Having children requires *raising* children, and a big part of raising children is educating them in all kinds of things.
We as parents naturally love our children, and we nourish them physically with wholesome nutrition, emotionally with wholesome bonds, and intellectually and mentally with wholesome concepts, ideas, and principles.
We teach our children first how to sit, how to stand, how to walk, how to talk, how to eat, how to throw a ball. Then as they get a bit older, we teach them how to wash their hands, how to brush their teeth, how to dress themselves, how to put away their toys after playing.
Then they get older still, and ask many questions about the world and their environment, and we answer all their questions.
We teach them Islam: we talk to them about Allah, our love for Him and our gratitude for His blessings on us, and how He has created the sun and the moon and the stars and mountains and birds and flowers. About the Prophet ﷺ and his beautiful life story. About the dunya and the Akhirah, about the creation of Adam and the plot of Shaytan. The Prophets and their amazing stories. The Sahaba and their heroic strengths.
We teach them basic fiqh: how to make wudu, how to pray, how to cover the awrah, how to eat the sunnah way, haram and halal. Simple du`as for when we wake up in the morning, when we enter the restroom, when we get in the car, when we get in bed at night.
Then we instill in their hearts values and begin to shape their character: how to be honest, how to be responsible, how to obey parents, how to respect elders, how to have mercy on the young, how to give in charity, how to set our intentions (نية , niyya), how to express our feelings to others, how to rely on Allah with full tawakkul (توكل, trust).
After all this, the important underlying foundation has been built. The stage is now set for more learning, more tarbiya, تربية.
Why stop now?
Why should we, as parents, suddenly stop teaching our children abruptly when we've been teaching them things since the day they were born?
We teach them Quran, first and foremost. We repeat it with them so they memorize it. Then we teach the meanings (تفسير, tafsir), narrate the stories, provide the context of the surahs. We teach hadith, first short simple ones, then longer. We teach the seerah more formally, first of Prophet Muhammad ﷺ then of his Sahaba and the Khulafa' Ar-Rashidun, then progress into the rest of Islamic history.
We also teach our children more "academic" subjects as well. We teach them math, reading, writing, art, science, geography, and world history. We educate them in multiple languages if we are able: English, Arabic, or whatever our mother tongue is. We pass down this wealth of knowledge to our children, in the richness of traditional Muslim languages and not merely limited to only English.
This is تربية: tarbiya. Child-rearing.
Raising a whole human being.
Addressing the physical, emotional, psychological, mental, spiritual, and intellectual needs of the child.
Why should we arbitrarily set random limits on what we teach our own children, and what we will hand over our children to strangers to teach?
We know our own children best, not some stranger!
We parents have been present from the beginning.
My eldest child is 11 years old alhamdulillah, so in my mind, I have been raising and educating my children for eleven years.
This is the start of our twelfth year homeschooling, in the larger sense referring to tarbiya and general education.
But in the more narrow definition of homeschooling using the ideas of the public-school model, where children start "formal schooling" in kindergarten at 5 years old, it's been six years.
But I don't tend to follow that mass-schooling model anyway. Formal schooling for us starts around seven years of age, or based on the interest and enthusiasm of each child.
I keep a simple spiral notebook each year as my Homeschool Tracker, kept for my own records over the years. In it, I write down what we accomplish that year. It is a daily log of the subjects for each child, the material we go through, the surahs memorized and the books read and even the field trips or experiments we embark on. It is also partially a journal, documenting my own thoughts, frustrations, struggles, and joys as I work with my children. It helps keep me on track, as well as keep me motivated and consistent.
Yesterday, as I made my Homeschool Tracker for the new 2023-2024 school year, I looked yesterday through my old notebooks and was hit with a wave of emotion.
I started the notebook tradition in 2019, when my first child was loosely in first grade. It's amazing to me to go back and read my old notes, the daily logs from so many years ago. To see the general progress and all the changes. What I struggled with that is no longer a problem, and the challenges that remain challenging for me even now. It's always fascinating to pause where you're standing and look back, reviewing the journey you have taken.
Homeschooling isn't always easy, but it is 100% worthwhile, meaningful, and beautiful. It is the best journey to take with your children, especially for us as Muslims. Alhamdulillah.
Umm Khalid
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