Please join us for part of our day. As my five children wake up and come out of their bedrooms, my eight year old son, Joseph, asks, "Is it Tuesday, Mom?" I tell him that it is indeed Tuesday and his smile stretches from ear to ear. He immediately goes to the window to see what the weather is like today. Then he looks at the outdoor thermometer to see the temperature. At breakfast, he leads us in prayer.

When we have finished with breakfast and morning chores, we head downstairs for school. Joseph holds the flag as we prepare to say the pledge. He asks, "Is that my right hand?" and I tell him, "No, it's the other hand." He switches the hand over his heart with the hand holding the flag and leads us in the pledge to the flag. Then he points at the letters of the alphabet while we sing the alphabet song. Being his mother and not the least bit biased, I think about how cute he looks, with his red hair and freckled face, earnestly leading his siblings in the song. After the alphabet song, he leads the rest of the children in reciting the books of the Bible.

We move on to Calendar Time. Joseph gets to say the month, the date and the day of the week. Then he gets to draw a picture of the weather in that slot of the calendar. Today was cloudy so he draws clouds with a smiling face in one of them. Down in the corner he writes the number 48 to tell the temperature. When he is finished with the calendar, he opens our school day in prayer. We move to the couch for stories and he gets to sit on my lap. 

Later in the day Joseph picks what we are having for lunch and helps me prepare it. He prays before lunch. After lunch, while the other children do chores, he gets to read to his two little sister, Jennifer. The two of them look so sweet, there on the couch, with big brother earnestly reading to his little sister as she looks at the book in rapt attention, loving the "one on one" with big brother. Never mind that two minutes from now the toddler may try to pull the book away and the seven year old will say, "Mom! She won't let me read to her!"

Later in the afternoon, Joseph and Josiah both want to play with the same toy. Josiah hands it to Joseph with only a bit of reluctance. At supper time there is only a little bit of applesauce left. Joshua and Joseph both like applesauce a lot. Joshua hands the jar to Joseph and says, "You can have it." That evening draws her seven year old brother a picture. 

By now you are probably wondering; Why is Joseph the favored child? Why does he get all the privileges? Please, before you get upset with me, let me explain. It's because it is Tuesday. Okay, maybe I'd better explain in more detail!

Each school day we have a Special Child of the Day. Since this is a rather long thing to say, we use the initials and refer to the Special Child of the Day as the SCD. As I explained before, at the beginning of each school day we have, what we call Opening. We say the pledge to the flag, recite the books of the Bible, sing the alphabet song, have calendar time and pray. The SCD holds the flag, leads in reciting the books of the Bible, points at each letter as w  sing the song and leads in prayer. During calendar time, the SCD tells the name of the month, the day of the week and the date (I help the younger children.) They also draw a picture in that space on the calendar reflecting the weather of that day (such as a rain cloud, a sun, snow falling etc). The older children also write the temperature in the corner. After Opening, we read spend 15 minutes reading through biographies. The other children gather around me on the couch while the SCD sits on my lap. Yes, even my big ten year old, though I suspect he tolerates it more for my sake than from his own enjoyment.

The SCD has other privileges and responsibilities through out the day. They pray at breakfast and lunch. The SCD gets to choose what we eat for lunch (we have six choices) and helps me prepare it. This child also gets to pick a bedtime story.

The other children are supposed to think of something kind to do for the Special Child of the Day. It is my hope and desire that my children will be kind to each other on a regular basis but this gives them a concrete time to think of a way to be kind to a sibling. My children usually draw each other a picture, do a chore for the sibling, let the SCD have a toy they were playing with and many other ideas they have come up with. The Special Child of the Day is required to do his or her morning chores but is excused from afternoon chores to spend time reading to our toddler. This is one of the favorite privileges of the SCD. It is precious to see our two year old little girl cuddled up on the couch with one of her older siblings as they look at books with her. It is a time of "bonding" between the two of them. The toddler always knows that as soon as lunch is done and her older brothers and sister start doing their chores, one of them will come and look at a book with her. As soon as lunch is done, she grabs a book and heads for the couch and waits to see who will read to her that day. Our younger children are not fluent readers yet so often they just look at the pictures with her. 

In our family it works out well that there are five school days and we have five children. Of course the toddler is not a full-fledged SCD yet, but she does do a few things like holding the flag and "helping" me with lunch (on her day, I look at books with her). However, families with more or less than five children can simply rotate the schedule as to who is Special Child of the Day.

Over the two years we have been implementing using the "Special Child of the Day," I have seen many benefits from it. The children have grown and matured through this. They take the responsibilities of their day very seriously. It is not unusual to see the SCD look out the window as soon as they wake up to see what the weather is like so they will know what picture to draw during Calendar time. It is also nice to see the other children work at being extra kind to the SCD. 

There are some areas that require extra care when having a Special Child of the Day. Our children learned quickly that being SCD is a "privilege, not a right." A couple of them tended to develop a "king" or "queen" complex. So the first time one of the children said, "You HAVE to do it my way, I am Special Child of the Day." or "I get to tell you what to do today because I'm SCD," well, they ceased to be Special Child of the Day. One child even had to lose the honor the next week. However, we have not had any problem for over a year since we "nipped it in the bud." When the children are older I hope to add a couple more responsibilities to the SCD. I would like the SCD to prepare a morning devotional. I would also like to start a family journal and have the SCD write in it each day.

I realize having a "Special Child of the Day" is not an earth shattering homeschooling idea. Curriculum, discipline, discipleship, addition, phonics, reading aloud to our children and many other homeschooling aspects are far more important. Having a SCD will probably not make a lick of difference in how your children turn out. It will, however build lots of wonderful memories. Having a Special Child of the Day has worked really well for our family so I wanted share it with you, in case it might work for your family. 

If you feel it would be an encouragement or a blessing to someone, you have the Stilwell's permission to forward this article in its entirety. They just ask that you include this note at the bottom of the article with their name and e-mail address (Jeff and Kim Stilwell, jkstilwell@juno.com) in case someone wishes to contact them. Thank you.

Note regarding our links -- We've programmed our site to open external links in a new window so you won't lose your place here.  If you have a pop-up blocker installed on your browser, you may need to open links manually (right-click with your mouse over links).  We do not use any pop-up advertising on our site.  Contact us with questions!

This site is hosted by  Web design by Anne Elliott.

Copyright © 2000-2008 Anne Elliott.  Clipart ©2002 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Terms of Use Privacy Statement  Used by permission.