2025: Words of Invitation from CHECH Board President
May 31, 2025
Written by Caroline Testa, CHECH President
The theme of the year grew out of our desire to focus on the culture in our home that inspires education. Every homeschool is different, just as every family is different, but the common thread that we see as we encounter other homeschooling families is the sense of education as part of the overall family culture. It is this culture that feeds the learning within each member.
We are born with a sense of wonder, a desire to learn what we don’t know. Anyone that has spent any time with a toddler knows that. Often traditional school models kill that desire in the child. I went to school; I received a college degree; I even went to graduate school, but what did I learn? What I learned was how to pass a test and check a box. I never asked why. My real education didn’t begin until later when I encountered something I did not know and chose to learn more, when I immersed myself in building a personal library with books on a variety of topics, and when I began sharing that desire to know with my children.
Our students need to explore the world around them. They need access to a large room, to a wide variety of subjects in order to make relations and connect one idea to another. Creating an atmosphere that embraces wonder will feed the culture of self-education in the home and in our children as they grow beyond our homeschool. If our goal is for the graduate to know a certain body of information about certain things, a limited number of subjects may be adequate. But if our goal is that he or she will grow by forming connections between things that will continue to motivate the inquisitive side and keep the learning alive, then we should not keep him in a small room. Encourage your toddler to ask these endless questions. Pause when the school-age child asks something you don’t know and answer with “let’s find out.” Show your children the wonder you have to learn more. And, then, watch your teens grow beyond you.
My desire is for my children-and yours-to have the desire to learn, to love learning not for the sake of awards or achievements, but for the joy in learning and building relationships with that knowledge. As our children grow beyond our homeschool, we should ask ourselves, not what did they learn, but how are they going to continue to learn. Are they going to continue to wonder why?
I invite you to wonder, to ask why, to say let’s find out, and to create a culture in your home where everyone does that every day. Plant your feet in a large room and continue to expand it, for education is a life, and a full one at that.
“The question is not, — how much does the youth know? when he has finished his education — but how much does he care? and about how many orders of things does he care? In fact, how large is the room in which he finds his feet set? and, therefore, how full is the life he has before him?" -Charlotte Mason
This article is republished from Volume 1 of the Annual Showcase Magazine "An Invitation to Wonder."
2025 Annual Theme | An Invitation to Wonder: A Culture of Learning at Home. Find more details on how to submit in the upcoming annual showcase magazine, more inspiration from the theme, and where to purchase a limited edition print copy of the 2025 magazine.
