Full Circle: Journey of a Homeschooled Child

Being the homeschooled kid of our church has been part of my identity for as long as I can remember. By the time my brothers came along four and ten years respectively after me, people had gotten used to the idea. Me? I was a novelty item.

“So what do you do all day?”

“So do you have, like, no friends?”

“Does your mom know everything?”

Those were just a few of the questions regularly thrown my way by fascinated strangers and family friends. For a practice that’s been around far longer than Father Abraham, homeschooling sure seems mysterious to many.

Primarily due to that mystery, my mother—juggling duties of homemaker, homeschool mom, and pastor’s wife for the past 24 years—has long accumulated a mental list of homeschooling benefits, ready to advocate her family’s choices at a moment’s notice. From time to time, people would visit us to inquire about or copy from my parents’ practices, eager to understand what homeschooling in the Philippines entails.

In the midst of all that, I remained blissfully oblivious. As far as I was concerned, I followed whatever schedule my parents set for me from day to day, learning all sorts of fun and exciting things along the way. While my friends in church were complaining about projects, traffic, and annoying boy stalkers, I was enjoying myself with trips to grandma’s house, activities in church, playtime with my brothers, and even off-season vacations to various destinations.

Life wasn’t about living in starchy uniforms and stuffy classrooms. It wasn’t about enduring one more boring class after another.

Life was real.

Life was about learning to run a household, from meal planning to sewing up my broken stuffed toys. Life was about making friends with little babies all the way to old grandmas in our church. Life was about reading, endless reading, of books that acquainted me with the whole wide world before the Internet was a way of life. By the time high school came around, life became a time for blogging and writing and reaching out to various communities

And life didn’t stop with home and church. It got bigger.

By God’s grace, I moved on to different chapters of life. I completed my college degree in Florida, U.S.A. I became a high school teacher in MGC New Life Christian Academy, a school whose administration and students I still love to no end. I dated and married my wonderful husband. Life was real and blessed and happy.

Then God called me back to my roots.

Last year, the Lord led our church to make the decision of establishing a homeschool academy—a school that would provide multilingual, biblical curriculum and guidance for homeschooling families. The need is present, and someone has to answer the call.

So here I am, administrator of Kairos Homeschool Academy.

Am I nervous? Yes.

Am I excited? Yes, yes.

Am I perfect at this? Not a chance.

But more than anything, I believe with my whole heart that the Lord’s grace is ever sufficient. It is the heart of every person involved in Kairos to build up a school that will bless, guide, and enable the next generation of parents who, like mine, want to bring up their children in a godly home.

I never saw it coming, even if others did.

Being a homeschooled child established the essence of who I am. It’s not a perfect system; there are no perfect systems. But my parents’ efforts and sacrifices in homeschooling have equipped me and my brothers with the love and skills we possess today, each of us still following God’s leading one step at a time.

And by His grace, Kairos will be making the reality I so enjoyed as a child into a reality for many, many more children to come.

Kairos Homeschool Academy

Remembering Mrs. Schmuck

It was the fall semester of 2011. As I completed my Secondary English Education Internship at Pensacola Christian Academy, I heard the news: Mrs. Sandy Schmuck had died.

Mrs. Schmuck had always been a hero in my heart—the epitome of a Christian English teacher. Her love for people, for English, and for the Lord condensed into the beautiful person that she was. As an intern under Mrs. Baker, who had been an intern to Mrs. Schmuck herself, I felt the loss very directly. I taught 11^th grade English, Mrs. Schmuck’s “baby.” The notes that I taught from, the box I used to carry papers, and the visuals I used were all inherited from her. I cried hard upon the final realization that she would never come back to teach again.

My heart weighed heavy throughout my internship. Every time I sat down to copy notes from Mrs. Schmuck's literature books, sorrow welled in me.

On the last week of my internship, I reached the last page of the literature book. The last poem--"How Did You Die?" by Edmund Cooke--read in simple but profound lines:

Did you tackle the trouble that came your way
With a resolute heart and cheerful?
Or hide your face from the light of day
With a craven soul and fearful?
Oh, trouble's a ton, or a trouble's an ounce,
Or a trouble is what you make it,
And it isn't the fact that you're hurt that counts,
But only how did you take it?

You are beaten to earth? Well, well, what's that?
Come up with a smiling face.
It's nothing against you to fall down flat,
But to lie there--that's disgrace.
The harder you're thrown, why the higher you bounce;
Be proud of your blackened eye!
It isn't the fact that you're licked that counts,
It's how did you fight--and why?

And though you be done to the death, what then?
If you battled the best you could,
If you played your part in the world of men,
Why, the Critic would call it good.
Death comes with a crawl, or comes with a pounce,
And whether he's slow or spry,
It isn't the fact that you're dead that counts,
But only how did you die?

At the very end, Mrs. Schmuck had scribbled while still in good health: “I have fought the good fight. I have finished the course!”

Feelings welled within me once more. But this time, a sense of closure and pride replaced the usual sorrow. It's not the fact that she's dead that counts, but the grace with which she had died. She had fought her fight and won her race.

I rejoice in her crown of glory.