Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them fade from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them.
Deuteronomy 4:9 ESV
This post is a part of the Five Minute Friday link up. Every Friday we write for just 5 minutes on a one-word prompt, without heavy editing, and see what happens. Today’s prompt is “teach.”
For 15 years, our family was involved in a K-8 parent-involved school where if your kids were enrolled, at least one parent had to work on campus in some capacity. Our first year, when our eldest started kindergarten, I was pregnant and due with our third child just 5 weeks after school started, so my job was working in the school office one day a week.
But two years later, I was tasked with becoming the registrar and a member of the management team for the school. After 6 years on that job, I took a step back and became the teacher’s assistant for our middle school teacher. But within a month, our new 3rd grade teacher decided to un-enroll her kids, and therefore a void was left on the teaching team. Now, I had said that I was not a teacher and I would never teach, but as I prayed over the need for a new teacher in my daughter’s 2nd grade class (one of her current teachers stepped into the 3rd-grade role), God changed my heart.
And so I took on the task of co-teaching 3 little 2nd graders (it’s not a big school). Within two years, I was asked to lead the breakout of our 6th graders into a new class of their own, separate from the other middle schoolers in 7th and 8th.
For the next 5 years, I lead the 6th grade class and taught language arts and humanities. I got to teach my daughter again in 6th grade, now with several more classmates than just the 3 from 2nd grade.
But what didn’t click in those years of saying I would not be a teacher, was that, even prior to 2010, I was teaching my kids every day those principles that I prayed would stay with them a lot longer than Greek and Latin roots: Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.
Compelled 
I really enjoyed this. Children absorb what we do, not just what we say. Living an honorable life while raising your children, teaches them morals, faith, and goodwill.
Thank you! It’s daunting sometimes, but worth it when they finally seem to “get it.” Thanks for stopping by.
I agree! We are all teachers in some capacity. I am so thankful, though, that I got to officially teach with you on your team!!!
Thank you, Jenni! Those were fun years!
I really enjoyed reading this post.
Thanks for sharing.
Thanks, Sandra. It was an easy topic this week. I appreciate you stopping by.
Oh, I think that sounds wonderful….teaching in a school where my children are and with small classrooms. What a blessing that must have been!
Thanks, Jennifer. It is definitely one of a kind. Very much a blessing, still going strong after 30 years!
Good to answer the challenges God places in front of you isn’t it? FMF3
Good and terrifying! Thanks for stopping by!
This resonates with me as a homeschool parent! I wasn’t well-equipped to teach my kids chemistry or calculus, but those were subjects I could hand off to a tutor. It’s my job to teach my kids to love and trust God and to see his wisdom in everything else that they study.
Visiting from FMF#26
All we can do is our best to model loving and trusting God. The results are up to the Holy Spirit. I hope your kids are all walking with the Lord! Thanks for stopping by.