My niece and nephew are 15-year-old twins and sophomores in high school. They’re typical kids who think zits are the worst thing that can happen to someone, who want to stay up late and roll out of bed around lunch time, and who are navigating high school. Except this year high school is nothing like high school was for you.
Along with their older brother, my niece and nephew are students at a suburban Chicago high school, but they have started the tenth grade from the shores of the Chippewa Flowage in Hayward, Wisconsin, as their school begins the year under distance learning guidelines. Now that may sound like a great gig if you can get it, but the woods don’t provide highspeed broadband, and cabin space is small, so you set up a classroom wherever you can get it. And, well, as hard as mom tries, algebra and geometry were never her thing.
In our church the beginning of a school year will deliver to families harsh realities unlike anything previously experienced. I’ve listened to many of you who express anxiety about what awaits you in the days, weeks, and months to come.
Many in our church will enter a hybrid learning environment. Some in our church begin with distance learning. A few in our church return to the classroom where full-time in-person instruction takes place, complete with face masks and shields, social distancing, and whatever daily adjustments take place in a classroom or school building. Maybe those in our church who are longtime homeschoolers will not be impacted, but I am not even sure about that.
While I am not in a position to affect the options offered by your local school, I want to offer some suggestions as you navigate these new waters.
Bring God Into the Situation
If you are not in the habit, begin the school day with prayer. Before distance learning from home, before the pickup on the school bus, before unloading in the drop off line, pray to God who loves your children more than you ever could. Pray out loud so your children hear you asking God for his protection and for his grace for both students and teachers. Your prayer need not be long, but pray you must before the school day begins.
You Are Not Alone
In our church are people riding the same turbulent seas that you are. Identify one of them and pray regularly with them for their children and yours. Look in your small group or look outside your small group. Who in our church has children learning like yours will in 2020-2021? Initiate a day and time to pray with each and for each other. A note to our men, I am talking to you not just your wife. Your children’s educations are not the obligation of her only. It belongs to you, so find a man in our church to pray with.
Parent First
You and only you are uniquely positioned by God to direct your children’s education. God made your child with the intent that you would be their parent. He has equipped you, and he will provide for you. Therefore, be a parent first and a school facilitator second. As a parent, you remain patient when tears flow, and the tears will come. You know that, right? Some of those tears might be yours. Your task as a parent is to train your child how Christians respond to failure, to temptation, to upheaval, to criticism, to anxiety, and the list goes on. Learning Christian truths and gaining spiritual training will serve your children much longer and in far more superior ways than identifying one of the eight parts of speech or reciting a geometric theorem.
Exercise Common Sense
God gives us his wisdom which serves to make a day better. Before the first day of distance learning, determine where each child will “do school.” That may not be easy with multiple children in the home. I get it. When Michael was a twelfth-grader, Jeffery was in the third grade. The girls were in-between. We discovered the more preparation we did before the school year, week, or day, the better the environment for learning.
Set some expectations. Get dressed for the school day; no pajamas allowed. No pets in the space where you do school. Do not put chores on your children when they are supposed to be doing school, like, “Can someone please let the dog out!” Get everything ready before school starts. All this requires discipline. Soon after our kids were learning from home, I discovered distance learning / homeschooling requires someone to be disciplined, and it’s not likely to be the kids. These expectations are simple acts of common sense but will likely require a parent’s endeavor.
Pray, Pray, and Pray Again
During the day when things are going well, pray. During the day when things aren’t going well, pray. During the day when you have no idea how things are going, pray. When the kids hop in the minivan and tell you about the day or come through the front door loaded down with a backpack, pray silently to God in thanks and rejoicing or in lament and request over what you’ve heard. When the day is drawing to a close and tomorrow is full of apprehension or anticipation, pray aloud with and for your child. The power of in hearing a parent pray aloud is beyond description. Soon ask your child to pray too as the next school day approaches. End the day as you began it by bringing God into the situation.
One last thing, involve your pastors. We don’t have all the answers. We may not have even one answer. But we love you, and we love your family. We want to help, and we want to intercede before God on your behalf. We want to encourage your children and your spouses, so invite us in to your world and allow us to bear the burden with you.
I am confident you have other counsel you can and should offer to each other. I hope you will. For now, please know that I am praying for you.
Mike VerWay
Pastor for Preaching & Vision