More than a Test Score

Currently, we find ourselves right in the middle of the season where school and grades and projects and tests seem to dominate much of the conversation at our home.  We have children ranging from college age, down to lower elementary, with two high school age kids and one in middle school that we are currently navigating life with.

First, let me say that I don’t envy the teachers in our education system or administration in the slightes. This is not a "bash the teachers" type of blog - this is a pray for them as they work within a system that I truly believe is broken.  I see the atmosphere as two of my children navigate life at a “farm school” where chores and nature and most importantly bible, prayer and Jesus are part of the equation. They are more relaxed and happier overall - they don’t even hate school!  Two of ours, my 16-year-old son and our 13-year-old niece, that we have been blessed to have for this season, decided they wanted stay within the public school system and I see the stress and anxiety that they carry as a result.  Particularly the middle school aged child. She works tirelessly on homework and struggles to get it done for several hours a night. She studies, with large parts of her study guide on a computer screen, making it difficult to help her, only to take a test where the questions weren’t even on any of the study guides.  She stresses, in tears, because she can’t understand and there is a test the next day and a standardized test the next week.  She is also trying to learn to be a little teenage human being in a world that defines success by a letter grade.   

I have seen it until I have just hugged her and walked away in tears myself from the struggle!!  We must remind our children that their worth is not determined by a letter grade or test score!! They are made up of so much more than equations and memorizing historical facts from the Mongul Empire.  I told the middle schooler last night, after one of those long nights - you are kind, you have a huge heart, you see the good in people when even I struggle to do so, and you are incredibly creative - all of those talents were meant for the purpose of glorifying God and will take you places no math test will ever define. Try your best and whatever happens, well it happens.

Maybe I am just venting here a little- but I am afraid that others may need to hear this as well.  We must make sure our kids understand that they are worth more than a test score!! We must foster an atmosphere where they understand their identity is not found in grades or assignments but in doing all they do to the glory of the God who made them in His image!! Never an excuse to try less than 100 percent, but a reminder that we do it to glorify Jesus and not for the praise of a grade.  Perhaps most importantly, we need to help them navigate big feelings of anxiety and fear that are being fostered by a system that constantly creates these feelings with the next test and how important it is they do well on it. 

Let us point them to Jesus, the one says lay your burdens on me and I’ll give you rest.  Let us point them to Jesus who says your greatest problem is a debt of sin, but I died to set you free.  Let us remind them that who the Son sets free is free indeed!!