Senior Year Worldview Study

Thinking of sending my oldest child out into the world caused me to do some power-thinking about his state of preparedness. I wanted David to think about his beliefs and the reasons he holds them. I wanted (and still want) him to "own" his beliefs and not just parrot them, so that when they are questioned (and I know they will be), he can defend them stalwartly. I also wanted him to be prepared in social skills and some other areas of his life.

Toward these goals, I chose the following books for him to read during his senior year, in addition to his academic reading.

1 - Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis
I read this book for the first time in my senior year of college and it really resonated with me. I've always been a fan of C.S. Lewis's Narnia books, but reading this made me realize how practical and sincere his faith in God was. I wondered if the book would be appropriate for a 17-year-old, since I had been several years older when I read it. However, David had no trouble with the book and found it insightful and relevant. I had him write a response paper to the book and he said the book is "nearly impossible to put down" and recommended it highly to everyone. I am really glad I had David read this in his senior year and I will plan to have the other kids read it as well.

Reading Guide HERE


2 - Slumber of Christianity by Ted Dekker

David enjoyed the Black, Red, White series of fiction books written by Ted Dekker and I thought that this non-fiction book by the same author might motivate him to a more passionate faith in God. This is a short book and I did find it personally inspiring. The main point is that most Christians have fallen into a boring slumber and we need to reawaken our passion and joy in Christ. David described this book as a "wake-up call" but said the next book he read (#3 on this list) was one he enjoyed more.

3 - Pagan Christianity?: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices by Frank Viola and George Barna

History always interests me and this book gives the historical reasons for many of the practices in the current church. Why do priests and some pastors wear special clerical garb? Why do we sit in pews? Why do churches have steeples? Why is the order of service so unvaried? These questions and many more like them are discussed historically and objectively to make us understand that church practices are not necessarily based in Biblical instruction. What's more, some of these widespread traditions harm the church rather than help it. 

I wanted David to understand the reasons behind some of the things we see in church and to look past them to the heart of God. What I didn't consider is that our family's lack of a firm foundation in a local church also affected him as he read this book. (We had left a church in rather a slow unorganized way - just slowly stopping our attendance and not really replacing it with another where we felt at home. Long story, but the main idea here is that David did not feel a connection to a local church body.)

So, even though he devoured this important information and really enjoyed the book, I am not sure it had the effect I was hoping for. He ended up feeling more disillusioned than motivated, I think. Since understanding the roots of church traditions is really important in my mind, I am still glad he read it and I hope that he can use what he learned to strengthen his faith and still maintain connections to local believers.

4 - A Praying Life: Connecting With God In A Distracting World by Paul Miller 
This is by far the best book on prayer I have ever read. I wanted David to read it to understand the insights about prayer that I learned from reading it. I could write tons about this book, but you would be better served to go buy it right now and start reading it. I am currently re-reading it again - my 3rd time through. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.

I had David also do the study guide which you can find HERE. 

5 - How to Make People Like You in 90 Seconds or Less by Nicolas Boothman
This is not a Christian book and I didn't assign it for worldview purposes. However, David is interested in psychology and I thought he would find it interesting from that perspective. Also, he will be meeting many new people and I wanted to give him some strategies for conversation and social situations.

I think this information is important, but I only chose this particular book because I found it used somewhere.  I did read the book beforehand and found it easy-to-read and practical. I will do some research before assigning a book of this type to Emily, but all-in-all, I did find it met our purposes.

6 - Every Young Man's Struggle by Stephen Arterburn
This book is actually going to be a summer study for my husband and my two sons. David has read it before when he was about 13, the age my younger son is now. This book is a frank look at the sexual struggles that young men will face in today's culture. I wanted my husband to do this study with the boys because he obviously has more experience in this area than I do.

 7 - The Bible
I required David to read through the entire Bible during his senior year. I will ask all my children to do the same.  I know we've read the entire Bible during our Bible study time in school throughout his K-12 years, but I wanted him to have the experience of reading it independently and in a fairly short time span. He used both a print version and an audio version of the Bible, both in NIV (New International Version).

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Was this everything I wanted my son to read before he graduated? Well, certainly not! However, he'd probably have been reading from sunrise to sunset if I had assigned everything I thought was important. Just typing out this information on these 7 books I thought of many more things I wish I had been able to stuff into his head in the last year of lessons.

However, I will lay all those thoughts at the feet of Christ and let Him take charge of David's worldview. My prayers will be fervent and frequent and I will take any available opportunity for discussion. But my 13 years of planning lessons for David are over.

My Teenage Son Likes Opera

Last fall, I received an email about some dress rehearsal performances coming up at the Detroit Opera House. We were offered the opportunity to get tickets for these performances for $10 each. I asked my kids about them and my then-17-year-old son said he was interested in attending some of the operas.

"Really?" I questioned. "You want to go to the opera?"

He reiterated his interest and so I ordered tickets for just him and me to the first opera, which happened to be The Barber of Seville (Rossini). (You're probably imagining THIS scene from Bugs Bunny now, aren't you?)



We LOVED The Barber of Seville. Since it is a comic opera, we found much humor and laughed a great deal. The music was wonderful and we were much impressed by the sets. If you are wondering about our comprehension, yes, the music is sung in Italian, but there are English subtitles above the stage so we could understand the storyline. We had great seats on the main floor that I later realized would cost over $100 each in a regular performance.

I asked David if he wanted me to order tickets for any of the remaining shows, which had to be ordered in the fall for the rest of the year. We chose Fidelio (Beethoven) and Aida (Verdi) and then settled into the rest of his senior year.

Now, lest you imagine David as a musician or a classical music snob, I do need to tell you that he loves many kinds of music. (Just about everything except country or hipster music, he will tell you.) He likes my 80's rock, his dad's hard rock, dub-step (which I cannot define, so please google), and so many other kinds of music (even some that I don't really approve of). So, opera is just one more genre he appreciates, but not the ONLY thing he likes.

In April, the tickets arrived for Fidelio and we once again headed to Detroit. (I even let him drive!) The music of Fidelio is amazing; we both enjoy Beethoven. Since these are dress rehearsal performances, the audience is warned that the performance may stop if necessary. During the Fidelio performance, the conductor did stop the orchestra in several places to rehearse. The plotline was not as interesting to me; I found it rather predictable, but we enjoyed the staging of the play as well as the amazing performances.

So, when our tickets arrived for Aida, we were excited. Even though this performance is just days before David's graduation and we have MUCH to accomplish, we took the time to drive once more to Detroit and spend the day enjoying opera. SO glad we did. What a wonderful time we spent together. The sets were just  WONDERFUL. David, as a potential mechanical engineer, can appreciate the set design more than many observers. Since the opera is set in Ancient Egypt, one of my favorite eras, I enjoyed that very much. The portions of the show with all the cast onstage were spectacular and breathtaking.

I look forward to discovering more great operas next year and I will likely drag my other three children along. Hopefully, David will be able to continue to enjoy opera as he moves into his adult life.

Christmas School Requested

My high school senior asked yesterday if we were doing Christmas School this year. We haven't done it in the last couple years, at least not to its full extent.

But David, my nearly eighteen-year-old, said something along the lines of, "I really love doing Christmas School. It's one of my favorite things." He mentioned liking reading the Nativity story (which we do every year).

How can I say no to that?

He expressed the desire to make a gingerbread cathedral. (He thinks big.) The other kids all wanted to do card houses again. Here are some posts about our past Christmas School experiences, including one from 2008 with pictures of the card houses.

Note: we did not design or make that cathedral. I just found it on the internet. You can see more pictures of it here. Hopefully David's will turn out somewhere between that and THIS.

Here's a funny article of 10 gingerbread house fails including the one I just showed you.

So, I guess my December lesson planning will include Christmas School! Stay tuned for how that pans out during my oldest child's last year of high school. Sniff.