We love reading books together. We love learning together.

We love stuffing the ourselves into our small bathroom with the light off, so that we can look into the mirror with a flashlight through prism glasses to see how color is dispersed through the light (and then laughing our tails off together because we are so crammed into the bathroom that we can’t open the door to get out without practically falling together into the bathtub.)

We don’t spend hours of our time filling out workbooks at our house. We used to and it didn’t work. It was grueling for the boys and I found myself nagging all day at them to finish their pages. Yeah, not so much a fun way to learn.

We want our boys to love learning. (Not that is always has to be fun…but we want them to be curious and creative and excited about learning new things.)  And we don’t want them to think that learning begins and ends with the opening and closing of a workbook or a textbook. We’ve begun to take more of an “un-schooling” approach to homeschooling over the past couple of years. (I’ll try to share more often some of the ideas we’ve used to teach our kids spelling and writing creativity and math and science…)

But beyond all of that…

Our family’s homeschool philosophy is that there are some things that are much more important than others:

Matt and I feel very strongly that teaching our boys to love and serve others is far more important than learning the states and capitals. We feel like teaching our boys about God’s kingdom is more important than learning all of the past presidents of the United States in chronological order. And we think that if they learn to be hard workers, but they don’t learn all the dates of history…we will not have failed as parents (or educators).

Our kids still learn all of these factual things…but we don’t focus on them nearly as much as we try to focus on spiritual matters and areas of the heart. Because of this philosophy…there are some days we don’t open very many books at all.

Some days our boys simply learn about life. And caring. And loving. And serving. And about being patient. And about how to talk to an elderly person. And about working hard until you are so tired you can’t see straight.

We’re constantly working to figure out all of this education stuff. And discipline stuff. And the most effective ways to train our kids to be like Jesus. Never have we been so thankful for grace as we have been as we raise our boys.

I’m very curious about what your opinions are on this subject (whether you homeschool or not).  If you do homeschool…what are some of your philosophies? Are you a workbook-y family? Does that work for you? What do you think are the most important things for our kids to know?

First, can I just tell you how much I am learning during school time? Yes, me, the mom. The one who is the teacher. I’m pretty sure the kids are learning too, and that is…you know…the real point of home education. But I just love how much I’m learning too. Wow.

So now, let’s take a poll… When did you learn World History in school? And how much did you learn? 

Me? I had one semester of World History in high school and that was it. And I don’t remember anything about it. 

Just the thought of learning World History has always sounded very dry and boring and overwhelming to me. And it also sounded very dry and boring.

AND, I’ve always had such a hard time connecting Bible Times with World History. In my head (limited brain space that it is)…I’ve separated the two. Like there were Bible Times…and there were also Ancient Egyptian times…but I never could put them together.

THAT, my friends, is the reason I love this awesome set of books my boys and I are reading about World History!! They are written by Susan Wise Bauer and are called The Story of the World.

Check it out here.

We are a little over half way through the first book in this four set series. They are so well written that my six year old is understanding it…my eight year old…my eleven year old…and yes this 35 year old mama. We’re all getting it! It all makes sense! The information is captivating and incredibly interesting! (Of course, it’s highly likely that the reason the boys are enjoying the book so much is because ancient times were so filled with fighting and wars and violence and swords…but whatever.)

The best part of these books? The author combines Bible Times and World History for me!! She writes about how Jacob and his sons came down to Egypt and made their home along the Nile and how the nation grew! And then about how things changed years later in Egypt and the Israelites became slaves and how Moses delivered the people. It all makes so much sense!! With dates and everything!

I just love this set of books, and my boys do too! So, I had to share that with you. If you’re a history buff then you know all this stuff already and you’re laughing at me…but I’m okay with that. I finally found a book that makes World History make sense to me! 

I just may be able to be on Jeopardy yet. 

(Yeah, that was a joke. But you didn’t have to laugh that hard.)  ;)