Book Month

On Wednesday mornings, we have the Ladies' Study at the church. Because we have a large number of homeschool families, part of our child care is the homeschool room. This is my responsibility, and I love it.

I actually have 2 rooms: grades 1-3 (formerly grades 1-4, but it became necessary to move the grade 4 student up to the big kids' room, much to their delight) and grades 4 and up. For the first hour, I teach the little kids while the big kids do school work, and then in the second hour we switch.

Every month I have a theme of sorts for what I'm teaching them. September/October we combined into church history months, culminating with Martin Luther on Reformation Day. November was geography month, and they did country projects. December we were off. January was astronomy month, and we had fun learning about stars and planets and the size of our solar system and galaxy.

This month is book month. I told them to bring books to read (or look at for my smallest students). For the smaller students, I had them read quietly for the first 30 minutes, and then my helper read them a story, and I finished with another story. The big kids had to read for the first 30 minutes, and then had a choice to keep reading or to start writing/drawing a book. I wouldn't let them just sit and colour; the choice was "read a book or make a book".

I have never heard my homeschool rooms so quiet, even the little guys (although it was a bit noisier as they can't all read in their heads just yet so there was a lot of whisper reading). It was beautiful, and I got to relax and read as well. I'm pretty sure this was my best idea yet. I wonder if we can keep book month going for the rest of the year?

Bits of Church Stuff

Today we started on the book of James in Sunday School. I was doing an introduction, and it wasn't long enough for the whole class, so we had time for some "Bible trivia". Basically, I ask them questions such as, "What is the 7th book in the Bible?" and "What is the fourth word in the eighteenth chapter of Isaiah?" and "What does Jesus talk about in Matthew 11?" It's all sorts of questions based on where I flip in the Bible, and the kids love it. Today we talked a bit about the valley of dry bones and how they came together and became people, and then about women eating their babies during a famine. The students were horrified and I realized that they don't all know these stories. I told them that next year maybe I should teach "gross stuff in the Bible".

Pastor James finished 1 Corinthians 14 today, talking about order in the church. It was a good sermon. I'm looking forward to the next few weeks because I love chapter 15.

I don't chew gum very often (almost never), but the past 2 weeks, the family I sit with has passed a piece of gum down to me during the sermon, so I've been chewing it. It's good gum; the mint is very strong and the flavour lasts a good while. The thing that I have trouble with is: what do you do with the gum when talking or singing? I sort of shove it to the side of my mouth, or stick it to one of my back teeth to get it out of the way, but I'm always aware of it. Do other people have that problem?

Two of the small boys were playing after the service, and one of the small girls was trying to keep up with them. She kept coming up to me to keep me updated on what was going on. I'm not sure what the game was, but it seems that one of them had been shot in the arm and leg (he seemed to be unbothered by it and didn't slow down one bit), and then she told me, "I can't find my boys and I've been shot in the leg!" before she ran off in pursuit of her boys. I'm still not sure what was going on!

So that was church today. It was good. Here's a song for you:

Teaching about Zwingli

It's another Reformation lesson in Sunday School this week. I'm teaching them about Zwingli and the Swiss Reformation. Zwingli is interesting: he was only involved in the Reformation for around 12 years, and he was only 47 when he died. He had a huge influence as a leader of the Swiss Reformation in a short period of time.

The interesting things that will come up in my teaching:

1. The disagreement between Luther and Zwingli about Lord's Supper, in which we will side with Zwingli and learn that no one (not even Martin Luther) is perfect. We may also discuss the issue of when to divide over an issue (since they agreed on the other 14 points).

2. The Swiss war between the Protestants and the Catholics, in which Zwingli was a soldier (although likely a chaplain). In this one, we may end up in a discussion about whether Christians can go to war, which is always interesting (although in reviewing my current class, I don't know that anyone is going to be as opposed to the idea as some students were when I taught it some years ago).

I like the Reformation weeks.

What I'm Reading

Over Christmas break, I read Marilla of Green Gables by Sarah McCoy. It's a story of young Marilla Cuthbert, and how she became who she is in Anne of Green Gables. I really enjoyed it; I liked where she went with Marilla's life, and how she brought in other characters from the series.

One part that particularly interested me was a bit about slavery. The story takes place before the American Civil War, and Marilla's aunt (who lives in St Catherines) is involved in hiding and caring for former slaves. Marilla is actually the one who gets her involved once she (Marilla) learns about how the orphanage in Hopetown is hiding runaway slave girls.

My next book then was The Mapmaker's Children (also by Sarah McCoy). In this one, she looks at slavery and the underground railroad more closely. The story is about Sarah Brown, daughter of the abolitionist John Brown (of the raid on Harper's Ferry). It's historical fiction, but moves between the past and a family in the present. I liked it, and I liked learning a bit more about the underground railroad and how messages were passed.

I am interested in learning more about how messages and maps were stitched into quilts and such, but I haven't found any books in the library about that just yet.

I also read Underground to Canada by Barbara Smucker. It's youth fiction, and I read it years ago. I picked up again last week (I have a copy) and enjoyed the story again. It's about two girls who escape from slavery in the deep south and make it to Canada. Again, it's fiction, but it incorporates real people. I'd like to read more about some of them one day (Alexander Ross and Levi Cotton).

I'm making a bit of a switch this week, to World War II. I'm just starting The Baker's Daughter, also by Sarah McCoy.

I also plan to read Amazing Grace by Eric Metaxax, his biography of William Wilberforce (the British abolitionist who fought to end the slave trade and then slavery in the British Empire).

I think this might be a very history-focused year.

Still Christmas

It seems I still haven't got Christmas out of my system (or my playlist), so here you go:

Christmas

I know it's well past Christmas (or a really long time until Christmas, depending on how you look at it). Too bad. This is my blog, and I want to talk about Christmas.

I spent Christmas with my oldest brother, his wife, their 6 children, and my parents. It was good. There was a lot of noise and a lot of food, and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. My youngest niece and nephew were happy to have a playmate who would ignore the other adults sometimes and play with them, someone who would let them climb and stand on her, someone who would play with Lego or make paper jewelry for Barbies. I loved seeing them all, and I'm glad I went.

At the same time, Christmas with them meant that I didn't spend Christmas with other family members, or the Edmonton families that I usually spend Christmas with, or the church family whom I spent Christmas Eve with last year. I missed all of them.

I realized, when I was thinking about this, how richly blessed I am. There were at least 4 places that I would have loved to spend Christmas, and where they would have loved to have me. God has given me so many people to love and be loved by. Happily enough, I can see most of them throughout the year (at not-Christmas).

Also, here's a Christmas song I discovered this year.

(And also, my YouTube play list is all messed up thanks to a month of listening to Christmas music. I don't think I'll ever convince it that Christmas is over. Random Christmas songs are going to show up all year.)

The Year in Books (Part 2)

Here we have my favourite nonfiction books of 2018. To dispel any confusion: my favourite lists are based on what I read that year, not what was published that year.

1. Matt B. Redmond: The God of the Mundane. Sometimes I just need to remember that God is not just in the big and exciting things, but also in all the little bits of life and routine.

2. William Wilberforce: Greatest Works. William Wilberforce is one of my heroes. It's not quite accurate to say that he wrote this though, since it includes a short biography and some news articles about his death.

3. Martha Peace and Kent Keller: Modesty: More Than a Change of Clothes. I think this book takes a broader look at modesty, starting with the heart rather than outward appearances.

4. Donald S. Whitney: Praying the Bible. I was looking for a prayer book to add to the women's counselling class, and this was suggested. I loved it. It's very simply written and very practical.

5. Mark Ward: Authorized: The Use and Misuse of the King James Bible. He lays things out very clearly without coming across as rejecting the KJV; rather, he shows the good of the translations as well as the challenges it presents (also, I learned a lot about how "reading levels" are determined).

6. Andrew M. Davis: An Infinite Journey: Growing Toward Christlikeness. True confession: this was Pastor James's recommendation for 2017, but I didn't get to it until this fall. It's a good book.

7. Paul Schlehlein: John G. Paton: missionary to the Cannibals of the South Seas. We all know I love biographies, and this one is very well written. It shows the challenges he faced and keeps from making him look like the perfect missionary.

8. Jen Wilkin: In His Image. She focuses on "who should I be" and shows how we are to become like God, and then everything else will follow.

9. Richard Mayhue: 1 and 2 Thessalonians. My main Bible study for the year was Paul's epistles to the Thessalonians. I found this commentary to be very straight forward and simple to understand.

10. Michael Harris: Solitude. Sometimes it's good to unplug and just be alone.

11. Laura Ingalls Wilder: A Little House Traveler. This is a collection of journal entries and letters written during the trip to Missouri, a trip to San Francisco, and a trip back home.

12. Jeremy Clark: I Gave Dating a Chance. Finally, I found the book that brings some balance to the dating/courtship argument. It's in the church library.

13. Booker T. Washington: Up From Slavery. I'd never read this, and I don't know why. It was really, really good, and gave a perspective of the post-Civil War years that I'd never read.

14. Laurie J. White: King Alfred's English. I got this for Christmas and loved it. It's "designed for students grade 7-12 and curious adults" so it's easy to read and full of information about how the English language came to be and why our spelling is so messy.

Bonus: From the Geoff and Janet Benge Christian Heroes Then and Now/Heroes of History collection (because there are always some of them):
Ben Carson: A Chance at Life
Clara Barton: Courage Under Fire
William Wilberforce: Take Up the Fight
David Bussau: Facing the World Head-on
Mildred Cable: Through the Jade Gate
Rachel Saint: A Star in the Jungle
Charles Mulli: We are Family
D.L. Moody: Bringing Souls to Christ

There were more, of course, and some of them very good (and some less so), but these are the ones that stand out the most.