We asked WISDOM parents, students, facilitators, staff and Parent Advisory Council members to offer suggestions to the following question – how do we beat the January blues? Read on for many great ideas that have worked well in the homes of other home schoolers.
By this time of year you will likely have developed a pattern or routine in your home-school day to accomplish your selected program of studies. Your children engage themselves with the various subjects that you assign them, most often with the help of a text book or other written resource. Depending on your child’s age and ability, the reading in these books may be done by your child, or you may be the one to read and explain the material to your eager learner.
Once upon a time in the not too distant past, there was a home schooling family.
Pa worked, and Ma stayed at home, teaching their five children. They had begun their home school adventure much like many other families, merely bringing school home...
It was with the support of their local school principal that Ken and Marlane Noster brought home their eldest child, half way through grade 3; but the superintendent threatened to charge them with truancy. The late 80’s were rife with inconsistencies in treatment of home schoolers.
Sometimes this question comes hard because we lack a context.
Are we talking about our student compared to other students his age? Are we addressing his particular talents and questioning whether he has buried them or multiplied them? Are we asking the question relative to some other standard - if so, what?
Let’s consider measuring success by comparison with other students his age. Before I go any further, please let me assert that in a tutorial context (home schooling) this is the least valuable approach to student evaluation. However, this is the type of evaluation we grew up with, it is the criterion our child (even if he didn’t ever attend school) is very familiar with, and it is possible that it is the primary means by which he views his progress. Realistically, for much of our population, this is the only means by which success, personal value, even life choices are measured, valid or not. A form of relativism, the flaw is evident.
When I completed high school I received an armful of awards that meant nothing. I’m not being humble here; it’s a fact. I received the award for the highest overall average in my graduating class. I also received the Science award and the Math award. This all sounds impressive until you compare my marks with the graduating class three years prior. That particular class was loaded with high academic achievers, many of whom rightfully scored very well in their final grades. Had I been among that class, I would have received not a single award. What’s more, I wouldn’t have seemed very good at the non-academic activities either, for the class three years ahead of me also shone in sports, debate, and public speaking.
Scripture tells us it is unwise to compare ourselves with each other (2Cor 10:12), and wisdom of the ages agrees (the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence); yet we persist. The same circumstances that saw me win all kinds of honour in grade 12 also define achievement - and its lack - in the lives of many people. Students who compare themselves to others will be discontented and frustrated or they will become puffed up, possibly complacent. In any event, their self-concept will be flawed.... (continued by clicking on the link)
It should be noted that some solutions for signing a PDF are about putting your actual, visual signature (or something that is good enough to be one) on the file, while others are about adding a digital "signature" in a different sense to the file to show that it was you who signed it. Sometimes one or the other is what's needed and you'll want to make sure you've picked the right one.
On computers
While Adobe Reader might be treated as an industry standard, there are other options.
- Foxit has a free reader with signing capability.
- On macOS, the built-in Preview app, which is the default app for opening a PDF file, has an option add visual signatures and few handy ways to create them that are easier than clicking and dragging with your mouse.
- Open the file
- In the menu bar, go Tools > Annotate > Signature.
- From there you can pick an existing signture, or add a new one with a simple webcam scanning process to digitise one written on paper, or finger-draw one on the laptop trackpad or a connected phone. (This is also where you'd remove existing saved signatures.)
On mobile phones & tablets
Here are a few suggested apps for filling out and signing PDF documents while on the go!
iOS
- pdfFiller
- PDF Expert (a bit more advanced/complicated)
Android:
- DocuSign
- Adobe Scan (thanks Peter!)
Often, history education consists of a short study of ancient history and several years of study about the time since the discovery of the Americas. There is so much information about the last 500 years that the sheer volume overwhelms earlier history. This emphasis is what most of us of the last generation experienced in our schooling.
There is a danger in this. We begin to think that the time before 1492 is in the same realm as myths and legends. Biblical stories, and perhaps Christ himself, are not seen as historically true. But if we have a more complete picture of history, preferably chronologically from the oldest known civilizations, we can see how God prepared the world for His coming, and how mankind responded. His Incarnation can be seen for what it is: the central event of all history.
Are you beating your head against a wall? Is your thirteen year old impossible to teach? Is the curriculum that has worked so well in the past suddenly "boring?"
I recently spoke with a mother of many who, after completing an enjoyable unit study of reading and discussion on Holland, decided her fourteen year old son should follow-up this project with something concrete. She asked him to write an essay on the history of the development of the tulip industry - a topic they had all found to be interesting. As days of reluctance dragged into weeks of resistance, a normally affable mother-son relationship became outright antagonistic....
The desire of my heart is to encourage families with grace and love. I do pray and hope that the attached article will bring encouragement to you and other home schooling families.
Building strong families together in Christ,
Karen Dargatz
(780) 962-3727
Unfortunately, almost all of us take our definition of "school" from the limited experience of our own schooling. Whether or not we actually acknowledge it, the public school system becomes our model of how things should actually work. We presume learning is best broken up into defined subjects, that tests are the best measure of learning, that we should finish the math book each year, and most of all, that school is work...