| From the TeachingtheWord Bible Knowledgebase |
Part six (final) of a series. Read part five.
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Christian parents across the United States and in other countries who have successfully homeschooled come from all sorts of cultural and educational backgrounds. Some of them, the world (and even many in the church) would say, could never homeschool successfully. But by God's grace they have.
As we conclude this brief series on Christian homeschooling, we take up another question that is on the minds of many prospective homeschool parents - and it is a question that does not go away during your children's homeschooling years: "I, as a parent, do not know if I am capable of doing this." Behind this question are a wide range of other thoughts, such as these:
- "I only barely graduated from high school myself!"
- "I never completed college," or "I only have an A.A. degree."
- "I have a college degree, but not in the field of education."
Many parents are also unsure of their state's or local government's legal requirements for homeschooling.
Let us look at these issues together.
Parental Educational Requirements
Within the United States, the educational qualifications for homeschool parents vary in each of the fifty states, but most are not as strenuous as one might first think. Many of the qualifications relate not as much to a parent's level of education as to the subjects and number of hours the mother and/or father commit to provide. Some states stipulate no specific qualifications.
Some states require the homeschooling parent(s) to have a high school diploma or GED (a General Equivalency Diploma which can be acquired by taking a battery of standardized tests). Some states do not even stipulate that, or parents can meet the requirement by membership in an umbrella group which provides the assistance of people who meet the state's qualifications.
Several homeschooling websites provide details on parental qualifications in each jurisdiction. These include The Old Schoolhouse (Christian emphasis), the Coalition for Responsible Homeschool Education (a secular organization), Successful Homeschooling (also secular), the Home School Legal Defense Association, and the education section of FindLaw.com.
One thing that is very telling is that most states require parents, in one form or another, to "remove" their children from the public school system in order to homeschool. The assumption of most state laws is that the government effectively owns your children, to indoctrinate them as it wishes, from kindergarten or even pre-kindergarten upwards. Removing your children from the "ownership" of the God-defying state represents no small incentive to homeschool!
For this reason, it is preferable to begin information-gathering about parental qualifications with non-governmental sources like those above, rather than by first contacting state or local governments. Those governments have a vested interest in protecting their supposed "right" to keep children in the public school system. Therefore, many educational bureaucracies make it unnecessarily difficult for parents to ascertain and assert their homeschooling rights.
Qualifications The World Cannot Understand
A vital element that is nowhere codified in man-made laws is the fact that Christian parents possess, and need to develop and nurture, the spiritual qualifications to homeschool their children. And fathers, do not forget that the responsibility for educating your children does not belong to your wife alone. Male headship in the Christian home is no less vital in this area than in any other. "And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord" (Ephesians 6:4).
Christian parents, you are qualified to teach your children because God has given them to you, and you know them better than anyone else on earth. Strive to know you children well. Strive to understand their interests and direct them in God-honoring ways. Strive to shape the required discipline according to your knowledge of your children as individuals.
You are also qualified because you have the Word of God in your hands, the Spirit of God living within you, and the tremendous privilege of prayer. Be in the Word yourself, systematically and continually. Seek the illumination of the Holy Spirit as you read and study it. Many homeschool parents find the opportunity to study the Scriptures together with their children in the homeschool setting one of its greatest joys and privileges. Seize the great privilege of prayer for your labors, and intercessory prayer for your children.
These are essential elements of the educational picture that the unbelieving world cannot understand, but which you as a believing parent must seek to fully understand and effectively employ.
For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base [insignificant or lowly] things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence. But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God - and righteousness and sanctification and redemption - that, as it is written, "He who glories, let him glory in the Lord." (1 Corinthians 1:26-31)
"I Can Do All Things Through Christ"
Dear friends, it can be done. I know Christian parents across the United States and in other countries who have successfully homeschooled, who come from all sorts of cultural and educational backgrounds. Some of them, the world (and even many in the church) would say, could never homeschool successfully. But by God's grace they have.
One lady I know married a man who had been stationed at one of the United States' embassies in southeast Asia. She came to this country and became a U. S. citizen, and became a Christian. When she arrived she knew very little English. But she homeschooled her sons for over twenty years and they have done well academically. One of them now holds a Christian university degree in cinema production and is pursuing a career in documentary filmmaking, another is a skilled automotive technician and talented church organist, and another plans to pursue a career as an announcer and voice actor.
Another case in my personal acquaintance is one of the more extreme ones. A young woman I know was the product of a broken home. She was abandoned to other relatives from birth by her biological parents. In God's providence those relatives were believers, and she received the benefits of a Christian day school education through the elementary years and came to know Christ at an early age.
In her early teens her birth parents, who sporadically attended church but were not believers, decided to retake custody of her. In a very dysfunctional home situation this young girl prayed for God's help and provision. With limited but providential help from people associated with the church school she had previously attended, she had to essentially homeschool herself through the remaining grades without meaningful parental involvement - in fact, in the face of ungodly opposition at home. During the high school grade levels, she actually had to select and buy her own curriculum materials and completely self-educate. By the grace of God she succeeded, completing the last two years of high school in a single year.
After graduation she worked for a time in the office of a Christian ministry as an administrative assistant. Today she is a nursing technician, is well on her way to completing a college degree and other training that will qualify her to be a registered nurse, and has married a fine Christian man.
The forces of Antichrist will be at work to thwart your homeschool efforts, and to tell you that you cannot do it. But "you are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world" (1 John 4:4). May you be able to continually rejoice in God's work in your life and in your children's, and may you be able to say with the Apostle Paul,
I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content: I know how to be abased [literally, how to live humbly], and I know how to abound [how to live in prosperity]. Everywhere and in all things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. (Philippians 4:11-13)
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