Meet the Purifoys
Combining his love of teaching, curriculum development, and filmmaking, Thomas Purifoy of Compass Cinema and Compass Classroom has found a unique niche within the professional world of filmmaking as well as the education community. In recent years, he’s also shared his amazing gifts with homeschooling families. Whether it’s script writing, researching, writing and shooting documentaries, creating dramatic films, or educating both adults and children through the medium of good storytelling on screen, the company offers its own unique brand of curriculum. “We tell stories and we teach,” he says. “That pretty much sums it up!”
Thomas grew up in Oregon, lived in Idaho, and served as a U.S. Naval officer and the director of a classical school in France before settling in Tennessee with his family. The innovative documentary Economics for Everybody, which he produced, wrote, and directed, and his Visual Latin have become favorites from the Compass Curriculum collection. His documentary, Seek Social Justice, produced by Compass Cinema in conjunction with The Heritage Foundation, is a six-lesson study on poverty and the compassion of churches in a variety of denominations. Not surprisingly, all aspects of education extend to the Purifoy home where Thomas and his wife, Maggie, teach their girls.
A Uniquely Typical Homeschool Family
On any given day, when they put away their school books, Mary Pierson, Libby, and Emily Purifoy do what they love best: handicrafts, artwork, sewing, singing in the church choir, practicing the piano, and putting on little performances for their parents. Their mom, Maggie, says that right now they are excited about family board games and are looking forward to what she likes to call “farm camp,” a weekly enrichment day where the ordinarily prim and proper Purifoy daughters have the opportunity to enjoy getting “gritty and back to the earth” on a friend’s farm in the foothills of Nashville.
Though Maggie stresses the fact that they are a typical homeschooling family, she also encourages other moms to not compare themselves with others. “I think it is important to talk to different moms, because everybody does it differently, and it is good to not feel like you have to model what you are doing after someone else’s template. Kids are different genders or different birth order of genders, and that does make a difference in how your homeschooling will run.”
Doing What Works
Both coming from backgrounds in education, Maggie and Thomas have been careful to remember that there are certain things that work in a formal classroom that do not work well at home. “I found I had to unlearn some things,” says Maggie. “Concentrate on what is a good fit for each child, which is one of the greatest benefits to homeschooling; you don’t have to have a ‘one size fits all’ model. In our homeschooling experience, I have been very eclectic. I have taken bits and pieces of so many things I like and have made what works for us. Find what you like and stick with it. Be confident in the fact that you are the one who is with your own children and you know what works and doesn’t work.”
When asked about prioritizing her day, Maggie doesn’t hesitate. “Reading is the foundation for the rest of your education for the rest of your life; it assures that there will be nothing you won’t be able to learn on your own! I can’t imagine giving someone else the pleasure of teaching my child to read! To me it’s as exciting as seeing them take their first steps. Books are a really big deal for our philosophy of education. I still read to my girls out loud for at least an hour every day; there is always an interaction with the written word. We love real books and use a lot of book lists—we wear out our library card! Reading together is also spending that time together making memories around that book. And reading out loud is not an extra, it is the main thing!”
The Key is Relationships
While recognizing the academic benefits of homeschooling, Maggie stresses that it is not the most important aspect of their family’s educational choice. “I went into homeschooling thinking ‘I will do this because I know I can do a better job of teaching my own children’ but then my heart really shifted toward the relationship aspect of it. The relationships that are being established cannot be underestimated. Do your academic work, yes, but allow time for the Holy Spirit to work in your relationships with your children. It is so important to spend time together, as children building relationships with parents and with siblings. The relationships between siblings will outlast the relationships they have with us as parents. Sometimes it is harder to live in community with people you can easily take for granted, but if they can learn to forgive and love one another as sisters, they should be well equipped to have good relationships outside our home.”
The heart of Thomas and Maggie’s desire for relationship building in the lives of their girls is best summed up in what they believe is central to all they do: “The most important thing about teaching your children at home is being able to incorporate your values and a biblical worldview into everything that you do. It is so important to spend our time preparing them for how their own futures may unfold. We have no idea what they may face, but God does. He has a plan. Our role is to provide a well from which they can drink, no matter where he takes them.”
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