Steady plodding brings prosperity; hasty speculation brings poverty.
–Proverbs 21:5 (TLB)
God’s ways work. It is the biblical normative that parents raise their children and not the “villages” of man’s construction. This is why homeschooling has done so well in the last forty years. It is not in the system itself nor is it the result of the giftings and education on the parents’ behalf, as wonderful and varied as these are. While organizations like ICHE—and many others—contribute resources and events, this still does not explain how parents who hold a G.E.D. or a PhD. produce students who consistently score twenty to thirty points better than public school students on academic achievement tests. It is the grace of God that watches over His word to perform it (Jer. 1:12). However, under the canopy of home discipleship, there are many subsets of principles which are found in God’s Word as well.
God has built into His economy the principle of steady plodding. Steady plodding is basically being faithful to do the little things right over a long period of time, say around the first eighteen years of a child’s life. It is definitely not the fast track to parental success, but it is the most biblical and therefore the most likely means or producing God-fearing, young adults. What does steady plodding actually look like in homeschooling?
Instead of surfing the internet to find the latest educational fad or parental shortcuts of man’s imagination, we are committed to doing one major thing through the early years of our children’s development. We seek to instill character into young hearts and minds by the power of the Holy Spirit. In other words, we are building a solid foundation on which everything else will ultimately rest. Day in and day out we are monitoring their conduct, teaching them to respect authority, whether that be their parents, grandparents, civil authority, or, of course, God. We also hope to see growing deference through sharing toys or patiently waiting their turn. We want them to learn to be honest, even if it means receiving appropriate punishment for an obvious offense. The list of character traits is extensive, but each one has merit.
We have to remember, however, that teaching character takes time, patience, intentionality, and the grace of God. This may mean that we initially spend a little less time on academics in order to focus more on integrity, and that is okay. If our children get the right character, they will typically do very well academically as the latter is a byproduct of the former. The problem comes when our children are compared to another child, and certain judgments are made, causing us to feel like inadequate parents. It is so easy to capitulate on our vision of character first and worry more about social construct like grades. We must resist the temptation to kill the goose in order to get the golden egg more quickly.
Foundations are not all that thrilling when building a house. Thousands of dollars are spent with only a two feet wall to show for all that expense. But we all know intuitively that a house, no matter how extravagant its furnishings and décor, is no better than its foundation. It is the same with education. We must expend the necessary time, energy, and resources in training our child in proper character
There are no short-cuts in training our children. You must not buy into the educational infomercials that suggest otherwise. This may mean you will experience moments of embarrassment, or fear that your child is falling behind. You must remember that the truest rewards of homeschooling are not measured by days, weeks, months or even in a single year. While we will get a kiss from God on occasion, the greatest witness on the return on our investment will be when our children are grown and out of the house. In the meantime, we commit ourselves to steady plodding in our field of homeschooling.
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