My husband, who reads my blog, says that I have horrible grammar. He tells me that sometimes my word choice is bad and that my sentence structure needs restructuring. It’s a good thing I’m not overly sensitive.

In my defense, I usually point out that I’m writing a blog, not a book, and that in order to post something within the lingering 32 minutes of naptime, you just have to take the unpolished version. In addition, I know that I shouldn’t end a sentence with a preposition, but truthfully, I don’t know how to fix it. But I like the first excuse better.

Yes, I am the mother, the teacher, the educator of my husband’s offspring. (Poor word choice?) I am the one who sees to it that his son reads well, his daughter writes well, and that his preschoolers color well. In the future, I will be teaching all of them about prepositions, times tables, and photosynthesis.

I will also (theoretically) teach them not to switch verb tenses in the middle of a sentence. My husband says I do that all the time, too.

Hi Amy, I am just starting to homeschool and I was wondering what kinds of things you do. Do you use a curriculum or use a variety of methods? I know there is a lot out there to choose from. It can be overwhelming. My kids are 5 1/2, 3 1/2, and 10 months. The older 2 are doing pretty well with reading already. Any thoughts? ~ Wendy

For over a year of typing here, I’ve never mentioned our homeschool method or philosophy. I hear you’re supposed to stick to writing on things you know about.

Education, however, is a subject I should know something about. I am a homeschool graduate. [Insert all sarcastic jokes here.] If that’s not enough, I’m one of those “professionals.” In other words, I have a piece of paper from the state of Florida that says I can educate kids. In theory, this means that I have an education since my degree is in education, but that isn’t necessarily so. Educated people know about prepositions and verb tenses. I’m sure of this.

But truly educated people possess more than a working knowledge of verb agreement; they possess wisdom. The goal of our children’s education is that they gain wisdom. This is done by teaching them God’s character (as revealed in the Bible) and what God requires of them. This is why I consider myself still learning, still growing. Educating requires more than just doing the opposite of what I was taught in a public university’s School of Education (though, one could get far on that method), rather, it requires renewing one’s mind according to God’s Word.

In order to choose a curriculum, you must have a goal. What do you want your children to learn? If you answer the “what and why,” the “how” becomes more obvious.

For us (and this is particular to our family), a focus on the “three R’s” during the primary years is a good method (but it is not the end). Right now, we use Rod and Staff for language and Saxon for math. The children also keep a journal. I keep things simple so that they have many opportunities to read, read, and read some more all day long. In the very early years, I did nothing but read aloud to them. Now that I have a seven and a six-year-old, they take over a lot of the read aloud time to the little ones.

We keep a simple schedule and stay home a lot. This is not only to save time, money, and energy, but also because a simple schedule allows for evening devotions, family time, and read alouds. This is the core of our curriculum, the primary means by which we disciple our children. Nobody imagines we’re doing “school” when Dad reads aloud from a chapter book, the family prays, and we hear a chapter from the Bible.

My son took a day off “school” this week and began repairing a riding lawn mower, salvaged from a neighbor’s trash. He wants to convert it to a go-cart, but my husband has visions of a new Lawn Boy in his head. Either way, the professionals disagree with me, but I think small engine repair with Dad is more useful than whatever is going on in second grade science chapter 5. We do read science books, but we don’t follow a formal science curriculum. We read G.A. Henty books, but we don’t have a formal history curriculum. This is what works for us.

Because of the lawn mower project and my husband’s plan to build a shed from scratch next month, my son got his first set of real tools. The curriculum, of course, is not just engine repair or building construction, but ultimately, family repair. Dad is teaching his son that a man takes responsibility for his family and works hard. The method is repairing engines and building things, but the agenda is always there, always underlying everything we do: be the man (or woman) that God has called you to be. Get wisdom. Work hard. Love God.

While there is more than one way to skin a cat, this is our current method. When it stops working, we’ll reevaluate. In the meantime, I’ll be picking up a good book on English grammar, and I’ll use my degree as a bookmark.