Homeschool Academic DisciplineA few years ago, my husband, David, occasionally traveled overseas to teach with an international organization that instructs Christian laity in leadership skills.  Strategically selected leaders in Estonia, Britain, India, and Kenya were among his students.  These men and women received training in leadership, evangelism, and multiplication for the purpose of spreading the Gospel to the unreached people in their respective nations.  Theory and strategy were the focus of the conferences.  Application of what they had learned had to wait until they got back home.

Every academic discipline is like leadership training.  As home school parents, we spend the greater part of every work day teaching our children theory:  grammar, spelling, punctuation, composition, logic, speech, math, and science.  You might even give them periodic exams to test their knowledge, but you will never know if your home school children really understand the concepts until you see them apply that theory in real life situations.

Grammar rules are antiseptic home school facts until your child has to actually write a sentence that is structured properly like “the boy threw the ball” instead of “the ball the boy threw.”  Spelling rules like “i before e except after c” are maddeningly meaningless until the child has to spell real words like “thief” and “deceit” in a written composition.  Home school biology is a theoretical system of hypotheses until the high school student steps out into the natural world and proves these speculations by examining the evidence of creation.

So, too, with leadership.  Your child has to step out, whether willingly or not, into a real crisis to demonstrate real knowledge.  I could take a group of Christian homeschoolers and teach them all about leadership.  Abraham, Joseph, and Moses could all illustrate my points on godly leaders.  In a perfect situation, every home school teen would look at me with rapturous attention soaking up every morsel of precious instruction.  But the truth is this:most of what kids (and adults) hear goes in one ear and out the other ear.  We don’t retain most of what we hear.  We have to apply knowledge right away to make it stick.  That’s why I have my kids take “branch” notes while they are listening to lectures or reading nonfiction, narrate what they’ve learned, then write an abstract summary of the content immediately afterwards.  The more ways that I can help them internalize the information, the more likely it is that they will remember it much later in life when they find themselves in a situation where they need to apply what they’ve learned.

My good friend, Sheri, and I are co-sponsors of a local chapter of the National Home School Honor Society.  Our chapter has three objectives:academic excellence, community service (specifically in the area of justice), and leadership.  Until recently, those three bylaw objectives were just abstract, theoretical ideas that the kids repeated every time a new member was inducted into the society: “I will strive to exhibit character and behavior that will naturally reflect the highest ideals of our local chapter – leadership, scholarship, and service.”  Words said in a simple pledge require no immediate action.

Well, like every journey, our home school honor society chapter has hit a few bumps in the road.  The most recent issue that the kids have been dealing with has to do with interpretation of our bylaws.  These teens are having a rip-roaring, ongoing email discussion about the definitions and direction of our society.  It reminds me of the discussion that conservatives and liberals often have over the interpretation of the U. S. Constitution or even of Scripture.  Should we interpret the words literally, or should we try to determine the original intent of the writers?

What I have found really exciting and encouraging about this wrestling match is this:  some of our teenagers are living out the pledge to be leaders.  They are all academic scholars as proven by their GPAs and standardized test scores.  They all have to log a certain number of community service hours as a requirement for continued membership.  But leadership is not mandatory.  Yes, we do have elected officers, but just because you are an officer doesn’t mean that you are a leader.  With this recent conflict, we have seen which of the kids are leaders.  Courageous in their zeal, they are learning firsthand how to lead in love and humility.  They are learning that leadership is exhilarating, but often lonely.  They are learning that those whom you are leading do not often appreciate your efforts to advocate on their behalf.  They are learning that the Lord is at work in this discussion as He prepares them for more challenging leadership tasks in the future.

So what does this have to do with your homeschooling journey?  Give your children opportunities to apply what they are learning.  Don’t be surprised when unscheduled demands surface.  Use these challenges for teaching.  The Lord is at work in your life, too.  He provides the theory and expects you to provide the action.  Abraham had to embrace Sarah before he became the father of many nations.  Second in command to Pharaoh, Joseph had to actively store grain before the nation escaped famine.  Moses had to lift the rod that God gave him before the Red Sea swamped the Egyptian army.  The potential for greatness was there all along, but each man had to act on his knowledge before theory became reality.  Home school theory without application is worthless.