Month: August 2017

Today is my wonderful husband’s Birthday. One of the things I most love about Scott is how he is our kid’s biggest fan. No matter what they are doing, he is interested. I so admire that in him. I am not naturally that way so have had to learn to be interested in what other’s are interested in. He is the first to help them pursue their interests and passions. 

I also love how he loves to share his passions with our kids. They love Astronomy, NASA, Star Trek, Star Wars, basically all things geek and space ? related because he took the time to share them. My kids love Disney, not only because I love Disney, but because he loves me and has made my interests a priority. He inspires me to do the same but I am not nearly as good at it. 

I am so thankful for his joy and delight in sharing not only what he loves but in sharing what each of his loves. I think it’s this in him that has caused our dinner table talk to be more about Space than philosophy, more about Star Wars than Jane Austen, more about the latest Doctor Who actor – wait, no, that is about me. He also encourages all of us to not just talk about our passions and interests but to step in and do something about it. He’s the one to take Connor to Barcelona and Boston to talk about Scratch, he’s the one who’s taken the kids to Space Camp, he’s the one who works extra so that the twins can do all the Robotics trips. He makes me want to be more interested and more engaged. I am so blessed to be his wife.

An older post but always pertinent….

Recently, we were challenged to make sure we have a working family purpose. I thought I would share what we’ve learned and how to make a family purpose. Oh, and goals for each of the kids too! The examples are our family purpose, the objectives are our goals for this stage of life and the goals are the kids goals. My poor kids don’t know how often I’ve used them as the example of good and bad behavior! I’ll have to raise their allowance.

Family Purpose

I. Purpose

Write an overall purpose statement for your family, making sure it reflects the morals and values of your family. Start with “Our purpose as a family is….” Make your statement as precise and simple as possible.

Example : “Our purpose as a family is to bring glory to God through the love and choices we make as individuals and corporately as a family.”

II. Objective

State in a phrase or sentence an objective in fulfilling your purpose statement. Begin your statement with “to…” and complete your statement in such a way that you would see your purpose statement fulfilled.

Example : “To raise our children to be Godly young men and women filled with integrity and joy, who will be leaders for Christ in their homes, churches and country.”

III. Goals

Education Goals – Years ago, when Scott and I were deciding on our kids education whether to homeschool, private school or public school we sat down to decide what we wanted out of our kids education. We each wrote down a list and then they all seemed to fall into these three categories.

• A Biblically integrated education. God’s Word wasn’t merely a subject in the day but was integrated into discussion of literature, history and science.
• Learning should be enjoyable and engaging. We want our kids to love to learn. Not everything can be “fun”, but an attitude that learning new things is something to be excited about.
• Academically Rigorous. We want our kids to be as prepared as possible for whatever God might have for them. We want to challenge them to be the very best that they can be. We want them to meet their potential, and we understand that this may be different depending on the child.

Sitting down and talking through what you want your child’s education to be, and what you want for them when when the graduate is vitally important. It will help you to decide and stay the course on all educational choices. I have these posted and on those hard days, I refer back to these as the, “why I am doing the crazy thing I am doing”. They also help me decide on curriculum. We never buy a curriculum if they do not meet atleast two of these goals.

Individual Yearly Goals –

Carefully consider individual goals for each family member. We make goals in three areas, spiritual, personal and academic (for our children) each year and have three goals per area..

Example : For our oldest son, here are the goals he is currently working on

Spiritual – self control over his emotions and tongue Gal 5:22-23

Personal – maintain responsibility over belongings (coats, piano bags, sports equipment) Eph 6:1-2

Academic – have multiplication and division tables memorized through 12

Carefully consider these goals and make sure they meet these criteria:

1. Are they biblical?

2. Do I have a verse or moral reason why to support these?

3. Do they fit our purpose as a family?

4. Do they bring glory to God or glory to us?

5. Are they achievable? We don’t want to exasperate our children. (Col. 3:21)
Post these in a spot where you can see them regularly and pick a goal to work on weekly or monthly, include your children and them pick the goal they want to work on.

.…A note on how this has worked years later- after having done this for over 15+ years, this has become part of how my kids make decisions. They know how to make goals and achieve them. We have talked and worked on how to make small steps to achieve a big goal. They also debate decisions about things like extra curriculars, college majors, colleges and even colleges based on their goals. It’s a vital skill and has already helped them to become high achievers at a young age.As parents and homeschoolers, this has allowed us to keep on a steady course. The education goals we set 15 years ago have come to fruition. We kept them in mind for every curriculum purchase, every decision for co-ops and extra curriculars. It has really helped us to make good solid decisions and not just jump on the newest, coolest thing.

If I had to give one piece of advice for parents it would be to have a set of goals and plans and then teach your kids how to make goals and achieve them.  

But the noble man devises noble plans; And by noble plans he stands. Isaiah 32:8

When Caileigh was little, she would have loved toys that taught Engineering ideas but were geared for girls.  She was (and is) a very curious girl so she just joined the boys in their toys but she also loves colors and is artistic so prettier toys would have appealed to her. This summer she wrote, designed and planned a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) Camp for Girls.  She and her best friend taught about Serpinski triangles and then they and the girls made a colorful, giant 12ft by 11ft Serpinski triangle.  She taught them about Fibonacci Numbers and them she had them trace with glitter glue Fibonacci spirals in pinecones, flowers, pineapples and fruit.  They built vibrating art robots and showed how flowers use water by using food colors and carnations.  They helped the girls be curious about the world around them all while showing how beautiful it is as well.  The girls were intrigued and engaged.

Later, Caileigh and I were talking about getting younger girls interested in STEM.  She specifically wanted to figure out how to encourage her two young cousins who are 5. We both feel that it is vitally important to encourage girls to think and play in STEM realms.  We often just encourage our boys in STEM fields but our girls need more purposeful encouragement because the world doesn’t naturally encourage them to pursue these fields.  We talked about getting them toys like she had when she was little but she really wanted to get toys that were girl oriented and we went into a toy store and there they were, the perfect toys.

They all feature girl action dolls who are engineers and they teach different skills and ideas.  There’s Goldie Blox and the Zip Line which teaches about suspension. Or Goldie Blox Craft-Struction Box which has ideas for a ton of projects and introduces the idea of prototyping. There are many more sets, each designed to introduce and teach girls engineering concepts during play.  I think I have several nieces who will be really happy come birthday and Christmas time.  I think they will be extra happy because I know that their favorite people, their cousins Connor, Caileigh and Collin will be more than happy to get on the floor and play with these toys with them.  I also think these might be great gifts or toys for Dads to play with girls.  I know my husband would be more willing (okay let’s be honest, I would be more willing too) to play with these then to sit and play dolls.