takes a bit of pressure off as they provide basically everything except language arts and math. I love the emphasis on memory work through music and am always amazed at my children’s capacity to memorize huge amounts of information. They always astound me! This year I am beginning to do more Ambleside Online readings as I’ve always been drawn to move fully in that direction. Charlotte Mason’s philosophy has resonated with more than any other approach I’ve encountered. Some other books that have been instrumental in shaping our home school have been For the Children’s Sake by Susan Schaeffer MacAulay, Mother Culture by Karen Andreola, Charlotte Mason Companion by Karen Andreola, The Brave Learner by Julie Bogart, Teaching From Rest by Sarah Mackenzie, The Hidden Art of Homemaking by Edith Schaeffer, Mere Motherhood by Cindy Rollins, and Home Education by Charlotte Mason. There are many I’m forgetting, I’m sure, but these have been so helpful and memorable.

Last year was such a challenge with our mornings being interrupted with a baby who needed mid-morning nursing and nap time and who was frequently up in the night, leaving me very groggy and slow to get up in the mornings. It felt like we weren’t getting into a good groove until 10 am. This year I am enforcing a stricter schedule for our morning and it’s been making a huge difference. I am getting up far earlier to ensure that I have time to enjoy coffee, the scriptures and some knitting before our day begins. Phoebe begins promptly at 8 am with math, which is her most challenging subject and it is her preference to tackle it first rather than dread it. (My aim this year is to recapture her wonder and love for math, if at all possible.) By about 8:30 am Noah begins and I bounce around between them both doing hand writing, copywork, grammar, spelling, reading, and math until about 10am. Then we break for snack and morning time — scripture reading, hymn singing, catechism memory work, poetry, ambleside readings, or whatever else strikes our fancy. Then we get back to work wrapping up whatever we can until 11:30 am. If the weather allows we head out for a walk. By noonish we are having lunch, some read aloud time, naps, and then everyone has a quiet time from about 1-3pm. This break allows them to read or play, while the little girls sleep. During this time I usually catch up on housework, workout, rest/knit, or work on this blog! If we still have work in the afternoon (usually history, science, nature journaling, or art), we will finish that up between 3-4pm. Then they are free for the remainder of the day and usually encouraged to spend the rest of the afternoon outside. As the warm days give way to cooler temps they will enjoy being outside for longer stretches. Of course we still do some read-aloud or game time in the evenings before bed and we finish our day off with scripture and prayer once again. I try to allow for at least one day a week that we do lighter work in order to be able to get out for a fun outing or hike. I’m also trying to fit in a few more extracurriculars, like music lessons and sports. Anyway, that’s a loose picture of what we are attempting this year and so far it is working more smoothly.

I finally named our school this year after deliberating over it for, well, the past few years. A name that we will carry with us throughout the years feels important and shaping somehow. So, I have named it Scattered Beams Academy after a very favorite quote of mine from Jonathan Edwards:

“The enjoyment of God is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. To go to heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely better than the most pleasant accommodations here. Fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of earthly friends are but shadows; but God is the substance. These are but scattered beams, but God is the sun. These are but streams. But God is the ocean.”

And these words by Matt Papa in his book Love and Live reflecting on this quote:

“The creation is ‘scattered beams’–God’s artwork, full of glory and dignity. But Christianity is not secularism–we do not run to the world. We don’t feast upon the world for its own sake, because these are just ‘scattered beams.’ They are not the sun, and thereby they are unable to bear the full weight of our worship and interest. To be a Christian means we don’t from the world, and we don’t look to the world. To be a Christian means we look through the world. Idolatry looks at the world in amazement. Worship, true worship, looks through it in amazement. To its source. To the One who is infinitely more amazing. More interesting. These things God has made–these shadows, these scattered beams, these shallow streams–are good. And God is better.”

Romans 1:20 tells us that God has revealed his invisible nature and eternal qualities in everything that He has made, so we can look at every subject as a scattered beam that points us back up to the source, the brilliant Sun which we cannot gaze on directly but by which all things are visible, beautiful, enriched, alive. Every creature and every subject of study has value and finds its place in the kingdom of God, revealing His nature, His beauty, His order, His brilliance, His delight, His creativity. I could go on. 😉 It is our aim to see everything through that lens and find Him in everything. (Hello, name of my blog..)

So that’s a little bit about us, four years in. To everyone else who is beginning a new year, whether homeschool or public, private or some combo in between, may we do that work before us (of shepherding our child’s hearts and minds) with diligence, with curiosity, with fresh eyes and faith, with joy and dependence on the one who breathes the energy and ingenuity into our sails daily. And to the students, which is hopefully all of us in one degree or another, let us keep an open learning mind! Know that I’m cheering you on from here, dear ones!

home and away

May 31, 2018May 31, 2018 MarthaKimball2 Comments

“The Scarecrow listened carefully, and said, ‘I cannot understand why you should wish to leave this beautiful country and go back to the dry, gray place you call Kansas.’

‘That is because you have no brains,’ answered the girl. ‘No matter how dreary and gray our homes are, we people of flesh and blood would rather live there than in any other country, be it ever so beautiful. There is no place like home.'”

-The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

In a recent blog post I shared all about planting our garden, only to discover on this past Saturday morning that the bulk of what we had planted had been eaten by a family of groundhogs. Our entire day Saturday was spent rectifying the situation, digging a 1 ft deep trench around the garden and putting up fencing. It was an all-day slog, half of it done in pouring rain and in between nursing and napping babies and feeding children. It was a ton of hard work and come Sunday, I just wanted to get out of the house. It can be a point of tension for Brandon and I sometimes on the weekends–he, working outside of the home and eager to be home and rest and work on projects here. I, working inside the home all week, eager to get out on the weekends and be refreshed elsewhere. On Sunday he agreed to drive up to a favorite spot of mine on the parkway for a hike and picnic. No sooner had we hiked to the top of the ridge and he took a few photos for me of my finished Timber cardigan, when the skies opened up and began pouring on us again. We got back to the car muddy and soaked (again) and ended up eating our picnic in the car at a pretty overlook. It was fun and refreshing. But still, when it was all said and done everyone was eager to go home and get cleaned up.

It’s funny how our ordinary days can feel so gray and blah sometimes and we are eager for more beautiful country, but in the end there really is no place like home. In the end most of our lives are lived in the ordinary moments, and it’s these I’m convinced we’ll look back on with the most fondness. All the glory we didn’t realize was such until later. I think that’s why I teared up when I read that quote from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz while reading to the children. Sometimes it feels like we aren’t doing enough, sometimes I feel like I’m not giving them enough, like I’m not enough. Like these days are too gray and dreary for them compared to all the fancy and exciting things other families are able to do for their children. I’m hoping that this proves true–that there’s no place like our home for them, our simple ordinary growing-up-together years.

We are wrapping up our final official day of school TODAY (!!!) and with tomorrow’s fresh new month begins our “summer break.” Now, of course, I don’t plan to quit all things educational, but our schooling will look less like ploughing through the necessities and more like soaking in our curiosities. I hope to do lots of reading on a blanket in the yard, lots of adventures and hikes and exploring. Learning along the way, delving deep into whatever strikes our fancy. Making time for crafts and fun, garden discoveries and kitchen experiments, field trips and camping. Sadly, these are the things we have so little time for during ordinary school days. I read a comment by a fellow homeschooling mom recently who said they don’t take breaks for summer because schooling is their way of life and they don’t feel the need to take a break from it. I’m trying not to feel “less than” upon reading that. The reality is, the last couple of months have been quite a challenge with Phoebe and getting our work done and she and I both need a break. I don’t think a break or a shift into more passive learning is a bad thing or gives schooling a negative connotation. The reality is, learning is hard work sometimes, and taking a break can be refreshing. Just like escaping to the mountains for a rainy hike makes coming home all the sweeter. I so want to recapture for her (and I!) the joy of learning and discovery and remind her that learning is a part of every facet of daily life. But at 7 years old, I don’t feel the need to constantly call everything we do “school.” I believe that giving the children a wealth and breadth of experience and information will enrich their minds and souls. I still think they need long stretches of play, free time, time to explore, imagine, and discover on their own. What better time than summer for such things? So yes, we will keep practicing flashcards and we’ll keep reading books together, but mostly we are hoping for some fun and some adventures.

planting days

May 25, 2018May 25, 2018 MarthaKimball1 Comment

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The last couple of weeks have been busy prepping and planning for our vegetable garden. We had prepared the ground and then had about a week straight of nonstop rain, as did most of the eastern US I believe, and then we thought we better get things in the ground when we had a few sunny days while we were able. We are very amateur gardeners really, and still learning a lot as we go. Last year we did maybe a third of the plot we prepared this year and had an over-abundance of veggies. (We had just moved into the home and rushed to get a few things in the ground. Then I found out I was pregnant and was so super sick I couldn’t go near the garden or smell or even look at any of the produce from it. So weird, I know, but when I’m pregnant all vegetables and basically anything food related make me sick. 😉 SO we ended up blessing our neighbors with all of our organic produce.) This year we wanted to expand the garden and grow some new-to-us things, branch out a bit from our usual swiss chard, zucchini, herbs, cucumber and tomatoes. We went a bit crazy at the garden store, as we usually do, finding things we were excited to grow. Phoebe also wanted a square of the garden for her very own and when asked she mainly wanted to grow strawberries and flowers. Her science segment for this part of the year has been plant life so this is perfect for some hands-on learning. We’ve done a few things together from this book and then found this cookbook from the library, which has been fun to read together and pull some lessons from and also learn about as we plan what we want to grow. Phoebe is the pickiest eater I’ve ever known and we’ve tried many things to get her to branch out in her eating (including occupational therapy, etc). Growing our own food is somewhat of a necessity because of the cost of feeding a family of six on a mostly grain-free diet, but also we want our picky eaters to maybe be inspired to try eating the things they’ve grown themselves (one can hope!). Last summer when I was spending most of my days alternately gagging and laying on the couch, noah and philippa spent hours every day in our tiny garden plot picking all our ripe produce for me. I couldn’t believe how much they loved it and took ownership of it when I was laid out.

Phoebe and I planted a few things from seed which really intimidates me because I’ve never had great success from it. I feel like planting from seed should be intuitive and primal but somehow I really fail at it. Maybe this will be my year?! I’ll keep you posted. I had seeds for carrots, dwarf kale and purple top turnips, so phoebe and I planted those, along with a few pots of herbs. They’ve been sprouting up abundantly and that’s been so neat for the kids to see! And me! Every time it feels like a curiosity–this tiny seed, buried in the dark soil, this miracle of tender sprout and leaf. Now, for transplanting things and hoping they take off well from there.

Brandon and I spent much of last Sunday getting the bulk of it in the ground, and I’ve been sowing the remaining seeds with the children during the week when we’ve had bits of time. We’ve planted a couple varieties of cucumber, some yellow squash and zucchini, green and red bell peppers, sugar snap peas and regular peas, sweet potato, a plethora of strawberry plants, swiss chard, beets, romaine lettuce, asparagus, fennel, basil, chives, oregano, sage, cilantro, (our thyme and rosemary came back from last year), marigolds and nasturtiums for pest control, and five different varieties of tomatoes. Phoebe planted purple coneflowers and zinnias as well as strawberries in her corner of the garden. All of the children have been so interested in helping plant and weed.

I wasn’t raised growing vegetable gardens so I don’t have much working knowledge, but I’ve always been interested and awed and somewhat mystified by it all. Many summers when I was growing up we would drive up as a family to my extended family in Ontario, Canada and usually would spend a few days with my grandparents on their cozy little farm before heading up to the Muskoka lakes. As soon as we would arrive usually we would take a walk through their extensive gardens, go visit my grandpa’s beehives and workshop where he extracted the honey. I wish I had paid more attention to it all and asked more questions and soaked up more of their knowledge. I felt somehow daunted by it all but drawn to it. Already today I’ve seen all our sweet potatoes tender little leaves have been chewed off and a good portion of our lettuce plants too, so I think John the Rabbit has been visiting when the children have left the yard vacant. Onto the task of protecting and nurturing all that we’ve planted and hoping for a happy yield! Right now it is all looking so tidy and sweet, but it’ll be a lot of work and come July it’ll be downright unruly, I know.

an overmountain field trip

September 20, 2017 MarthaKimballLeave a comment

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Last week I took the children on a little homeschool day trip along with our co-op to Spruce Pine, NC where the annual Overmountain Victory Celebration is held. What an awesome opportunity it was to explore a living history of the 1780s militia encampment, learning about the time period and the history of the Overmountain men fighting British forces. Phoebe relished the chance to dress-up sort of Laura Ingles style (her interpretation), and she was pretty enraptured with each station, learning about fabric dying, fire starting, cooking over a fire, corn-husk doll making, how to use the lucet (knitting fork), and the general dress and culture of this time in history. It was fun to bring to life the period of history we are studying for her, and I so appreciated all the people who gave their time and energy to make something like this happen. We all had a really fun day and each learned a few things! Noah and Philippa were only mildly amused, mostly enjoying rolling down the grassy hill. Still, I love including them and planting little seeds and curiosities in their minds.

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