We who teach should make it clear to ourselves that our aim in education is less good conduct than good character. We may mold good conduct in our children, but it is of value to the world only as it has its source in character. – Karen Andreola in A Charlotte Mason Companion

This is my quote to ponder for the week

I have often searched for the words to describe this concept, but Karen Andreola wrote them far better than I could. It seems to me like so many parents work hard on getting good conduct (via punitive methods) and yet they completely miss the goal of creating good character in their children. It doesn’t matter if you have kids who only comply. Grownups who comply and don’t have character certainly aren’t a benefit to society. I want my kids to have enough character to question authority when it is wrong. I do not want them to blindly accept what those above them tell them. I want them to be able to make decisions of good character when I am not there to spoon it to them

One of the things that I respect the most about my parents is that if they said something wrong and we challenged them, they would admit their err and dialogue with us. They were not all-knowing and all-powerful, although they were an authority in the home. Knowing that they were willing to admit their mistakes made it much easier for me to admit mine.

I am so glad that Mrs. Andreola wrote this out so well

Last night I was reading the above book, and I had a really nice moment of clarity. Although the book was referring to not beating yourself up if something happens in life that makes it so that your school schedule gets thrown off, I realized that I do that in all aspects of my life. It is really easy for me to get stuck in my schedules and then I make myself feel like a failure for things that are beyond my control. Here is the quote that made me think

One priority is to complete most of our academics in the morning hours. Expect interruptions and intrusions – those things that throw us off schedule or prevent us from reaching a goal. This is “real life” education. It could be that Mother has another miscarriage, Brother gets chicken pox, the family car dies, the water heater malfunctions, another appliance catches fire, the house needs major repair, Father loses his job or changes jobs, and it becomes necessary to start packing boxes in preparation to move to a different town or state yet again. All of the above and more have occurred during our homeschooling years – experiences probably shared by many of you, too. Habit and order preserve weary homeschooling parents so they can keep to their original priorities and get back on track again. Getting off track wasn’t a “bad” thing, it was a “real life” thing that God will work out for good if we are truly His children. Old faithful habits make order out of disorder and leave space for both practice and play. We can be content to be God’s children through life’s challenges.

I have been focusing on “habit training” just like Charlotte Mason encourages us to do for our chlidren. This is something that I would like to work on as well. I used to be very flexible in my plans and then I rebounded a bit too far in the opposite direction. I need to work on a happy middle ground.

On an unrelated note: my emails are acting funky, so I’m going to wait on the chore list until I can get it working. Silly servers.