DoodleBlog

Kevin and Elizabeth Schatz were arraigned in court last Tuesday, accused of murdering their 7-year-old adopted daughter during a discipline session which occurred the Saturday morning before.

Most disturbing? Apparently the Schatz’s are homeschoolers and their discipline methods can be traced back to Michael and Debbi Pearl’s child training book.

Here are two bloggers’ thoughts on this devastating event which I found helpful: Child Discipline or Child Abuse by Virginia Knowles, and When Parenting Kills by Katiekind.

Read, be informed, and share with your friends. There are many new, well-meaning parents who are looking for instruction and help in parenting. Use your knowledge to help them keep away from this dangerous path.

Since about the time we could toddle Mom began assigning us chores, and due to Mom’s early expectations and delegation talents we grew up with an expectation that we always would have jobs to complete and responsibilities to manage.

If your homeschooled children are still quite young and you are looking ahead for how to begin this whole process, you might find this list helpful with age appropriate chores for preschoolers all the way up through the teens. While not an exhaustive list, it gives a helpful starting place.

Or if your family has likewise been engaged in work since your children were little you might instead have some further helpful suggestions for new families starting out, just post them below!

A recent interview with homeschoolers Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar discussing such topics as: will they have more children, what they will name the new baby, how they respond to critics and much more.

I appreciated the flavor of this article in which, while the Duggars love their many children, they are quick to acknowledge that they are not a perfect family and also to say that God’s will for other families may or may not include many children.

Although we have been raise to love and embrace the biblical perspective that children are a blessing from God, it is refreshing to read of this family who although they have so many of these wonderful blessings not promoting their children but rather God.

While we often discuss and analyze learning styles during our child’s first few years of homeschooling, we often think less frequently about learning style differences for the older learner.

If this has been true for your family, you may find College Plus’ article on learning styles, written by Melody Dornink, especially helpful. Written to assist the college-aged student, Melody gives a concise and helpful summary of six different learning styles and how each style’s strengths will most likely portray itself.

Read the entire article here.

“The sure mark of an unliterary man is that he considers ‘I’ve read it already’ to be a conclusive argument against reading a work. We have all known women who remembered a novel so dimly that they had to stand for half an hour in the library skimming through it before they were certain they had once read it. But the moment they became certain, they rejected it immediately. It was for them dead, like a burnt-out match, an old railway ticket, or yesterday’s paper; they had already used it. Those who read great works, on the other hand, will read the same work ten, twenty or thirty times during the course of their life.”

—C.S. Lewis, An Experiment in Criticism (Cambridge, 1961), p. 2

HT:Miscellanies. A Cross-centered blog

Photo by (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images) # viewed at Boston.com’s BigPicture

Have you talked yet with your young homeschoolers about the dangers of playing with fire? Authorities have just determined that the California Station Fire was caused by arson!

Now is a great time to discuss the ramifications of careless use of fire with your homeschoolers!

Here are some phenomenal pictures of the current California fire, the Station Fire.

Whether or not you would choose to have your young daughter compete on America’s Got Talent, you will likely be able to appreciate the innocence of Kaitlyn Maher and enjoy her sweet spirit.

Why does Kaitlyn sing? She says, “It glorifies God and it makes people happy.”

According to the Washington Post, “Kaitlyn, who is home-schooled, has always been bright. She reads at the fourth-grade level, and loves playing math and spelling games with her mom.”