History of Christianity

New to the homeschool library is the video series, The History of Christianity, written and presented by Dr. Timothy George. This video series was used last year for one of the Co-op classes. There are six programs on the video. Bill and I viewed the entire video in one sitting. Our interest level was kept. Since my favorite books to read to my children have been Christian biographies I was familiar with many of the people mentioned in the video. But I did learn some interesting things. It was mentioned that Martin Luther and Zwingli had met only once face to face. They met to discuss their differing views of the Lord's Supper. Zwingli saw the Lord's Supper as a memorial feast while Luther still believed that Christ was bodily present in the sacrament of the altar "in, with, and under" the elements of bread and wine. I found this interesting since I was raised by my parents in a church that does believe in the doctrine of transubstantiation. Now I go to a church where Communion is a memorial service.

The Reformation period in the history of Christianity was a very important time. Men like John Wycliffe, Martin Luther, Zwingli, and John Calvin did much to reform and bring revival to the Christian faith. Johannes Gutenberg has been named "Man of the Millennium" as a result of his 1455 invention of the printing press. The first book he published was the Bible. God used Gutenberg's work to spread the Gospel to the entire world.

Christian biographies are my favorite books to read to my children. This is why in the homeschool library we have so many biographies. One series we have is the Heroes of the Faith series. It is written by several authors. This exciting biographical series explores the lives of famous Christian men and women throughout the ages. These books were written to inspire and encourage you to follow the example of these "Heroes of the Faith" who made Jesus the center of their lives. Some titles that are found in the homeschool library are: Gladys Aylward, Missionary to China by Sam Wellman, John Bunyan, Author of the Pilgrim's Progress by Sam Wellman, Jonathan Edwards, the Great Awakener by Helen Hosier, Martin Luther, the Great Reformer by Dan Harmon, Hudson Taylor, Founder, China Inland Mission by Vance Christie, John Wesley, the Great Methodist by Sam Wellman, William Tyndale, Bible Translator and Martyr by Bruce and Becky Durost Fish, and George Whitefield, Pioneering Evangelist by Bruce and Beck Durost Fish. We do have other titles available that are not listed. The biographies are found together on one shelf as you enter the library.

The homeschool library does have some videos about people from Christian history. From Gateway Films we have the following films: Children's Heroes from Christian History, Volumes I - III, God's Outlaw - William Tyndale, Martin Luther, and Stephen's Test of Faith.

The animated series called The Storykeepers is from the time of Nero when the early Christian were persecuted. There are eleven videos in this series. I like this series since the main characters are constantly telling stories about Jesus.


My favorite biography is Missionary Stories with the Millers by Mildred A. Martin. When Josh was a small boy I read one of the missionary stories from this book to him nightly as he was lying in bed ready to sleep. I had read this book several times since my children's ages vary. The Salina Public Library in the Christian Fiction section of the children's library have a series of Christian biographies by Dave & Neta Jackson. In the homeschool library we have four volumes of these biographies that are shorten by these authors titled Hero Tales by Dave & Neta Jackson. These biographies are told from the viewpoint of a young person involved with the character.

A book that I suggest you purchased for your personal devotion time is One Year Book of Christian History by E. Michael and Sharon Rusten. We do not have a copy in the homeschool library mainly because once somebody checked the book out it would take a year to read. It is a daily glimpse into God's powerful work. There is a different selection for each day of the year. This book can be purchased at Christianbook.com and probably at other book sites.

Labor: Created to Create from The Truth Project

Bill and I are attending the Focus on the Family series called The Truth Project at church. I noticed in The Salina Journal earlier this fall that there are other churches in Salina also using this video series. The Truth Project is an in-depth Christian worldview experience. It is led by Dr. Del Tackett. If you are not familiar with The Truth Project you can go to this web-site: http://www.thetruthproject.org/ This is our second time attending this video series. If the opportunity is available I do encourage you to attend this series.

For the homeschool library I have purchased the children's version called The Truth Chronicles. It is in the style of Adventures in Odyssey also produced by Focus on the Family. There are over 5 hours of audio. The back cover of the CD case reads: Are there really right answers to big questions about God, faith, and truth? The kids of Odyssey are about to find out! Can the science club discover the reality of intelligent design? Will Captain Absolutely triumph over the evil schemes of Dr. Relative? And what happens when kids are in charge of their own city - with no adults? There's absolute adventure ahead with these life-changing stories on seeing the world from a Christian perspective - and that's no lie.

This evening the lesson from The Truth Project was Lesson 11 - Labor: Created to Create. In this lesson Dr. Tackett makes the case that work is far from being a curse as the secular world sees it but work is creative labor and a glorious privilege. Labor flows out of the heart of God , who worked 6 days to bring the world into existence. Dr. Tackett states that the creativity of man is a mirror-image of the creativity of God. Work is to be a source of joy so fulfilling and wonderful that God found it necessary to give us the fourth commandment in order that we set our work aside and rest at least one day a week! This creativity is intended to include all areas of work, whether in the factory, the arts, or the media. The video stressed that as Christians we are to be a creative force. Our homes and churches need to find ways to be centers of creative and artistic activities.

So what does the homeschool library have to offer in the area of work and creativity? Right away the book for boys called Created for Work by Bob Schutz came to my mind. Another book by Bob Schutz called Boyhood and Beyond includes many references to the value of hard work. The homeschool library has both of these books. Children need to be encouraged to work. How to get Children to Help at Home by Elva Anson may be helpful for a parent who is experiencing difficulty getting their children to work.

I have studied U.S. History many times with my children. As we study the founding of Jamestown we always learn about the difficulties the early settlers at Jamestown had. The reason was that they would not work. John Smith wanted the men to plant gardens. But the men only wanted to search for gold. They did not want to work. When John Smith became the leader of Jamestown he made a wise new rule - He who will not work shall not eat! Proverbs 18: 9 states, " He who is slothful in his work is a brother to him who is a great destroyer." from the NKJV Bible

Learning to read and read

Reading is necessary for life. I am reading almost constantly. I read the Bible in the morning to my daughter Rachel since she has dyslexia. I read her textbooks to her. I read the math problems to her. As I help her with the phonics and reading tutoring session I read the teacher's manual on how to tutor properly. I read my mail and then I read my e-mail. I read about the news on various web-sites and sometimes I even read The Salina Journal. I like to read interesting books to Rachel but sometimes I am too tired to do much reading aloud. I do struggle with teaching reading to Rachel. After all my other five children learned to read! Jason learned to read by the third grade, Gary by the first grade, and Paul by the fourth grade. Sara and Josh were reading by the first grade. Rachel who is fifteen is still not reading first grade material. I am using the Barton Reading and Spelling System with her. We are on Level 5 which introduces prefixes and suffixes. We do have up to five syllables words but there are many phonic patterns in the regular first grade readers that we have not studied yet. So Rachel mostly just reads material from the Barton Reading and Spelling System, which is an Orton-Gillingham based system that research has demonstrated to work best for people with dyslexia.

This is challenging for me. I learned to read by third grade. I liked reading so much once I learned how to read that in the fourth and fifth grade I was known as a book worm since I turned in the most book reports to the teacher. Reading has been my favorite activity. My aunt encouraged my mother to get me more active in other activities but I prefer reading whenever I could. I did my farm and household chores but whenever I had free time I would read. Reading helped me through high school. I probably would have been valedictorian but I did get a "D" in P. E. so that did hurt my grade point average. By being a good reader I was able to get scholarships. I took the C.L.E.P. test when I entered college and was able to quiz out of 15 college credits. All that I credit to being a reader. As a Christian, reading is very important to me. As I read and reread the Bible and other Christian books God's Word becomes part of me. God's Word gives me life, strength, healing, and hope. Reading is very important to me. This is why I have served as part of the S.V.H.E. library committee for the past ten years. My goal is to pass my love of reading on to others.

This blog is created for the purpose to encourage you and your children to read and even to help in learning the mechanics of reading if necessary. I do plan to blog on dsylexia but I will spend more time and energy on other topics. The S.V.H.E. library at the present time does not have any practical helps for dyslexia. We do have one book that does explain dyslexia and lists many sources that are helpful. That book is Overcoming Dyslexia by Sally Shaywitz. M.D.

The learning to read books we have are mainly for readers who have no difficulty with reading. They are the graded readers. The S.V.H.E. library does have the Pathway readers from first grade through 8th grade. They are basal readers. Sara and Josh had used these to learn to read. We did use the workbooks along with the readers. The workbooks do teach phonics and spelling rules. The library does not have a copy of their workbooks.The library also has a graded set of Christian Light Publishers readers. Both set of readers are Christian based. The Pathway readers are Amish while the Christian Light Publishers are of Mennonite origin.

Another set of readers I do recommend are the ABEKA readers. The library does not have a copy of these readers to check out. Many homeschoolers do use the ABEKA curriculum so many families have already purchased these readers. For time to time the Salina Christian Academy, which uses the ABEKA curriculum, will update their books and usually will give us their used books for homeschooling families to use. There are often ABEKA readers on our free give away shelf at the homeschool library.

Once your child has learned to read the library does have a good set of biographies called The Childhood of Famous Americans Series. It is one of the most popular series ever published for young Americans. These classics of childhood have been praised alike by parents, teachers, and librarians. With these lively, inspiring, believable biographies - easily read by children of seven and up - today's youngster is swept right into history. (Taken from the back cover of one of the books.) We do have over 50 different biographies in the homeschool library. At the current time there are several families reading this series of biographies. Included biographies are people like Clara Barton, Davy Crockett, Albert Einstein, Babe Ruth, Henry Ford, John F. Kennedy, Davy Crockett, and many others.

Ruth Beechick's books are helpful for many new homeschool teachers that are just starting to teach reading and math to their children. The titles that we have include: Easy Start - Arithmetic, Home Start - Reading, Strong Start - Language, Teaching Preschoolers, Teaching Kindergarteners, Teaching Primaries, Language and Thinking for Young Children, and The Lanuage Wars. You Can Teach Your Child Successfully by Ruth Beechick is very helpful,also.



More to come . . .