[FAITH FRIDAY] Our Story of How We Know Everything Is Awesome

The #ButterflyHomeschool Family Shares Their Story About Learning and Life Challenges And What It Takes To To Succeed. We really believe that #EverythingISAwesome – read on to learn why we say that.

Charity and I, Mom Donna, had an interesting conversation this week. It went something like this (see image below):

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Now, honestly, that morning I was a little disappointed that she wasn’t as optimistic as I was. At that moment in time, I was super excited for the older kids, who had the blessed opportunity to go off on a new adventure to a business-work immersion event at the World Congress Center in Atlanta because of their membership in One Talent. (We shared about OT in a previous post. Click here to learn more about it.)

So, after reflecting on what she said to me that morning, I decided to ask her again later in the day after the big kids had returned. At first she said, no, but then I framed it in a different way and asked:

“Right now in this moment is everything awesome?”.

Then she said:

“Yes.”

And this mom was so happy that the Holy Spirit turned around the heart of my little optimist-in-training. Praise God!

In #ButterflyHomeschool, one of the main things we learn every day is that attitude impacts every part of our lives, even though it is intangible… and because it is intangible. Attitude is a spiritual force that is ‘tangible’ as long as you are breathing and have a soul. Attitude is most easily seen physically manifested in a person’s face and body posture, heard in their voice and manifested in their choices. We set the atmosphere of our day and of our entire life by how we choose to carry our attitudes.

USE YOUR WORDS TO CHANGE YOUR WORLD

So, will you say our confession with us, no matter how you are feeling right now, and see your life and world change?

FATHER GOD

IS OUR EVERYTHING:

WHENEVER & WHATEVER

WE NEED HIM TO BE

THEN HE IS THAT

SO WE DECLARE OUT LOUD THAT

RIGHT NOW IN THIS MOMENT:

EVERYTHING

IS #AWESOME

NO MATTER WHAT IS GOING ON

IN FRONT OF OUR EYES OR EARS.

More of Charity’s Story

If you know us or have been following our blog for any time, you may know Charity’s story, however, for those of you who don’t, we’ll share more below so that you can see why this story about attitude is so very important for her.

Charity began life as a 35.5 week preemie. Evenso, she has always been very healthy with few residual issues after she came home from the NICU. Currently, she is 8 and in 2nd grade, but she looks 10 or 11, and most people are shocked when they realize that she’s tall for her age.

Charity’s Challenging Learning Journey

Charity began kindergarten with a reading challenge that had us both in tears and very discouraged. To make it worse, the public charter virtual school teacher (who was a great teacher and as helpful as she could be) informed us that our state doesn’t test for reading challenges. So, because there is no testing, there is no support. The teacher helped me understand what was going on by providing me with resources and encouraging us. However, there wasn’t anything else she could do or that the system would do. So, we returned to traditional homeschooling, and by first grade, she was a fluent reader.

We shared about Charity’s reading journey in a previous article, too. When we shared, we talked about how her attitude was critical in her learning process (and so was mine). Well, as you can see from what I shared above, this is super duper duper important!

For a child that learns differently,

parents need to be even that more diligent about

managing attitudes and atmosphere surrounding learning,

at home or at school or wherever you choose to learn.

Now, Charity still has more work to do, and so do I, to ensure that she’s able to learn in ways that fit her learning style. Now our focus has shifted to writing. And I expect that, as we enter a new school season, setting our atmosphere now during this summer will be critical as we transition into the Fall learning season. And, everything is going to be #Awesome because Father God is Awesome, and He’s got this. He’s handling all of the details and helping us in our successful learning journey.

~Donna Marie 🙂

 P.S. PLEASE SUPPORT CHARITY’S FIRST TIME PERFORMING ON STAGE

This little cutie will be singing and dancing with all the kids of One Talent on July 26th. Please buy a ticket. And even if you are not in Atlanta, please buy #TheBelieveMovement t-shirts for your whole family.

Preview of #BelieveInYourself Step Dance practice

 

[Learning Challenges Part 2] How Do You Help Your Kids Love Writing?

This article discusses how we are now learning to love writing in the #ButterflyHomeschool and ask for your help.

Before we moved this blog over to wordpress.com, I shared a ‘victory dance’ video post about learning challenges our young reader had overcome. She is a fluent reader now. Yeah!… but, that’s not the end of our story. Here is…

Learning Challenges Part 2

‪#‎ButterflyHomeschool‬ is tackling creative writing nowadays. For our young one, we’ve started using a story starter tool on the  Chateau MeddyBemps website to help Mommy help the baby really learn to love writing.

http://meddybemps.com

This site is great because she has had anxiety about all things language learning, and their illustrations are fun and inviting and fun for her.

SO HERE IS WHERE I AM AT…

It’s weird (to me) that she’s still anxious about it even though she overcame her reading challenges (serious dyslexia symptoms but no formal diagnosis), and now is a fluent reader. I don’t really fully get why she has been anxious, but I am working over time to learn what I have to do to help her get past it.

WOULD YOU HELP ME OUT HERE? HOW DO YOU HELP YOUR KIDS LOVE WRITING?

If you have had similar challenges, please comment and help me out by answering the following questions:

• What writing resources have you found for your reading challenged child?
• How do you help to soothe their anxiety when it is time to work on language learning assignments?
• Where have you found articles or books on this topic that have helped?
• Any other comments?

Even though I did successfully teach her how to read, and publicly celebrated her victory in a past video post, now this new hurdle with her writing has kind of thrown me for an unexpected loop. I thought we had conquered it all, but I guess the reading was just our first stepping stone to help her learn to love learning language skills.

Thanks in advance for reading and for sharing your answers and feedback!

~Donna Marie Johnson, The Mommy at #ButterflyHomeschool

P.S. I’ll repost that victory video again, soon, once we’ve made more progress on building up this new blog site.

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P.P.S.

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DISCLAIMER: This is my affiliate link: If you decide to click and sign up, Thank you in advance for supporting #ButterflyHomeschool  because Amazon may compensate us for referring you to them. My opinions expressed here are my own true opinions about the Amazon Prime program which we truly enjoy using.
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Reading Hater Now Loves To Read

Our family has been so blessed to see our young reader’s progress. She was a true reading hater that would do all she could to get out of it, and now she loves to read. And we are happy to say that Reading Eggs and other great online learning resources have been a great part of it. We were able to get a membership in Reading Eggs via our homeschool co-op, and it was worth this very affordable investment (was less than twenty for the whole year).

She was rewarded with her own mini-Kindle (6 inch) for her great attitude.

In past posts, we have shared about her reading challenges. When we initially realized that she was turning letters and numbers around and tried to get help through the public school system in Georgia, we were shocked (and upset) to find out that there was no help. No testing for dyslexia = no help for dyslexia. Despite it all, her teacher at that time was a huge help. And our co-op group and other homeschool families who share online have also been very helpful.

So, fast forward a year and a half, and she is now reading relatively fluently. She self-corrects most of the time, if she has a backwards letter episode. And she has tools and tricks that she’s learned to help her keep her learning momentum going. Yes, she still needs some encouragement on the bad days, but she always turns things around. Who doesn’t have a bad day? We all do. We all need encouragement. Hers is just a different kind of encouragement.

To all of the families out there who are dealing with reading challenges, fear of reading and hatred of reading:

NEVER

GIVE

UP

And don’t allow them to give up or to give in to the temptation for having pity parties. Let them take a break to rest, then get right back to it the next day.

Our little one has memorized:

I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. ~Philippians 4:13 (KJV)

And this one scripture has been a great way for her to encourage herself and for us to keep her reminded about encouraging herself. She is so much more confident now. Here is a recent video of her reading. 

VIDEO

link: http://youtu.be/VB846J65aLA

If you find our blog helpful, let us know what you liked the most in the comment area below.

Thanks for taking a look at our blog!

Sincerely,

Donna, The Mommy at Butterfly Homeschool