April 29, 2025 • 56 mins
"We get to make the connections to life because without a connection to life, it's empty." ~ Aby Rinella
Yvette Hampton and Aby Rinella tackle your homeschooling questions. From motivating an 8th grader with unique career aspirations, to getting to the heart of a strong-willed teenager and meeting children where they are in their education journey, Yvette and Aby provide practical insights and encouragement. Yvette and Aby also bring encouragement for moms wondering “how much is enough,” and share their favorite books and book lists for readers of every ages. Whether you're a new homeschooler or a seasoned veteran, this episode is packed with valuable advice on curriculum choices, balancing academics with relationships, and nurturing your child's unique talents.
Submit Your Homeschooling Questions
Middle School: Hormones, Hygiene, and Homeschooling Adventures – Cindy West
The Hiding Place, by Corrie ten Boom
Tramp for the Lord, by Corrie ten Boom
The Five Silent Years of Corrie Ten Boom, by Pamela Rosewell Moore
Little House on the Prairie Series, by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Kisses from Katie: A Story of Relentless Love and Redemption, by Katie Davis Majors
Honey for a Child’s Heart – Gladys Hunt, Mark Hunt
Honey for a Teen’s Heart – Gladys Hunt, Barbara Hampton
Apologia is a Christ-centered, award-winning homeschool curriculum provider. Our mission is to help homeschooling students and families learn, live, and defend the Christian faith through our print and digital curriculum and online classes.
BJU Press Homeschool is dedicated to providing homeschool families with academically strong curriculum rooted in a biblical worldview. They offer a complete curriculum from preschool through 12th grade, available in both traditional textbooks and video courses. By teaching through the lens of Christ’s power, they help students view the world through the transformative story of God’s creation
CTCMath specializes in providing online video tutorials that take a multi-sensory approach to learning. Creative graphics and animation, synchronized with the friendly voice of internationally acclaimed teacher, Pat Murray, make learning math easy and effective. Start your free trial today.
The Schoolhouse Rocked Podcast is a member of the Biblical Family Network. Our mission is to support and encourage the family by providing the very best podcasts on family, discipleship, marriage, parenting, worldview, culture, and education, all from a Biblical perspective. Visit the website for more great shows, like the Thinking Dad, Culture Proof, Homescho
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
He said why do I have to clean my room?
Do you think Jesus had to clean his room?
So I want to tell you this isn'tyour child and this isn't just
because your kid wants to be an animator, cartoon, comic book
writer. This is a universal 8th grade
dilemma. Hey everyone, this is Yvette
Hampton. Welcome back to the Schoolhouse
Rock podcast. I am so excited because today is
(00:23):
a special Q&A episode with none other than Avenella.
I am so excited. It has been months.
I mean like since since 2024. That was a long time ago it.
Was a very long time ago. So long ago since we've been
together on the podcast, becausewe've been hosting our own
podcast. And so this is the first time
(00:43):
we've recorded in the new year. This is the first time we've
recorded together since we've made the announcement that we're
not going to record together. Which was like, you know, weeks
and weeks before Christmas. I know it's been too long.
So we are you. I know I've missed you, and I
know our audience has missed us because they've told me.
Oh, really? We have gotten a lot of messages
(01:05):
and and people are loving the new format with all the
different hosts, but people misshearing us together.
And so I'm excited. We're it this is this is a like
just this week, we're here. We're back.
People, we're back, people, every several months there's a
fifth week in the month. And so on that fifth week, Abby
and I will be back together and we'll probably do Q&A most of
(01:27):
those times or if we just have something else exciting to talk
about. But this is it.
This is like a one shot. Episode AB 5th.
Week yes Oh yeah I like that andthis is going to be like an hour
long episode so. Why it's going to be an hour?
Because Garrett's like, there's no way you and Yvette could talk
for 30 minutes. You guys have never been only
able to talk for only 30 minutes.
(01:47):
He said that we were just going to do a 30 minute Q&A and he's
like that's not even possible. You guys cannot answer questions
in 30 minutes. It's true and we.
Got a lot of questions and we went out to you guys.
We went to our audience and saidhey, send us your questions.
And you guys did not disappoint.You totally delivered those
questions. And so Abby and I have had a
great time going through them, talking through them, and we're
(02:10):
excited to answer those for you today on this special episode
with Abby and I. But before we do, I want to say
thank you to today's sponsor, Apologia.
You guys, we are so grateful forApologia and for all of our
sponsors. Without them, we would not be
able to do this podcast. And we love Apologia.
We love their curriculum. They are an important part of
our homeschooling. So if you are looking for a
(02:32):
trusted homeschool resources to support your child's education
with a strong biblical worldview, check out
apologia.com. For decades they've been a go to
resource for Christian homeschool curriculum designed
to educate, inspire and build a lifelong love of learning.
And you can do self-paced courses, you can do live
classes. They have great instructors.
Their textbooks are amazing. Everything that they have is
(02:54):
from a solid biblical worldview.And we absolutely love them and
we love the family behind them, Davis and Rachel Carmen.
You guys know Rachel is one of my favorite people and they
stand behind their product. Check them out today at
apologia.com and discover how they can help your family
thrive. Well, we are so excited to get
to your questions. But before we do, I just want to
remind you again, for those who may not have heard and where
(03:16):
there's only a few weeks until this event, but Garrett and I
are going to be at the Teach Them Diligently convention in
Branson, MO, May 15th through 17th and it's going to be a
great conference. We are so excited.
We are not speaking there. We are just going to hang out.
Honestly, I just told Garrett, Isaid I just want to go hang out
and be encouraged and talk to people and meet people.
(03:37):
And I, I'm still in the thick ofit.
I still love going to workshops.You would think I would be kind
of tired of it by now, but I'm not.
I love the encouragement. So I'm going to go to workshops
and I'm going to go look throughthe vendor hall and all of that.
But we are going to be hanging out for a good part of the
weekend at Ginger Hubbard's booth.
So we would love to meet you. If you are a listener and you
(03:58):
are going to be there, we would love to meet you while we're
there. They have a great lineup of
speakers, Heidi Saint John, Ken Ham, Ginger Hubbard, of course,
and many, many others are going to be there.
So it's May 15th through 17th. They have conferences also in
Dayton, OH, Pigeon Forge, and atLiberty University.
So you can go to any of those, but we will only be in Branson.
So if you were going to be there, please, please, please
(04:20):
come and talk to us. And if you have not yet
purchased your family pass, you can get $25 off by using the
Code Sr. for Schoolhouse Rock, $25 off use Code Sr. and you can
get those at teachthemdiligently.net.
That's where you can sign up anyway.
All right, Abby, let's get into our questions because these are
so fun. You guys did such a great job
(04:41):
sending these questions in. And if we also if you have
questions after this send them still because we want to collect
them for the next fifth week that. 5th week or yes.
And I actually don't know that we'll get to all of them today
because we got a slew of question questions.
And so if we don't get to them all, we will be back shortly.
And we won't answer the rest of the questions, but you can go to
(05:01):
schoolhouserock.com/feedback andsubmit your questions there.
You can also submit if you have ideas for shows that you would
like us to talk, you know, topics you want us to talk about
or guests that you would like usto have on.
You can put that in there as well.
And we do our best to meet your needs.
That's why we're here. So, so go to
thatschoolhouserock.com. Back slash feed, no forward
(05:24):
slash feedback. I was going to say back slash
because it's feedback. schoolhouserock.com/feedback.
Oh my goodness, I know all the slashes.
Forward slash, back slash. Anyhow, OK, so here's our
question and I'm going to tell you guys, OK?
This is Abby. OK, Abby went to
schoolhouserock.com/feedback andshe submitted a form and when it
(05:47):
asked the question, you know what her question was, she said
how much wood could a woodchuck Chuck if a woodchuck could Chuck
wood? And I was like, Abby, seriously,
does anyone you actually know? Did you?
Did you know it was me? Not when I first read it, but I
knew it was someone messing withme.
Because I tried to let you know it wasn't me, but I wanted you
to get some good questions for the show.
(06:08):
And that is a good question. It's.
It is a good question. It is.
Time. It spans gender, it spans
ethnicity, like everybody wants to know.
Right. And I don't think that question
has ever actually been answered.All right.
Sorry to disappoint. I don't know.
I mean, if a tree falls in the forest and there's no one there
to hear it, does it make any noise?
I don't know. Question.
(06:28):
Actually it would make noise because I've actually seen a
tree fall and it makes noise so.Wait, what?
But then, yeah, that. But the whole thing is that if
you didn't see it, would it makenoise?
Yeah, yes. If no one was in logic, would it
make noise? It is.
It would absolutely make noise. I agree with you.
I concur. Next question.
Next question. OK, the next question we have
(06:51):
comes from Malia, and this is a great one.
She says how do I motivate an eighth grader for school?
The questions I get are why do Ineed to know history, science,
math, etcetera? I want to be an animator,
cartoon, comic book writer. That is a fantastic question
and. I have to tell you this, my son
just said to me. Tell me.
OK, he said why do I have to clean my room?
(07:13):
Do you think Jesus had to clean his room?
So Malia, I want to tell you this isn't your child and this
isn't just because your kid wants to be an animator,
cartoon, comic book writer. This is a universal 8th grade
dilemma. How to motivate an eighth grader
not just for school before every.
But in life in general? But we want to tell you that you
(07:34):
are not alone. And I've just heard this too.
Shall pass because I had an eighth grader that's no longer
an eighth grader. And it passes.
It really does pass. Yeah, yeah.
Meanwhile. Your son is in 8th grade this
year, right? Yes, he.
Is, so is Laci. So we both have 8th graders.
This year, so we're. Right there with you, Malia.
We are with you. Moment of silence for 8th grade
parents. Let me let me just say real
(07:56):
quick, I'm going to plug a podcast episode that we did.
It was back in 2024 and that waswith Cindy West and we talked
about homeschooling middle schoolers.
I will link to that, but if you missed that, go back and listen
to that episode because that onewas so good.
And she really hit on this age group of middle schoolers and,
and why they ask all the questions.
(08:19):
And part of it is just they're the world that they're in their,
their, their way, their minds are starting to form their own
ideas and they're asking all thequestions, not just about why do
they have to know history, science and math, but why do I
have to clean my room? Why do I have to do the totally,
why do I have to mow the lawn? Why do I have to obey you?
Why do I have to obey God? And these are often times I
think good questions for them toask because they actually want
(08:40):
to know the why of these things.And.
And you know. Usually there's a good question.
Right, because why do I have to learn history, science and math
if I'm going to be an animator? I mean, that is a valid
question. So it it doesn't, we always take
it as a challenge. Like they're challenging me, but
they they in a sense are, but they're also genuinely, they're
trying to make the connections. Tell me why.
(09:02):
And we as the homeschool families get to give our kids
the why. And that's what they don't
public school. It's just that do this, it has
no connection to life. You're just going to do the
worksheet and move on. And we get to make the
connections to life because without a connection to life,
it's empty, right? And so I would say the answer
is, is when you're doing life with your kid and history,
(09:24):
science or math come up like, I mean, they do, they come up
every single day. You're going to see math in
everything. Then you need to back, hey,
this, this is math, this is math.
And so, you know, when you're cooking, when you're going to
the grocery store, when you're driving the speed limit, your
8th grader, it probably their biggest thing they want to do
right now is drive, right? And that's right.
And that takes math and it takesscience.
(09:46):
I mean, how fast a car goes and how fast it's going to hit the
car in front of it if you don't put the brakes on 8th grader.
So I think that you can connect those things to life if even if
you can't connect them to being an animator.
Does that make sense? Yeah, totally it does.
But but yes, I, it's a question I have actually pondered myself
(10:06):
quite often as, as I have been educated myself, as I've
educated my girls, I have asked the question because I remember,
you know, of course, Brooklyn asked the question, you know, in
high school, Mom, why do I have to know algebra 2?
I'm never going to use it. And I'm like, you're not, you
know, you're not wrong. We'll probably never use algebra
2 pre algebra, yes, algebra, algebra 2 depends on what your
(10:27):
job is going to be. And so there are these are valid
questions that they're asking. But when you look at every
subject and it's like general context and even starting with
art, I mean, if he wants to be an animator and a cartoon artist
and a comic book writer, as he even looks at art, he has to
understand. And this is a great way for you,
(10:48):
mom, to point him back to God ascreator, because God our creator
is the one who made us creative,right?
Because we're made in his image.And so God is the designer of
all things. I mean, he designed color and
shapes and nature and people andanimals.
He designed all of those things.Like you just look at the color
wheel and you look at how many different colors there are.
You've got your, your main basiccolors.
(11:10):
What are those called? Again, the basic your.
Primary color. Primary, thank you.
Yeah, yeah. So you haven't done kindergarten
in a lot? It's been a long time.
You've got the primary colors, but all of those primary colors,
you mix them together and you can make the most incredible,
beautiful colors. You look at sunsets, you look at
the rainbow, you look at. Everything.
They're called secondary colors.Secondary Thank you, Abby.
(11:31):
Abby has been educated. She has a college degree in
education. Kindergarten.
Elementary education, so you remember those things.
But. You know, as a creator himself,
he can see that God is the one who created him in his image
that way. But then even looking at other
subjects, like you look at history and history is the story
(11:54):
of, of humanity. It's God's story.
And so I, I was thinking about that quote, those who it's, it's
by George, I think Santayana, I'm not even sure how to say his
last name, but he says those whocannot remember the past are
condemned to repeat it. And if we don't know the past,
we're going to repeat it. And that's, that could be both
good and bad, right? Sometimes good things have
(12:16):
happened in the past and we wantto repeat those things.
But often times really bad things have happened in the
past. And we don't want to repeat the
past because we see the pain that it's brought to the world,
to humanity. So history is important because
it's God's story of humanity. Science, of course.
I mean, that is the most I, I, I, I don't, won't say the most
important, but it's so importantto teach science from a biblical
worldview and for our kids to learn science because it helps
(12:38):
them to understand God as creator and to understand his
creation. So whether we're studying
astronomy or the human body or plants or whatever it is, it all
points them back to Jesus. And so science is important for
that. Math is one that I always was
like, why do we need math? I don't love math, but the more
I understand about math, the more I understand, of course,
(13:01):
that God is a God of order, not a God of chaos.
And so we need to understand math.
We need to understand how to read so we can read God's word.
We need to understand how to write so we can write about him.
So language arts is important for those reasons.
Even as an animator and an artist, he needs to know how to
write about his savior and read about his savior.
And so every subject that we teach our kids should be an An
(13:23):
Ave. to pointing them back to their creator.
Totally. I I couldn't agree more.
And also like, then you could take it to, you know, a comic
book writer will need a businessand a businessman.
I mean, if you're going to sell comic books, you're going to
need to know math to sell those comic books, right?
I also think there's been times in math with my kids that
they're like, when am I ever going to need this?
(13:44):
And I'm like, honestly, never. But the challenge with this is,
is it isn't so much the math, it's the figuring out how to
figure out something that's hard, right?
And you may never remember the exact thing, but it's the lesson
on this is hard. I there's an unknown that I
don't understand. And I can figure out, I can work
at it because God has given me with a brain to be able to do it
(14:05):
right. And it grows your brain.
So, so there, there's a lot of connections and and it's your
job, Mom, to help them make the connections, right?
Yeah, and then you may get to a point where they're like a
junior and there's like upper level chemistry and you're like,
you're never going to need this.And so unless you need it to get
into the whatever you want to do, then it's OK that we don't
learn this. I, I mean, I have to, I people
(14:26):
might stream me up for saying that, but there are certain
things that I'm like, sure. I would rather spend this time
teaching you things that, that ignite your passion for learning
than things that I can honestly say you are never, ever, ever
going to need this, right? Unless God has a career for you
to do it, and then you'll learn it, you'll want to.
You'll desire to. Yeah, and usually by the time
they get into high school. You'll know that.
(14:48):
They'll know what they're passionate about, you'll know
what they're passionate about and you can, you know, right,
really dive into those things specifically.
So like. I am not going to force my
junior, that's a boy. If he is really not wanting to
read Shakespeare, you know, he'sbeen exposed to stuff.
I'm not going to make him. I'm just not, you know.
Yeah, yeah. This is one of the greatest
(15:08):
blessings of homeschooling, though, is that we get to know
our kids. We know what they're bent is we
know how God created them and then we can cater their
education to them specifically. And that can't be done in a
classroom. And so we we have a great
privilege to do that. And also, you know, you may have
state standards that you have toabide by and certainly abide by
(15:30):
those standards. But at the same time, don't feel
like just because the public school is doing a certain right,
you know, math level or science curriculum or history, what
don't feel like you have to stick specifically to what
everyone else is doing. For sure.
Do what your kid enjoys and and you know, I mean, he, if he
wants to be a comic book writer,he's gotta learn to write
(15:50):
anyway. He does.
But history and science and mathcan come into that as well.
And so well, of course. Comic books, I mean, what's how
like humor in comic books? They draw from things in the
past like. That's what makes.
Things fun, you know. Connect those things to him
being a comic, I think you need to connect those subjects to
what he wants to do and then he'll he'll desire to learn it
(16:11):
because it's connected to what he loves, right?
This is why we can't spend 30 minutes answering questions.
I want to just you're right. I want to say one more thing on
this though, too. I wouldn't use use it to your
advantage and just say, Hey, these other subjects are
important. We still have to study history
and science and math For these reasons so that they that you
(16:31):
can know God better. But why don't you spend the
first half of the day animating and drawing your cartoons and
drawing your comic books or, youknow, what do those things use?
I mean, if you're reading I was.That's that's what I'm trying to
say, Abby. I'm gonna just say it for you.
Thank you. Yeah.
If you're reading history out loud to him, then let him
(16:53):
animate as you're reading it. If you're reading science to
him, let him animate that science as you're reading it to
him. Let him create that as you're
studying those things with him. So yeah, good stuff.
Good stuff. So good where?
Can I get through the 8th grade years together?
We are. Let's take a break.
We'll be right back. Homeschooling is a big
(17:14):
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(17:36):
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To learn more, visit bjupresshomeschool.com.
All right, on to the next question because we could go on
(17:56):
and on about subjects, but let'slet's try to get through these.
All right, Our next question is how do you know you're doing
enough in your homeschooling? I love that question and it's
one that I think every single homeschool mom asks herself.
Yep. And, and I would say usually the
mom that asks that is already doing enough, right?
Those are usually the moms that are doing too much and they need
to maybe back off a little bit. That's that's usually what I
(18:21):
find. The mom that asks that is
usually already doing more than enough.
Right. Yeah, because she's thinking
through, you know, what needs tobe done.
Again, kind of going back to what we were answering before,
don't don't lock yourself into what everyone else is doing and
feel like if you're not doing this, this, this and this,
you're not doing enough. That is the danger of sometimes
(18:43):
co-ops and social media and, youknow, looking at all the other
families and you feel like a failure because it seems like
everyone else is doing all of the things.
And they're doing field trips every week, and they're teaching
their kids to cook, and they're teaching their kids to sew, and
they're teaching them to garden.And they're teaching them all
the things. And you're like, I'm not doing
most of that stuff. And so you feel like you're
(19:05):
failing sometimes. Don't feel that way.
Don't compare. Yeah, exactly.
Don't compare yourself to others.
You know, as far as if you're doing enough, well, they're,
they're pretty, pretty good. I, I'm saying don't look at
standards, but you do, you know,if you're concerned about
whether or not you're doing enough, you can look at like
what the average 8th grader is doing or what the average middle
(19:27):
schooler or what the average high schooler is doing and kind
of gauge what your student is doing and you know, relation to
that. And I would say not on a
day-to-day basis, on a year to year basis, right?
I wouldn't say are you doing math, language arts, science,
social studies and all these other things everyday.
I would say in any given year, are your kids growing
(19:50):
academically in the core subjects?
And then are you also making time for them to pursue their
passions and their, you know, the other things over the course
of a year? That's what I would.
That's what I would say, right? Right.
Yes. And you have to remember it's
not all about the academics. It's also a huge part of
homeschooling is about the relationships.
(20:10):
It's about, you know, serving inyour church or at your local
pregnancy center. It's about sometimes playing
sports. If you've got an athlete, it's,
I mean, it's, it's if you have an artist, it's taking art
classes and learning from othersthe skills that your kids want
to learn. But it's not doing all of it all
the time, right? It's it's being able to just
know overall, if I look from this point last year to this
(20:32):
point this year, have we grown in the majority of those areas?
Right, right, exactly. And we've talked about this a
lot of times on the podcast, butfrom whatever point you're at,
if you're in the early elementary years or even if
you're in the high school years,you have to look at what your
end goal is with your kids and then work backwards.
So where do you want to be? Where do you want your kids to
(20:53):
be when they leave your home when they are adults and they
and you hand them your home school diploma and you said, OK,
I've done everything that I can do.
I've done my very best. Here's where we want our kids to
be in the end and. Not just academically, but.
Not just right, not just academically.
Relationally, you know exactly all of those things.
(21:15):
Yep, Yep. And then work backwards from
there. And you know, that's what I've
tried to do with my girls and itit's not like you have this
perfect blueprint and formula that's going to work out exactly
as you want to, but at least youhave goals.
It's that GPS that we're using. You've got to know where your
destination is in order to know how to get there.
So look at what your destinationis.
Where do you want your kids to be?
(21:36):
Where do you want your family tobe when they turn 18, when they
leave their when they leave yourhome, you know, maybe at the age
of 20 or 25, where do you want them to be?
And then work back from there. So but but just don't compare to
everyone else because that's a really.
Always make you feel like you'renever doing enough, right?
Yes, every. Time.
Way of knowing. Yes, yes.
(21:56):
And I think the enemy does that on purpose to make us feel like
we're not, we're not enough. So let's just put it back in
school because the experts will do a better job of it and they
will not. They.
Will not. They're your kids.
You will do the best job. You are the expert chaining them
up. That's right, You are the expert
for your children. So I hope that was encouraging,
Amanda. All right, so this next one is,
(22:16):
I think Cherie is how you say it.
Maybe Cherie, but I think it's Cherie the way it's spelled.
And she says my soon to be 13 year old daughter is looking for
teen books to read over this summer.
Do you have any suggestions? As a matter of fact, we do.
Yes, and you know, you just hit like our love language talking
about books like and we both. Have had 13 year old daughters.
Yes it's true and we both been 13 year old daughters and we
(22:39):
both love to read. Yes, yeah.
So yeah, I started. I'll go first.
I started pulling books from my bookshelf and then I was like,
OK, this could take a really long.
Time the whole episode. So, so I'm going to narrow it
down to like, if I were strandedon an island and I could only
choose five books to take with me, what books would I take?
(23:01):
So these are the books that I feel like for myself and my
girls have been enjoyable to read.
There's so many that are going through my head, but but I'm
going to give you some resourcestoo.
The ones that have been most enjoyable and most impactful for
us are The Hiding Place. I think both of my girls have
read The Hiding Place. I've read it probably 5 or 6
(23:21):
times. My girls have both read it at
least two or three times. And I would say that's one to, I
would say that's one to read with her.
Honestly I think it's so good toread with her.
Yes, yes, yeah, it's it's. There's some heavy there's.
Some heavy stuff in there. Yes it's true but I would say I
wouldn't read the hiding place below middle school.
(23:41):
I feel like middle school is a perfect time to start reading
the hiding place. I wouldn't read it earlier than
7th grade for sure and if you have a very immature 7th grader
or 8th grader I would maybe waittill high school.
It's all about the Holocaust andit is tough to read sometimes
but man it's so good. And I call this the Corey
Tenbohroom trilogy. So the Hiding place Tramp for
the Lord, which was also writtenby Corey Tenboom.
(24:02):
And that's her life after the war.
And it's so good. She talks about going out and
how she ministered to the world,literally the world telling
about her story of having been in Robinsbrook and just what
what God didn't and and how he worked in her through her family
and I. It's just an incredible story.
And then there was another one that was written by one of her
(24:23):
assistance. I can't remember her.
Pamela, somebody I think is her name.
It's called The Five Silent Years of Corey Tenboom.
And that is such a good book. I, I man, I want to say all of
them are my favorites. They're not.
But but once you read the HidingPlace, she could easily read
Tramp for the Lord and the Five Silent Years on her own and they
(24:44):
are literally life changing. And then the other book that I
would say is Kisses from Katie by Katie Davis Majors.
That book, again, for both my girls night was life changing
and we read that when Brooklyn was probably 12, maybe I want to
say 12 or 13. So Lacey would have been, you
know, 7:00-ish somewhere around that.
(25:05):
So that one could be read to smaller kids, but at that's a
great a younger kid would not pick up that book and read it.
That book is perfect for a middle school girl.
But, and I know Abby's got a bunch to share, but I do want to
share just two resources with you.
One of them is called Honey for a Child's heart.
And this was written, I want to say probably in the 80s.
I don't know. So it's a little bit dated, but
(25:26):
I mean, there it it, there's just a ton of really great
resources in here of books that you can read.
And I love what she does is she gives kind of a summary of the
different books that she suggests in here.
And so these you can start with young kids and it's just got
it's a it's a book of books is what it is.
(25:48):
But there's also another one written by the same author,
Gladys Hunt, and it's called Honey for a Teen's Heart.
And so there's Honey for a Child's Heart and honey for a
Teen's heart. This one for teenagers is
fantastic. And again, I love it because
it's hard to answer this question because every child has
different interests in books. But in this book, she goes
(26:09):
through book lists that will help you choose what is good for
your child or what they would enjoy.
And so there's adventure and suspense, there's contemporary
fantasy, historical mystery, nonfiction, science fiction,
sports, and it is written from aChristian worldview.
So I won't say that I agree withevery single book that she
listened here 'cause I've obviously not read them all, but
(26:30):
you can look at what genre your kids like.
And again, it gives kind of a synopsis, a description of what
the book is about in here. And then she even gives a
guideline for if it's good for early teens, middle teens, late
teens, or all ages. And this is just a fantastic
resource to have. Again, it's called Honey for a
Teens Heart. So this would be a great
(26:51):
resource for her. And we will put links to these
all in the show notes. So hey Abby, what do you have?
Well, you you hit it hiding places.
Hands down one of the best. I think you do need to know your
your child if kind of what age to do that one another one if
they love that genre, and this is maybe for a it it's kind of
in the same. It's called saving my assassin.
(27:11):
I just read it. It's phenomenal.
You told me. About that one, it is it is mind
blowing. It's kind of along the same, you
know, the same lines, but I would say and and if that kind
of hit it that know their genre.I think summer reading for me is
just letting the kids pick in their own genre that they love.
And I, if you're having a kid that you want to get into books,
let them stick with the genre they love and then every once in
(27:34):
a while throw something else in.But then if you have like a, a
reader that loves all of it, I kind of have tried to do this
challenge of like, I'm trying toread two books in each genre
because I get stuck in historical or true.
So, you know, try a new genre. But I, there are so many book
lists because here's the thing, once you hit 13, there is no way
(27:54):
to pre read all the books. Like it is impossible,
especially homeschool families who have more than one child.
And so find the really good booklist that you can trust and one
that Eva and I use a lot is the not consumed.
If you go to notconsumed.com, she has a book list in there.
I think if you, you sign up and she it gets emailed as APDF.
But there is such a phenomenal that's such a phenomenal book
(28:16):
list and you can trust the bookson there.
Now that doesn't mean like that they don't have heavy content,
but it's all if it's heavy, it'slike, OK, it's World War 2
because guess what, World War 2 is heavy, but there's not going
to be inappropriate thing. So find a good booklets.
I love not consumed. The other thing you can do is go
to like sunlight and even thoughif you're not a sunlight person,
(28:37):
like even if you don't use sunlight curriculum, you have
access to their booklets and youcan trust those booklets as
well. So yeah, that's, that's what I
would suggest. It's so fun.
I also think that is such a fun age to read books with your
kids. Maybe not.
I mean, yes, out loud is really fun.
But my daughter and I, when she was that age, we read them
simultaneously but separately. Like she would be reading it at
(28:58):
night and I would be reading it and then we could just kind of
talk about it or just know we'rekind of, you know, in the same
place when we're reading. Fun.
It's fun to do. You're in a fun age.
Yes, it is fun. I'm reading Heidi with Lacey
right now by Johannesbury. I know I well, so Laci, I read
that to Brooklyn again. She was probably 11 or 12.
(29:21):
So Laci was Pretty Little. She was like 6 when we read that
and she remembers it, but she atfirst she's like, no, we've
already read that. And I was like, oh, but it's so
good. Sometimes I just want to read it
myself. And so because we always have a
read aloud, she has a book that she's reading, but we always
have a book that we're reading together that I read out loud.
And so I said, can we please do Heidi again?
So she's like, OK. And it's fun because it's
(29:43):
really, I mean, it's been so many years.
It's been like 8 years since we read it.
I. Need to read it.
You always tell me and I'm like,you watch the show and you're
like, no, no, no, no, no. You can't watching.
The movie is not the same. No, it's not even it's not.
It's like reading Little House on the Prairie versus, oh right,
watching the Little House show. Like it.
There's no comparison. So which Little House too?
I mean if your daughter has not read the Little House series.
(30:04):
So. Fun.
So good, so much fun. Start with Brooke One and work
your way through the whole series.
They are so fantastic and you can listen to those on audio as
well. Cherry Jones is one of the
people who does the audio version of Little House and it's
fantastic. I love the way she reads so.
So if your daughter likes audio books, that's a great one and
(30:25):
even boys enjoy. We listened to the entire Little
House series while we were traveling and Garrett enjoyed
them as much as my girls did, and he's a grown man.
So I mean, there's a lot in there and there's, boy, I mean,
it's, it's life, right? It's not.
Yeah, they're talking about building their their family and
building their homes in their journey, you know, So yeah,
it's, it's incredible anyway. Awesome.
(30:48):
OK. So that's it for books.
We will put those links in the show notes for you, Cherie.
So that hopefully that will be helpful for you, which by the
way, just so you guys know, I'm going to put a little plug here.
When we put links in the show notes, most of the time the
links that we put in are somehowattached to some sort of
affiliate, something or other. And so we get like, if you're
(31:08):
going to buy them, buy them through our link because we get
a little bit of a kickback from that.
And that goes to help support the Schoolhouse Rock ministry.
Maybe you didn't know that. So you feel less guilty when you
buy on Amazon because at least you know part of it's going to
something good. Yeah.
And we have, you know, christianbook.com, we sometimes
put links to there. We have an affiliate with them
and other others as well. Have you tried CTC Math yet with
(31:32):
your child? Here's a testimonial from
another happy homeschool mom. Amber said.
I'm absolutely thrilled with CTCMath.
It's a rare find that I've used with my children for more than
five years now. I have six children using CTC
Math and each child has found iteasy to navigate and very
applicable. Thank you so much for all that
you are doing and providing quality math lessons for my
(31:54):
children. If you're looking for a great
online math program, visit ctcmath.com.
That's ctcmath.com. All right, this one comes from
Bethany. And her question is this, she
said, how do you decide when to have a child repeat a subject or
grade level the next year? And for students who are ahead
of their age, how do you balancekeeping them challenged and
(32:15):
interested in learning but not overwhelming them?
I have one student who is giftedand talented and picks up on
things easily and another student who struggles in some
subjects but mostly from lack ofmaturity and discipline, not
their ability to learn. And then she said thanks for the
great content and encouragement.Oh, you are so welcome, Bethany.
Abby, do you want to go first onthis one?
(32:35):
Yeah, I feel like, Bethany, I feel like maybe you were a
teacher or in the school system,because I used to ask this too.
But here's the fun thing about homeschool.
Your kids aren't like ahead or behind.
They're right where they're supposed to be.
So when you said like, how do you decide to have a child
repeat a subject or grade level?Well, first of all, I would say
(32:58):
throw out grade levels because your kids are where they're at.
So you aren't going to have to. This is the other really fun
thing. You don't necessarily have to
repeat because you don't ever need to move on beyond where
they're where they're succeedingat.
Does that make sense? So, so you're just going to move
at your kids pace and if they'rein 3rd grade in if they were in
(33:21):
the system in 3rd grade and they're in first grade, they're
not, they're not behind because they're right where they're
supposed to be. And then also if they're doing
5th grade in another subject, they're not ahead.
They're right where they're supposed to be.
And so that's also the other thing is my kids have never been
in a grade level that's the samein all subjects.
They might be in 4th grade in math and in fifth grade in
(33:43):
science. And we just kind of throw out
grade levels and and then we move once they've mastered
something, we move forward. And so you don't really have to
repeat or if you're finding thatyou've passed something and they
aren't they, they missed that, then you can go back.
That's how you know when to go back is if they haven't mastered
it. And do you know when to know
(34:04):
when to move ahead when they've mastered it.
And so you get to determine the pace, you get to determine where
they're at on anything. So the first thing I would say
to any homeschool mom, get rid of grade levels.
I would even honestly, for my kids, I have exed out the grade
levels on the books. So they don't even know because
sometimes kids will be like if they if they're 12 and they're
(34:25):
in a first grade, they're like, why am I in this?
Or, or they get proud. I'm working at an eighth grade
level and I'm only, I just will like get rid of it.
So they don't know. Here's what we're doing.
We're doing math. We're doing math at the level
that you're at. And when you're ready to move
forward, we move forward. And if you haven't mastered it,
we stay where we're at until you've mastered it.
And that's the freedom of. And what you might find is you
(34:46):
start to panic because, Oh my goodness, we're behind.
But then all the sudden one yearyou just went through two years
of school in a year because theywere getting it and they were
moving forward. So home school is at your pace.
It's not based on grade levels. It's not based on and on what
everybody else is doing. And it's not even that
everybody's the the same grade level in the same subject.
(35:07):
You move forward when they're ready, you stay back when
they're not. Yes, I absolutely you hit it
dead on. But I do want to say one other
thing too. Your child does, you know, going
back to Malia's question at the beginning and she, you know, her
son was asking, why do I have toknow science and math and
history and all these other subjects?
Not every child is created to bethe expert in every single
(35:31):
subject, right? And so you might have a child
who, like Malia's son, wants to be an artist.
Well, he needs to know the basics of math and history and
science again so that he can understand God in his world that
he created. But he doesn't have to be a
mathematician. He doesn't have to be a
historian. He doesn't have to be a
scientist because God created him to be an artist.
(35:53):
And so, you know, you don't knowvery many historians who are
also scientists or very many mathematicians who are, you
know, homemakers. Well, I I don't know, I
shouldn't say that Maybe there are a lot of homemakers who are
scientists and we. Are authors usually
mathematicians? Are authors right, Right.
That's a better one. Yes.
You know, if you're super good at science, you probably don't
(36:14):
enjoy writing novels. And you know, I mean, and so God
has just created each one of your kids to love certain
things. And it's OK if they are not
experts at all of the subjects. And so have them learn the
basics of those things and, and you know, go along with them.
(36:35):
But, but they don't have to, youtalked about mastering them,
Abby. They don't necessarily have to
master every single thing. You know, if they're going to be
an engineer, well, they should probably know calculus.
But if they're not going to be an engineer, they don't need to
know calculus. Or, or if you know, if they
don't have a career in mind right that requires these
(36:57):
things, then it's OK for them tonot be the expert.
Well, and honestly, like you said, the only the only subject
that ever you would need to master to move on is math.
You do like if you can't do addition, you really shouldn't
want. But honestly think about every
other subject you you there is no, I mean there is no grade
level in learning science, right?
(37:19):
You learn something in science and then you keep learning it
until you're done learning and you and you don't need to know
any more science. Now if like you said, if you're
going to be an engineer, you should probably learn or
whatever a science, you need to learn more science.
If you're not, you don't. We grade levels and holding back
and moving for that's all just this, this thing that we've
made-up. And so math, I would say is the
(37:40):
one that you need to master before you move on.
And it doesn't matter where you're at.
Everything else just do. In fact, I have always said this
too, like in in the public school, like 4th grade is state
history, 5th grade is World War,whatever.
Like that's how they've always done it.
Or science. It's like in this grade you do
biology, in this grade you do chemistry.
(38:01):
In this grade you do botany, right?
And I've always said, don't likeask your kids what do you want
to learn this year? So that as long as you get out
of school and you have a basic understanding of everything, who
cares what order you do it in, right?
Who cares except math? Yes, because math builds on
itself. Math builds on itself, so you
got to shake this whole get ahead, get behind, behind who
(38:23):
ahead of who. You just just teach to your
child where they're at. And that's that's the answer.
Yeah, totally. And your kid does not have to
finish the worksheet on every single subject that you're
putting in front of them. You know, this year Laci and I
are studying world history and like we, we've talked before in
(38:45):
the past about our, our kids learning styles.
Well, Lacey, she, my 8th grader,she is a, she is an auditory
learner. She learns so well by hearing
things. And since she's my only child at
home now, I have the time to read to her and I enjoy it.
I love sitting with her and reading to her.
So she could open the book. I mean, she's fully capable of
(39:07):
that. She knows how to read.
She's really good at it. She could open the history text
and she could read it on her own, but she would rather I read
it to her. And every day she's doing
something with her hands. She's either crafting or she's
drawing or she's she, she, she'snow into these like adult
coloring books, you know, because they seem more mature.
But she's got her colored pencils out.
(39:28):
She's doing something. Sometimes it's just a fidget in
her hands. And so she will sit while I read
to her. And so we had these worksheets
and she was doing the worksheets, but they were
different than the science work.She enjoys doing the science
worksheets and filling in the blanks and answering the
questions. But the history ones, for some
reason, a couple weeks ago, she was like, mom, can we just read?
Because she's getting it. I mean, I'm reading a turn.
(39:49):
She's totally getting everythingI'm reading.
She's like the, I feel like the worksheets are just taking up
too much of my time. So can we just keep just blazing
through and reading? I'm getting what you're reading.
I don't need to write it down ona piece of paper.
And I was like, absolutely. So that's what we've been doing.
I just, I read it like a book. And that's working really well
for us. And so, you know, you don't have
(40:11):
to stick to feeling like, well, I'm doing it wrong or we're
gonna have to go back if we didn't finish the whole book.
Or finish all of the 160 and we can't move to 161 until 160 is
done and that will slip the lifeout of you and your.
Child. Yeah.
Right. And if you, if they're
exhibiting that they have that they know the the stuff in one
question or talking to you or acting it out or whatever, then
(40:33):
then move on. You're done.
You got it right. I mean, that's the whole point
is so that they know what it is that they're studying.
Right. Not that they can fill out
worksheets because as an adult, how many worksheets do you fill
out on a day? Not.
Very many. So enjoy.
I mean, Laci loves filling out her science worksheets.
Yeah, she finds great satisfaction in it.
It does. It does.
And she goes back, you know, so his science is just different
(40:55):
than history. She goes back to the text, and
she'll find the answers. If she doesn't know him, she
tells out what she can first. Totally.
Right. Not as a good skill.
Research. Learning how to research.
Yep, exactly. So good.
Anyway, all right. I hope that that answers your
question, Bethany. OK, the next one is from Kayla
and this one's quite lengthy. It's such a good question, but
I'm just going to kind of, kind of grabbed some pieces out of
(41:18):
here. So, so that I, I don't read the
whole thing. Her kids have only ever been in
public school. And so first I want to say,
Kayla, welcome to the wonderful world of homeschooling.
And I think like every mom, you probably went into it with this
fantasy of how wonderful it was going to be and how easy it was
going to be. And you were going to be, you
know, just singing through the days.
And you have quickly learned that that is not always the
(41:39):
case. And so welcome, welcome.
Homeschooling is amazing. It is a blessing, but it is also
very, very hard, hard sometimes.And so she says that she has a
12 year old who's a very strong willed.
So for all the strong willed parents, can I hear an Amen?
Yep, I've got one of those myself.
She has a 12 year old who's verystrong willed.
And it's been, she says, and it's been something that has
(42:02):
required determined parenting, which I love that.
I love that you have been determined to parent her and to
disciple her and never giving upfrom a very young age.
Now that she's at home so much, it seems that all we ever do is
fight. I can feel you on that.
That's hard, she said. Sometimes she becomes
disrespectful when she feels like she's being challenged by
her parents and there's lots of fighting.
(42:23):
And it is it's affecting the dynamics and relationship in
their home. And that is a really, really
hard thing. She's almost 13 and so she's
she's asking for help. She's like, how, how do I deal
with this strong willed child inmy home school?
And she also talks a little bit about how, you know, when she
was in school, her all of her teachers were like, she's
amazing. Which why is it that kids do
(42:44):
that, right? I remember taking my kids to the
babysitter. You know, I say babysitter, What
I mean by that is grandma and grandpa's house when they were
little or my sister's house and they would say she they were
amazing. They were so well behaved.
And I'm like, are we talking about the same kid here?
Because I can't even go to the grocery store with this kid
right now without tantrums. And so yes, it, it is very
(43:07):
different when your teachers, when her teachers are saying,
oh, they were amazing, never gave them problems and now she's
home, but it's because she's more comfortable with you.
So I will say that that is one of the reasons she's in her
comfort zone. She's at home.
And so, so this this is a big question.
And I would say first relationship, relationship over
(43:28):
reading, character over curriculum.
You want to build that relationship with her.
And if that means you taking therest of this year and putting
aside the academics, I'm not saying do it forever, but put
the academics aside and you justwork on character and your
relationship with her so that there's peace in your home, then
(43:49):
you do that and and let her knowthat I would say, you know what,
daughter, I love you so much. I don't want to fight with you
all the time. And I've noticed that when we're
doing our academics together, there's always conflict.
And so we're going to put academics aside for right now.
And if she's someone who is, especially if she's good and she
enjoys learning, she's going to want to get back to those
academics anyway. But just say we're going to just
(44:12):
put these aside for now, whetherit's from a week, a month, you
know, the next few months. And when I feel like we're at a
part, at a point in our relationship where we can
peacefully learn together, then let's, let's do this again.
Let's do it together. The strong will child is is
very, very hard because they know what they want.
(44:33):
They're going to fight to get their way.
It doesn't matter who they run over or who they hurt.
But I don't think that they do it intentionally.
It's just that's how God made them.
And so with our strong willed, you know, we've told her since
the day she was itty bitty and started throwing those tantrums.
Honey, God gave you this strong will for a purpose, but we need
to learn to use it for God's glory and not for your own gain.
(44:54):
Right. And that's what I was going to
say is that I was a strong willed child.
Oh man, was I. And I'm a strong willed adult.
And yeah, I think I finally realized one day that you know
what? God made me strong willed.
And and here's the thing, we live in a world where we need
strong willed people to be able to stand against what's being
thrown at them, to be able to stand against the enemy, to be
able. I mean, it's those strong willed
(45:15):
people that are making a difference in those this world.
It's those strong willed people that are willing to stand and
say, you know what? I don't care how much pressure
comes my way. I'm going to stand for what is
right and I'm going to build up other people around me.
They can usually rally the troops, right?
And we're gonna they're they they can be, you know, people in
legislation, they can be those people make huge differences.
(45:36):
And I think that rather than fight it, you say, listen, like
you said, your strong willed andpraise God.
I love that about you. And it is going to be you have
to bring it under the authority of God.
You know, all of our greatest strengths can be our greatest
weaknesses. And, and at 12 years old, here's
number one that is that is a really hard age for her.
(45:57):
Not we think it's so hard to be parents of that middle school
years, but really it's really hard for them.
Their hormones are all over. They're trying to figure out who
they are. And then for her to have been
brought, you know, her life was changed for the better.
Mom, you did the best thing for her.
But the reality is, is it was a lot for her.
And so you have to know that part of it is, it's the age.
(46:18):
Part of it is it's the temperament.
But I think with that age and that temperament, you can talk
to her and say, you know what, we're bucking and I don't want
to buck and you don't want to buck.
What how do you think that we can work better to ask her?
Talk to her. She's of that age where you're
transitioning because this isn'tchild centered, but you are
transitioning her into that those adult years where you guys
(46:39):
can have more of a communication.
You can ask her, what am I doingsomething that's rubbing you?
You know, am I doing something? Or it it that question also
said, you know, when you're grading her, but she does great
with the work, but it's when you're grading, ask her, what is
it about this? Would you like to grade your own
papers? Would you rather migrating be
that we just talk about it. You know, I think you're at an
(47:00):
age where it's not letting her take charge, but it's it's kind
of that working together more and also just understanding that
she's raging inside of herself at 12.
Like there's just a lot going on.
And so have it's not homeschool.I'm telling you, you didn't make
a mistake. It's not homeschool.
This is the best place she can be.
And you going to be the steady while she's the storm, right?
(47:22):
And so when she starts being thestorm and bucking you and all of
that, you be the steady. Don't allow disrespect, but try
to work together and keep affirming her.
If this is your strong will. This is a gift from God.
How do we bring it under God's authority so that it can be used
for good, right? Absolutely.
Two other things I'll say is one, start every day in God's
(47:43):
word. Whatever you do.
If if you're not sure, if you'renot going through a book of the
Bible or something like that, I would suggest starting in
Proverbs. There are 31 proverbs.
There are typically 31 ish days of the month, 30 to 31.
So read a proverb a day. Whatever the day of the month
is, read that proverb for the day though, you know, March
(48:04):
19th, read Proverbs 19 because the Proverbs are so full of
wisdom and has the proverbs has have a lot to say about children
listening to the instruction of their parents.
And so so I would start start the day out that way.
Maybe start the day out with music.
Find out what is she passionate about?
(48:24):
You know, you maybe you don't even quite know yet.
Maybe she doesn't quite know yet, but you know, she if you
need to take a break from academics and she loves art,
have her do art for the next fewweeks or the next couple of
months, have her do something that's going to just kind of
revive her. But as Abby said, talk with her
about it. However, don't do that in the
heat of the moment. We've learned that the hard
(48:46):
part, we've learned that the hard way.
Never, ever, ever try to have these conversations with your
child, especially with your strong willed child in the heat
of the moment. Wait until you're calm.
Sometimes that might look like taking them out for ice cream or
for lunch or something like that.
And then sitting down and havingto talk with her saying, hey,
honey, we this, this is not working, but we're going to make
homeschool work in and don't ever make it sound like, well,
(49:08):
maybe this isn't working so well, so maybe we'll go back to
school. Yeah, that's not, that's not.
No, say this is this is what ourfamily.
Because what you're telling her is you're getting too hard.
I don't want to stay in the battle with you.
And so that's not an option. But this is encouraging, too.
When you said she's so respectful to parents or I mean
to the teachers, she says here'swhat this means.
(49:29):
She knows and she knows right from wrong.
And she what you have done it, it's been good.
It's just that you're the safe place.
So when so when she is falling apart or when she's trying to
work out, what does it mean to be strong willed and bring it
under the authority? God, they're trying to figure
this out at 12. You're a safe place for her to
work that out with. But the fact is she obviously
(49:49):
knows because she's treating other people with respect.
She knows. And so that's encouraging.
You know, it's the kid that leaves your home and just is
crazy everywhere. It is disrespectful to everyone.
That's when there's really a problem.
So be encouraged. Be encouraged.
And you can say to her too, you know, so you know, when you were
in school, your teachers always had amazing reviews about you
(50:10):
and they, they adored you. They talked about how you were,
you know, so respectful and wellbehaved.
And so and just say I'm, you know, I'm your teacher now.
God's made me your teacher. And you can make it personal to
say, how do you think it makes me feel?
And I know that you've treated your teachers so well, but I,
your mom who love you more than anything.
And I'm not saying this in a manipulative kind of way, but
(50:32):
you know, I'm your mom. I love you more than anyone.
Like Abby said, you know, I'm onyour side.
We're we're we are on your team.We're here to help you.
You know, it doesn't make me feel nice when you are
disrespectful. And when you yell at me, it's OK
to say that to your kids becauseyou're a human too.
And so it's it's OK to let them know how you feel really
quickly. She's she said this was at the
end of her question. She said on a side note, she's
(50:53):
very involved in a weekly basis with youth group and sports of
all seasons. But she tells me constantly that
she's lonely. She's also a kid that gets
filled up by social interactions.
So she's an extrovert. It sounds like it's great that
she's involved in other things. It this is just a transition
year for sure, going from alwayshaving been in public school to
(51:14):
now she's home with her mom and siblings.
That's a really hard transition and you've only really been at
it for a few months. I mean, even you know, though
we're we're starting to get to the end of the year, we're
closing out this year. It still has only been a few
months of her life compared to all the many, many months that
she's been in school. So it's a transition time still.
(51:37):
And so so give yourself some grace.
Give her some grace. Tell.
You the loneliness thing? Yeah, I, I, I always say this, I
was surrounded by 700 people in a public school and I've never
been lonelier just because people are around people.
Also, God can use the lonely. God can use the lonely to draw
her to him. And so don't always be afraid.
(51:59):
We always get afraid if our kidsare lonely, God can use it.
And it sounds like she's not alone, right?
She's she, you have her active in things, you're doing things
with her. So that's important.
Like get them out, get them around people.
But sometimes in that age, in that 12/13/14, you know those,
those teen years, you could put them around 800 people and
they're still going to feel lonely.
(52:21):
Walk into any middle school and you see 400 lonely kids.
It's kind of the nature of that season when they're trying to
figure out who they are and where they belong.
The beautiful thing about homeschool is if they're feeling
lonely, they have the Lord and that's when they can go to the
Lord and they have you. It's a safe place to feel
lonely. We are deceiving ourselves if we
(52:41):
don't think that, if we think that just because kids are
around a lot of other kids, they're not feeling lonely.
It's just the nature of them andthat season, so.
Yeah, that's right. Well, Kayla, I hope that that is
encouraging to you, man. We, we are out of time.
We have more questions. I promise you guys we will get
to them. We'll do another Q&A as soon as
we can and we will get to the rest of your questions.
(53:03):
You interested? In so many good ones, a lot of
the questions are worded differently, but they're a lot
of the same answers that we're gonna give.
Like, you know what, work at your kids pace.
And you know, just the kind of the answer that we just gave to
Kayla could be answered to 500 more questions.
It's kind of all the same principle, the polls, yes.
And so so hopefully you found your answers in there somewhere.
(53:25):
Yes you can. Find out your answers in the
board of God. I will tell you every question
you have. God's word says it has
everything you need for life andgodliness and that is includes
these really hard homeschool questions, these really hard
parenting questions. There, it's in there, it's in
there. And so moms be in the word.
You've got to be in the word because because you have to be
(53:45):
filled so that you can walk these little ones and these big
ones through these hard things. Yes, good stuff.
Well, we will answer the rest ofthe questions next time.
I wasn't sure how many we'd get to today, but your questions are
so good and we have several more.
Again, if you do have more questions for us, you can always
fill out our form at schoolhouserocks.com/feedback.
(54:08):
And again, for those who didn't remember, maybe you forgot in
the last hour, our family's going to be at Teach Them
Diligently. The Teach Them Diligently
Homeschool Convention in Branson, MO May 15th through
17th and we are super excited. If you have to be anywhere near
Branson, we would love to meet you there.
You can get $25 off the family pass with the code Sr. for
(54:30):
Schoolhouse Rocked and we would love to see you.
We will be hanging out with Ginger Hubbard in her booth for
a good part of the weekend so you can find us there.
You guys, thank you so much for sending in your questions.
Thank you for being with us. We love you guys so much.
You can find everything at our website Schoolhouse Rocked dot
com and please take a few minutes to leave a review for
this podcast and share it with your friends.
(54:51):
Have a great rest of your week and we will see you back here
next time. Bye.
You're listening to the Biblicalfamily Network.
Hey, I'm Miki and I'm Will and we're the Co host of the Culture
Proof podcast. We want to invite you to join us
every week as we discuss what's happening in the world and then
(55:11):
filter those happenings through a decidedly biblical lens.
There are many questions, especially when we see what's
happening in our culture today, but the answers are found within
the word of God. So that's where we want to look.
Amen. When we resist those cultural
trends that rival the truth, we remain culture proof.
Instead of pummeling our kids with man, you need to be a man
(55:32):
of courage, you need to be courageous, you need to be
humble, you need to be this and that.
If we can just read stories thatdemonstrate that, then that's
that's sinking in. So many moms are also writing
their own curriculums. So you can get a curriculum for
anything all year long and you can have a stack a Mile High and
have that pressure like, Oh my goodness, this is all this
(55:54):
beautiful curriculum. And then they have these
homeschool planners and I've seen them just like by the 15
minute. My goodness.
Like, Oh my goodness. And and some women operate
better that way. I get right and then some.
Just want the freedom of just sit with a stack of books and
grab a cup of tea and take a breath.
He said why do I have to clean my room?
Do you think Jesus had to clean his room?
So I want to tell you this isn'tyour child and this isn't just
because your kid wants to be an animator, cartoon, comic book
writer. This is a universal 8th grade
dilemma. Hey everyone, this is Yvette
Hampton. Welcome back to the Schoolhouse
Rock podcast. I am so excited because today is
(00:23):
a special Q&A episode with none other than Avenella.
I am so excited. It has been months.
I mean like since since 2024. That was a long time ago it.
Was a very long time ago. So long ago since we've been
together on the podcast, becausewe've been hosting our own
podcast. And so this is the first time
(00:43):
we've recorded in the new year. This is the first time we've
recorded together since we've made the announcement that we're
not going to record together. Which was like, you know, weeks
and weeks before Christmas. I know it's been too long.
So we are you. I know I've missed you, and I
know our audience has missed us because they've told me.
Oh, really? We have gotten a lot of messages
(01:05):
and and people are loving the new format with all the
different hosts, but people misshearing us together.
And so I'm excited. We're it this is this is a like
just this week, we're here. We're back.
People, we're back, people, every several months there's a
fifth week in the month. And so on that fifth week, Abby
and I will be back together and we'll probably do Q&A most of
(01:27):
those times or if we just have something else exciting to talk
about. But this is it.
This is like a one shot. Episode AB 5th.
Week yes Oh yeah I like that andthis is going to be like an hour
long episode so. Why it's going to be an hour?
Because Garrett's like, there's no way you and Yvette could talk
for 30 minutes. You guys have never been only
able to talk for only 30 minutes.
(01:47):
He said that we were just going to do a 30 minute Q&A and he's
like that's not even possible. You guys cannot answer questions
in 30 minutes. It's true and we.
Got a lot of questions and we went out to you guys.
We went to our audience and saidhey, send us your questions.
And you guys did not disappoint.You totally delivered those
questions. And so Abby and I have had a
great time going through them, talking through them, and we're
(02:10):
excited to answer those for you today on this special episode
with Abby and I. But before we do, I want to say
thank you to today's sponsor, Apologia.
You guys, we are so grateful forApologia and for all of our
sponsors. Without them, we would not be
able to do this podcast. And we love Apologia.
We love their curriculum. They are an important part of
our homeschooling. So if you are looking for a
(02:32):
trusted homeschool resources to support your child's education
with a strong biblical worldview, check out
apologia.com. For decades they've been a go to
resource for Christian homeschool curriculum designed
to educate, inspire and build a lifelong love of learning.
And you can do self-paced courses, you can do live
classes. They have great instructors.
Their textbooks are amazing. Everything that they have is
(02:54):
from a solid biblical worldview.And we absolutely love them and
we love the family behind them, Davis and Rachel Carmen.
You guys know Rachel is one of my favorite people and they
stand behind their product. Check them out today at
apologia.com and discover how they can help your family
thrive. Well, we are so excited to get
to your questions. But before we do, I just want to
remind you again, for those who may not have heard and where
(03:16):
there's only a few weeks until this event, but Garrett and I
are going to be at the Teach Them Diligently convention in
Branson, MO, May 15th through 17th and it's going to be a
great conference. We are so excited.
We are not speaking there. We are just going to hang out.
Honestly, I just told Garrett, Isaid I just want to go hang out
and be encouraged and talk to people and meet people.
(03:37):
And I, I'm still in the thick ofit.
I still love going to workshops.You would think I would be kind
of tired of it by now, but I'm not.
I love the encouragement. So I'm going to go to workshops
and I'm going to go look throughthe vendor hall and all of that.
But we are going to be hanging out for a good part of the
weekend at Ginger Hubbard's booth.
So we would love to meet you. If you are a listener and you
(03:58):
are going to be there, we would love to meet you while we're
there. They have a great lineup of
speakers, Heidi Saint John, Ken Ham, Ginger Hubbard, of course,
and many, many others are going to be there.
So it's May 15th through 17th. They have conferences also in
Dayton, OH, Pigeon Forge, and atLiberty University.
So you can go to any of those, but we will only be in Branson.
So if you were going to be there, please, please, please
(04:20):
come and talk to us. And if you have not yet
purchased your family pass, you can get $25 off by using the
Code Sr. for Schoolhouse Rock, $25 off use Code Sr. and you can
get those at teachthemdiligently.net.
That's where you can sign up anyway.
All right, Abby, let's get into our questions because these are
so fun. You guys did such a great job
(04:41):
sending these questions in. And if we also if you have
questions after this send them still because we want to collect
them for the next fifth week that. 5th week or yes.
And I actually don't know that we'll get to all of them today
because we got a slew of question questions.
And so if we don't get to them all, we will be back shortly.
And we won't answer the rest of the questions, but you can go to
(05:01):
schoolhouserock.com/feedback andsubmit your questions there.
You can also submit if you have ideas for shows that you would
like us to talk, you know, topics you want us to talk about
or guests that you would like usto have on.
You can put that in there as well.
And we do our best to meet your needs.
That's why we're here. So, so go to
thatschoolhouserock.com. Back slash feed, no forward
(05:24):
slash feedback. I was going to say back slash
because it's feedback. schoolhouserock.com/feedback.
Oh my goodness, I know all the slashes.
Forward slash, back slash. Anyhow, OK, so here's our
question and I'm going to tell you guys, OK?
This is Abby. OK, Abby went to
schoolhouserock.com/feedback andshe submitted a form and when it
(05:47):
asked the question, you know what her question was, she said
how much wood could a woodchuck Chuck if a woodchuck could Chuck
wood? And I was like, Abby, seriously,
does anyone you actually know? Did you?
Did you know it was me? Not when I first read it, but I
knew it was someone messing withme.
Because I tried to let you know it wasn't me, but I wanted you
to get some good questions for the show.
(06:08):
And that is a good question. It's.
It is a good question. It is.
Time. It spans gender, it spans
ethnicity, like everybody wants to know.
Right. And I don't think that question
has ever actually been answered.All right.
Sorry to disappoint. I don't know.
I mean, if a tree falls in the forest and there's no one there
to hear it, does it make any noise?
I don't know. Question.
(06:28):
Actually it would make noise because I've actually seen a
tree fall and it makes noise so.Wait, what?
But then, yeah, that. But the whole thing is that if
you didn't see it, would it makenoise?
Yeah, yes. If no one was in logic, would it
make noise? It is.
It would absolutely make noise. I agree with you.
I concur. Next question.
Next question. OK, the next question we have
(06:51):
comes from Malia, and this is a great one.
She says how do I motivate an eighth grader for school?
The questions I get are why do Ineed to know history, science,
math, etcetera? I want to be an animator,
cartoon, comic book writer. That is a fantastic question
and. I have to tell you this, my son
just said to me. Tell me.
OK, he said why do I have to clean my room?
(07:13):
Do you think Jesus had to clean his room?
So Malia, I want to tell you this isn't your child and this
isn't just because your kid wants to be an animator,
cartoon, comic book writer. This is a universal 8th grade
dilemma. How to motivate an eighth grader
not just for school before every.
But in life in general? But we want to tell you that you
(07:34):
are not alone. And I've just heard this too.
Shall pass because I had an eighth grader that's no longer
an eighth grader. And it passes.
It really does pass. Yeah, yeah.
Meanwhile. Your son is in 8th grade this
year, right? Yes, he.
Is, so is Laci. So we both have 8th graders.
This year, so we're. Right there with you, Malia.
We are with you. Moment of silence for 8th grade
parents. Let me let me just say real
(07:56):
quick, I'm going to plug a podcast episode that we did.
It was back in 2024 and that waswith Cindy West and we talked
about homeschooling middle schoolers.
I will link to that, but if you missed that, go back and listen
to that episode because that onewas so good.
And she really hit on this age group of middle schoolers and,
and why they ask all the questions.
(08:19):
And part of it is just they're the world that they're in their,
their, their way, their minds are starting to form their own
ideas and they're asking all thequestions, not just about why do
they have to know history, science and math, but why do I
have to clean my room? Why do I have to do the totally,
why do I have to mow the lawn? Why do I have to obey you?
Why do I have to obey God? And these are often times I
think good questions for them toask because they actually want
(08:40):
to know the why of these things.And.
And you know. Usually there's a good question.
Right, because why do I have to learn history, science and math
if I'm going to be an animator? I mean, that is a valid
question. So it it doesn't, we always take
it as a challenge. Like they're challenging me, but
they they in a sense are, but they're also genuinely, they're
trying to make the connections. Tell me why.
(09:02):
And we as the homeschool families get to give our kids
the why. And that's what they don't
public school. It's just that do this, it has
no connection to life. You're just going to do the
worksheet and move on. And we get to make the
connections to life because without a connection to life,
it's empty, right? And so I would say the answer
is, is when you're doing life with your kid and history,
(09:24):
science or math come up like, I mean, they do, they come up
every single day. You're going to see math in
everything. Then you need to back, hey,
this, this is math, this is math.
And so, you know, when you're cooking, when you're going to
the grocery store, when you're driving the speed limit, your
8th grader, it probably their biggest thing they want to do
right now is drive, right? And that's right.
And that takes math and it takesscience.
(09:46):
I mean, how fast a car goes and how fast it's going to hit the
car in front of it if you don't put the brakes on 8th grader.
So I think that you can connect those things to life if even if
you can't connect them to being an animator.
Does that make sense? Yeah, totally it does.
But but yes, I, it's a question I have actually pondered myself
(10:06):
quite often as, as I have been educated myself, as I've
educated my girls, I have asked the question because I remember,
you know, of course, Brooklyn asked the question, you know, in
high school, Mom, why do I have to know algebra 2?
I'm never going to use it. And I'm like, you're not, you
know, you're not wrong. We'll probably never use algebra
2 pre algebra, yes, algebra, algebra 2 depends on what your
(10:27):
job is going to be. And so there are these are valid
questions that they're asking. But when you look at every
subject and it's like general context and even starting with
art, I mean, if he wants to be an animator and a cartoon artist
and a comic book writer, as he even looks at art, he has to
understand. And this is a great way for you,
(10:48):
mom, to point him back to God ascreator, because God our creator
is the one who made us creative,right?
Because we're made in his image.And so God is the designer of
all things. I mean, he designed color and
shapes and nature and people andanimals.
He designed all of those things.Like you just look at the color
wheel and you look at how many different colors there are.
You've got your, your main basiccolors.
(11:10):
What are those called? Again, the basic your.
Primary color. Primary, thank you.
Yeah, yeah. So you haven't done kindergarten
in a lot? It's been a long time.
You've got the primary colors, but all of those primary colors,
you mix them together and you can make the most incredible,
beautiful colors. You look at sunsets, you look at
the rainbow, you look at. Everything.
They're called secondary colors.Secondary Thank you, Abby.
(11:31):
Abby has been educated. She has a college degree in
education. Kindergarten.
Elementary education, so you remember those things.
But. You know, as a creator himself,
he can see that God is the one who created him in his image
that way. But then even looking at other
subjects, like you look at history and history is the story
(11:54):
of, of humanity. It's God's story.
And so I, I was thinking about that quote, those who it's, it's
by George, I think Santayana, I'm not even sure how to say his
last name, but he says those whocannot remember the past are
condemned to repeat it. And if we don't know the past,
we're going to repeat it. And that's, that could be both
good and bad, right? Sometimes good things have
(12:16):
happened in the past and we wantto repeat those things.
But often times really bad things have happened in the
past. And we don't want to repeat the
past because we see the pain that it's brought to the world,
to humanity. So history is important because
it's God's story of humanity. Science, of course.
I mean, that is the most I, I, I, I don't, won't say the most
important, but it's so importantto teach science from a biblical
worldview and for our kids to learn science because it helps
(12:38):
them to understand God as creator and to understand his
creation. So whether we're studying
astronomy or the human body or plants or whatever it is, it all
points them back to Jesus. And so science is important for
that. Math is one that I always was
like, why do we need math? I don't love math, but the more
I understand about math, the more I understand, of course,
(13:01):
that God is a God of order, not a God of chaos.
And so we need to understand math.
We need to understand how to read so we can read God's word.
We need to understand how to write so we can write about him.
So language arts is important for those reasons.
Even as an animator and an artist, he needs to know how to
write about his savior and read about his savior.
And so every subject that we teach our kids should be an An
(13:23):
Ave. to pointing them back to their creator.
Totally. I I couldn't agree more.
And also like, then you could take it to, you know, a comic
book writer will need a businessand a businessman.
I mean, if you're going to sell comic books, you're going to
need to know math to sell those comic books, right?
I also think there's been times in math with my kids that
they're like, when am I ever going to need this?
(13:44):
And I'm like, honestly, never. But the challenge with this is,
is it isn't so much the math, it's the figuring out how to
figure out something that's hard, right?
And you may never remember the exact thing, but it's the lesson
on this is hard. I there's an unknown that I
don't understand. And I can figure out, I can work
at it because God has given me with a brain to be able to do it
(14:05):
right. And it grows your brain.
So, so there, there's a lot of connections and and it's your
job, Mom, to help them make the connections, right?
Yeah, and then you may get to a point where they're like a
junior and there's like upper level chemistry and you're like,
you're never going to need this.And so unless you need it to get
into the whatever you want to do, then it's OK that we don't
learn this. I, I mean, I have to, I people
(14:26):
might stream me up for saying that, but there are certain
things that I'm like, sure. I would rather spend this time
teaching you things that, that ignite your passion for learning
than things that I can honestly say you are never, ever, ever
going to need this, right? Unless God has a career for you
to do it, and then you'll learn it, you'll want to.
You'll desire to. Yeah, and usually by the time
they get into high school. You'll know that.
(14:48):
They'll know what they're passionate about, you'll know
what they're passionate about and you can, you know, right,
really dive into those things specifically.
So like. I am not going to force my
junior, that's a boy. If he is really not wanting to
read Shakespeare, you know, he'sbeen exposed to stuff.
I'm not going to make him. I'm just not, you know.
Yeah, yeah. This is one of the greatest
(15:08):
blessings of homeschooling, though, is that we get to know
our kids. We know what they're bent is we
know how God created them and then we can cater their
education to them specifically. And that can't be done in a
classroom. And so we we have a great
privilege to do that. And also, you know, you may have
state standards that you have toabide by and certainly abide by
(15:30):
those standards. But at the same time, don't feel
like just because the public school is doing a certain right,
you know, math level or science curriculum or history, what
don't feel like you have to stick specifically to what
everyone else is doing. For sure.
Do what your kid enjoys and and you know, I mean, he, if he
wants to be a comic book writer,he's gotta learn to write
(15:50):
anyway. He does.
But history and science and mathcan come into that as well.
And so well, of course. Comic books, I mean, what's how
like humor in comic books? They draw from things in the
past like. That's what makes.
Things fun, you know. Connect those things to him
being a comic, I think you need to connect those subjects to
what he wants to do and then he'll he'll desire to learn it
(16:11):
because it's connected to what he loves, right?
This is why we can't spend 30 minutes answering questions.
I want to just you're right. I want to say one more thing on
this though, too. I wouldn't use use it to your
advantage and just say, Hey, these other subjects are
important. We still have to study history
and science and math For these reasons so that they that you
(16:31):
can know God better. But why don't you spend the
first half of the day animating and drawing your cartoons and
drawing your comic books or, youknow, what do those things use?
I mean, if you're reading I was.That's that's what I'm trying to
say, Abby. I'm gonna just say it for you.
Thank you. Yeah.
If you're reading history out loud to him, then let him
(16:53):
animate as you're reading it. If you're reading science to
him, let him animate that science as you're reading it to
him. Let him create that as you're
studying those things with him. So yeah, good stuff.
Good stuff. So good where?
Can I get through the 8th grade years together?
We are. Let's take a break.
We'll be right back. Homeschooling is a big
(17:14):
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(17:36):
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All right, on to the next question because we could go on
(17:56):
and on about subjects, but let'slet's try to get through these.
All right, Our next question is how do you know you're doing
enough in your homeschooling? I love that question and it's
one that I think every single homeschool mom asks herself.
Yep. And, and I would say usually the
mom that asks that is already doing enough, right?
Those are usually the moms that are doing too much and they need
to maybe back off a little bit. That's that's usually what I
(18:21):
find. The mom that asks that is
usually already doing more than enough.
Right. Yeah, because she's thinking
through, you know, what needs tobe done.
Again, kind of going back to what we were answering before,
don't don't lock yourself into what everyone else is doing and
feel like if you're not doing this, this, this and this,
you're not doing enough. That is the danger of sometimes
(18:43):
co-ops and social media and, youknow, looking at all the other
families and you feel like a failure because it seems like
everyone else is doing all of the things.
And they're doing field trips every week, and they're teaching
their kids to cook, and they're teaching their kids to sew, and
they're teaching them to garden.And they're teaching them all
the things. And you're like, I'm not doing
most of that stuff. And so you feel like you're
(19:05):
failing sometimes. Don't feel that way.
Don't compare. Yeah, exactly.
Don't compare yourself to others.
You know, as far as if you're doing enough, well, they're,
they're pretty, pretty good. I, I'm saying don't look at
standards, but you do, you know,if you're concerned about
whether or not you're doing enough, you can look at like
what the average 8th grader is doing or what the average middle
(19:27):
schooler or what the average high schooler is doing and kind
of gauge what your student is doing and you know, relation to
that. And I would say not on a
day-to-day basis, on a year to year basis, right?
I wouldn't say are you doing math, language arts, science,
social studies and all these other things everyday.
I would say in any given year, are your kids growing
(19:50):
academically in the core subjects?
And then are you also making time for them to pursue their
passions and their, you know, the other things over the course
of a year? That's what I would.
That's what I would say, right? Right.
Yes. And you have to remember it's
not all about the academics. It's also a huge part of
homeschooling is about the relationships.
(20:10):
It's about, you know, serving inyour church or at your local
pregnancy center. It's about sometimes playing
sports. If you've got an athlete, it's,
I mean, it's, it's if you have an artist, it's taking art
classes and learning from othersthe skills that your kids want
to learn. But it's not doing all of it all
the time, right? It's it's being able to just
know overall, if I look from this point last year to this
(20:32):
point this year, have we grown in the majority of those areas?
Right, right, exactly. And we've talked about this a
lot of times on the podcast, butfrom whatever point you're at,
if you're in the early elementary years or even if
you're in the high school years,you have to look at what your
end goal is with your kids and then work backwards.
So where do you want to be? Where do you want your kids to
(20:53):
be when they leave your home when they are adults and they
and you hand them your home school diploma and you said, OK,
I've done everything that I can do.
I've done my very best. Here's where we want our kids to
be in the end and. Not just academically, but.
Not just right, not just academically.
Relationally, you know exactly all of those things.
(21:15):
Yep, Yep. And then work backwards from
there. And you know, that's what I've
tried to do with my girls and itit's not like you have this
perfect blueprint and formula that's going to work out exactly
as you want to, but at least youhave goals.
It's that GPS that we're using. You've got to know where your
destination is in order to know how to get there.
So look at what your destinationis.
Where do you want your kids to be?
(21:36):
Where do you want your family tobe when they turn 18, when they
leave their when they leave yourhome, you know, maybe at the age
of 20 or 25, where do you want them to be?
And then work back from there. So but but just don't compare to
everyone else because that's a really.
Always make you feel like you'renever doing enough, right?
Yes, every. Time.
Way of knowing. Yes, yes.
(21:56):
And I think the enemy does that on purpose to make us feel like
we're not, we're not enough. So let's just put it back in
school because the experts will do a better job of it and they
will not. They.
Will not. They're your kids.
You will do the best job. You are the expert chaining them
up. That's right, You are the expert
for your children. So I hope that was encouraging,
Amanda. All right, so this next one is,
(22:16):
I think Cherie is how you say it.
Maybe Cherie, but I think it's Cherie the way it's spelled.
And she says my soon to be 13 year old daughter is looking for
teen books to read over this summer.
Do you have any suggestions? As a matter of fact, we do.
Yes, and you know, you just hit like our love language talking
about books like and we both. Have had 13 year old daughters.
Yes it's true and we both been 13 year old daughters and we
(22:39):
both love to read. Yes, yeah.
So yeah, I started. I'll go first.
I started pulling books from my bookshelf and then I was like,
OK, this could take a really long.
Time the whole episode. So, so I'm going to narrow it
down to like, if I were strandedon an island and I could only
choose five books to take with me, what books would I take?
(23:01):
So these are the books that I feel like for myself and my
girls have been enjoyable to read.
There's so many that are going through my head, but but I'm
going to give you some resourcestoo.
The ones that have been most enjoyable and most impactful for
us are The Hiding Place. I think both of my girls have
read The Hiding Place. I've read it probably 5 or 6
(23:21):
times. My girls have both read it at
least two or three times. And I would say that's one to, I
would say that's one to read with her.
Honestly I think it's so good toread with her.
Yes, yes, yeah, it's it's. There's some heavy there's.
Some heavy stuff in there. Yes it's true but I would say I
wouldn't read the hiding place below middle school.
(23:41):
I feel like middle school is a perfect time to start reading
the hiding place. I wouldn't read it earlier than
7th grade for sure and if you have a very immature 7th grader
or 8th grader I would maybe waittill high school.
It's all about the Holocaust andit is tough to read sometimes
but man it's so good. And I call this the Corey
Tenbohroom trilogy. So the Hiding place Tramp for
the Lord, which was also writtenby Corey Tenboom.
(24:02):
And that's her life after the war.
And it's so good. She talks about going out and
how she ministered to the world,literally the world telling
about her story of having been in Robinsbrook and just what
what God didn't and and how he worked in her through her family
and I. It's just an incredible story.
And then there was another one that was written by one of her
(24:23):
assistance. I can't remember her.
Pamela, somebody I think is her name.
It's called The Five Silent Years of Corey Tenboom.
And that is such a good book. I, I man, I want to say all of
them are my favorites. They're not.
But but once you read the HidingPlace, she could easily read
Tramp for the Lord and the Five Silent Years on her own and they
(24:44):
are literally life changing. And then the other book that I
would say is Kisses from Katie by Katie Davis Majors.
That book, again, for both my girls night was life changing
and we read that when Brooklyn was probably 12, maybe I want to
say 12 or 13. So Lacey would have been, you
know, 7:00-ish somewhere around that.
(25:05):
So that one could be read to smaller kids, but at that's a
great a younger kid would not pick up that book and read it.
That book is perfect for a middle school girl.
But, and I know Abby's got a bunch to share, but I do want to
share just two resources with you.
One of them is called Honey for a Child's heart.
And this was written, I want to say probably in the 80s.
I don't know. So it's a little bit dated, but
(25:26):
I mean, there it it, there's just a ton of really great
resources in here of books that you can read.
And I love what she does is she gives kind of a summary of the
different books that she suggests in here.
And so these you can start with young kids and it's just got
it's a it's a book of books is what it is.
(25:48):
But there's also another one written by the same author,
Gladys Hunt, and it's called Honey for a Teen's Heart.
And so there's Honey for a Child's Heart and honey for a
Teen's heart. This one for teenagers is
fantastic. And again, I love it because
it's hard to answer this question because every child has
different interests in books. But in this book, she goes
(26:09):
through book lists that will help you choose what is good for
your child or what they would enjoy.
And so there's adventure and suspense, there's contemporary
fantasy, historical mystery, nonfiction, science fiction,
sports, and it is written from aChristian worldview.
So I won't say that I agree withevery single book that she
listened here 'cause I've obviously not read them all, but
(26:30):
you can look at what genre your kids like.
And again, it gives kind of a synopsis, a description of what
the book is about in here. And then she even gives a
guideline for if it's good for early teens, middle teens, late
teens, or all ages. And this is just a fantastic
resource to have. Again, it's called Honey for a
Teens Heart. So this would be a great
(26:51):
resource for her. And we will put links to these
all in the show notes. So hey Abby, what do you have?
Well, you you hit it hiding places.
Hands down one of the best. I think you do need to know your
your child if kind of what age to do that one another one if
they love that genre, and this is maybe for a it it's kind of
in the same. It's called saving my assassin.
(27:11):
I just read it. It's phenomenal.
You told me. About that one, it is it is mind
blowing. It's kind of along the same, you
know, the same lines, but I would say and and if that kind
of hit it that know their genre.I think summer reading for me is
just letting the kids pick in their own genre that they love.
And I, if you're having a kid that you want to get into books,
let them stick with the genre they love and then every once in
(27:34):
a while throw something else in.But then if you have like a, a
reader that loves all of it, I kind of have tried to do this
challenge of like, I'm trying toread two books in each genre
because I get stuck in historical or true.
So, you know, try a new genre. But I, there are so many book
lists because here's the thing, once you hit 13, there is no way
(27:54):
to pre read all the books. Like it is impossible,
especially homeschool families who have more than one child.
And so find the really good booklist that you can trust and one
that Eva and I use a lot is the not consumed.
If you go to notconsumed.com, she has a book list in there.
I think if you, you sign up and she it gets emailed as APDF.
But there is such a phenomenal that's such a phenomenal book
(28:16):
list and you can trust the bookson there.
Now that doesn't mean like that they don't have heavy content,
but it's all if it's heavy, it'slike, OK, it's World War 2
because guess what, World War 2 is heavy, but there's not going
to be inappropriate thing. So find a good booklets.
I love not consumed. The other thing you can do is go
to like sunlight and even thoughif you're not a sunlight person,
(28:37):
like even if you don't use sunlight curriculum, you have
access to their booklets and youcan trust those booklets as
well. So yeah, that's, that's what I
would suggest. It's so fun.
I also think that is such a fun age to read books with your
kids. Maybe not.
I mean, yes, out loud is really fun.
But my daughter and I, when she was that age, we read them
simultaneously but separately. Like she would be reading it at
(28:58):
night and I would be reading it and then we could just kind of
talk about it or just know we'rekind of, you know, in the same
place when we're reading. Fun.
It's fun to do. You're in a fun age.
Yes, it is fun. I'm reading Heidi with Lacey
right now by Johannesbury. I know I well, so Laci, I read
that to Brooklyn again. She was probably 11 or 12.
(29:21):
So Laci was Pretty Little. She was like 6 when we read that
and she remembers it, but she atfirst she's like, no, we've
already read that. And I was like, oh, but it's so
good. Sometimes I just want to read it
myself. And so because we always have a
read aloud, she has a book that she's reading, but we always
have a book that we're reading together that I read out loud.
And so I said, can we please do Heidi again?
So she's like, OK. And it's fun because it's
(29:43):
really, I mean, it's been so many years.
It's been like 8 years since we read it.
I. Need to read it.
You always tell me and I'm like,you watch the show and you're
like, no, no, no, no, no. You can't watching.
The movie is not the same. No, it's not even it's not.
It's like reading Little House on the Prairie versus, oh right,
watching the Little House show. Like it.
There's no comparison. So which Little House too?
I mean if your daughter has not read the Little House series.
(30:04):
So. Fun.
So good, so much fun. Start with Brooke One and work
your way through the whole series.
They are so fantastic and you can listen to those on audio as
well. Cherry Jones is one of the
people who does the audio version of Little House and it's
fantastic. I love the way she reads so.
So if your daughter likes audio books, that's a great one and
(30:25):
even boys enjoy. We listened to the entire Little
House series while we were traveling and Garrett enjoyed
them as much as my girls did, and he's a grown man.
So I mean, there's a lot in there and there's, boy, I mean,
it's, it's life, right? It's not.
Yeah, they're talking about building their their family and
building their homes in their journey, you know, So yeah,
it's, it's incredible anyway. Awesome.
(30:48):
OK. So that's it for books.
We will put those links in the show notes for you, Cherie.
So that hopefully that will be helpful for you, which by the
way, just so you guys know, I'm going to put a little plug here.
When we put links in the show notes, most of the time the
links that we put in are somehowattached to some sort of
affiliate, something or other. And so we get like, if you're
(31:08):
going to buy them, buy them through our link because we get
a little bit of a kickback from that.
And that goes to help support the Schoolhouse Rock ministry.
Maybe you didn't know that. So you feel less guilty when you
buy on Amazon because at least you know part of it's going to
something good. Yeah.
And we have, you know, christianbook.com, we sometimes
put links to there. We have an affiliate with them
and other others as well. Have you tried CTC Math yet with
(31:32):
your child? Here's a testimonial from
another happy homeschool mom. Amber said.
I'm absolutely thrilled with CTCMath.
It's a rare find that I've used with my children for more than
five years now. I have six children using CTC
Math and each child has found iteasy to navigate and very
applicable. Thank you so much for all that
you are doing and providing quality math lessons for my
(31:54):
children. If you're looking for a great
online math program, visit ctcmath.com.
That's ctcmath.com. All right, this one comes from
Bethany. And her question is this, she
said, how do you decide when to have a child repeat a subject or
grade level the next year? And for students who are ahead
of their age, how do you balancekeeping them challenged and
(32:15):
interested in learning but not overwhelming them?
I have one student who is giftedand talented and picks up on
things easily and another student who struggles in some
subjects but mostly from lack ofmaturity and discipline, not
their ability to learn. And then she said thanks for the
great content and encouragement.Oh, you are so welcome, Bethany.
Abby, do you want to go first onthis one?
(32:35):
Yeah, I feel like, Bethany, I feel like maybe you were a
teacher or in the school system,because I used to ask this too.
But here's the fun thing about homeschool.
Your kids aren't like ahead or behind.
They're right where they're supposed to be.
So when you said like, how do you decide to have a child
repeat a subject or grade level?Well, first of all, I would say
(32:58):
throw out grade levels because your kids are where they're at.
So you aren't going to have to. This is the other really fun
thing. You don't necessarily have to
repeat because you don't ever need to move on beyond where
they're where they're succeedingat.
Does that make sense? So, so you're just going to move
at your kids pace and if they'rein 3rd grade in if they were in
(33:21):
the system in 3rd grade and they're in first grade, they're
not, they're not behind because they're right where they're
supposed to be. And then also if they're doing
5th grade in another subject, they're not ahead.
They're right where they're supposed to be.
And so that's also the other thing is my kids have never been
in a grade level that's the samein all subjects.
They might be in 4th grade in math and in fifth grade in
(33:43):
science. And we just kind of throw out
grade levels and and then we move once they've mastered
something, we move forward. And so you don't really have to
repeat or if you're finding thatyou've passed something and they
aren't they, they missed that, then you can go back.
That's how you know when to go back is if they haven't mastered
it. And do you know when to know
(34:04):
when to move ahead when they've mastered it.
And so you get to determine the pace, you get to determine where
they're at on anything. So the first thing I would say
to any homeschool mom, get rid of grade levels.
I would even honestly, for my kids, I have exed out the grade
levels on the books. So they don't even know because
sometimes kids will be like if they if they're 12 and they're
(34:25):
in a first grade, they're like, why am I in this?
Or, or they get proud. I'm working at an eighth grade
level and I'm only, I just will like get rid of it.
So they don't know. Here's what we're doing.
We're doing math. We're doing math at the level
that you're at. And when you're ready to move
forward, we move forward. And if you haven't mastered it,
we stay where we're at until you've mastered it.
And that's the freedom of. And what you might find is you
(34:46):
start to panic because, Oh my goodness, we're behind.
But then all the sudden one yearyou just went through two years
of school in a year because theywere getting it and they were
moving forward. So home school is at your pace.
It's not based on grade levels. It's not based on and on what
everybody else is doing. And it's not even that
everybody's the the same grade level in the same subject.
(35:07):
You move forward when they're ready, you stay back when
they're not. Yes, I absolutely you hit it
dead on. But I do want to say one other
thing too. Your child does, you know, going
back to Malia's question at the beginning and she, you know, her
son was asking, why do I have toknow science and math and
history and all these other subjects?
Not every child is created to bethe expert in every single
(35:31):
subject, right? And so you might have a child
who, like Malia's son, wants to be an artist.
Well, he needs to know the basics of math and history and
science again so that he can understand God in his world that
he created. But he doesn't have to be a
mathematician. He doesn't have to be a
historian. He doesn't have to be a
scientist because God created him to be an artist.
(35:53):
And so, you know, you don't knowvery many historians who are
also scientists or very many mathematicians who are, you
know, homemakers. Well, I I don't know, I
shouldn't say that Maybe there are a lot of homemakers who are
scientists and we. Are authors usually
mathematicians? Are authors right, Right.
That's a better one. Yes.
You know, if you're super good at science, you probably don't
(36:14):
enjoy writing novels. And you know, I mean, and so God
has just created each one of your kids to love certain
things. And it's OK if they are not
experts at all of the subjects. And so have them learn the
basics of those things and, and you know, go along with them.
(36:35):
But, but they don't have to, youtalked about mastering them,
Abby. They don't necessarily have to
master every single thing. You know, if they're going to be
an engineer, well, they should probably know calculus.
But if they're not going to be an engineer, they don't need to
know calculus. Or, or if you know, if they
don't have a career in mind right that requires these
(36:57):
things, then it's OK for them tonot be the expert.
Well, and honestly, like you said, the only the only subject
that ever you would need to master to move on is math.
You do like if you can't do addition, you really shouldn't
want. But honestly think about every
other subject you you there is no, I mean there is no grade
level in learning science, right?
(37:19):
You learn something in science and then you keep learning it
until you're done learning and you and you don't need to know
any more science. Now if like you said, if you're
going to be an engineer, you should probably learn or
whatever a science, you need to learn more science.
If you're not, you don't. We grade levels and holding back
and moving for that's all just this, this thing that we've
made-up. And so math, I would say is the
(37:40):
one that you need to master before you move on.
And it doesn't matter where you're at.
Everything else just do. In fact, I have always said this
too, like in in the public school, like 4th grade is state
history, 5th grade is World War,whatever.
Like that's how they've always done it.
Or science. It's like in this grade you do
biology, in this grade you do chemistry.
(38:01):
In this grade you do botany, right?
And I've always said, don't likeask your kids what do you want
to learn this year? So that as long as you get out
of school and you have a basic understanding of everything, who
cares what order you do it in, right?
Who cares except math? Yes, because math builds on
itself. Math builds on itself, so you
got to shake this whole get ahead, get behind, behind who
(38:23):
ahead of who. You just just teach to your
child where they're at. And that's that's the answer.
Yeah, totally. And your kid does not have to
finish the worksheet on every single subject that you're
putting in front of them. You know, this year Laci and I
are studying world history and like we, we've talked before in
(38:45):
the past about our, our kids learning styles.
Well, Lacey, she, my 8th grader,she is a, she is an auditory
learner. She learns so well by hearing
things. And since she's my only child at
home now, I have the time to read to her and I enjoy it.
I love sitting with her and reading to her.
So she could open the book. I mean, she's fully capable of
(39:07):
that. She knows how to read.
She's really good at it. She could open the history text
and she could read it on her own, but she would rather I read
it to her. And every day she's doing
something with her hands. She's either crafting or she's
drawing or she's she, she, she'snow into these like adult
coloring books, you know, because they seem more mature.
But she's got her colored pencils out.
(39:28):
She's doing something. Sometimes it's just a fidget in
her hands. And so she will sit while I read
to her. And so we had these worksheets
and she was doing the worksheets, but they were
different than the science work.She enjoys doing the science
worksheets and filling in the blanks and answering the
questions. But the history ones, for some
reason, a couple weeks ago, she was like, mom, can we just read?
Because she's getting it. I mean, I'm reading a turn.
(39:49):
She's totally getting everythingI'm reading.
She's like the, I feel like the worksheets are just taking up
too much of my time. So can we just keep just blazing
through and reading? I'm getting what you're reading.
I don't need to write it down ona piece of paper.
And I was like, absolutely. So that's what we've been doing.
I just, I read it like a book. And that's working really well
for us. And so, you know, you don't have
(40:11):
to stick to feeling like, well, I'm doing it wrong or we're
gonna have to go back if we didn't finish the whole book.
Or finish all of the 160 and we can't move to 161 until 160 is
done and that will slip the lifeout of you and your.
Child. Yeah.
Right. And if you, if they're
exhibiting that they have that they know the the stuff in one
question or talking to you or acting it out or whatever, then
(40:33):
then move on. You're done.
You got it right. I mean, that's the whole point
is so that they know what it is that they're studying.
Right. Not that they can fill out
worksheets because as an adult, how many worksheets do you fill
out on a day? Not.
Very many. So enjoy.
I mean, Laci loves filling out her science worksheets.
Yeah, she finds great satisfaction in it.
It does. It does.
And she goes back, you know, so his science is just different
(40:55):
than history. She goes back to the text, and
she'll find the answers. If she doesn't know him, she
tells out what she can first. Totally.
Right. Not as a good skill.
Research. Learning how to research.
Yep, exactly. So good.
Anyway, all right. I hope that that answers your
question, Bethany. OK, the next one is from Kayla
and this one's quite lengthy. It's such a good question, but
I'm just going to kind of, kind of grabbed some pieces out of
(41:18):
here. So, so that I, I don't read the
whole thing. Her kids have only ever been in
public school. And so first I want to say,
Kayla, welcome to the wonderful world of homeschooling.
And I think like every mom, you probably went into it with this
fantasy of how wonderful it was going to be and how easy it was
going to be. And you were going to be, you
know, just singing through the days.
And you have quickly learned that that is not always the
(41:39):
case. And so welcome, welcome.
Homeschooling is amazing. It is a blessing, but it is also
very, very hard, hard sometimes.And so she says that she has a
12 year old who's a very strong willed.
So for all the strong willed parents, can I hear an Amen?
Yep, I've got one of those myself.
She has a 12 year old who's verystrong willed.
And it's been, she says, and it's been something that has
(42:02):
required determined parenting, which I love that.
I love that you have been determined to parent her and to
disciple her and never giving upfrom a very young age.
Now that she's at home so much, it seems that all we ever do is
fight. I can feel you on that.
That's hard, she said. Sometimes she becomes
disrespectful when she feels like she's being challenged by
her parents and there's lots of fighting.
(42:23):
And it is it's affecting the dynamics and relationship in
their home. And that is a really, really
hard thing. She's almost 13 and so she's
she's asking for help. She's like, how, how do I deal
with this strong willed child inmy home school?
And she also talks a little bit about how, you know, when she
was in school, her all of her teachers were like, she's
amazing. Which why is it that kids do
(42:44):
that, right? I remember taking my kids to the
babysitter. You know, I say babysitter, What
I mean by that is grandma and grandpa's house when they were
little or my sister's house and they would say she they were
amazing. They were so well behaved.
And I'm like, are we talking about the same kid here?
Because I can't even go to the grocery store with this kid
right now without tantrums. And so yes, it, it is very
(43:07):
different when your teachers, when her teachers are saying,
oh, they were amazing, never gave them problems and now she's
home, but it's because she's more comfortable with you.
So I will say that that is one of the reasons she's in her
comfort zone. She's at home.
And so, so this this is a big question.
And I would say first relationship, relationship over
(43:28):
reading, character over curriculum.
You want to build that relationship with her.
And if that means you taking therest of this year and putting
aside the academics, I'm not saying do it forever, but put
the academics aside and you justwork on character and your
relationship with her so that there's peace in your home, then
(43:49):
you do that and and let her knowthat I would say, you know what,
daughter, I love you so much. I don't want to fight with you
all the time. And I've noticed that when we're
doing our academics together, there's always conflict.
And so we're going to put academics aside for right now.
And if she's someone who is, especially if she's good and she
enjoys learning, she's going to want to get back to those
academics anyway. But just say we're going to just
(44:12):
put these aside for now, whetherit's from a week, a month, you
know, the next few months. And when I feel like we're at a
part, at a point in our relationship where we can
peacefully learn together, then let's, let's do this again.
Let's do it together. The strong will child is is
very, very hard because they know what they want.
(44:33):
They're going to fight to get their way.
It doesn't matter who they run over or who they hurt.
But I don't think that they do it intentionally.
It's just that's how God made them.
And so with our strong willed, you know, we've told her since
the day she was itty bitty and started throwing those tantrums.
Honey, God gave you this strong will for a purpose, but we need
to learn to use it for God's glory and not for your own gain.
(44:54):
Right. And that's what I was going to
say is that I was a strong willed child.
Oh man, was I. And I'm a strong willed adult.
And yeah, I think I finally realized one day that you know
what? God made me strong willed.
And and here's the thing, we live in a world where we need
strong willed people to be able to stand against what's being
thrown at them, to be able to stand against the enemy, to be
able. I mean, it's those strong willed
(45:15):
people that are making a difference in those this world.
It's those strong willed people that are willing to stand and
say, you know what? I don't care how much pressure
comes my way. I'm going to stand for what is
right and I'm going to build up other people around me.
They can usually rally the troops, right?
And we're gonna they're they they can be, you know, people in
legislation, they can be those people make huge differences.
(45:36):
And I think that rather than fight it, you say, listen, like
you said, your strong willed andpraise God.
I love that about you. And it is going to be you have
to bring it under the authority of God.
You know, all of our greatest strengths can be our greatest
weaknesses. And, and at 12 years old, here's
number one that is that is a really hard age for her.
(45:57):
Not we think it's so hard to be parents of that middle school
years, but really it's really hard for them.
Their hormones are all over. They're trying to figure out who
they are. And then for her to have been
brought, you know, her life was changed for the better.
Mom, you did the best thing for her.
But the reality is, is it was a lot for her.
And so you have to know that part of it is, it's the age.
(46:18):
Part of it is it's the temperament.
But I think with that age and that temperament, you can talk
to her and say, you know what, we're bucking and I don't want
to buck and you don't want to buck.
What how do you think that we can work better to ask her?
Talk to her. She's of that age where you're
transitioning because this isn'tchild centered, but you are
transitioning her into that those adult years where you guys
(46:39):
can have more of a communication.
You can ask her, what am I doingsomething that's rubbing you?
You know, am I doing something? Or it it that question also
said, you know, when you're grading her, but she does great
with the work, but it's when you're grading, ask her, what is
it about this? Would you like to grade your own
papers? Would you rather migrating be
that we just talk about it. You know, I think you're at an
(47:00):
age where it's not letting her take charge, but it's it's kind
of that working together more and also just understanding that
she's raging inside of herself at 12.
Like there's just a lot going on.
And so have it's not homeschool.I'm telling you, you didn't make
a mistake. It's not homeschool.
This is the best place she can be.
And you going to be the steady while she's the storm, right?
(47:22):
And so when she starts being thestorm and bucking you and all of
that, you be the steady. Don't allow disrespect, but try
to work together and keep affirming her.
If this is your strong will. This is a gift from God.
How do we bring it under God's authority so that it can be used
for good, right? Absolutely.
Two other things I'll say is one, start every day in God's
(47:43):
word. Whatever you do.
If if you're not sure, if you'renot going through a book of the
Bible or something like that, I would suggest starting in
Proverbs. There are 31 proverbs.
There are typically 31 ish days of the month, 30 to 31.
So read a proverb a day. Whatever the day of the month
is, read that proverb for the day though, you know, March
(48:04):
19th, read Proverbs 19 because the Proverbs are so full of
wisdom and has the proverbs has have a lot to say about children
listening to the instruction of their parents.
And so so I would start start the day out that way.
Maybe start the day out with music.
Find out what is she passionate about?
(48:24):
You know, you maybe you don't even quite know yet.
Maybe she doesn't quite know yet, but you know, she if you
need to take a break from academics and she loves art,
have her do art for the next fewweeks or the next couple of
months, have her do something that's going to just kind of
revive her. But as Abby said, talk with her
about it. However, don't do that in the
heat of the moment. We've learned that the hard
(48:46):
part, we've learned that the hard way.
Never, ever, ever try to have these conversations with your
child, especially with your strong willed child in the heat
of the moment. Wait until you're calm.
Sometimes that might look like taking them out for ice cream or
for lunch or something like that.
And then sitting down and havingto talk with her saying, hey,
honey, we this, this is not working, but we're going to make
homeschool work in and don't ever make it sound like, well,
(49:08):
maybe this isn't working so well, so maybe we'll go back to
school. Yeah, that's not, that's not.
No, say this is this is what ourfamily.
Because what you're telling her is you're getting too hard.
I don't want to stay in the battle with you.
And so that's not an option. But this is encouraging, too.
When you said she's so respectful to parents or I mean
to the teachers, she says here'swhat this means.
(49:29):
She knows and she knows right from wrong.
And she what you have done it, it's been good.
It's just that you're the safe place.
So when so when she is falling apart or when she's trying to
work out, what does it mean to be strong willed and bring it
under the authority? God, they're trying to figure
this out at 12. You're a safe place for her to
work that out with. But the fact is she obviously
(49:49):
knows because she's treating other people with respect.
She knows. And so that's encouraging.
You know, it's the kid that leaves your home and just is
crazy everywhere. It is disrespectful to everyone.
That's when there's really a problem.
So be encouraged. Be encouraged.
And you can say to her too, you know, so you know, when you were
in school, your teachers always had amazing reviews about you
(50:10):
and they, they adored you. They talked about how you were,
you know, so respectful and wellbehaved.
And so and just say I'm, you know, I'm your teacher now.
God's made me your teacher. And you can make it personal to
say, how do you think it makes me feel?
And I know that you've treated your teachers so well, but I,
your mom who love you more than anything.
And I'm not saying this in a manipulative kind of way, but
(50:32):
you know, I'm your mom. I love you more than anyone.
Like Abby said, you know, I'm onyour side.
We're we're we are on your team.We're here to help you.
You know, it doesn't make me feel nice when you are
disrespectful. And when you yell at me, it's OK
to say that to your kids becauseyou're a human too.
And so it's it's OK to let them know how you feel really
quickly. She's she said this was at the
end of her question. She said on a side note, she's
(50:53):
very involved in a weekly basis with youth group and sports of
all seasons. But she tells me constantly that
she's lonely. She's also a kid that gets
filled up by social interactions.
So she's an extrovert. It sounds like it's great that
she's involved in other things. It this is just a transition
year for sure, going from alwayshaving been in public school to
(51:14):
now she's home with her mom and siblings.
That's a really hard transition and you've only really been at
it for a few months. I mean, even you know, though
we're we're starting to get to the end of the year, we're
closing out this year. It still has only been a few
months of her life compared to all the many, many months that
she's been in school. So it's a transition time still.
(51:37):
And so so give yourself some grace.
Give her some grace. Tell.
You the loneliness thing? Yeah, I, I, I always say this, I
was surrounded by 700 people in a public school and I've never
been lonelier just because people are around people.
Also, God can use the lonely. God can use the lonely to draw
her to him. And so don't always be afraid.
(51:59):
We always get afraid if our kidsare lonely, God can use it.
And it sounds like she's not alone, right?
She's she, you have her active in things, you're doing things
with her. So that's important.
Like get them out, get them around people.
But sometimes in that age, in that 12/13/14, you know those,
those teen years, you could put them around 800 people and
they're still going to feel lonely.
(52:21):
Walk into any middle school and you see 400 lonely kids.
It's kind of the nature of that season when they're trying to
figure out who they are and where they belong.
The beautiful thing about homeschool is if they're feeling
lonely, they have the Lord and that's when they can go to the
Lord and they have you. It's a safe place to feel
lonely. We are deceiving ourselves if we
(52:41):
don't think that, if we think that just because kids are
around a lot of other kids, they're not feeling lonely.
It's just the nature of them andthat season, so.
Yeah, that's right. Well, Kayla, I hope that that is
encouraging to you, man. We, we are out of time.
We have more questions. I promise you guys we will get
to them. We'll do another Q&A as soon as
we can and we will get to the rest of your questions.
(53:03):
You interested? In so many good ones, a lot of
the questions are worded differently, but they're a lot
of the same answers that we're gonna give.
Like, you know what, work at your kids pace.
And you know, just the kind of the answer that we just gave to
Kayla could be answered to 500 more questions.
It's kind of all the same principle, the polls, yes.
And so so hopefully you found your answers in there somewhere.
(53:25):
Yes you can. Find out your answers in the
board of God. I will tell you every question
you have. God's word says it has
everything you need for life andgodliness and that is includes
these really hard homeschool questions, these really hard
parenting questions. There, it's in there, it's in
there. And so moms be in the word.
You've got to be in the word because because you have to be
(53:45):
filled so that you can walk these little ones and these big
ones through these hard things. Yes, good stuff.
Well, we will answer the rest ofthe questions next time.
I wasn't sure how many we'd get to today, but your questions are
so good and we have several more.
Again, if you do have more questions for us, you can always
fill out our form at schoolhouserocks.com/feedback.
(54:08):
And again, for those who didn't remember, maybe you forgot in
the last hour, our family's going to be at Teach Them
Diligently. The Teach Them Diligently
Homeschool Convention in Branson, MO May 15th through
17th and we are super excited. If you have to be anywhere near
Branson, we would love to meet you there.
You can get $25 off the family pass with the code Sr. for
(54:30):
Schoolhouse Rocked and we would love to see you.
We will be hanging out with Ginger Hubbard in her booth for
a good part of the weekend so you can find us there.
You guys, thank you so much for sending in your questions.
Thank you for being with us. We love you guys so much.
You can find everything at our website Schoolhouse Rocked dot
com and please take a few minutes to leave a review for
this podcast and share it with your friends.
(54:51):
Have a great rest of your week and we will see you back here
next time. Bye.
You're listening to the Biblicalfamily Network.
Hey, I'm Miki and I'm Will and we're the Co host of the Culture
Proof podcast. We want to invite you to join us
every week as we discuss what's happening in the world and then
(55:11):
filter those happenings through a decidedly biblical lens.
There are many questions, especially when we see what's
happening in our culture today, but the answers are found within
the word of God. So that's where we want to look.
Amen. When we resist those cultural
trends that rival the truth, we remain culture proof.
Instead of pummeling our kids with man, you need to be a man
(55:32):
of courage, you need to be courageous, you need to be
humble, you need to be this and that.
If we can just read stories thatdemonstrate that, then that's
that's sinking in. So many moms are also writing
their own curriculums. So you can get a curriculum for
anything all year long and you can have a stack a Mile High and
have that pressure like, Oh my goodness, this is all this
(55:54):
beautiful curriculum. And then they have these
homeschool planners and I've seen them just like by the 15
minute. My goodness.
Like, Oh my goodness. And and some women operate
better that way. I get right and then some.
Just want the freedom of just sit with a stack of books and
grab a cup of tea and take a breath.
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