Whoever said that a home educator’s life is easy cannot be more wrong. Homeschooling isn’t a walk in the park. But it still is the road we chose to take anyway for a host of good reasons. Aside from our desire to be our son’s primary influencer, we also would love to see him maximize his potential in a way that, in our opinion, traditional school cannot do – at least in the duration of his formative years.
Our 4 year old son graduating with honors on his first year of preschool (March 2010)
Admittedly, parents go the extra mile for their children to reach their full potential and we consider this choice of ours, “our extra mile.” Let’s face it, children are born into this life with the pressure to be not just achievers but well-rounded individuals as well. It is but normal for parents to want their children explore their potential to the fullest. What parent would not want his child to achieve the best that he or she can, right?
Our son’s Most Number of Excellent Marks and Best in Sound Recognition awards
Truth be told, the ground work laid at home has a lot to do with a child’s success. For some, it might mean that a child has to take brain boosting supplements like Nutroplex. My son’s health is amongst the top of our priorities. This is also the reason why he has been taking brown rice since he was 6 month old, for its nutritional benefits. As much as we would like to serve the ideal sustenance at home, the fact of the matter is, brain boosting ingredients like Iron, Calcium, B Complex, magnesium, et. al are some of the nutrients they need that are often deficient in a typical diet.
Progress Chart, Goal Setting Pad and Congratulations Slip
One of the ground works that I speak of is teaching a child to set goals. Yes, as young as my son is, at 5 years old and an incoming First Grader at that, he is taught to enter on a printed card his pace objective for the day. This is then placed in front of his office table. The topmost pad (Goal Setting Sheet) in the above image is where our son writes the number of paces he sets for himself to finish during the day. Goal setting prepares the child for independence, responsibility and success. Even as he is trained to make this a habit, he will be less likely to have a hard time with more complex subjects as he grows up. And later on as he pursues whatever career path God has purposed for him to tread. One of the things that we believe in – Do not do for a child what he can do for himself. More often than not, he surprises us how he is able to do far more than we expect of him. Which reminds me a lot of the First Law of John Maxwell’s 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership – Law of the Lid.
The cardboard behind the pads is where we place the stars that mark his progress. It hangs on the wall at the side of his office table. The congratulations slip is what he is rewarded with whenever he has completed a set of pace. We sometimes exchange a reward for a congratulations slip. But we also do not do this on a regular basis to make sure his motives for doing his school work is in check.
These are just a few of the things that we have been doing in our homestead. Most of which, we have started long before we started homeschooling. This brings us back to emphasize the child’s need to be nutritionally capable. Supplement if you must. You cannot expect a child who is lacking in nutrition to achieve and mount up with wings like eagles. Education should focus not mainly on making sure that a student gets employed when they graduate, but for a person to live life to the full.
Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by Nutroplex.
The above article was published via Unblogged, PhilStar on August 16, 2011.
