Setting Goals

So what do we hope to accomplish as a home school family? We've been talking about our goals here--over arching and short term. Why did we pull Kate out? What do we hope to do that she wouldn't have gotten at school Thankfully, while we fell into homeschooling by accident, we had at least considered it as a possibility, you know in the days before we met Kate and her tornado like personality.

We want our kids to love the LORD their God. To seek after Him, worship Him, and devote themselves to Him. I know for many people, this is the reason they choose home school or private school. It wasn't the reason for us. We have been teaching our kids about Jesus since they were babies. I know that the people of the world, and even the children at the school up the way, will not always behave the way that we would like our kids to see, but neither do their siblings, the man at the store, that lady screaming profanities in the parking lot, or (much more embarrassingly) even us, as their parents. I can't control the whole world, and I won't try to. I would love it if schools were still founded on Christian principles, thankfully our home school can be, so now that we have that opportunity we will use it.

We want our kids to love learning. That's the big reason we withdrew her to begin with. After going to orientation and hearing about all the academics, it seemed so dry and dull. Hours of drudgery. We have to do some things that Kate doesn't care for. I've spent the past two years waiting for her to want to read and write and it hadn't happened, so I had to push it eventually. She can do it, but she didn't want to take the time--it slows her down. But, in so much as I can, we 'do' learning. We read aloud, we explore, and we look at things on the computer.

We want them to have a good basic foundation. When I was teaching high school, I found that the students that were in my peer tutoring class didn't have basic skills that I had expected they knew as juniors and seniors, like how to write properly. Having the kids here, we can work on those skills that will carry them through high school and into college if they so choose.

We also want them to know that they are loved and valued. We care enough about them to want them around, even when we could send them off to school, where I would have less children to care for and I could eventually return to work. While home school isn't for everyone, I know that, this is a way we say we like you enough that we don't mind having you home all the time too, if it is how we believe that you will be best educated and our family will be best served.

For kindergarten, there are a lot of little things I have in a list to check off as we get them, but our big goals are to read a short story solo, add and subtract numbers under 10, and have her find interest in hands on science and have a basic understanding of people groups.