Happy Wednesday, friends! I hope you had a great Labor Day weekend and your week is off to a good start! I’ve been thinking a lot about foundations this month, and I want to share something that happened in my kitchen that ended up teaching me more about math than I expected. 😊😅

Life

A while back I decided to make banana bread. Nothing fancy, just a recipe I’d made before. I measured everything out, popped it in the oven, and waited for that amazing smell to fill the kitchen.

And it did smell amazing and look great.

But then I tasted it.

Something was… off. Not terrible, but definitely not right. It had this weird, almost sharp saltiness that was NOT supposed to be there. I went through the whole recipe in my head trying to figure out what I’d done wrong. Did I use old baking soda? Wrong flour? Did I forget the sugar? (I definitely didn’t forget the sugar lol)

I finally went back and reread the recipe line by line.

Aaaaaand there it was.

The recipe called for 1/2 teaspoon of salt. I’d read it as 1/2 tablespoon. That’s three times the amount of salt. 🤦🏻‍♀️ In banana bread, you can absolutely taste that difference.

The thing is, I followed the recipe…or at least I thought I did! And I did every step correctly. The problem wasn’t my effort or my technique, it was one tiny misread, buried early in the process, that threw the whole thing off. And I never would have found it if I hadn’t gone all the way back to the beginning and looked again.

Homeschool + Math

This kind of thing happens in math more often than you’d think.

Your child is working through a lesson, following the steps, doing everything they’re supposed to do. But something just isn’t clicking. The answers keep coming out wrong, or they’re getting the right answers sometimes but can’t explain why. Then the frustration builds, the tears start, and you’re both about to lose it. And your instinct (understandably!) is to re-teach the lesson from the beginning or push forward and hope it makes sense with more practice.

But here’s the thing: the problem usually isn’t the current lesson.

It’s often times something earlier, something foundational that got skipped over or memorized without real understanding. And now everything stacked on top of that far-back concept feels all sorts of fuzzy, because it is!

So here’s something practical you can try this week. The next time your student hits a wall, pause. Don’t re-explain the procedure. Instead, ask them: “Can you tell me what __ actually means?”

Not how to do the steps. What it means.

If they can’t explain it, you just found your starting point! That’s your 1/2 tablespoon of salt hiding in the recipe. And honestly? Finding it is the most useful thing you could do, because now you know exactly where to go back to.

Going back isn’t falling behind. Going back is how you build the kind of understanding that holds up when the problems get harder.

Grace

Can I tell you something? One of my favorite things about God is that He doesn’t expect us to figure it all out on our own before we come to Him. Which is a really good thing, because I don’t know about you, but I’m a hot mess 99% of the time! 🫠

When I was staring at that banana bread trying to figure out what went wrong, I had to go back to the source. The recipe had the answer the whole time. I just needed to stop guessing and actually look.

God speaking through His Scripture and prayer works the same way.

When something feels off in homeschooling, in your child’s understanding, in your own confidence, or even in your patience at the kitchen table, you don’t have to troubleshoot alone. You can bring the mess, the confusion, and the “I don’t even know what the question is” feeling straight to Him.

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:6-7 (ESV)

He’s not waiting for you to have it figured out. He’s waiting for you to ask. And when you do, He gives you something better than the answer. He gives you peace while you look for it. ❤️

You know how God says to hide His word in our hearts? Its in those hard moments that His words come back to us, bringing with them the wisdom, peace, and patience we are praying for. 🩷

See you soon!

- Mrs. Holman