Yearly Archives: 2006

Defining Biblical Principles Education

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This pic has nothing to do with this post, but is only included for the Summer Splash BiblePrinciples Facebook Party 🙂

God’s Kingdom is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field. ~ Matt. 13:31

What is Biblical Principles education? I believe it can be summed up in one word, Foundations or Seed. It is about seeking that which lies under, supports, and from which all else is built upon.

It is more than just “teaching based upon the Bible”, although it certainly is that. Biblical Principles education is based solidly on Christianity, particularly as seen in the historical protestant faith beginning in the Reformation, that sought to restore the pure Christianity of the New Testament, that taught that the Law of Liberty begins in hearts submitted to God. It has as its foundation some core teachings of the Reformation, Sola Scriptura–God’s Word alone, and Soli Deo Gloria–for God’s glory alone. Biblical Principles education is a specific philosophy and methodology of teaching based upon the Bible for specific goals.

Foundational Goals

Some of the Foundational aspects of Biblical Principles education are in realizing that what is produced and seen externally begins internally. This is seen in some of its goals:

  1. to be self-governed under God, which requires a heart submitted to God.
  2. to reason Biblically, taking all of life and learning back to “what does the Scripture say” that applies to this.
  3. to think governmentally, determining not only who or what is vying for control, (while realizing that everything lies in the ultimate control of God Himself,) but also discerning what view of government is being promoted.
  4. to see life and learning from God’s perspective, that is in context of the Big Picture. This is wisdom.

Rudiments

Every effect has a cause, and these results are accomplished by seeking out the perspective, purpose and principles of what we are studying. These are the “seed that contains the whole” of our study, the basic elements from which all else (the details and facts) spring forth. These basic elements, Rudiments, are:

  1. seeking God and His purpose in everything learned–the Biblical origin, foundation and purpose of each subject and topic studied.
  2. seeking out the foundational principles of a study–seeing the Big Picture of the study, putting it in context–in both God’s Word and His Creation. I heard it said recently that we can really only study 2 things, God and His Creation. His Word is our Source, His Creation is our re-source. The Principles found will be both Universal (in context with its relationship to all things) and Unique (specific to the subject itself).

Relational Learning

From this “seed” of our study springs forth the entire study. From a foundation of wisdom, we gain understanding and knowledge. From seeing the study in the above context we are able to relate it to our own life (and other things in God’s Creation), learn from it, not just learn it. Then when we learn the facts and details unique to the study, we are learning them in proper context; the facts and details have meaning and relationship. We can look at them both in their universal and unique applications.

The Kingdom of God is like… Seeds

This is Kingdom Education. Have you ever noticed how God so often relates His Kingdom to a seed? (another message for another day) It is whole learning–wisdom, understanding, and knowledge, seeking God’s perspective, purpose and principles, in everything we read and research, so that it is understood in the context of Truth, so we can apply it to our own lives. When we apply God’s Word, in all areas of life, to our own lives, that is growth, true education. What is the final result of the growth of seeds? Reproducing more seed. This is seen in our recording our findings so we can both teach others, and build upon our own learning.

Lifestyle Education through Discipleship™

As you can tell, this is not just a curriculum, in the context of a daily plan and set of resources, you place before your child. It is a lifestyle of education that begins with you renewing your own mind, pressing toward those goals above for your own life. The education of your children is actually “seed reproduction”, planting in their lives from the harvest in our own. This is discipleship. Notice at the end of Matthew’s telling of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, what we call the Great Commission, that Jesus told His disciples to make disciples, to reproduce themselves. Notice, the teachers were to first of all be students of Christ themselves. This is what I call Lifestyle Education through Discipleship.

In a Nutshell

To put it into one sentence I could say, Biblical Principles education is seeking God’s perspective, purpose, and principles in every area of life and learning, and applying them to my own life, and journaling all the rich treasures I find therein.

To hear a short clip from our Freedom & Simplicity™ of Lifestyle Education through Discipleship™ Seminar on how Principle Approach™ and L.E.D. fit together, click here.

 

When You Lie Down & Rise Up

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On our bibleprinciples elist I was asked for the nitty-gritty of our days. I’ve placed parts of that answer over here, to not make that post way too long, especially the details of our family worship times. As I noted in that post, every single thing isn’t done every single day, but this is our typical pattern, and what we work toward daily. Here’s how we teach when we lie down and rise up.

I like to begin our day the night before – remember God said it was “evening and morning the first day….”

Our evening family time consists of: Family discussion about the day and upcoming things, a chapter from a family read-aloud – “life changing literature”, a Psalm (or more than 1), and prayer together – including prayer that God will pull it all together! Usually each family member prays each night.

We are currently reading the Crown and Covenant series by Douglas Bond. It is historical fiction telling the stories of the Scottish Covenanters. We many times read “Rare Collectors” from Lamplighters. Last year’s highlight was the Kingdom series by Chuck Black.

We begin the morning with each person doing their own devotions – Bible reading and prayer. A Bible reading schedule that has us all reading the same chapters is awesome, but it doesn’t always work that way. Little ones can use a tape/CD or mom or older person can read to them. We encourage the children to journal their devotions. Little ones can draw. The older ones can follow the pattern set out in our Redeeming the Time forms – Read, Rewrite, Relate, Recite.

When we come together we have a Family Altar time: Opening with Prayer, Worship (singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs), Wisdom-Proverb of the Day, Scripture Recitation, Catechism study, Daily Prayer Focus – we pray for different areas each day, and each person writes a daily journal of what God is teaching them through Life and Learning studies. The little ones are required to be a part of all this, they can draw pictures of “what God is teaching them.”

Our older girls and I used to read 5 Psalms and the Proverb of the day each morning. We can’t get that much in anymore. So we do our Psalm at night, and many times only 1, but I figure we will still get through the book of Psalms at least once, maybe close to twice a year.

I will also say about this morning time, I believe music is very important for “physical” and spiritual reasons. Music (well at least certain forms) opens our hearts to God and also our minds to learning. Well balanced music helps our brains make connections between those creative and orderly parts of our brain and helps us remember. We begin with psalms and hymns to “enter His gates with praise” and play low level classical music through most of the day, at least as we get the day, and our brains, going. This is a good time to do music/ instrumental practice also – they usually snatch a few minutes each, in between their clean-up chores, and practice longer later.

 

 

Books of Remembrance IV

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Hmmm, I said I would write a Part 4 to conclude this series on “MyMini Books of Remembrance”, but I didn’t write down what I planned to conclude with right away, and I now have no idea what it was. Let me think a minute, and review. In Part 1 we covered what a “MyMini Book of Remembrance” is and why to make them. In Part 2 we covered general questions about making MyMini BOR’s. In Part 3 we covered the supplies needed. So that must leave the nitty gritty details for this Part 4 – How to actually MAKE the MyMini Book of Remembrance.

But before I get into that, I did remember one supply I left out of Part 3, pictures. You may want to find or draw images to enliven your MyMini Book of Remembrance. You can draw your own pictures, cut or copy them out of books or magazines, or find online clip art to print out. Add them to the your mini-books and the BOR folder itself. These will all help enhance your BOR.

Now on to making mini-books and your MyMini Book of Remembrance:

A mini-book will be made anytime you have a piece of info to add to your MyMini Book of Remembrance. If you are teaching one point per day, and/or one theme per week, it won’t be hard to determine the basic “what” you will put in your mini-book. How you want to state it and what form of mini-book you will put it in is where your/your child’s creativity comes in.

You may state your main point of the lesson as a “title” for your mini-book, then include some of the details you learned about it. You may be state things you learned as questions and answers. In teaching by Biblical principles, many times our main point is followed up by examples/applications. We also many times are looking at the internal cause or meaning and the external action or effect. The choice is totally yours as to how to present what you have learned. Again, as I stated in Part 3, do not get hung up on some supposed right way of doing this and mimicing someone else’s BOR. This is for what YOU learned.

Some mini-books have general limitations which will help you choose which mini-book to make. A single Match Book presents 2 pieces of information. A Tri-fold Book presents 3. And an Envelope Book presents 4. Flap Books and Layered Books can be varied greatly in number of ideas you can present in one. I made a proto-type folder of all the types of mini-books. My children are able to look at it to determine which type of mini-book best suits the material they want to add to their BOR.

Generally, throughout the lesson/week the children are encouraged to take notes – preferably in graphic outline (mindmapping) form. for example, our weekly (or longer) theme may be the Parables of Jesus. Each day we study a different parable, looking at the meaning. The children are noting what the parable was about, its Bible reference (Book, chapter and verses) and its meaning. At the end of the week/theme, they make their mini-book. A Layered Book or a Flap Book would both be good for presenting this theme with so many different details. On the outside they may write “Parables of Jesus” – perhaps here or on the first page giving the definition of a parable. Then on each flap or bottom of the layer giving the reference and/or the “name” of the parable. Inside they can tell (briefly) what it was and what it meant.

Or how about a biography you are reading. As you read, take notes on the person’s history, influences, character, and contributions. If it is a part of another study, you may just want one mini-book on this person. Perhaps make a Quad Shutter Book (that closes) for this. Put the person’s name, birth and death dates and their picture on the outside. On the 4 shutters inside list the 4 aspects of their life (above) or a quality from them in the person’s life, then under each shutter write examples and details.

Perhaps you are doing a whole BOR on this one person. You can use one section of the BOR for each of the 4 aspects of their life, with 1-3 mini-books each. For example, in the History section you may want to do a Timeline Book of their life, perhaps another mini-book on their childhood and one on their adult life, or one on where they lived, or what their world was like then. On the Influences section you would put mini-books on their education and other key influences in their lives. I think of Helen Keller; you’d want a whole mini-book on Anne Sullivan. In the Character section perhaps you can identify 2-3 character traits that were prominent in this person’s life and do a mini-book for each, giving examples from their life that show that character trait. In the Contributions section, you will put mini-books that demonstrate their achievements in life. For example, for George Washington perhaps you’d want a mini-book on his military contributions and one on his Presidential contributions.

These are all just very small tips of endless icebergs for creating mini-books themselves. Now, what do we do with them? We keep our mini-books in zip lock baggies until we are finished with our topic and ready to make our “MyMini”. As you make your mini-books, be thinking ahead as to how you want to lay them out. As suggested above you may want them organized into sections or a certain order. OTOH, perhaps they can be placed anywhere in the folder. Let your eye be your guide.

When you are ready to put your MyMini BOR together, fold your file folder into a shutter fold and start laying out your mini-books. Experiment until you like the lay-out, then glue them in. Make some sort of “cover” design for the outside of your BOR. You may not want it to be a folded mini-book, but perhaps a picture and title. You can glue on these aspects or just draw/write them on.

Too many mini-books to fit in your folder? Make extensions. You may need just one extra panel, or maybe you need a whole extra folder or more. No problem, MyMini Books of Remembrance are expandable.

In this series of articles I have only given you a taste of what can be done with MyMini Books of Remembrance. I plan to devote a whole session or two to this in our Freedom & Simplicity™ of Lifestyle Education through Discipleship™ seminar, late this spring in North Platte, NE. I hope you can join us.

But above all remember, we are children of the Creator Himself, made in His image. He has placed within each one of us creativity. How can you use yours to document your learning in Books of Remembrance?

 

Books of Remembrance III

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Greetings form Me and My House,

This is part 3 of this series. Part 1 here. Part 2 here. In this part we will cover what all is needed to make a MyMini Book of Remembrance.

Some people get really hung up on this. It really is not hard at all. And you certainly don’t need a kit or someone else’s plans to direct you through this. Like its big sister Book of Remembrance Journaling (Notebooking) it is the record of what you have learned/internalized from your studies. No one else can lay that out for you. PLEASE do not use this to try to copy someone else’s learning.

All you need is the basics – the supplies, and instructions for making the mini-booklets – and of course something you have learned and want to document.

Your supplies begin with paper to make the mini-booklets out of.
You could use plain ol’ white copy paper, but that would be very boring. Go to the office supply store (or Walmart, if yours has it) and get an array of various colored papers, brights, neons, primaries, pastels, whatever you desire – just standard 20-24 weight.

You will also need scissors and glue – glue sticks work great. If you like nice straight cuts you may want a paper trimmer, a small one such as used for scrapbooking works great.

You will also need some kind of writing utensil. Again, something not quite so boring as a plain pencil or blue ink pen. Various colored fine tip markers are great – preferably ones that don’t bleed through the page.

The last supply you need is file folders. Again, please bypass the boring tan manila ones and get the pretty colors. 3 cut or 5 doesn’t matter.

I’ve already told you in part 1 where to get your instructions for the mini-books, Dinah Zike’s The Big Book of Books and Activities – unless you have a friend that will show you. (Yes just that one book is all you need.)

In part 4 I will conclude this series.

 

Books of Remembrance II

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Greetings from Me and My House,

Continuing discussion on MyMini Books of Remembrance. Read Part 1 here.

Several questions are usually asked about MyMini Books of Remembrance, otherwise known as “lapbooks”, “shutterbooks”, or my shortened term for ours MyMini BOR. Who does them? When do they do them? What do they cover? Here’s some answers.

“Do we make one MyMini BOR as a family or does each child make their own?” Yes. Do both. At times your children will want to each make their own MyMini BOR on a study they do. At other times one book can be made together. You can assign, or each child can choose, one or more aspects that they will do a mini-book on and then you can arrange them all together into one MyMini BOR.

“Do we make one BOR per day or per week or per month?” Yes. Well, it might be a little rare to make one per day, but you could make one mini-book per day or 2 to add to your BOR. For the actual BOR, weekly or monthly, depending on the topic, are both normal. A couple examples from our home:
1) 3 of our children took a 3 day art class with Barry Stebbing. After the class they made a MyMini BOR together.
2) Our children have also done MyMini BORs on their own over a 6 week topic.

Mini-books can be made daily or weekly, then all compiled into the BOR at the end of the unit. Or you can wait until the end of the study, and take a day or a few to make the mini-books and the MyMini BOR.

“Do we include all subjects in one BOR or make a different BOR for each subject?” Yes. Some of our MyMini BORs are on specific subjects, some are on everything we’ve learned during a certain time period, most are on whatever we covered during a topical study that integrated several subjects.

Continued in Part 3 and Part 4.

 

Mini Books of Remembrance

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You’ve probably heard of MyMini Books of Remembrance by another name – lapbooks. Or perhaps shutterbooks. They are made up of little booklets, sometimes called minit-books, mini-books, or book folds. We began making them many years ago. But like many good things they sometimes got brushed aside, and we needed “reawakened” to them and their joys.

In Exodus 17:14 God tells Moses to write a book of remembrance and to tell it to another; “Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua.” Journaling is a big part of Lifestyle Education through Discipleship™. We teach our children to journal their learning, not only for their own benefit but also as a “text” that they can teach others from, patterning off of this Scripture. This too is how we learn to teach.

But sometimes plain old Journaling in our Notebooks can become kind of mundane. We begin to lose our joy in it. We forget the creativity God has placed in us. Sometimes we lose sight of the Wisdom seen in the “Big Picture”. That’s the time to remember to pull out our colored papers and colored folders, some scissors and glue, and make those Books of Remembrance” something to really remember, by making MyMini Books of Remembrance.

MyMini Books of Remembrance are perhaps the best, primary method of Journaling for our younger children. Our youth still enjoy it and can use it as much as they’d like also. These truly are books that help them remember what they have learned.

Just what is a MyMini Book of Remembrance (or lapbook)? It is several small uniquely cut and folded booklets, made from colored paper, containing the things we’ve learned – one thing per mini-book, attached to a shutterfolded file folder (preferably colored 🙂 ) Dinah Zike has written the definitive book for making the little books. It’s called The Big Book of Books.

Well, with that introduction, I close for tonight. I have much more to share with you on this topic. But it will have to be on another day. I hope I’ve at least inspired you to check this out further.

Continue to Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4 of this topic.

 

We Won!

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I just received the most awesome news. Our family has won a week at Horn Creek Camp in Colorado for Little Bear Wheeler’s Outdoor Adventures Homeschool/Family Camp! This is a camp we have looked at in the past, but really was way out of our price league for our famiy of 8 at home.

When we registered for a free drawing at the Colorado home school converntion, we told the lady at the booth, “We’re going to win this one.” I don’t remember if they announced a winner at the conference or not, but now, nearly 3 months later, we knew we hadn’t won. And really hadn’t given it another thought for many, many weeks.

When I received the call this morning, on the other end of the phone, Robin told me that one of the winners was not able to make it – and our name keeps coming up.

has only 1 day of vacation left, so things will be a stretch on this end. But our God is so good and so awesome, and greatly to be praised. Rejoice with us!

Are You Ready for a New Start?

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We have returned from vacation, just in time for me to get a nasty sinus infection and headache – uggh. So I’m feeling like I should post, but my brain really is not up to thinking through an article at this point. So I’ll just share some basics on preparing for a new year of discipling our children at home.

Probably the most beneficial thing you can do is prepare a few foundational lessons for each area of study. Some keys I include in prepare these lessons are:
1) the Biblical perspective of the area of study
Every area of study has a Biblical philosophy behind it and can (and should in the Christian home and school) be taught based on that. Giving our children a “Christian” education does not mean just tacking Scripture verses or Bible classes onto your “normal” learning. It means studying everything from God’s perspective and for His glory. A good beginning resource for this is Ruth Haycock’s Encyclopedia of Bible Truths.

2) the foundational vocabulary of the area of study
It’s always good to know just what you are studying. What is the big picture of it? How does it all fit together? Knowing the vocabulary is the key to taking dominion. A good resource for this is Noah Webster’s original 1828 Dictionary. You can also use it for free online.

3) the source/ origin of the area of study and the purpose for studying it
Every area has a Biblical source or origin and reason for studying it. You could simply say, “It started with God.” But it is good to go a bit further than that. Use an exhaustive concordance along with the terms and definitions you got from Webster’s 1828 for this.

4) the rudiments of the study area
What aspects are the basic elements of the area of study? The whole of the study will expand from these – throughout all the years of study. The student that receives these seeds of each area of study will have a stong foundation for all his years of study to be built upon. Much of this too can be determined from the word studies in Webster’s 1828. Further helpful information can be found in the Noah Plan Curriculum Guides and the Guide to American Christian Education for Home and School.

5) the Biblical principles of the study area
Here we look both at how the subject reveals the 7 Biblical Principles of Liberty and also the principles specific to the individual study. These will only be deduced from the above studies – reading and researching, and spending time ruminating and reflecting on the subject.

These 5 key elements form a foundation for each area of study that we can build upon each year. This year perhaps you will only scratch the surface of each, next year you can expand each area in each area.

Mom and Dad, there is only one way you can disciple your children. That is by beginning these studies yourself. You must be headed somewhere before you can lead your children there. That is what L.E.D. is all about – “you follow me, as I follow Christ”.

 

Freedom & Simplicity™ in HisStory & PIPEline

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I cannot believe I didn’t post this here. I will get some testimonials up at my website later, when I get a few moments. This is a labor of my love of learning and teaching by Biblical principles.

My Freedom & Simplicity™ in HisStory guide has been completely revised and expanded. Also I have developed the PIPEline of HisStory™ pictorial timeline.
Click their names, if you are interested in learning more about them or ordering them.

The Freedom & Simplicity™ in HisStory guide is almost 100 pages on the foundations of history and how to teach by biblical principles. I’ve tried to include plenty of practical helps, and recommended resources.

The PIPEline is 10 pictures of the links of the PIPEline – that is, People, Ideas, Places, and Events, key reference points of God’s dealings with His people throughout time. (There are 2 optional links for those looking for something similar to the Chain of Christianity.) No work to make this one, just print it out and cut it out. You can see a list of my 10 links here:
PIPEline and a picture too.