The Seasons of Our Day

Leadership education, a model of education that I follow emphasizes finding natural rhythms and patterns in your life that can help you do what comes naturally to you.  In the book called The Phases of Learning, The Demilles mention as one of the ingredients to successful Leadership Education is following the seasons of the year.

They said that they decided to heat their home with wood so that they can truly experience winter in their home.  They say that there is so much that we can learn during each season of the year and things that you learn during each season are different and contribute to a whole person.  I loved this idea.

I read another post by another girl in a facebook group that I follow.  She mentioned how she followed the seasons of the year to pattern her day.  I thought this was a great idea.  So, I pondered this thought and taught this to my family.

The Seasons of our Day:

Spring  (morning):

Words that came to my mind:
awakening,  new beginning,  planting seeds,  pulling weeds,  resurrection, spring cleaning

We decided that the morning is the time to clean,  to eliminate distractions,  to plant our seeds of learning and to study the gospel.

Summer (Mid-Afternoon):

Words that came to my mind:

Relax, free-play, outside,  keep on watering seeds that have been planted so that plants don't die

We decided that the mid-afternoon is the time to keep watering our seeds of learning,  to relax with a good book, to play and to go outside.

Fall (late afternoon):

Words that came to my mind:

Clean up leaves from Spring,  reap the rewards of our harvest, prepare for winter

The late afternoon is the time for us to clean up from the day and then we can reap the rewards of our planting during the day.  Sometimes this means play a game, play with friends,  do sports or other activities oh and get ready for the winter (dinner).

Winter (Evening):

The people that we spend our evening with are the people that we bond with.  - The Demilles

Words that came to my mind:
Holidays (family time), food, hibernate (sleep)

The evenings are our time for our family to come together and have dinner,  we read together,  watch a show together. play together,  talk about our (year) or our day together and then hibernate or go to sleep.

The Keys of Great Teaching

I want to post this printable that I have framed in our home.  Every parent is a teacher, mentor and a leader.  I love this printable and I love these principles.  As I pondered each principle they rang so true to me and I knew this is what I wanted for my family and what will help us on our journey.    I believe that these principles when applied along with the gospel of Jesus Christ can help me on my quest to teaching my kids.  Ultimately,  I believe it's not what I'm  teaching my kids but how that will yield the greatest result.

I am going to go over each principle in detail over the next few posts.  I already covered "You, Not Them".

My thoughts

Mission in Life...

Who has a mission in life?...

We all do!!!!

Wouldn't it be great if we all knew and felt that we had a purpose.  Wouldn't it be great if we had the freedom to find our purposes in life?  I believe this is the key to happiness.  When we feel that we are free to choose what ignites our passion.  When we find something that we love,  and when we want to share it with others. 

Wouldn't it be great if our kids education was centered around the idea that they are great?  That they are of infinite worth.  That they can succeed.

Wouldn't it be great if we believed this about ourselves.  I know I wandered around 4 years of college trying to discover my purpose and never really found it.  

I believe this is what I want for my kids and I want them to learn it from the time they are young. This is what led me to Leadership education.

What is Leadership Education??

To me the definition of Leadership education is the idea that each person on this earth is born with greatness.  We all have something great to offer the world.  To become a leader means to become your best self.  Leadership education is the pathway to finding that best self.  Given the right home environment or school environment,  we find our best selves naturally in a loving and safe environment where we are free to explore and discover our purpose.  Once we find our purpose we will want to share this purpose and mission with the world in order to make it a better place. 

In order to implement Leadership Education I believe that you have to make your house a house of learning, and a house of God where you can feel the spirit.  The spirit is the best teacher and the best guide for all of us. 

Well,  it's not just about our kids.  It's also about us as parents.  One of the key principles to successfully teaching Leadership Education is  "YOU, NOT THEM".

We are the leaders.  As our kids watch us carrying out our life's mission and purpose,  they will want to follow.

Here is an example of Leadership Education in President Monsons' October 2013 talk in General Conference:

"Dad would drive about 35 miles an hour all the way up to Provo Canyon or until we would come around a bend in the road and our journey would be halted by a herd of sheep. We would watch as hundreds of sheep filed past us, seemingly without a shepherd, a few dogs yapping at their heels as they moved along. Way back in the rear we could see the sheepherder on his horse—not a bridle on it but a halter. He was occasionally slouched down in the saddle dozing, since the horse knew which way to go and the yapping dogs did the work.

Contrast that to the scene which I viewed in Munich, Germany, many years ago. It was a Sunday morning, and we were en route to a missionary conference. As I looked out the window of the mission president’s automobile, I saw a shepherd with a staff in his hand,leading the sheep. They followed him wherever he went. If he moved to the left, they followed him to the left. If he moved to the right, they followed him in that direction. I made the comparison between the true shepherd who led his sheep and the sheepherder who rode casually behind his sheep."

I feel that this is a true principle of the gospel.  What kind of leader are we if we are not showing our kids the way.  If we tell our kids to do something we must do it as well.  Likewise,  they must realize that their education is their responsibility.

"Self-education is, I firmly believe, the only kind of education there is.” 
― Isaac Asimov

The other day my son said "You keep me up too late."  I said,  "You keep yourself up too late."  We and our kids need to stop blaming eachother for things that we do to ourselves.  Sure there are circumstances that affect our lives,  but ultimately it's the choices we make that affect our own lives.  Our kids need to take responsibility for their own actions and not blame parents or anyone else for the outcome.  This too me is "You, Not Them"  and is "Self education".  

No one person can educate another.-Oliver Demille

We can teach, inspire, lead, exemplify,  but ultimately it is up to each person to choose and decide that they want to learn something for themselves.  Until we decide to learn something for ourselves,  we are not truly learning.  

The key for me is to inspire my kids to learn by sharing what I'm learning,  setting rules and parameters like not allowing excessive media in our home, and inviting them to  learn the things I'm learning and things I think that they need to learn.

"You, Not Them" is an important principle that I believe can truly transform homes, schools, churches.  If everyone is taking care of themselves and becoming their best selves,  then we truly would have a whole world of "great" people.  This is what I feel the Celestial Kingdom will be like,  everyone learning and growing to become their best selves.  

Reflections on Motherhood

During my journey through parenthood I've read so many books, considered so many opinions and pondered and prayed deeply about how to be the best Mom that I can be.  I have always felt that I wanted to keep my kids close to home.  When other Moms were sending their kids off to preschool,  I felt the Lord telling me to keep them close.  So, I started a little Joy School group.  I loved Joy School and loved teaching my kids and having a community of Moms who enjoyed teaching their kids at home,  It was a fun time in my life of being a Mom.



.... Then my oldest son went to school.  My heart ached and longed to be with him,  but I thought every kid has to go to school and Mom's just need to get over it.  So,  I tried to enjoy my other 2 kids at home while my oldest was at school.  We had a great time,  but,  then he would come home and have sports and I thought,  oh,  but I want him to have time to play at home and to read to him.  I tried the best I could while he was on break,  but then of course he wasn't used to being at home anymore,  so we had to go places all of the time and have playdates.  I still kept on thinking,  but when does he have time to play and just hang out with his siblings.  But,  I followed the norm,  thinking this is what I had to do.

Then my second daughter went to school.  I was so sad,  and missed her so much,  but thought,  this is what I have to do right?  Then she didn't want to go to school and she wanted to stay home.  I longed to keep her at home and sometimes I did.  But, then she was falling behind in school and she loved to color and her teacher said, "  she takes too much time coloring,  she needs to spend more time doing worksheets."  Her teacher sent me home with packets telling me that she needed to do extra homework at night in order to stay caught up.  I complied, an we did homework and dreaded every minute of it.  This was all when my little girl was 6 years old.

Then,  my 3 year old boy had speech delay and I took him to get tested.  The school district said he didn't know his colors at 3, he couldn't talk and so he has to do 4 days a week preschool at the school.  Remember,  I wanted to teach my kids at least when they were little,  but now,  I had to keep them caught up in the system.   I felt that I was being told if your kids aren't doing this and this by this age,  they are going to fail in life.  There isn't time for them to be kids,  they have to stay caught up with everyone else.  This didn't feel right to me,  I felt there was so much more to childhood than drilling and homework and tests.

Finally,  my oldest son came home crying from 3rd grade saying that his head hurt from being in the computer lab all day taking a weeks worth of tests,  I said,  "  this is not what I want".....  so,  " I said,  we're not doing any of it anymore.  We are going to come home all of us.  My kids are going to learn to be together,  we are going to spend time together as a family and I am going to teach my kids,  not the school district,  not some teacher that doesn't know them or care about them as much as I do.  and I told my husband,  which was the hardest thing in the world.  Because I knew he considered it to be pretty strange,  he didn't want our kids to be wierd.  But,  my heart and the Lord told me this is what I needed to do.  My husband told me "I know you will be a great teacher to our kids."  That gave me a lot of confidence,  but now what to do.....

I have never done this before,  I was worried how they were going to grow up and fit in with society and how was I going to teach them.  They aren't very good at listening to me, and how do I do this?   Well,  I found great curriculums and tons of ideas,  but really what I needed to know was how not what to do.  I found "A Thomas Jefferson Education", by Oliver Demille and read it and loved it,  but heard and read negative reviews and thought that's not for me.  I still did not understand how to do this thing called homeschooling.

Then after my first year of homeschooling I was having a baby and in so much pain.  I still did not understand how to do this,  so called homeschooling,  but I just felt  this is what I must do,  I could see the big picture and knew where I wanted to be,  not how to get there.

So, in my second year of homeschooling I set out bound and determined to figure this out.  How am I going to do this?  I signed myself up for A Thomas Jefferson Education Facebook group to get ideas and tips from Moms who have homeschooled their kids and who have raised their kids to not only be educated, but whole individuals,  kids who have strong testimonies, are hard workers,  know how to socialize,  have strong families and love to learn.  This is what I discovered....  This book..... is the ultimate handbook for raising kids.  It's not about homeschooling,  but it's about research and a compilation of ideas and things that have helped families to raise successful children and it's not do this or else they won't turn out successful,  or it's not homeschool them this way or they won't turn out great.  It's about why our modern education system is failing and what we as parents can do to fix it in our homes whether we homeschool or not.  I truly believe that if we follow our kids developmental patterns and listen to our kids and trust that the Lord knows what he needs of them we will be led to know what to do for them.  I am so grateful for this book and for the things that it has helped me understand that I would never had understood if I had not decided to homeschool.  The next few posts will be about ways that we have implemented "Leadership Education"  in our home.