Two Things That Surprise Me About Homeschooling Teenagers

There are two things that have surprised me most about homeschooling teenagers.

The first is that we ever arrived here at all.

It seems as though it was just yesterday I had an eight year old in tears as he suffered through sounding out his very short reading lessons. And before me today is a young man who finds such delight in the very wordy descriptions of Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables.

Back then, in the early days, I clung to the cloudy truth that the struggles then would not always be. But the truth is, regardless of the passage of time, without the hard work of disciplining and habit building, the same struggles would be there- just magnified.

Without time and attention, an eight year old who cannot read well does not become a sixteen year old who reads well. So too, a mouthy child, or a prank playing child, or a sloppy child becomes that as a teen. Save for two things: attention to lay good habits in place of the bad, and – primarily, the grace of God.

What a mercy that where we fail our children in their training in their youth the Lord does not fail. The areas we neglect or overlook are not life sentences for our children as they grow. We have a responsibility to steward well this gift of mothering – but the Lord cares more for them than we do, and He has created them in His own image and desires them to walk in His ways. And while the passing of time from childhood to near adulthood may reveal the cracks in our own formation of our children, we have a great God who redeems, who nurtures and disciplines, and who takes the broken and weak and equips them to do His purposes. We purpose to do well with our weakness and limitations to the glory of God, and leave Him to be the manager of His glory.

The second surprise about teenagers is how much time they take. Though maybe the surprise in this is how easy it is to miss how much time they need.

As they have gotten older they have matured and become more independent. This has freed me up – I can run an errand at 10 am on a Tuesday while they read descriptions of the weather and terrain out west, or of Lewis (of Lewis and Clark) attempting to take his own life, or of Winston Churchill’s impartial perspective of the American Civil War.

These are, in order, boring, heavy, and fascinating ideas to digest and while narration is a part of their life – very well audibly and questionably faithful at written – they want more than just to retell in their own words.

When they sit in front of me their narrations are full of life. They connect them to other ideas and personal thoughts; “Remember when…?” “This reminds me of…” “I wonder how…” When they make an audio recording of their narrations (because I am out running errands, because I have independent young adults!) the narrations change. The animation is gone. The narrations are short and to the point. Of course not all narrations can be personally listened to, but having noticed this difference I have determined to be home and available more for my teenagers.

There have been many little instances like this – they are growing in their independence and their interests often take them off to spend hours in solitude working on their current hobby where they very much do not need me. Learning computer languages or mastering writing a made up language take hours and hours of time where mom is not needed (because, in truth, mom has nothing to offer in these arenas). And yet when they reach a moment of accomplishment, it is mom they come looking for to show it off to.

I’m finding their language doesn’t sound like; “Mom we want to spend time with you” but rather “What is there to eat?”

I can tell them and they will collect the vittles (thank you, Redwall) and go off to their own corner and eat. Or I can lay it out and the humble feast becomes a foundation for a conversation.

And how can we ever put a significance on conversation? I was reminded recently of a very ridiculous season. It was our PA home and our bedroom floor bathroom was under renovations and so we all used the main floor bathroom for a summer season. If one’s faithfulness with classical art studies were graded on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being terrible and 10 being excellent, I would fall at a generous 3. But for whatever reason my brain is so wired that when things are ridiculously challenging, I add more to my plate.

So we had this major bathroom reno and were all sharing this one bathroom and I decided I was going to become the good mom who exposed her teenagers to art. In the single bathroom we were all stuck using. I have a thick binder of classical art some other homeschool mom (who would rank a solid 10 on that scale) had printed and assembled and passed on to me when she finished with it. I looked through the binder and decided a piece entitled “Watson and the Shark” was the perfect piece for teenagers in a bathroom.

At first I just hung over the toilet paper roll. But then I added a post it note and a pen and started leaving observations. Or questions about Watson (I mean, truly: why is he naked?) And they began writing back. And the comments were hilarious and ridiculous.

Then we moved and Watson and the Shark were packed up. Just last week the boys were having a conversation about re-enacting art pieces for photographs and one mentioned that Watson and the Shark should be recreated for a picture and we all laughed.

I’m fairly certain they will remember Watson for the rest of their life. I’m equally as certain it’s the only named piece of art they will ever know.**

Watson was a long and lingering conversation. Yes, over post its and pen. But he was a bright spot in a hard renovation season.

All conversations take time, and it’s very rare we hear that they ever had any role in a life – but it is these very ordinary moments that make up a life. And they take time.

It is hard as they grow their independence to know the right posture to take – we know hovering is not becoming, but how does a mother be available and yet not hover? How do we wisely steward the new time available to us as our teenagers are plunging in to the adult world, and yet freely be available to them when they ask “What is there to eat?”

This surprise is one I am still unwrapping, and perhaps one day I can reflect back and offer things well done and things I wish I’d done differently. But for now it’s enough to remind myself they need, but will not ask for, time. And the same truth that reigned through their childhood is true now:

We have a great God who redeems, who nurtures and disciplines, and who takes the broken and weak and equips them to do His purposes. We purpose to do well with our weakness and limitations to the glory of God, and leave Him to be the manager of His glory.

Do not grow weary in doing good!

——

Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged.

They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony.

But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon.

It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.

G.K. Chesterton

**the entirety of this was read and vetted by the teenagers, with their only protest being that they know more pieces of art. They immediately named two more, one being the incorrect title. And then listed off thirty more, trailing off with “… at least we know artistic sounding names. At least two of those are probably real pieces.”