Two of my children are in college now, and one has already graduated. Our homeschooling days are long gone, but the fruit keeps ripening.

     When we began homeschooling, our children were in 8th grade, 4th grade, and kindergarten. We decided ahead of time to evaluate yearly.  We didn't know how long we would persist in this experimental venture into home education.

     However, homeschooling fit our lifestyles well and our kids' personalities.  Having three at home meant that they had interaction and fun.  Belonging to a church provided additional social opportunities and training from someone other that Mom and Dad.
      Our girls were home educated all the way to college.  Our son began public high school in the 9th grade. We saw other families start and stop home education.  I have come to believe that this venture is only for those dedicated to both quality education and character development.   

     These are the questions every homeschooling family should ask yearly:

1. Are we meeting our exceeding our state's educational standards?

2. Do our children obey us, help with chores, and complete homework?  Or have our lives become a haphazard, stressful mess?

3. Are we associating with a church and exposing our kids to others with values like our own?

4. Have we allowed other homeschooling groups or families to suck us into their hectic, unproductive, undisciplined lifestyle?

5. What must we change in to have order, peace, and sufficient rest to produce well-educated, balanced children?

     Obviously, I had some negative events while home-educating my offspring.  Other people liked the way our kids were turning out.  Therefore, they wanted to dump their kids off a couple of days a week to "learn" at my house.  The result was utter chaos!  I had kids come to my doorstep with a fully developed agenda (abetted by their mother) that I would run the kids to the mall and rent movies. I had another friend's children who couldn't focus on a read-aloud session for 5 minutes---in the fourth and sixth grade.  After just a few weeks, I had to tell these friends that we couldn't do school together.  (Incidentally, it was all to take place at my house, and not reciprocally.)

    Similar care must be taken not to laden the schedule with various activities and lessons outside the home.  Perhaps students need more real life lessons, not more age-structured activities that isolate kids from younger and older people.  I felt that my chilren needed to cook, help others, play with babies, visit grandparents, and do things that occurred naturally within families in days gone by. However, I've known other families who arranged their homeschooling around dairy farming or a budding gymnastic career. Those families had a well-defined center which was enhanced by the educational style.
     Above all, the homeschool lifestyle is an opportunity, not to duplicate public school, but to tailor a child's life and a family lifestyle into something unique in partnership with God.  That takes a lot of introspection and examination. We must begin to know our offspring's gifts and calling.

     For our family, that meant that my nature-oriented son had time to dig up a 'possum skeleton in the back yard, then clean and assemble it.  He learned where the tree frogs lived, and stayed out with the chipmunks long enough that they trusted him enough to pick them up and put them into a bowl.  My girls read aloud to one another for hours and played all types of made-up games. They cooked and cleaned and created. They helped with service-oriented projects, and learned selflessness.  

    Today, Sam attends a university that offers marine science.  He is on the rowing team. Julie is a teacher. She has always ministered to numbers of children.  Krystal is studying entomology--bug science.  She helps to tutor within a homeschooling family. They are all finding their unique gifts.  I think that the seeds were sown in their younger days.