I never thought I would be this excited

Boo is really picking up the pace with learning to read. He is often readin over my shoulder as I sit at the computer and read or type. He's reading everything around him and every lesson is going faster and faster. There were days I would DREAD doing reading lessons due to the snail-like pace.

But that's not what I am excited about. I am excited about the fact that I actually like to teach math. I've never been a good math student, and I have never liked the subject, but I like teaching it. Apparently, Boo and Meenie both enjoy learning math, evidenced by the fact that Meenie can count and understand the concept of numbers and Boo is doing addition now at age 5.

I guess that is what is so great about homeschooling. At five, I was in half-day kindergarten, where I was with all the other children who had not learned their ABC's yet. I do not remember any type of math, but I do remember that there were addition facts involved in Kindergarten.

Some people would say, that you have to let kids play and be little kids, and so on. My kids have more playtime than children who go to school. I've estimated that the average school child has between 2-3 hours at most, of play per day (not counting recesses at school). Many children have homework, dinner and baths to take care of in the evening after school. How much time does that really leave for playing and being a kid?

So even though I try to push my children to reach their full potential, there are over 8 free hours per day, in which they have to be a kid.

My Life without TV

Before we were married, my husband and I made a commitment that we would not be allowing our children to watch television. For those who cannot understand this, here is why:

• It fosters immorality and anti-Catholic ideas
• Impurity on television is rampant
• Adult themes can even be found on children's shows
• It robs children of creativity
• It steals away precious time that we could be doing something for God, our Faith and other people
• It creates a television-based culture in many aspects of life, just look at how products are used to market TV shows
• We want to have our own Catholic culture based on values that we determine, not networks
• Television is a passive activity and does not promote critical thinking
• It is a distraction from our daily duties and our spiritual duties
• Anything can pop up on the TV, thus limiting parental control

Now, before you draw other conclusions, let me say that I do not think the object the TV set is evil or bad in itself. It is what is put onto the television that makes it bad. I think renting movies, shows, documentaries is a good idea. Not all shows are bad, but many commercials are. I do think that people should seriously consider renting instead of subscribing to a cable service. In this way, TV does not rule your day and you are more in control of what you and your children view.

If television programming came into union with Catholic standards of morality and decency, I would subscribe to it once again, however, it would not rule our lives. We would not base how we relate to others on television shows and it would not be our only discussion piece among friends.

I definitely strongly oppose children having a TV set in their rooms. I think this is so detrimental to children, so many studies have been done on the effects of TV on the brain. I think you would have to be a very careless parent to allow a television in the bedroom.

One of the best rewards of having a no-TV home that I have seen in my own life is reflected in my children. Everywhere we go people compliment us on good behavior, the children are able to sit through Good Friday Liturgy, which is so wonderful. They are much better behaved and kinder than other children their age, that I have met, who watch a lot of TV. They would rather play horses than pretend they are Spiderman. To me, this is a gift to me because I know I am giving my children something that I never had, a great but innocent imagination, with which it is my hope and prayer that they will use their gifts to serve God and His Church well.