Guiding Gentle Souls

Oh be careful little eyes what you see

That line in the child’s song is extrememly important when you are dealing with gentle souls. Whether your child is a genius or not. What you let them read, watch, and take part in has major implications.

While I do not agree that watching a minimal amount of television causes ADHD. I do think that television, or rather the ideas from TV can encourage poor behaviour.  Think for a minute about a “kids channels” 2 jump to the front of my mind and frankly the sitcoms and cartoons suggest things like, disrespecting your parents for the laugh, cheating if you don’t get caught, eco-love/love mother earth, clothing that is totally out of proportion to the age or moral standard of the majority of christians.  Children with problems diciphering social cues could misunderstand fiction and reality and begin acting out and looking for the wrong things.

As for books, don’t think that because your child is reading it’s good.  When I was a child I was reading by 4. By second grade most everything in the library was available to me. The school librarian thought that was neat so she gave me some of her most popular books for the older kids. True stories of shark attacks and bizare urban legends, to this day I wish that I had never picked these books up. Along with that great reading ability went a great ability to retain what I read whether or not I could fully understand it intellectually and emotionally.

So how could this affect your homeschooling? Do you really want to spend your time unlearning some poor behavior? Dealing with a child that has developed a paranoia of germs because he read a book about germs that was too advanced? Teach once, teach correctly.

Make available multiple books that are intellect appropriate. If you haven’t read the book ask around, look for a christian review such as at Focus on the Family. Watch the TV shows with your child to be sure that it is acceptable. Don’t be afraid to stop a show or a book if it suddenly takes a turn. There have been shows in the past that have taken a mother earth turn or more teen based (meaning less clothing and more nasty attitudes) that my husband and I have stopped. Did the my oldest put up a fight? Yes. We used this as a time to train her that we had her best interest in mind and that as her parents we set the rules in the home

Set the tone of your home. Monitoring what is watched, and read. Our gentle souls can reach such heights but we must vigilantly guard their hearts until they are old enough to take over. It is a big responsibility but you will be blessed with a young adult that is Godly and able to discern right from wrong based on Godly princibles rather than TV or cultural dogma.

May the Lord bless your homeschooling journey!