Interesting topic this week for the Heart of the Matter Meme. I usually don’t differentiate between those two roles of teacher and mother. I think it’s because I view motherhood as a teaching, guiding, instructive role but instead of teaching academics I teach other life skills – cooking, budgeting, sewing, spiritual guidance, moral values, etc. Being a homeschool mom those varied teaching moments happen all day long with all of my children. There isn’t time to to think, “Now I will be a teacher,” or “Now I will be mother.” They are one and the same for me. I believe any mother feels the same whether they homeschool or not.

During “school hours” I do tend to have more of a teacher attitude as I tutor my children in the 3 R’s and science, history, music, and art. My children even call me ‘Teacher” during that time. It started off as a game but the habit has been created. The rest of our day is spent doing household tasks – laundry, cleaning, cooking – and other activities – playing, sewing, hobbies. Most of them we do together. My children learn from me how to properly iron a shirt, plan a menu, dance in the kitchen, have a tickle fight, scrub a toilet, say their prayers, read their scriptures, and love one another. A mother is never off duty; she is constantly teaching.

“Perhaps the teacher you and I remember best is the one who influenced us most. She may not have used a chalkboard nor possessed a college degree, but her lessons were everlasting and her concern genuine. Yes, I speak of Mother.”
~ Thomas S. Monson ~

My divine role as a mother allows me the privilege of calling upon God for His guidance on how to care for those precious souls He has entrusted to my care. As Elder Jeffrey R. Holland so eloquently stated, “When you have come to the Lord in meekness and lowliness of heart and, as one mother said, “pounded on the doors of heaven to ask for, to plead for, to demand guidance and wisdom and help for this wondrous task,” that door is thrown open to provide you the influence and the help of all eternity. Claim the promises of the Savior of the world. Ask for the healing balm of the Atonement for whatever may be troubling you or your children. Know that in faith things will be made right in spite of you, or more correctly, because of you….Remember, remember all the days of your motherhood: “Ye have not come thus far save it were by the word of Christ with unshaken faith in him, relying wholly upon the merits of him who is mighty to save. (2 Nephi 31:19)” Jeffrey R. Holland, “‘Because She Is a Mother’,” Ensign, May 1997, 35

I am so grateful that I can be a mother and a teacher to my children. It is time well spent, an investment with great dividends, a gift precious to me.