With all the trappings of Biblical Principle Approach–word studies, 4-Ring, notebooks, the Red Books, Rudiments, etc., you can easily get overwhelmed and frustrated. Your idea of home education is not caught up in books and all that research, but in being with your children, learning alongside them. There is a way to do both.

• Ease into the whole BPA mindset. It takes time and effort to reformulate your ideas of American Christian education, to get a handle on the terminology and to reflect on what you are learning. Give yourself time. How much time? As much as it takes.
• Take one subject and deal with that. Don’t take the whole homeschooling elephant in one bite. You’ll just pull something and you’ll still be hungry.
• Don’t make everything formal. You can ease into word studies and literature studies without making a big announcement. It’s okay to just fold these things into your homeschooling day. Pull out the Bible and the 1828 dictionary and just ask a few questions. The children will do the work for you.
• Lower your expectations. That seems counter-intuitive to BPA philosophy, at least at first blush. But we are home educators, not classroom Master Teachers. We [probably] teach multiple grades with many subjects and to expect to become a Master Teacher in every subject is asking for a breakdown. Just keep ahead of your students. Learn alongside them. Discover things together as you dig into the Word. It’s amazing how lowered expectations can set you free and actually produce better results in the long run.
• Think of teaching deep, not broad. The principles expand through the grades, so you get deeper and deeper, as Ms. Dang says, going 20 years deep. It’s not a smattering of learning but more like digging a well. A well your children can draw from as they learn to teach themselves.
• Take one principle per subject per day. No need to overwhelm baby birds with too much food. It will just fall to the ground. One idea to reflect on and discuss will lead to exciting results.

What challenges do you encounter with the Biblical Principle Approach? If you are new to this methodology, what questions do you have?

1. It is too labor-intensive. Yes, it does require much from the teacher. Everything in life that is worth anything has come about through struggle and toil and patience and diligence. You must internalize the principles in order to teach them. And that takes time. Too much time, it seems sometimes. But in the end the price is small compared to the rewards of seeing your children maturing in the Lord, reasoning effectively form God’s Word and exhibiting Christian character.
2. It is too expensive. Actually the Biblical Principle Approach is economical. Real literature and other resources can be reused and enjoyed. Compared to consumable programs, BPA is affordable.
3. It is only focused on American history. It is not. We study the whole chain of Christianity, that is, the whole timeline. Nothing in His Story happens in a vacuum. Since we study from cause to effect, we study all of history all around the world.
4. It is classical education. BPA is not classical education after the Greek model. It is considered Biblical classical, after the Hebrew model.
5. I can pick it up and use it right away. While the Noah Plan from the Foundation for American Christian Education has lesson plans for grades K-3, but is difficult and burnout-inducing to jump in before you have renewed your mind and formed your philosophy of education and at least gotten the basics of a BPA education under your belt. It’s not a race or a canned curriculum. It is something that takes time and effort to implement.

BPA is so exciting, so life changing, so excellent that those new to this approach can, in their zeal, overdo things and burnout quickly. It can leave you feeling like you have failed or that BPA is not a fit for you. Because it requires more on the part of the parent-teacher, it takes more time to make the changes you desire to see in your homeschool.

It is not a matter of simply tossing out the old and starting fresh Monday morning. There is a process that will keep you growing, learning, and on track. I cannot stress strongly enough the word transition. It is a process, not a box you open and use right away.

First you must renew your own mind. You cannot teach it until it has been made light to you. Take time to internalize scripture, principles and the ideas of America’s Christian history before you even begin to add it to your lessons.

Then you choose one subject and 4-R that. Leave all your other materials as they are and teach only that one subject BPA. Introduce this new way of learning in history, literature or whatever subject you feel led to choose.

Add one subject each year that you teach from a BPA perspective. Baby steps will prevent burnout. Jumping in and trying to teach every subject this way from the start will leave you exhausted and frustrated.

Keep your standards high and your expectations low. Your children may struggle with ideas and producing their own work. Present one idea per lesson per day. Don’t overfeed and be patient. Let them sit with ideas and wrestle for their own education. They will own it and real learning will happen.

Making small changes over the years will get you where you want to go. Displacing ideas, Biblical reasoning and producing your own work all take time, effort and patience. As long as you understand it’s not a race but a journey, your transition can be a happy and painless one (but not without struggle!).

And the Freedom & Simplicity on the R Road to Biblical Wisdom ebook goes to…

TRICIA!

Thanks to everyone for playing. I love giveaways and hope to have another one soon. Tricia let me know where to email your book!

I haven’t had a contest in a long time and I love this book, so I thought I would give away a copy to a fortunate reader.

Lisa Hodgen’s new book Freedom & Simplicity on the R Road to Biblical Wisdom: A “How to” Guide to Biblical Learning in Home Education is one of new favorite books. I reviewed it at The Curriculum Choice so I won’t rehash it here. Just know that I think this book gets you where you want to go in your home education journey–Wisdom’s house.

How do you win? Leave a comment about something related to Biblical wisdom–a scripture, a question or just a comment. And please read the review before you enter so you have a good idea of what the book is about. One entry per person please. I will draw randomly from all entries stamped by 9pm CST on August 31, 2009. If the winner does not claim the prize within 7 days another winner will be chosen.

Just want to spread the word about a few things.

• Ms. Dang has audio and handouts from her regular Wednesday night salon. They are a must-listen.
• Mrs. Smith with Pilgrim Institute has a free 45 minute video on Repairing the Breach for you or your church.
• Mrs. Smith also is working on some online classes. Details coming.
• Her latest (#4) history book will be out later this year.
• FACE has some dinged books at a discount.
• 23rd Pilgrim Institute conference will be in Elkhart , IN March 19-20. Theme is “Educating for Liberty”

In case you didn’t know, you can take a Rudiments of America’s Christian History & Government by correspondence course. More details here.

Unit studies (which I prefer to call integrated studies) are wonderful. Teaching all the kids all together, planning one stream of lessons for the whole bunch is smart and interesting, and you actually retain more information as you see how it is all connected. However, the thing that always has concerned me is the tendency to focus on facts. It is easy to get caught up in the activities and the topic and lose sight of the beautiful principles that hold it all together. How do you create a unit study that keeps the focus on the principles? Some things to remember:

1. The overarching principle is the focus of the unit. This is the umbrella for all your lessons.
2. The leading ideas point to the Principles. They guide your lessons.
3. Lesson plans come from the leading ideas, which come from the principles.
4. The facts of the lesson illustrate the principle, much like an illustrated sermon.

So this is it in a nutshell: principle—->leading idea—->lesson

For example, your study on WWII may discuss the Holocaust. Your study may have the overarching principle “God’s Principle of Individuality.” Your lessons could include the leading ideas like, “All men are created in God’s image,” “We are all responsible for our own relationship with God” and “Man has intrinsic value.” Your lessons would be guided from these leading ideas that reinforce the Principle. So your lesson might include studying a concentration camp story, reading up on the third Reich and their ideas that are contrary to the principle or calculating how many people lost their lives.

You could show that even as the prisoners lost their freedom they went to great lengths to maintain their individuality–sharing stories of their heritage, smuggling out personal items,writing stories during and after the horrific events. (It is interesting that the Third Reich went to so much trouble to document the Jews as individuals, taking photos, issuing numbers, keeping meticulous records.) Also there are many inspiring stories like Corrie TenBoom’s biography that are inspiring stories of individuals making a difference in the lives of other individuals during the war. And you can do scripture documentation, key sheets and word studies to complete your study. This is just scratching the surface of course, but I hope it gives you an idea of how an integrated study can work well using Biblical principles.

Do you see how the lessons come alive as you discuss the material in light of Biblical principles? Writing, reading, history, literature and sometimes math and science can be intertwined into a cohesive study that makes sense to all of your students. Have them study some things on their own and then share what they learn with one another. (They learn even more and you didn’t have to teach it yourself!) You will be amazed at what the Holy Spirit can prompt in your children.

It is almost like planning a traditional BPA lesson plan, only you have several subjects together instead of separate. Providential HisStory flows naturally between the subjects because everything has happened at some point in history.

I think the label “integrated studies” makes more sense for BPA families because the subjects are integrated under a principle and not a topic. If you think of them as integrated subjects that can keep you out of the “facts only” unit study ditch.

While this isn’t the only way to create an integrated BPA study, it’s the way that makes sense to me and I hope I’ve done a good job of explaining myself. Thoughts? Ideas? Please leave a comment.

My most exciting times as a home educator have come under inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Without the help of the Holy Spirit my lessons become dry and frankly pretty boring. I thought I would share some thoughts concerning this.

If you are a Christian teaching your children at home, you probably already have experienced spirit-led lessons, even if you didn’t know it or call it that.

When you are teaching multiple grades together you can relax. Just as happens in a church full of individuals, the Holy Spirit has a wonderful way of tailoring the lesson to fit the needs of the hearer. I never cease to be amazed that a room full of people can hear the same sermon, the same words and scripture, and get something intimately personal from it. Only God’s living Word can do that.

The Holy Spirit is here for, among other things, education.  John 14:26 Jesus says that when He left the Holy Spirit would come and “will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.” “All things” there means in the Greek just that–all things. So rejoice that the Holy Spirit is there to teach you, to teach your kids, and to teach you to teach your kids all things.

If you are struggling in an area such as math or history or even how to schedule your day or deal with a difficult character issue, help is a prayer away. God gives wisdom liberally if we will only ask (James 1:5). And when we don’t even know what we need the Holy Spirit (Rom. 8:26) and Jesus (Rom. 8:34) both are praying God’s will on our behalf. Praise God! If you are weak in an area let God show Himself strong. I can tell you from experience those are the most exciting lessons of all because I cannot do that in my own ability. (2 Cor 12:9)

I encourage you to be careful not to put your lessons in a box and think there will be amazing revelations every day in every subject. That won’t happen. Many days will be pretty average. But that’s what makes the special times so special. And God’s grace is in the every day, speaking in quiet whispers through His Word in every subject.

With the Biblical Principle Approach that places God’s Word at the center of every subject, you can’t help but have Holy Spirit inspired lessons each time you pick up your Bible and read His life-giving words to your family. It’s rhema.

For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.      Hebrews 4:12

To begin our study of America’s Christian History we must discuss some basic ideas.

The Christian Idea of Man

The Christian idea of man is the basis for our form of government. It is also the foundational principle that the other 6 principles of America’s Christian History and Government. It is the idea that man is created in God’s image as a unique individual. All men are therefore created equal with independent value. This is a wonderful principle to meditate on. If we are unique, equal and have value, then the state is servant to us and not master.

The Purpose of Government

The state was created for man, not the other way around. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are rights from God and the responsibility to keep them is delegated to the state. Today this weighty task is not respected by federal government, but rather it is becoming more and more irrelevant. Our government (state and federal)  is moving more toward a pagan idea of government.

The Pagan idea of Man

To the pagans (pagan meaning those who are not Christians) is that man has value as related to the state. The state has all the power to control, not protect, our liberty. We also have a society that looks to the state as keepers or even dispensers of liberty. It is a socialist idea that pervades our society today. Our citizens have not been educated on the Christian idea of man so we should not expect anything different.

I will go into more detail on the Leading Ideas (step 2) in the next post.

The first Biblical principle we study, and the overarching principle as well, is “God’s Principle of Individuality.” This principle can be seen everywhere, and we focus on seeing it in the subjects.

If God cares about individuality, then if we study the subjects individually we are enjoying the distinctiveness of each subject. There is a rich history, diverse vocabulary and important principles that each subject contains. A goal of learning with the Biblical Principle Approach is not fact mastery but subject mastery (through principles).

We are not discussing facts but principles, so multiple grades are able to learn together. There is no need for complicated lesson plans for each child. A little modification and all your children can learn at the same time.

How can we understand the unique vocabulary and rudiments of a subject if they are all lumped together? Each subject has its own language and foundation. It is important for children to learn these in order to master the subject.

When you understand the rudiments of a subject, along with its vocabulary, you are able to see how the subjects naturally overlap and fit together. There are common principles that bring the subjects in harmony and bring a richer appreciation of all the subjects.

For more reading on the subject, these two PDF handouts are available for download.

Selected Quotes Concerning the Individuality of Subjects

My personal notes concerning unit studies vs. individuality of subjects

I have nothing against unit studies per se, I just prefer a distinct subject methodology with natural subject integration. What I mean is I do not rally around a topic but around the principle of a subject. I may pick a certain topic that several subjects will naturally fit into but I do not try to contrive lessons to fit a topic.

Once or twice a year I will do a study on a subject and the subjects will naturally integrate, such as a study on Bach (which we are starting this week). HisStory, geography, literature, English and music are all naturally covered as we read through the book, adding to our enjoyment and understanding of the life and times (and character) of Bach. The subjects add to our understanding of cause and effect, of the things that made Bach who he was. They are not disjointed facts but parts of the whole under the principle of individuality. We see how, where, with whom and when he lived contributed to his character. Along with this study we continue our math, Bible and science separately.

The subjects are beautiful and unique. I don’t want my children to miss out on the treasures that each subject contains. 

I hope this post will spark some conversation regarding the topic.  I will begin over the next several weeks to go over each of the individual subjects, beginning with history. Our Thursday chat will also correspond to the weekly subject.