Determination

We are confident that we have a very determined group of children that we are raising. It would take lots of determination for them to survive all that they have been through - both prior to coming to our home and all that the past two years of transition have meant for our entire family. I used to joke that the term determined was the polite kindergarten teacher's way of referring to a child as stubborn or obsessive. I might have even used the word determined on some report cards in the past when trying to find a positive term to define an often frustrating character quality. (Hopefully if you are one of my former kindergarten families you are not digging out old report cards right now!) There are often two ways to look at the same character qualities. Determination is a wonderful character quality - and it is also a drivenness that can manifest in anxiety and frustration for some people. We pray that we can help channel this determination, and that anxiety and frustration lessens, as the children learn to trust God as He leads them.

Corinn is a very careful child and determined in almost all that she does. She does not like to take big risks and does not enjoy participating in new activities until she is certain that she can succeed at them. She quietly observed for the entire first two dance classes she attended, refusing to participate, and now we can't keep her from turning everything into a stage for a personal performance of the Nutcracker. She loves dance class. She has been determined to keep up with her big sisters in homeschooling and has followed along in all their subjects, eating it up. Last summer she tried a few times to ride her bike without training wheels but just wasn't ready. Being a careful child, she knew it was a risk she was just not willing to take. Yesterday she asked for the training wheels off, declared that she was ready and going to learn, so after bedtime they were removed. Today - she's zooming around with no help from me! She determined that she was ready to do it and off she went. Even more impressive she taught herself how to start, stop, turn around, go down our sloped driveway, and was racing her siblings including her big sisters within the afternoon! That is some real get-up-and-go determination! Everyone celebrated Corinn's new success together with her today. It was so nice to see the kids cheering one another on.

Noting that children are all different and have different ways of displaying their determination, upon seeing Corinn ride her bike without training wheels, Noah immediately declared, "I'm going to learn to ride without training wheels next week! Papa, can you take mine off?" And knowing the kind of child he is, fearless and determined with regard to challenges, this will probably be the true for him.

Racing with Noah

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