Sunday, December 13, 2009

Homeschool Motto

"I Am, I Can, I Ought, I Will."
Based on "Charlotte Mason" Homeschool Method.

I am . . . a child of God, a gift to my parents and my country. I'm a person of great value because God made me. ~Ephesians 2:10

I can . . . do all things through Christ who strengthens me. God has made me able to do everything required of me. ~Philippians 4:13

I ought . . . to do my duty to obey God, to submit to my parents and everyone in authority over me, to be of service to others, and to keep myself healthy with proper food and rest so my body is ready to serve. ~Deuteronomy 11:1, Ephesians 6:1, Proverbs 14:21, 1 Corinthians 6:19-20

I will . . . resolve to keep a watch over my thoughts and choose what's right even if it's not what I want. ~Hebrews 3:12


 'I am, I ought, I can, I will'––these are the steps of that ladder of St. Augustine, whereby we
                    "rise on stepping stones
     Of our dead selves to higher things."
'I am'––we have the power of knowing ourselves. 'I ought'––we have within us a moral judge, to whom we feel ourselves subject, and who points out and requires of us our duty. 'I can'––we are conscious of power to do that which we perceive we ought to do. 'I will'––we determine to exercise that power with a volition which is in itself a step in the execution of that which we will. Here is a beautiful and perfect chain, and the wonder is that, so exquisitely constituted as he is for right-doing, error should be even possible to man. But of the sorrowful mysteries of sin and temptation it is not my place to speak here; you will see that it is because of the possibilities of ruin and loss which lie about every human life that I am pressing upon parents the duty of saving their children by the means put into their hands. Perhaps it is not too much to say, that ninety-nine out of a hundred lost lives lie at the door of parents who took no pains to deliver them from sloth, from sensual appetites, from willfulness, no pains to fortify them with the habits of a good life.
Charlotte Mason's Original Homeschooling Series vol 1 pg 331
"Education is thus a most powerful ally of humanism, and every American school is a school of humanism. What can a theistic Sunday school's meeting for an hour once a week and teaching only a fraction of the children do to stem the tide of the five-day program of humanistic teaching?" — C.F. Potter, signer of Humanist Manifesto 1930

"Open war is upon you whether you will risk it or not!" — Aragorn, "Return of the King"