I had just met a woman in ministry when I told her that after I finished my Ph.D. in clinical psychology, I wanted to be a Christian psychologist.
“You can’t just be a Christian psychologist,” she said.
I tried to listen to what she said after that about qualifications and training, but I was stuck on that sentence. I was annoyed. How did she know? Why couldn’t I be a Christian psychologist if that’s what I wanted to do? What I felt called to do? At the same time, I was scared. When I entered graduate school, my classmates and I were stunned to learn all the requirements we had to fulfill in order to be practicing psychologists. Maybe this woman was right. I would have another whole list of requirements to meet to be a faith-based counselor.
When I finished my internship and graduated, I applied for a job with a Christian practice. I had to complete a questionnaire about my faith as part of my application. When I was interviewed, I worried that it would become apparent that I didn’t have the qualifications. I had earned my degree in a secular university. My father wasn’t a pastor. My family hadn’t even gone to church most of my life. Maybe he would say, “You can’t just be a Christian psychologist.”
To my surprise, he said nothing of the sort. I was hired and given my own office. Then I was scared again. I had never brought my faith into the counseling room. How would I do that? Fortunately, there were books on Christian counseling that I bought and read. I also had a Christian psychologist supervising me for my first year. But many times I found myself at a loss as to what to say or do with a client. I would say, “Let’s pray!” To my surprise, my clients were pleased with that idea.
Not Qualified to Be a Teacher
I was, in fact, able to just be a Christian psychologist. But that lesson didn’t stick with me. I struggled with it when I was hired to teach developmental psychology at the university. I had a Ph.D., but I had never taught students of any age before, let alone college students. I ordered the recommended textbook, did some of the things my professors had done to teach me, and came up with some of my own ideas. I had a good response from the students, ended up loving it, and my supervisor said he would be glad to hire me again. I quit teaching to have a baby, though, and faced a whole new round of qualification issues. I really didn’t think it was wise for the hospital to let me take the baby home. I hadn’t even done much babysitting!
I muddled my way through parenting the same way I had counseling and teaching. But when God called me to homeschool, I worried that I didn’t have the qualifications for that either. I had taught college students, but I had never taught anyone to read. What if I couldn’t do it? I had never taken an elementary education course. Once again, I managed to do it with reading and wisdom from others. I even began to feel qualified to teach my own children. In more than one discussion with people who asked about homeschooling, I was told that it was fine for me with a Ph.D. Other people, though, weren’t qualified to teach their children. I did what I could to educate them. “There are books, curricula, and support groups to help anyone homeschool,” I would say. And I believed it.
But when it came to me, I still believed that woman who said I couldn’t just be something. I had to be qualified. I had to be trained.
Not Qualified to Be a Homeschool Publisher
When I had the idea for writing my own language arts curriculum, I started off in the true spirit of homeschooling. I just jumped in and learned as I went along. I started writing the curriculum I’d always wanted to have for my kids. But as I came closer to finishing it, I got stuck. I made excuses. I quit working on it. I didn’t feel qualified.
I then had the opportunity to meet with a small group of homeschool publishers. I figured I could at least say that I was a blogger if I chickened out in admitting that I was writing curriculum. I met Charlene Notgrass, whose history curriculum I had used with my children. She was so warm that I decided to tell her what I was working on. I told her the concept behind it — that I would use story to teach language arts concepts and make them funny and memorable.
I expected her to ask me about my experience in writing fiction and curriculum. I expected her to ask me about my experience in homeschool publishing. I expected her to tell me what I needed to do before I ever thought of trying to publish. I expected her to say, “You can’t just be a homeschool publisher.”
How foolish of me. I recently read the story of Orville and Wilbur Wright in another history curriculum my kids have enjoyed, Mystery of History. The Wright brothers were high school dropouts. Apparently, no one told them that they couldn’t just be engineers, or they couldn’t just be inventors. Because that’s exactly what they were.
The heart of homeschooling is that we can just be our children’s teacher.
Not only that, but our children can just be whatever God calls them to be. As the saying goes, “God doesn’t call the qualified. He qualifies the called.”
I shouldn’t have been surprised when Charlene’s face lit up when I told her about my curriculum. She got her husband’s and others’ attention and told them about it, too. That encouragement gave me the extra confidence I needed to finish Grammar Galaxy. Charlene found me at the homeschool conference where I exhibited it for the first time and hugged me.
Taken the day the books arrived
That was just 21 months ago. Since that time, many moms who have used Grammar Galaxy with their kids have told me their kids beg to use it every day. They’ve told me it’s changed their homeschools because now their kids love to read. They tell me they are using it to learn grammar themselves because it was not their strong suit.
I now have three volumes of Grammar Galaxy published and a fourth in the works.
I now believe I can just be a homeschool publisher. I also believe you can just be a home educator. I believe you can raise excellent readers and writers, even if you don’t think you can.
Has anyone told you you’re not qualified to homeschool or do something else you long to do? Let’s chat about it on Facebook.
Unlike most other careers, homeschooling doesn’t come with built-in assessments for teachers. Some homeschoolers are required to meet with teachers and these meetings may help gauge progress. But many home educators don’t have that requirement. So, how can we assess our progress as homeschool moms?
I’m going to take a different approach than you might expect and use this Scripture as a framework:
He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. (Micah 6:8)
Act Justly.
What does it mean to act justly as a homeschool mom? I think it means two things. First, we have to obey the homeschool laws of our state. If we are to provide a certain number of hours of education, a homeschool plan, and work samples – even if we do not have to turn these in to anyone, we ought to be above reproach. If we aren’t homeschooling in such a way that we would be confident having our homeschool evaluated, then we need to change. What grade would you give yourself in the legal requirements of homeschooling? If it’s not an A, what can you do to improve? If you need help, Google how to meet the homeschool requirements of your state or ask a veteran homeschooler in your community. Often, we make the requirements seem insurmountable in our minds when they’re usually not a big deal. If you have everything in order, you’ll feel so much more confident in your homeschooling.
The second thing that acting justly as a homeschool mom encompasses is providing the best education for your child. After a call from God, this is why I started homeschooling. I believed it was the best education I could provide for my children. Are you giving your children the best in terms of:
A school schedule
Curriculum
Activities
Your teaching approach
Involvement with others?
We would do well to ask ourselves these questions for each of our children regularly. What grade would you give yourself? How can you improve the grade?
It’s also wise to discuss these issues with our children. My kids often give me excellent feedback and ideas for ways to improve. I’m not talking about complaining, but constructive suggestions. Next, discuss them with your spouse or another family member who is involved in your homeschooling. What suggestions do they have for improvement? Finally, ask other homeschoolers. It’s been so gratifying to see worn-out moms have new inspiration after asking the women in HomeschoolScopes for advice.
Love Mercy.
God requires us to act justly in our homeschools by abiding by the law and providing the best education we can. He also requires that we love mercy. A short path to discouragement is expecting our children to get everything right and to do so quickly. They should learn everything we give them and love it. Assignments and chores should be completed immediately and perfectly. There should be no conflict with you or with their siblings. Anything short of that means they are failures and so are we.
Good teachers are firm. They do not allow a child to shirk their responsibilities or to behave disrespectfully without consequence. But they are also merciful. They know their children are immature. They know they will make many of the same mistakes they made as children, even though they wish they wouldn’t.
A merciful homeschooler preserves the relationship with her child. I have had very stern teachers in my life. I didn’t like them. I didn’t want to visit them as I grew older. We want our children to know that they are more important than their performance. My oldest son helped me see that I valued his outward behavior more than him as a person. Because I did, we had serious problems in our homeschool. I was failing. When I focused on mercy and love for him as a person, everything changed. I started getting A’s again.
There is a second important aspect to being a merciful homeschooler. That’s the mercy we extend to ourselves. Being compassionate and forgiving of our weaknesses and failings does not mean that we give up and settle for substandard homeschooling. On the contrary, mercy is most likely to help us succeed. If we have the highest standards for ourselves and are harsh in our assessment, we are more likely to quit. I hear from many homeschool moms who say they are failing and have to send their kids to school as a result. Good teachers don’t just say, “You have an F and you’re expelled.” They say, “I believe you can get this grade up and I’m going to help you.”
If you have struggled as a homeschool mom, I believe you can improve. If your home is in chaos, listen to the podcast episodes I did with FLYLady here and here. Comment on this post and tell me where you need help and I’ll do my best to point you in the right direction. But extend mercy to yourself. His mercies are new every morning and so should ours be.
Walk humbly with your God.
Scripture also tells us that we are to walk humbly with our God. Somehow I went from not wanting to homeschool though God had called me to do it to not wanting to let my child go to school, though I believed God had called me to do that, too. I wasn’t walking humbly with God in my homeschooling.
Are you walking humbly? This means that our homeschooling isn’t about us. It’s not about our kids making us look good. It’s not about proving the naysayers wrong. It’s not about our identity. What grade would you give yourself in this area?
I worried what my blog readers would think if I sent my child to school. I worried about what my friends and family would think if my children didn’t turn out well because it would be a reflection on me. I was getting an F in this area, but I’ve improved a lot.
Are you walking with our God? I read an excellent book called Joining Jesus with our small group Bible study. The book’s point is that sharing the gospel isn’t about memorizing a script or forcing yourself to have a deep theological discussion with someone you’ve just met. It’s about joining Jesus in what He’s already doing in people’s lives. Our homeschooling journey is the same.
God was already at work, preparing my son to go to public school. It was up to me to join Him in that journey. Thankfully, I did and we experienced a number of blessings as a result. You can read more about that here.
We can’t walk humbly with our God unless we are with our God. Our desire, our focus, and our time have to be on Him through prayer and the Word. I know when I’m going through the motions of prayer and Bible reading. You do, too. I’ve had times I was earning a failing grade in this area. It was obvious because I was failing in other areas, too. Getting an A in walking with our God has nothing to do with law. It doesn’t require devotions at a certain time of day, for a certain length of time, or using a certain program. Just as we know when we have our children’s hearts, God knows when He has ours.
If we’ve wandered away, we can confess it and come home to Him. Take a moment right now to pray. Ask Him for forgiveness and a word of blessing and encouragement. He loves you so much, regardless of the grades you’re getting as a homeschool mom. He longs to lift the burdens you’ve been carrying–if only you’d ask. I’m praying for you to have joy in your homeschool journey. With God’s help and provision, you can be a grade-A homeschool mom. On the days when you fail, you have God’s forgiveness, comfort, and encouragement to start again.
Download this progress report and make a plan for improvement now.
Click to download
What will you do to raise your grade as a homeschool mom? Let’s chat about it on Facebook.
The excitement of the new year is starting to wane, leaving me with a need for refreshment. I don’t want to wish my way through the rest of winter. Neither do I want to give in to sloth and discouragement. I want energy and vitality in my homeschool now. How about you?
There are a number of ways to incorporate a little Energizer bunny into our homeschools. I’ve discussed them on The Homeschool Sanity Show podcast. But I have one favorite way of getting refreshed — organizing.
I’m not one of these ultra-organized women. I don’t have everything in a beautifully labeled basket or bin. Martha Stewart wouldn’t be impressed. But I do geek out on getting my act together. I once purchased an organizing system for my scrapbooking supplies and couldn’t sleep because I was so excited about using it. I get a little jolt of energy, a burst of encouragement, and a bit more tenacity when I organize something.
I think refreshment from organizing is hard-wired. We crave completion. It’s one of the hardest parts of homeschooling. We have to wait more than a decade for our work with one child to be done. Organizing in your homeschool or your life gives you a win. It’s like running a marathon and feeling like you can’t take another step. Then you reach a mile marker where there’s a refreshment stand. Suddenly you believe you can finish. (I’m guessing that’s what it’s like because I don’t run marathons!)
If you’ve been too busy to think about changes you need to make in your homeschool, now is the time. I have some ideas for changes we can all make now, regardless of our homeschool approach.
The first change you should make to your homeschool now is to make your homeschooling fast. I wrote a very popular post called How to Homeschool in an Hour a Day. At this point in my homeschooling, an hour of direct teaching is all that I need to do on most days. This does not include individual tutoring, editing papers, or the courses I teach in our co-op. One of the reasons we homeschool is so that our children do not have to sit at a desk for seven hours a day. Research is conclusive that our attention is not sustainable for long periods. The shorter the lesson, the better. Short, frequent lessons are more effective in helping our children learn anyway. Short lessons are especially helpful for your children who have attention challenges. It’s even helpful for distractible moms!
We do morning family time as a way of saving time. We can complete many subjects in short order. I reserve Fridays for teaching things that I never have time to teach. We watch Bible or history videos, study art, or read about contemporary issues. The afternoons are reserved for independent work. My kids actually prefer their independent work time. They read and prep for their co-op classes, do math, Bible, piano, extra reading and writing, and exercise. They love structuring their own time.
The most common cause of homeschool mom burnout is trying to do too much. If you’re stressed and overwhelmed, reevaluate what you’re doing. God doesn’t ask us to do more than we can handle. Sometimes the stress is circumstantial. There is an ill family member, a job loss, or a move, to name a few of those circumstances. But more often than not, the stress comes from driving kids to two co-ops, six sports practices, and trying to complete two math curricula. It can also come from directly teaching individual students when that isn’t necessary. If you have a preschooler or emerging reader, more of your time is required. However, the younger the student, the less formal teaching you should be doing. When your student can read well, he can be asked to work independently. He can ask older siblings for help. He can wait for you to finish what you’re doing and go on to another question or subject.
Make Your Homeschooling Easy
The next change I recommend you make now is to make lessons easy. Planning lessons that are too easy for gifted children is something to avoid. Very easy lessons that are far beneath a gifted child’s ability level are demotivating for them. But in most cases, even for gifted children, lessons that can be completed without struggle are more motivating. Consider your own response to a difficult, time-consuming task. The harder it seems, the less you want to do it–the more likely you are to put it off. Many children who are resistant to reading are resistant because the reading material they’ve been given is too difficult for them. We want our children’s lessons to be easy and quick to complete so that motivation stays high.
Making it easy can mean skipping repetitive, unnecessary work. Curriculum authors want you as the teacher to have enough work to meet your needs. They aren’t implying that your child must complete every exercise, every page, or every book they suggest. I used a curriculum that would have exhausted me in college, let alone junior high. I cherry picked from the material to make sure my students wouldn’t hate it and me. A particular issue I’ve noticed with some homeschool curriculum is the expectation that students write a paper every week. That isn’t a requirement even at the college level, so I don’t expect it of much younger students. If you’re confused about what’s reasonable to expect, ask a traditional student the same age as your child how much they have to do. Expecting a little more than what public schools do is understandable, except you also want your child to have more time than public school students do.
If your child is struggling with grade-level material, give them material that’s a step down. We often don’t want to do that because we are afraid our child will be behind. The opposite is actually the case. If your child resists the work, she is more likely to get and stay behind. Give her work that makes her think she is a competent student. She will be motivated to get back to grade level on her own. If you can, find ungraded materials. Do some research on an easy curriculum for the subject your child is struggling with. Ignore the teachers who scare you by saying it’s too easy. There’s no such thing as too easy if it helps your child understand a subject. For example, don’t worry about college when your child hasn’t mastered algebra. Just focus on making algebra easy.
If you can’t find a curriculum that does the trick, find a teacher who can make concepts simple to understand. Reaching a struggling student can be like translating a foreign language. Someone else may have the words or the illustrations that will click with your child. Getting help isn’t failing. Not getting help when it could benefit your child is failing them.
When you make a subject easy for your child, you make it possible for him to love it. We all hate things that are hard, that we don’t understand. When the light comes on, we discover the joy of learning the material.
Make Your Homeschooling Fun
Finally, change your homeschool now by making it fun. Not everything we have to do in life is fun. I will never enjoy cleaning toilets. Some children will never enjoy certain homeschool subjects. But we can do our best to make things more enjoyable. We can pair less enjoyable activities with something pleasant like music, for example. We love to do chores with upbeat music playing. Some children find that working together with you as teacher or with other students makes material fun. My son resisted his art curriculum until I suggested we do art together. This is also why we are so committed to our homeschool co-op. My children love science, unit studies, and high school classes because they are doing them with other students and sometimes with another teacher.
You can make school fun by incorporating games. The advantage of digital curriculum is that it often gamifies learning, taking advantage of a proven motivator. Online educational curriculum or just games can supplement your primary curriculum and may end up being the most educational. I have written a post on the best online sites for grammar. Games don’t have to be on the computer, however. Talented teachers have created a number of card, board, and group games to teach just about everything. My post of the ultimate list of grammar games was my #1 post in 2016. I refer to it all the time myself.
In addition to using games, make your homeschool fun by incorporating variety. Anything that’s done repeatedly can become dry. As important as homeschool routine is, it’s also important to change things up in your homeschool. If you’re a textbook family, consider taking a break to do a unit study. If you are a unit study family, consider doing some traditional curriculum for a while. One year our co-op decided to only do field trips. We had focused on subject-intensive courses for quite some time and we needed a break. Surprise your students with a new plan, a new twist, or even just a new recipe. It will keep their minds fresh and help to eliminate oppositional attitudes.
I do not want to suggest that if your children don’t enjoy doing schoolwork that they should not have to do it. Having fun is not a requirement. But it is a worthy goal.
I created Grammar Galaxy to make language arts fast, easy, and fun. I had to share what mom Elizabeth recently told me. She mentioned that their schooling had been a little off schedule because of a move. She wrote:
We got back on track yesterday and started Mission 8. Let me tell you, it’s been fun, but my son lost his mind on this lesson! I have NEVER seen him laugh so hard during any lesson, for any subject since we started homeschooling. When the queen told Ellen, “I hate you” with tears in her eyes, he fell off his chair. He actually begged me to read the story to him again! I laughed equally hard at your instructions to try mixing up synonyms and antonyms at dinner (But [to] let your parents know what you are doing). Our 5 year old was so offended when he told me dinner was just terrible! You really did it. You truly made grammar fun. I didn’t think it was possible but you obviously deserve some kind of medal! THANK YOU!
If you have a 1st to 3rd grader, a beginning reader, or a reluctant reader, I highly commend it to you.
Which of these homeschool changes are you going to make this week? Let’s talk about it on Facebook.
The end of the year always seems to get particularly busy for me. That makes it a perfect time to think about how I want my homeschooling life to be different in the new year. As a psychologist-turned-homeschooler who has been at this for 17 years, here are my recommendations.
The best way to ensure that we get more sleep is to go to bed earlier. Set an alarm on your phone. Use that alarm as a signal that you and/or your children need to go to your room for some quiet reading before bed. Make sure the room is cool and dark enough. Getting enough sleep will give you the energy that you need to accomplish all of your goals for the year. Going to bed earlier means you won’t sleep in. Waking up late is likely to make you feel behind. The one exception I have for going to bed early is teens. It just seems to be helpful for teens to sleep later. But that doesn’t mean that you as mom need to sleep in. I will allow myself to get as much sleep as I need at times when I need it. But I still feel much happier and more productive the earlier I get to sleep at night. If getting enough sleep at night just isn’t possible for you right now, plan regular naps. Sleep when your little ones do. Or nap while your children have a quiet time.
#2 Establish routines
I have mentioned the mistake of giving up on our routines this time of year. Establishing new routines or going back to the old routines that work is a great way of having an excellent homeschool year. The more chaos that reigns, the more likely people in your family are to be irritable and unproductive. If you’re someone who likes variety in their day like I do, you can still use routines. Just don’t make every single part of your day a routine.
Do begin with your morning routine. A book that may inspire you is The 5 Am Miracle by Jeff Sanders. Jeff and his wife don’t have children, but his experience with making the most of the morning hours is inspiring. If you don’t already do morning family time as part of your homeschool, I highly recommend it. You can learn more about it in Pam Barnhill’s Morning Basket Guide. Children are more likely to be cooperative when they know what to expect. Whatever it is that you hope to accomplish in the coming year that didn’t happen this year, a routine is likely to be part of your accomplishing it.
#3 Discipline children
One of the most common questions I get from homeschooling moms concerns their child’s unwillingness to participate in homeschooling. Because homeschooling can be so much more fun than public school, we can get the idea that our children always have to be having a good time. That just isn’t so. You and I learned something from classes we weren’t crazy about. I’m all about making learning fun, but if you have allowed your children to continually complain, ignore your requests, or refuse to participate in schooling, now is the time to correct that.
When I first began homeschooling, discipline was the number one subject I taught. We did a unit on obedience from Konos and I think it was more helpful for me as a mom than it was for my kids. I learned the importance of obedience and how much work was going to be required to teach it. I want to address child discipline in a future podcast episode, but for now recognize that you do have the right to expect your children to complete school work and participate in your homeschooling without excessive complaint. A complaining, obstinate child does not mean that you are a failure as a mother. Sending them to school will not relieve the problem. Even if they decide to cooperate at school, you still have to deal with them once they get home.
If you need help, I like the book How to Have a New Kid by Friday by Kevin Leman. Watch episodes of Supernanny and Nanny 911 on YouTube. And I recommend that you listen to an episode I did with Reb Bradley on the subject. Require your children to participate. Give them a consequence if they don’t that isn’t excessively harsh. With consistency, you’ll have a much saner homeschool year. If you still have a problem, seek professional help.
#4 Require your children to do chores
I did an episode of this podcast on teaching children to do chores well. But if you don’t have a chore system or one that you have use faithfully, I highly recommend that you begin that this year. Again, children don’t have to approve of your chore program. They only have to follow your instructions or suffer the consequences. There are so many chore programs that will work if you do. The main problem that destroys the effectiveness of a chore program is mom’s failure to require it and supervise it. After having tried numerous complicated chore systems, my favorite approach is to work together. We clean each floor of our home for 10 minutes. All the while I am able to see whether they are working or doing a good job or not. My children also have once-a-week chores that they complete. You are not being mean to require children to participate in the upkeep of your home. It’s up to you whether you give your children an allowance or payment for more complicated chores. But I have had great success in using both approaches.
#5 Meal plan
When I am tired at the end of the day, the last thing I want to do is figure out what I should make for dinner. Discovering that I don’t have the ingredients for what I want to make just adds to the stress. Heading to the store at the busiest time of day is not a good idea. I plan my meals a week at a time using Plan to Eat. I can generate a shopping list quickly and easily that way. Currently I am using the 30 day meal plan from Tastefully Simple and my family has really enjoyed those meals. It saves me even more time because the planning is already done for me. Whatever you choose to do for your meal planning, a little bit of time spent planning and shopping in advance is certain to save your sanity. For more on meal planning, pick up your free copy of The Once and For All Meal Plan.
#6 Have an overall plan
Planning, even when we end up changing the plan, is a powerful way of making positive changes in any area of your homeschooling life. I will be planning my homeschool speech class for our co-op happening this semester. Having a plan laid out will keep me from wondering what we should be doing when all the students have already arrived in my home.
Our kids need a plan to follow too. Make sure they have their own list of work to accomplish. I have two free planners for kids. Or give Trello a try.
Homeschool moms tend to spend a lot of time shopping for the perfect planner and I understand that. Planners are awesome! But just as important is what you write in that planner. If you want to teach your kids a new subject this semester, you’ll want to plan for how to do that. We can save ourselves a lot of time by adopting someone else’s plan that we think would be workable. You can use an online unit study from Techie Homeschool Mom that’s already been put together. I’ve also talked about how we can get organized this year by using someone else’s plan, which in this case happens to be mine. The Organized Homeschool Life gives you a plan for organizing a different aspect of your life every week of the year. There may be particular challenges that don’t apply to you. So you can simply choose to work on an area of your homeschool life that does apply to you. But you don’t have to reinvent the wheel.
Search for plans for gaining control and meeting the goals that you have for the various aspects of your homeschooling life besides organizing. If you want to get in shape, you don’t have to cobble a workout together on your own. There are numerous workouts that have already been developed to help you. You can find someone else’s plan for growing spiritually, too. There are prayer and Bible reading calendars ready for you to Google them.
You’re busy. You’re dealing with lots of people. You’re stressed this Christmas season. Stress can lead us to make some mistakes that will make things worse. Avoid these six mistakes and you’re likely to have a merry Christmas.
What we typically do is get busy with other things this time of year. There is more shopping and cooking and even chatting going on. After all, it’s Christmas! Somehow in the midst of all the extra activity, we end up not doing school. But it isn’t a planned break. We just sleep in, do some Christmas shopping, or watch Christmas movies instead of homeschooling. We aren’t doing a Christmas unit study. That’s different. We find ourselves falling into a Christmas break. The result is we feel guilty. We really wanted to get a lot done before Christmas. But we didn’t. And we don’t feel refreshed like we should from a planned break. Instead of falling into a Christmas break this year, decide whether you really are going to do a Christmas unit study. Plan what to do. If you don’t have time to plan, try the Christmas Traditions or Christmas Around the World online unit studies from Techie Homeschool Mom. They’re done for you.
If you don’t want to do a Christmas unit study, plan when you are going to take a break and for how long. If you feel behind on your regular studies, decide what you want to accomplish before Christmas. Make a realistic list for yourself and your children. Give your children the option of finishing early if they finish their work early or you finish your family work early. This is the process I used to create the most motivating homeschool planner ever.
Mistake #2: Changing your sleep schedule
Changing your sleep schedule may be one of the things you look forward to at Christmas time. You can stay up late watching movies and can sleep in. A few nights of this is okay, but erratic sleep schedules will wreak havoc on you and the kids. I recently read that our melatonin levels go down after 10 p.m. This means that it will be harder for us to fall asleep later at night. Adequate, consistent sleep provides a number of benefits. It helps to control weight, maintains a positive mood, increases focus, strengthens immunity, and helps control stress. No matter how busy you are, you will benefit from sticking to your regular bed and awakening time as closely as you can. If you have to stay up late for a Christmas party, for example, sleep in if you can. If you can’t because your kids will be up early, get up at the same time as usual. Then do your best to take a nap during the day. This advice is good for your children, too. We took a family vacation over Christmas break when my youngest was three. He did not get his nap and had night terrors as a result. He woke up screaming and could not be consoled. It’s a great example of what lack of sleep does to all of us internally.
Mistake #3: Skipping personal devotion time
When we go to bed late, we tend to get up late. If you have your time with the Lord in the morning as I do, you’ll miss it. Then you will struggle to have that time with God later in the day. Not having a quiet time of prayer, Bible reading, and meditation is a real problem when you are stressed, because that’s when you need it most. In fact, having that time with God during the Christmas season is likely to prevent stress in the first place. What’s more, if you continually skip your time with God this season, you will find yourself looking back on Christmas and feeling as though you missed the most important part. If in the midst of Christmas stress, you find yourself missing your time with God, make plans to correct that immediately. In addition, don’t limit yourself to your planned times with God. When you find yourself feeling frazzled or annoyed, take a few minutes to sit down in the presence of the Lord. One of my favorite things to do in those instances, is to write out what I’m feeling. Go to God with your stresses and worries and concerns and write them down. Pray and ask God what He has to say to you about these things. He may give you an idea or a Scripture or just a sense of peace that you did not have before.
Mistake #4: Not getting exercise
Another common habit we skip when we are under stress is exercise. That’s unfortunate because exercise helps to control the physical and emotional side effects of stress. For example, our immunity suffers when we are stressed. One of the benefits of exercise is that it raises our body temperature, helping to kill viruses and bacteria like a fever does. Over the Christmas season, we may have erratic sleep schedules, eat differently, and will spend time with large groups of people who may have a variety of germs. Giving up our exercise is not wise in these conditions. Exercise is also proven to relieve depression and anxiety. Christmas is the season we need exercise more than ever. If you don’t currently exercise, now is the perfect time to start. Check out 6 Short Workouts You Can Do at Home. Exercise doesn’t have to take an hour to be effective.
Mistake #5 Dropping other routines
There are other aspects of our routine besides sleep, devotions, and exercise. Because we’re stressed at this time of year, we can be temped to let them go. But not doing laundry, regular picking up, and meal planning will make life even more stressful. A cluttered environment adds to the feeling of being out of control. No meal plan will lead to irritability and an extra expense at this costly time of year. Not taking a few minutes to put laundry away and do dishes will cost you more time. It’s a lie that we will have more time to do these routine things later. Instead of dropping your routines when you’re stressed, maintain your habits. Use this time to start new ones. Set the timer and do a whole house pick up together for 15 minutes. Then do it again the next day. This is the time to be even more careful to schedule your days. You’ll accomplish what you hope to in your homeschooling, your home, and other responsibilities and you’ll still have time to enjoy special Christmas activities.
Mistake #6 Skipping your favorite parts of the season
When we are stressed, we immediately consider ways of saving time and cutting corners. That’s a good thing unless we consider eliminating things that are the highlight of our Christmas. If you don’t love making everyone’s favorite appetizer, pick something up instead. But if making Christmas cookies is a treasured tradition, make sure you do it — even though you’re stressed. The disappointment of having a busy, but unsatisfying Christmas just isn’t worth it. What if you don’t know how you can still do your favorite activities? Pray about it. The Lord will show you if there is something you think is non-negotiable but could be dropped. He may show you a way to multi-task. Need to have lunch with a friend and get Christmas shopping done? Do both together. Be willing to talk to people you love about your predicament. Will they really be disappointed if you don’t do something this year? They’ll let you know. You can include your favorite parts of the season even though you’re busy by asking for help. I used to be exhausted trying to wrap dozens of gifts. Then I switched to purchasing three gifts for my family members. You can find the link to my idea list for this in the show notes. And I asked my family members to help wrap. They love wrapping! And we spend time together while we do it. Being with my family just happens to be one of favorite parts of the season.
Which of these mistakes has caused you the most problems in previous years? Let’s chat about it on Facebook.
I’m a Christian psychologist turned homeschooling mother of six. My life can be a little crazy, so I look for sanity-saving ideas to use and share. I hope you’ll read my About page to learn more.
