Ah, the wisdom of John Holt! It seems a simple idea, but we so often forget that our children are learning all the time through every experience they have and every idea they encounter.
Our two-year-old reminded us of this recently. We’ve been watching the incredible What’s in the Bible? series, and our four-year-old just decided it would be cool to know the names of all the books of the Bible. He’s been going over them daily, reciting them to us or often to himself, sometimes singing songs from the show to help him remember.
The other day, he was going through the prophets and hesitated at “Jonah, Micah, Nahum..”. Much to our surprise, his little brother jumped in with “Habakkuk.”
Of course, then we had to ask him to start at Genesis and see how much he really knew. With zero instruction from us and without us even realizing he was paying attention, here’s what our two-year-old can do:
He may have skipped over a few, but I like how confident he is about Malachai. 🙂
If you ever think that your children aren’t paying attention or that they have to sit down and be “taught” everything, think again! Create an atmosphere of growth and exploration in your home. Fill your family life with rich ideas and experiences — what Charlotte Mason calls “spreading the feast.” Be intellectually curious yourself, and your children will be more than happy to come along for the ride!
They are learning all the time. Give them wonderful things to learn!