Perseverance

One of the difficult things about encouraging child-lead learning and delight-directed studies is knowing when we need to step in and teach good, old-fashioned character traits like perseverance. On the one hand, we want to allow our children to develop and pursue their own interests. On the other hand, we don't really want our children to grow up flitting from one thing to another, giving up whenever something gets boring and difficult, and never developing the ability to stick with something.

Although this article deals specifically with martial arts classes, the advice in it can be used in other situations as well.

I'd appreciate thoughts on the subject. Obviously, we don't require ourselves or our children to pursue everything they begin for the rest of their lives. At the same time, it is not in our children's best interests to allow them to give up whenever they grow disinterested and discouraged. How do you handle it when your children want to quit something, such as piano lessons, sports teams, etc.? How do you handle when your children want to give up on difficult subjects or projects in school?

How are you teaching your children to persevere?

Kitchen Chemistry 2

We got one of the best Christmas presents ever from my husband's sister. She sent us a gourmet food brochure that allowed us to pick out something delicious from a tantalizing selection.

The beef wellington we chose was delicious. But, for the boys, the best part of the whole thing was that the food arrived packed in dry ice, which prompted hours of fun experiments.

I think this was the perfect present for a homeschooling family.

Kitchen Chemistry 1

Recently a friend of the family taught us to make several of his favorite health elixers. The first one was quite...how should I put it?...potently scented. It contained a mixture of lots of fresh garlic, onions, horseradish, ginger, and more.

As you can see, the boys without gas masks found their own way to deal with what they insisted were noxious fumes.

Even though it's a holiday...

...school is in session.

We're having quite the wind storm and some of our students were outdoors, checking for damage and battening down any hatches that needed it.

Suddenly (remember, these are boys) one of them felt compelled to do a science experiment. How far would the wind carry his spit? This so impressed a younger student, that he decided to repeat the experiment. Unfortunately, he was facing into the wind.

His pronouncement, "So this is what Mama means when she says, 'It's like spitting into the wind.'"