Worldly

Vicky left this comment on Homeducation and I want to address this topic separately, so, a new post.

Hi Natalie,

It’s interesting to read your thoughts about this. I don’t have kids myself but I hope to one day and I am a Christian. I can see your point about standards and certainly teaching a child on a one-to-one basis with a curriculum tailored to them and taught in a way that suits them, is going to get the best out of them. I also agree that sometimes school systems force children to grow up faster than they should by giving them sex education too soon etc.

But I can’t help thinking that as Christians we are called “to be in the world, but not of it”. If I do have children one day, then I wouldn’t home-school them, because they need to learn how to deal with worldly situations in a godly way. One day children leave home, they go to college, they go out and get a job, they have to go out into the world at some point. Will they have the ability to deal with the adult stuff, if they haven’t learnt how to how deal with the kids stuff in a godly way?

And what about telling their friends about Jesus? What about showing their friends about Jesus by their actions. If they’re at home, perhaps with just siblings, they can’t do that. Sure they’ll be interacting with others kids at some point, perhaps a dance class or after-school activity, but it’s limited to an extent and the opportunities for witnessing are fewer.

Christian parents can still teach their children how to try to live by God’s standards, that God comes first, but children need to learn how to apply that as they live in the world and I just think that home-schooling, whilst it has many advantages isn’t necessarily going to prepare them for the world when they eventually go out into it.

Just my 2 cents anyway. I hope you don’t mind me saying so and I do wish you well with the home-schooling.

Hi Vicky, I’m glad you commented today. You brought up a whole other topic I didn’t want to get into in the post, but it’s important. First I want to urge you not to make decisions now for children you don’t yet have. :)

Now, believe me, I have gone over and over this issue in my heart, and in prayer and the answer I keep getting is this:

The call to be in the world and not of it is a call to adults, not children.

To ask a child to take on this kind of responsibility is unfair. When you have a child and you become responsible for the well-being, spiritual and otherwise, for another small being, when you watch Satan attack that little one on a daily basis… I just can’t make myself send her to the wolves every day knowing I won’t be there to protect her.

Your other concerns are classic examples of how uneducated I was about homeschool until my research these past few months. I fully believed I was doing the “Christian” thing by sending her to “witness” to the other kids, but that’s just not what really happens. No matter how bright she is, how often she sings about and talks to God at home, it gets left at home because she “might look silly” around her friends (her words). Honestly, looking back, it was just easier to use that as a cop out because in reality, with the twins, it was more convenient for me, for her to be in school.

Worldly Situations

You say, they need to learn how to deal with worldly situations in a godly way and you’re absolutely right! Trouble is, the only one to teach them at school is the teacher and the teacher’s only job is to teach them academics. And even if a teacher just happened to follow a godly worldview, that teacher would be forbidden to offer it to the child.

So as parents we’re left to try to undo what the day has done. We can’t address the issue until well after it happens and by then, the “teachable moment” has passed and that child has already learned how to deal with that situation with no help from Mom and Dad.

And, chances are, most of what they’ll need to learn about worldly situations will be missed because the child isn’t capable of recognizing what is a worldly danger and they won’t come home telling us all the things they now need clarified from our biblical point of view. Most of the time we’ll never know what worldly situations they’re dealing with until it’s too late and they’re hiding makeup and changing clothes on the bus.

Being a strong witness

When I first found Christ and allowed Him into my life, and I began to see changes in my life that couldn’t have happened without Him, I wanted to tell everyone I knew. I was a horrible witness. Well-meaning as I was, I was still partying it up in the clubs, still drinking, smoking an occasional drink-companion cigarette, and cussing when socially appropriate. I was the same old chick trying to pass my religion off on people. I was too young to be witnessing to people.

This is the way I feel about kids being a witness. Children are still learning basic fundamentals about life themselves, so it’s not fair to ask them to take on the added responsibility of being a witness to other kids. That’s the job of their parents, and other adult influences. And besides, being a witness for Christ isn’t reason enough to sacrifice their education and well-being.

Bottom line on this one is that children need to be taught how to be a witness first, and I don’t think this can be done successfully if the child is in someone else’s care for 7 hours a day.

Final Preparation for the big bad World

When you say, I just think that home-schooling, whilst it has many advantages isn’t necessarily going to prepare them for the world when they eventually go out into it, my heart aches for you because I look back just a few weeks ago and I said nearly the same words.

I recommend reading Lisa Welchel’s book. I read it in one sitting and it changed everything I knew about homeschooling. Fifteen families talk about their homeschooling experience and they’re all different. One person talking is a work-at-home mom like me, another is a military family, another is a single mom, and yet another is from the perspective of a 15-year-old boy who’s about to graduate high school (and his sister goes to public school). How’s that for different?

Teens are better equipped to handle “the real world” than small children.

Now a lot of what you’re saying sounds more like something you’d argue for teens, who are a totally different story. What I’m talking about here is small children. As I looked at her innocent smile this morning while we waited for the bus, I tried to imagine instructing her to remain pure and be a witness to the other kids and it just seemed unfair to ask that of her. She’s so little, still learning what it means to love God and obey Him.

But I’ll have years to teach her, and when she’s older, when she reaches a maturity level that makes her an adult, whether that’s at 18 or 12, then we can discuss her going out into the world. I think society today has the idea that if kids don’t learn something early they never will and that’s what leads to sex education in kindergarten. People begin to believe the only way to prevent hyper-sexuality in teens is to teach them about sex at a very young age, just like your belief that kids need to be “in the world”, but neither is true.

Preparing children for “The World” isn’t necessary right now because they’re not going to be in the world until they’re much older. I prefer to stick to the basics right now and when they’re older we’ll work on things they can handle.

As with any subject, the subject of following Christ has to be taught before it can be practiced. I wouldn’t send AJ to teach other kids to do geometry until she herself has been taught because they’ll outnumber her and she’ll come home with only basic addition under her belt when we could have been teaching geometry at home. Does that make sense (replace geometry with Christian principles)?

I prefer to let Mom and Dad be “in the world” without bringing that world home, or sending the kids out into it to fend for themselves. No matter how well we instruct them, they just aren’t always able to stand up to peer pressure.

A few years ago I watched a friend send her kids to public school and then pull them out again when her son was bullied so bad he spent every day in the nurse’s office throwing up from the stress. This was a good Christian family and the kids were beautiful, well-mannered kids.

---

I’m not about to judge someone for choosing public school or homeschool. I’ve been on both sides of the fence and each time felt it was the best place for us. I’m just at the place now where, for my children, this is the best solution.

Share Tweet me (but don't mistweet me)

Copyright © 2008 – 2010 Natalie Jost