A Glimpse At What I am Working on: Using the Bible as Our Main Text

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I am beyond excited about our upcoming homeschool year. Back in the spring I heard Mark Hamby from Lamplighter Publishers speak at my local homeschool convention. He was wonderful. Since I was speaking at the same convention, I must admit though, I had my mind preoccupied during his first presentation. However toward the end, he captivated me with a statement he made, and that stuck with me all summer. He said if he could go back and do it all over again with his children, at around age 12, he would put away all of the textbooks and just study the Bible. Wow. What a thought.

As I continued to have this idea in my head all summer, I kept thinking this was something I wanted to do, with some tweaking.  I wasn’t planning on only doing this with my oldest (11 years), although that would be a great idea too. I wanted our whole family to study the Bible together. I was thinking how could God not work if we were in  the Bile everyday for hours at time, as a family? Imagine the transformation that would take place!

But how would this all look actually day to day? Especially with various age groups. I wanted to figure out a way to do this to some degree, and to do it with all of the kids.  Not an easy task. I put aside the idea for a bit, but it just kept coming back. So I took that as the Lord’s leading and pursued it.

At one point I even contacted Mark Hamby about his input on how this would look. He was very helpful with some ideas. He inspired me.

There are many different books out there and curriculum that are Bible based. Yet I wanted to go a bit deeper. I wanted to really study the Bible with the kids. Not just Bible stories. Not just Bible-based. But really dig in verse by verse.  I prayed, I researched. I prayed more.

Well, I have somewhat of an outline prepared now for the first two months. I have figured out a way to cover all subjects but to be in the Bible mostly.

Most importantly, I am letting God lead us in this. If one day He wants us to just stay in a certain verse, we will. I will be open to letting His Word transform us.

I can’t imagine how we can lose? If we were to do nothing but read the Bible everyday for a few months, then we still win. God’s Word is more powerful and active than any textbook.

So here is what I have planned so far. I will be blogging along this journey so be sure to subscribe so that you can follow along this fall. We will begin right after Labor Day.

We will be studying Genesis. I have the following resources to use with our Bible:

• Genesis: Finding Our Roots, by Ruth Beechick
• The New Answers Book 1 by Ken Ham, Answers in Genesis
• Several commentaries
• A Child’s Geography, Explore the Holy Land
• A is For Adam, Answers in Genesis
• Adam and His Kin, by Ruth Beechick
• The True Story of Noah’s Ark {beautiful book!}

I have gone through each passage and selected spelling words for each child directly from the verses. I have then taken the words and made lists on SpellCity.com. Oh My.Word. Why didn’t I use this free resource sooner? You can customize spelling/vocabulary lists, the children can play games based on their lists, and you can make printouts.  Wow. Awesome resource.  I have several weeks worth of lists already entered in and am continuing to do more.

Copywork. I have chosen passages directly from the text we will be studying each week for each child to use.

Each child will have a binder to keep the spelling words (I have already printed all the lists), copywork, and additional notes that they learn as we go through each passage.

Writing assignments. I have several assignments already planned for each age group. For example my middle schooler will be these assignments: 1)Write what you would tell an atheist about creation. b) Write what you would tell a humanist about creation 3) Write what you would tell an evolutionist about creation. These are just some of the many ideas from Beechick’s Genesis: Finding Our Roots.

Word study: learning the original Hebrew or Greek words to really understand the text

Additional Reading: I am assigning books for each age group. My middle schooler will be reading Adam and His Kin by Ruth Beechick. I also hope to get lots of Lamplighter books in there for lovely reading with character lessons weaved throughout.

Science: I will be getting this book to do these experiments based on the days of Creation.

Geography. We will be doing some map assignments comparing the ancient map to our current map.  Also discussing where the Garden of Eden actually took place, Noah’s Ark, etc. We may use A Child’s Geography, Explore the Holy Land once a week. I am not sure how we will fit it in yet.

Art: There are several paintings and ancient artifacts that I have photos of to study based on Genesis.

Math: We will be using separate math (Math U See and Life of Fred) yet I have found many math activities to go along with out studies!

Most importantly, besides all of these assignment will be our discussion time. We will truly be studying the Bible, and breaking down the verses to really dig in. If this takes all morning, that is fine with me. We will be right where God wants us to be.

All of this is new to me too, so I know I will make mistakes along the way. I will share with you what is working and what isn’t as we take this journey.

I am linking this post with iHomeschool Newtwork’s Not Back to School Blog Hop. Be sure to visit over there and link up your posts as well!

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