Born2Kids

Why we chose to home educate our children

When we first became parents, back in 2011, we experienced firsthand the realisation of what a great responsibility the gift of a child truly is.  Amidst the cuteness of the baby snuggles it was somewhat terrifying to know that this beautiful, tiny baby was now completely dependent on us for all her needs.  Feeding, changing, bathing, and gently lulling them to sleep (for what seems like hours) in those early days often seemed overwhelming.  However, it wasn’t long before we felt we had these very practical responsibilities mastered, just in time for some new and arguably more challenging ones to emerge. Perhaps the greatest of these new responsibilities was education.

Biblically it is the parents’ responsibility, particularly the father, to provide an education for their children (Deut 6 v 5 – 7, Eph 6 v 4).  The government are quite correct in requiring parents to provide a suitable education for their children, without stipulating how this is achieved.  However, before answering the question as to how best to educate a child, we must first consider the question – what is education?  Kevin Swanson in his book “Upgrade: 10 Secrets to the Best Education for Your Child” provides a great definition of education as “…the preparation of a child intellectually, emotionally, spiritually, and physically for life and for eternity.”

Education is much more than teaching information for regurgitation and application in exam settings.  Education must include the spiritual.  Whether you realise it or not, everyone has a worldview (“a particular philosophy of life or conception of the world” Oxford Languages) and, as Christians, we have a biblical worldview.  It is the gospel message of Jesus Christ, through the lens of a biblical worldview, that we desire to educate our children in above all else, to prepare them, not only for this life, but for eternity.  To best achieve this, we believe the spiritual should not be segregated from other subjects but incorporated throughout the study of other subjects like science, history etc.  There is no such thing as a neutral subject.  Every subject answers to, or raises questions regarding, the world we live in and we believe every opportunity should be taken to present to our children a gospel-centred biblical worldview.

The responses we have received from people over the years since we began home educating our children have been varied. Here are some that come to mind:

Could you take my kids?!

Wow! You deserve a medal for what you’re doing.  You’re a warrior!

Is that legal? Can you do that?! I’ve never heard of that.

I could never do that.

Do they not miss out on having friends?

That’s amazing!

So, are you a teacher?!

You must be super patient.

You’re trying to keep them in a little bubble away from the world.

I did that with my kids – best thing ever!

Perhaps someday we’ll write a blog on these and our responses to them but for now let us address just a couple.  Are we trying to protect our children from the big bad world?  At the moment…absolutely!  Let us be clear, as Christians, life is not a playground, it is a battleground.  If we are to win any fight we must be intentional and serious in the quest for victory.  While young we seek to protect them but at the same time prepare them for the future launch into the heart of the battle.  No army would send untrained soldiers into the heat of battle without training and preparation, this would be considered irresponsible.  As our children grow and mature they will see the wonders of this world, be taught the dangers of our present life/battle and be exposed to the world as and when we determine they are ready.  Our children are not little evangelists or ‘salt and light’ as yet to a dying, corrupt and hurting world.  1 Cor 15 v 33 says “Evil company corrupts good habits” and we need to take care to limit our children’s exposure to such things until they are prepared.

Socialisation is often an objection to home education but when has socialisation been the main objective of education?  Important, yes, but surely not a deciding factor.    We would argue that home education provides a more realistic and fruitful socialisation environment as children meet regularly with adults and children of all ages in settings where we as parents can oversee who and when.  Contrast this with children in a school setting mainly socialising with an adult teacher and 29 other children of the same age.  This is not real world preparation.

It has been a pleasant surprise to us how many people who are not Christians understand why we have chosen to home educate our children and admire us for even attempting it.  Perhaps one of the greatest surprises that has saddened us is how many Christians have been critical and even offended that we have chosen to home educate and not send our children to public school like most others.  We are not ‘qualified’ teachers but all parents are teachers and it is because we home educate our children that we are acutely aware of the specific needs of each of our children in their education.  We are best placed to identify these needs and tailor their work appropriately.  There is no need to rush ahead or keep up when our child is struggling to grasp a new concept.  We slow down, we take our time with it and we even take a break and revisit a little later.  Conversely, if a child is excelling in a subject the freedom is there to allow them to press ahead rather than fill their time with busy work.  When a young child struggles to concentrate for long periods of time we figure out how best to engage them whilst also encouraging them to develop their focus.  These issues and many others would be difficult for a teacher to truly deal with effectively when having responsibility for 30 children of varying abilities and the various pressures they are under to perform.

When our children first found out about the Born2Know book and that we would be setting up a website to make it available around the world they were excited and instantly onboard.  Immediately the ideas flowed of how they could be involved and what they could share with the world online.  Our vision is not only to educate our children with a gospel-centred biblical world view but as a family to share this with the world around us, especially family and friends. The world of today and the world of tomorrow will increasingly function and communicate using information technology so why not allow our children to have some fun and share some of our home education journey while learning new skills.  This is what has led us to set up Born2Kids and we hope you enjoy and are blessed by what is shared.

On this page you will find individual links to each of our children’s pages.  Please feel free to click and browse their posts.

Jonny & Gillian