The best part of homeschooling is….

..that you can incorporate your own tales into every lesson that you are teaching your child. For example, today for TJ’s second grade Health and Fitness class, we were discussing swimming safety. We also discussed the importance of wearing life jackets when riding in a boat. I was reminded of the news from three days ago where three prison inmates, Jon Fowler, Nelson Pettis and Larry Bohn from Larch Corrections Centers, who were working near the Salmon Creek in a Washington State Park, saved the lives of three brothers aged 16, 10 and 8 whose boat overturned in the creek. I was able to discuss with TJ not only the importance of wearing a life jacket but also the religious aspect of this story where this crew from Larch, which in fact was a replacement crew for someone else who was supposed to work at the creek that day, were sent as guardian angels by God to help these boys. The family of these three brothers is real lucky that these men were working near the creek or otherwise this could have been a big tragedy for this family. May God bless Fowler, Pettis and Bohn for their extremely selfless and brave deed. Amin!

Not everyone gets lucky in water. I told TJ about the news from nearly two years ago where six teens drowned in front of their helpless families in the Red River in Shreveport, Louisiana while trying to save each other. Neither the kids nor their families knew how to swim. This was a very sad event and had the teens known swimming and about the dangers of undercurrents in seemingly static rivers, they wouldn’t have drowned. It’s also important to know to not jump to save another individual when you don’t know swimming yourself. Many important points about the rules of safety while swimming or while riding a boat or a canoe were highlighted while telling these stories to TJ.

Yesterday, while discussing 2^nd Grade Islamic Education, we were studying how our dear Prophet (PBUH) built his mosque with only palm leaves as the roof top. I told TJ how this was a big contrast to how mile long palaces are being built in Saudi Arabia today or how excessive gold gets incorporated into some of the mosques today. Our Prophet (PBUH) didn’t aim for grandiose and extravagance when he built his mosque and his living quarters. One of the children pointed out that perhaps in that day and age, the rich stuff didn’t exist. I reminded the kids about the Pharaohs, their extremely indulgent way of life (and even death) and the fact that they existed much before our Prophet (PBUH) but still had access to all the richness in the world. Our Prophet (PBUH) was the leader of the Muslims but barely spent anything on him.

That is the best part of homeschooling where a simple line in a text book just doesn’t stay a simple line. It turns into a complete story by itself and the kids love hearing stories. Masha’Allah.

About these ads