December 2024
Reflections of a Homeschool Mum
By the time I attended Catholic schools in the 80s, the standard of education had become so impoverished, I was lucky to receive the basics in the 3 R’s, Science, History, Civics and Religious Education. Despite this, my parents instilled the qualities of diligence and hard work in my siblings and me at a very young age (for which I am eternally grateful!).
Looking back, my parents did an amazing job in raising a large family in the Faith and giving us an appreciation of the good, true and beautiful — despite the Catholic school system. By God’s grace, they saw early on, that a diabolically-disoriented form of Catholicism had already deeply permeated Catholic education in Australia. As they did their utmost to defend their children against a barrage of Modernist claptrap and disintegrating standards of education, an all too often heated altercation with a teacher, principal, priest or even Bishop resulted. This witness of my parents’ stalwart militancy helped me appreciate that my education was not to be taken for granted and that my faith was worth fighting for.
Oh, the dichotomy of ideologies I was subjected to in my youth could not have been more striking. On the home front there was Mass and the Sacraments, daily Rosary, novenas and the not uncommon recitation of an informative article from Christian Order, around the dinner table. On the school front, outright heresy and the blatant deconstruction of all forms of traditional pedagogy. Amongst volumes of Modernist verbiage, I distinctly recall our RE teacher (a Christian Brother, no less) boldly denying the divinity of Christ to a class full of hapless teenagers. What hope did most of my peers have?
According to statistics, upon graduating in 1998, 92% of the kids in my year were now considered ‘fallen away’ Catholics. So, after 12 years in Catholic schools, only a handful still practiced the Faith? Were these kids going to become our next generation of parents and professionals? Most of them weren’t bad people, but the thought of these kids going through life with very little knowledge of their Faith and no moral compass to guide them was confronting indeed.
As for myself, as grateful as I am for the wonderful, pious faith I grew up with, once I left the safe haven of my loving, Catholic home and embarked on a higher education at university and then a career in Medical Imaging, I too began to notice deficiencies in my secular education. More importantly, because of the solid faith my parents had instilled in me, I was able to discern that the necessary formation in the knowledge of the true traditional Catholic faith had not been made readily available to those of us born into the post-Conciliar church. It was during this period of my life that I was hit with the stark realisation that my generation had been robbed! Robbed of millennia of authentic Catholic teaching and Tradition. Robbed of the knowledge of our Western Christian heritage. Robbed of a truly Christian classical education.
So, how was I to remedy this? Firstly, I knew I couldn’t fix it on my own. I needed God’s help. And help He did!
Over the following years, through His grace, I encountered many wonderful Catholics who planted in me the desire to fill those gaps in my own formation and the determination to do things differently when I had children of my own. But how was I going to educate them? How was I going to form them into intentional disciples of Christ? How was I going to form young men and women who see not only an earthly value in education but also its eternal significance?
Quite simply, the solution was homeschooling. I had experienced the alternative and knew I wanted more for my own children. As a variation on an old saying goes, ‘I have seen the village, and I don’t want it raising my children!’
Fast forward to today. Nearly nine years of homeschooling later and we’re still going strong. It’s been a sharp learning curve and definitely not always a bed of roses. We have good days and bad days, but ultimately I am grateful for the blessings, lessons and opportunities it has afforded us.
Homeschooling is more than a full time job, it is a life-altering decision. With the help of God’s grace we have one chance to raise well-educated men and women of virtue, with a burning desire and ability to use that education in the service of God and our fellow man. Thus, while I don’t purport to be an expert in education or parenting, I’d like to humbly offer a handful of practical tips I have found helpful over the years that might provide a little encouragement and advice to my fellow homeschooling parents.
Seek First the Kingdom of God
The best advice I can give any parent about to jump into the world of homeschooling, or to those who have already entered this realm, is to put Christ at the centre of your lives and never underestimate the power of prayer.
Pray about your decision to homeschool. Pray about the school year. Pray for your family. Pray with your family. Pray for your children. Pray for yourself. When you’ve finished, pray some more. Keep in mind the words of St Edith Stein: "The first hour of your morning belongs to God. Tackle the day’s work that He charges you with and He will give you the power to accomplish it."
Have a Purpose
The ultimate goal of educating our children is to cultivate their souls towards their supernatural end of happiness in heaven. Therefore at the top of the tree in any homeschooling curriculum is the Faith taught thoroughly and clearly, preferably using a text that is underpinned by good Catholic philosophy, so that your children will have the language and concepts to know and understand their faith deeply and to defend it with strength and clarity. No matter the path their future may take, by heroic virtue and devotion to their faith, they may transform the world instead of being led by it.
Catch-phrases like, ‘Knowledge is Power’ and ‘Education = Success’ betray our modern culture’s obsession with reducing education to a means of achieving mere temporal success. We all know the world is in desperate need of well-educated men and women for all professions and vocations. St Thomas teaches that true education is ordered to human happiness. God is Truth, thus the pursuit of truth in the arts and sciences is noble and good and will help your children develop into well-rounded individuals capable of happiness and success in this world and in the next.
So, let us rebuild Christian civilisation student by student, saint by saint, by placing Christ at the centre of each soul in our care.
Master the Basics
Rote learning our tables can be boring, practicing scales on the piano, monotonous, and memorising the rules of grammar, challenging. However, once these fundamental tools are laid, maths becomes more logical, one’s fingers move with greater agility over the piano and reading and writing become more comprehensible and meaningful.
Take time over the seemingly ‘mundane’ things, as it will help lay strong foundations upon which your children can advance in knowledge and understanding into their future years. Resist trying to cover an overwhelming quantity of subjects, as you may end up compromising on fundamentals just trying to fit everything in. As C S Lewis said, "the greatest service we can do to education today is to teach fewer subjects. No one has time to do more than a very few things well before he is twenty, and when we force a boy to be a mediocrity in a dozen subjects, we destroy his standards, perhaps for life."
Books, Books, Books
Take a tumble through a wardrobe, accompany a little burglar as he confounds a dragon, stand defiantly with the saints in the colosseum!
Give your children a love of great literature that helps to transcend their minds to the good, true and beautiful.
Put at their disposal captivating stories of sanctity, virtue, chivalry and adventure. Stories that have been loved throughout the centuries, full of timeless themes, that provide children with captivating lessons about God and the Saints, our world and its history and how to live lives of heroic virtue — all without the need for lesson plans or tutorials!
Have Backup
Whilst it’s often Mum who assumes the role of educating in the homeschool setting, we all know that both parents have been assigned primary educators of their children. Therefore, get Dad involved! Whether it’s taking kids on the odd excursion, listening patiently to the preschooler practising her reading, or taking over the teaching of a particular subject, Dad as the head of the home, is there in the background providing much needed backup, discipline, encouragement and support.
Get Outdoors
The great John Senior, author of The Restoration of Christian Culture, knew the importance of having children’s imaginations formed by the beauty of nature, allowing them to open their minds to living in truth and goodness. Senior argued that prolonged exposure to technology facilitates a disconnect from reality; that people experience life today through artificial means (i.e. TVs and smart-phones). This is the case today more than ever before, where children (and people in general) are so engrossed in their cyber realm that the lines between reality and fiction have become increasingly blurred.
So, put down your pens, turn off your phones and get outdoors!
Take the kids for a stroll in the park, learn to play tennis together, plant a vegie garden as a family, or raise some animals.
Not only is it healthy for us, being outdoors and giving children a love and wonderment of nature inspires learning. Nature is God’s canvas, and after all, there is just as much merit in milking a cow or growing vegetables, as there is in conjugating a Latin verb!
Find a Community of Homeschoolers
Whilst not essential, this can be extremely helpful. Not only can it provide some much needed fraternity, sanity and advice for homeschooling parents, but associating with people with similar ideologies and expectations as ourselves can lead to lifelong friendships for our children too.
Take a Break
No-one is superhuman.
As homeschoolers we are often plagued with the questions: Are we covering enough? Are we socialising enough? Are my kids missing out on important learning?
The hidden pressure to keep up with their peers at school or with an idealistic standard of education can sometimes push us to overdo things. This can often lead to ‘homeschool burnout’ (yes, it does exist!). Keep your goals in mind. We are working to produce saints first and foremost. Everything else is a bonus.
Have a tea or coffee. If finances permit, outsource some lessons. Get a trusted tutor in to help. Take a day off to go to the museum or the zoo (school excursion!). Plant another vegie garden. Take the children to Adoration. Sit down and read a story with your little ones. Have another tea or coffee. Be kind to yourself and take breaks!
Have a Schedule…….but Be Flexible!
Most kids flourish with routine. Without it, life tends to spiral out of control! Schedules, timetables and rosters can encourage discipline and eliminate guesswork. Children can know in advance what the day entails, what their required chores are and what extra-curricular activities are scheduled for the week.
All that being said, no-one ever planned for a sick child, a death in the family, a burst water pipe or a cow escaping into the neighbour’s yard (which happens all too frequently here, much to the children’s delight!).
Thankfully, homeschooling allows us the flexibility to drop a day here or pick up an extra lesson there. So while schedules can be helpful, remember to allow room for the unexpected!
Pray, Hope and Don’t Worry
The last point, but by no means the least!
Homeschooling is hard! It demands much labour, love and sacrifice. But so does parenting, so does marriage, and so does any pursuit in life worth striving for. After all, there was no Resurrection without the Cross.
So let us consecrate our homes, our hearts, our lives, our marriages, our children and their futures to the most Sacred Heart of Jesus and Immaculate Heart of Mary and let them take care of the rest.
As James McAuley, one of Australia’s greatest Catholic poets, expresses so beautifully in his poem, Retreat:
It is not said we shall succeed,
Save as His Cross prevails:
The good we choose and mean to do
Prospers if He wills it to,
And if not, then it fails.
Nor is failure our disgrace:
By ways we cannot know
He keeps the merit in His hand,
And suddenly, as no-one planned,
Behold the kingdom grow!