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This year I have three high schoolers, and one wannabe (8th grade going on 20!). I’ll tell you what – it feels like the pressure is on. These young people are in a sweet mix of having just enough space in their lives to have a few hobbies, and some (read that: not all) feel the squeeze to get all the boxes checked for their transcripts.
My husband and I have always felt an intense desire to pass on to our children a Biblical worldview.
In the elementary years that has meant using our curriculum as a springboard for discussions and teaching moments that sometimes lead to important rabbit trails.
But as the high school years have come, passing on a Biblical worldview can feel challenging. Often the “required” courses take more and more time and are increasingly more difficult.
When we were newlyweds, my husband and I would have long conversations about at what point a child or young person is solid in their worldview.
Initially, I thought 12 was a turning point. If a child had Christian perspectives taught to him during his childhood, by 12 perhaps he might be solid.
Then I remembered my peers as a 12-year-old; the petty social and fashion imitations, shallow relationships, and faulty common sense that was so popular. I thought, no, not quite at that age.
Then I thought about the high school years.
While many who have received Biblical worldview instruction are becoming more stable in their beliefs, high schoolers are also highly influenced by the culture around them.
The very nature of universities is that they are reaching an age group that is still able to be profoundly shaped. Not just by the strong minds of professors, but by the peer culture.
If college and university students were locked-down, and totally fixed in their views and beliefs, colleges, by definition, could not exist or function. They are counting on being able to influence the thinking of students.
I’d like to encourage you, as a homeschool mom, to think carefully about the sanctity of your young person’s training.
The temptation many homeschooling parents face with a strongly rooted young person is to think their child can withstand the false teaching and youthful temptation prevalent in America’s government educational system.
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In the name of evangelism, many parents send their teens to government schools to be “missionaries.” I’d like to challenge you to place a higher value on education.
Not just academics, but the spiritual, emotional, and academic training of your child, viewing it as a service to them to fit them for life.
There are multitudes of ways to reach out to the world with the Gospel without enrolling your students in the government school system.
Young adults are maturing and increasingly thinking deeply, and yet sometimes they still demonstrate seasons of immaturity and/or stubbornness.
We yearn to take their education to that level of passing on a legacy of Biblical thinking.
If you are like me, you’re feeling pressed for time in getting through the courses for high school and also with younger children! If that is you, mom, I would like to offer some help:
That doesn’t mean you have to hold their hand through every single problem, but it means you need to be involved enough that you know what concepts they are wrestling through in their studies so you can have meaningful conversations with them.
Deuteronomy 6 has had a deeper meaning for me in my years with high schoolers. We’re passing on this message WHILE we walk with our teens, WHILE we talk through corrections in their work, WHILE we help them sort out understanding their course work. Worldview isn’t meant solely to be a separate study.
It is best understood and assimilated when integrated into life in front of us. There are moments waiting to be captured! Let’s use them!
Choose a curriculum that integrates a Biblical worldview into the core subjects. The options for curriculum, yes, even high school curriculum, have expanded greatly in the last several years.
There are amazing resources for guiding your young person not only in challenging and academically excellent material, but that also integrates a solid Biblical perspective.
It is important that we don’t buy into a philosophy of value-neutral academics. There is no such thing.
The government schools are skillfully integrating a worldview into every class experience.
They know that education is more than just information – it is a belief system, a perspective on how to utilize knowledge.
By carefully choosing curriculum that takes the ideologies and perspectives of truth, with a Biblical approach, we’re gaining help in our end goal by our resources.
Team up with dad for in-depth conversations about the concepts your home school high school is sorting through currently. Perhaps to get that kind of conversation going, utilize videos, church discussion groups, current events, or media.
This doesn’t all have to be heavy! Make it interesting, and when necessary, make it short.
Conversations With Your High Schooler That Count
If in-person discussions aren’t happening in your home, look for other ways to communicate with your teen. During busy seasons, perhaps writing back and forth via text or email can be a good option.
In their future careers, they may be brilliant in their area of expertise… but if it isn’t used for the Lord, its value is likened to wood, hay, and stubble – the stuff of earth that fades away. Right now we have an influence on our young people’s life.
As they grow, each of our children will have life choices of their own surrender to the Lord.
But right now, in our homes, in our educational guidance, we have a precious opportunity to pass on to our children a way of seeing the world around them through a Biblical lens.
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Brook Wayne, and her husband Israel are parents to ten children. They seek to minister to families through Family Renewal, LLC. You can find more information about a Biblical worldview in home schooling in Israel’s book Education: Does God Have an Opinion? Available from www.familyrenewal.org/store.
