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Fast forward to when your child is 18 years old and walking out the door to go off to... college, work, their own apartment, or the military. What will have been done in the intervening years to prepare them for that day? You do know that it will come faster than you think!
Well, if you are like most parents, you want your child to be prepared with the necessary information and tools that will enable them to be successful in whatever lies ahead. But let’s be a bit more practical and more specific than that– What work ethic, character traits, and worldview can we focus on building up within our children now to help them in the future?
First, let me suggest that there is value in knowing information. Can your child read? Do they understand what they are reading? Do they know parts of speech and can they digest a complex sentence for meaning? Do they enjoy getting information from the printed page—newspapers, magazines, novels, etc. What do they understand about how numbers work when added, subtracted, multiplied, and divided? (This is different from just knowing the process of how to do those things. This involves understanding aspects of the process, such as place value and repeated patterns in number sequences.) Does your child know and understand fractions, decimals, and their relationship to division? Have they memorized the facts related to those things so that there is quick recall in use? And can all this be done with a desire to know more and not to rely on the “Google tool” in their pocket?
The second part of that character content you are working on is in giving your child a moral compass. In your daily living are they being encouraged to live out of truth rather than how they feel? Do they have some solid truths (found in God’s Word) that they have heard enough times that in the moment of future temptation, it will stick in their head as something that they WANT? Will there have been sufficient training as they are doing their present schooling, that they know a job well done is worth more than the “quick get-it-done” tendency of children? Are they able to critique (not criticize) the world’s ideas that don’t line up with that solid biblical truth?
The third part is all about relationship. Will your child know that their work, though it needs to be done well, does not define who they are? If they are not able to get a high grade, will they be loved and cared for because they are a unique image-bearer of the Most High God? Will they feel loved even when they are bad or do wrong things? Will their experience be one where the adults in their world express their care regardless of their actions?
I cannot think of a better environment for these things to take place than Immanuel Christian School. While the hybrid model does not allow us to provide this content as often or to the degree that we would like, it is the means that we believe serves our families best at this time. And it is certainly better than only remote because we would not have a “life-on-life” relationship with our students.
So, at 18, will your child be ready? You only get one chance with each child. We are glad to help you toward that this year!