With little background in elementary education I sometimes find myself uncertain of what to reasonably expect from my children. These are my ah-ha thoughts:
1. There's still lots of hope for their spelling! Mine sure has improved over the last thirty years. :-) I'm not sure I'm on to the right track yet with curriculum. I'm just encouraged that there's still time to make good spellers out of them yet.
2. There's also hope for their handwriting. My son's writing is downright appalling. Turns out his teacher thought he had some sort of syndrome that made it impossible for him to form his letters properly. He has a syndrome, but it`s completely curable. It's commonly referred to as the "I Don't Care" syndrome. I don't blame the poor woman as she had thirty students to deal with and his attitude can be formidable. I decided that I do care and that he will care someday so I ordered a handwriting program and we started at square one.
I remember feeling embarrassed about my handwriting in Junior High and getting a book and retraining myself. It is possible to improve handwriting. Even with habits developed over years.
There are many ideas floating around about the value of handwriting, etc., so I debated with myself for some time. In the end, I decided that I`m raising a great man and that great men need to communicate clearly so I would tackle handwriting like it matters. If he still writes "like a doctor" someday, at least I tried.
3. Finding this little booklet was very impacting to me personally. It was like I could see my life in panoramic and realized there`s a strong theme of writing for the purpose of encouragement. I do already recognize many of the gifts my children have, but it made me want to be more intentional about nurturing those gifts and also alert to ways the enemy would want to destroy them. I know that in my own life, the places of greatest "calling" have also been the places of greatest attack. I think part of our role as parents is to recognize the giftings of our children and to be very intentional about speaking truth into the lives of our kids.
Blessings on your parenting, homeschooling, and any other wild adventure that you`re on!! He who started the good work in you will be faithful to complete it!
In one place I worked, there were a few older men with gorgeous, elegant handwriting. I have always wondered how these men were taught... but what a great gift to them in the long run. I definitely like that you "do care"! I tell my kids that too!
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