October 14, 2025 • 41 mins
Join Aby Rinella and special guest Kathy Gibbens as they dive deep into the importance of teaching logic in your homeschool and discuss the nitty-gritty of raising—and graduating!—an only child. In this heartfelt and practical episode of the Schoolhouse Rocked Podcast, you’ll learn why developing your child’s ability to think critically from a biblical perspective is more vital than ever. Kathy shares empowering advice for moms with one child, including actionable ways to cultivate friendships, conquer fears about socialization, and embrace God’s unique plan for your family. Don’t miss Kathy’s favorite resources, thought-provoking questions, and tips on building a strong, truth-centered foundation for your children!
Recommended Resources:
• Filter It Through a Brain Cell
• The Fallacy Detective, by Nathaniel Bluedorn and Hans Bluedorn
• Mere Christianity, by C.S. Lewis
• Live Not By Lies, by Rod Dreher
Sponsors:
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, The Nicki Truesdell Podcast, Homeschool Insights, and Made2Homeschool.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
There is no stability like Jamestells us, unstable in all his
ways. Well, what are we seeing a a
massive explosion of is mental instability.
People that do not have a solid foundation of truth.
You're open to anything. We're told to take every thought
captive. We are told think on these
(00:21):
things. Hey everybody, welcome back to
the Schoolhouse Rock podcast. I am Abby Rinella back with you
this week and I was with you last week also with my guest,
Kathy Gibbons. And this week we're going to
dive back into the topic of logic and the importance of
teaching our kids logic. If you did not listen to last
week's episode, go back and listen to it.
(00:42):
We had a lot, a lot of fun chatter about kind of where we
found our ways and in teaching our kids logic and examples and
and it was a lot of fun. And this week we're going to
dive into some of the nuts and bolts and the nitty gritty.
But before we do, I want to thank Apologia for sponsoring
this podcast. If you're looking for a trusted
homeschool resource to support your child's education with a
strong biblical worldview, you'll find it through Apologia.
(01:04):
For decades, Apologia has been ago to source for Christian
homeschool curriculum designed to educate, inspire, and build a
lifelong love of learning. They know the homeschooling
isn't 1 size fits all. That's why they offer a growing
catalog of resources to fit yourfamily's needs.
Dive into online self-paced courses, join live classes led
by incredible instructors, or stream engaging video lessons
(01:26):
anytime, anywhere. They even offer audio books
perfect for learning on the go. Apologia will partner with you
in your families educational journey.
Go to apologia.com. Kathy, this has been so much fun
and I, I, you guys have to go back and listen to last week
because we really discussed it As parents and homeschool
(01:47):
parents, we have to, it's not optional.
It's not a subject that we mightthrow in like maybe chemistry,
maybe not, probably not. We have to have to teach our
kids logic and logic is just a fancy pants way of saying
teaching our kids to think well,right.
Is, was that what you would say that?
Well, how would you explain whatis logic?
(02:08):
Yeah, logic is the ability to think well and to reason
perfect. And we discussed Kathy's podcast
and how I've personally used it in my home school.
Her podcast is thinking through a brain cell.
Sit right? Filter it through a brain cell.
Filter it through a brain cell. Kathy's podcast is filter it
through a brain cell. Go over check that out, work it
into your home school and go back and listen last week how I,
(02:31):
how my family has worked it intoours.
So I want to dive in a little bit on we, we kind of discussed,
we, we discussed a lot of great things, but I want to ask a kind
of a bigger, a bigger thing is how can bad thinking.
We talked a lot about teaching our kids good thinking, but if
we don't do this, how can bad thinking lead to bigger issues?
And I've, you know, it's really,I was just having some deep
(02:54):
thinking because you, you've inspired me to think deeper on
the bigger things. But I realize that say, you
know, for years and years and years, we've taught our kids
evolution and not we, not you, not me, but the school system
And I for years was like, peoplejust think, Oh, you know what,
that's the only bad thing there.This only lie they're teaching
in school. It's just evolution.
(03:14):
When they come home, we're goingto teach them creation.
No big deal. It's just one subject.
And I have fast forwarded and looked at this and gone.
OK, Ultimately the heart of evolution is to say there is no
God. You are not created on purpose
for a purpose. You're just no different than
the sludge in the street that might have a live bacteria in
it, right? And we Fast forward that however
(03:35):
many years evolution has been taught in our schools.
And I look at the abortion and the transgender stuff that's
being pushed now. And I really believe that it is
a direct effect from all those years of telling people you have
no innate value. God did not create you on
purpose for a purpose. If you're telling people that,
then why can't I be anything that I want?
(03:56):
Why can't I be a boy or a dog ora why can't I murder a baby
that's in my womb? Because it has no innate value.
And I think so often we think just little tiny lies, little
things like it's just my parentslearned evolution in school,
right? And they're in their 70s.
My dad is almost 80. And that was in their
generation. And it was like, oh, it's just
one thing. We can just let it go. 1
(04:18):
untruth, but those little untruths grow and grow and grow
and they end up causing major, major bigger issues, major
damage. And so can you kind of share
some either other examples or why it is so important that we
don't let those little bad thinking things go either in our
personal lives, in our kids lives or bigger picture in in
(04:38):
our culture? Yeah, there's a quote.
I'm sitting here trying to remember exactly how it goes.
It's by Bill Jack, and he says something along the lines bad
thinking leads to bad ideas, andbad ideas have victims, right?
It's something like that. I might not have that quite
exactly right, but the bottom line is ideas have consequences.
(05:00):
And when we don't understand what's behind these ideas and
when we don't take the time to think something out to its
logical conclusion. OK, so if we believe this is
true, then what does that mean? And then what is the
repercussions of acting on that as if that were true and you
(05:21):
follow it out? We see this with socialism.
Oh, socialism and communism, communism, it's just never been
practiced right. It's just never been done right.
If it was done right, well, let's follow the mindset, the
belief system that's behind thatout to its logical conclusion.
And it always ends in disaster, despair, death.
(05:43):
Like there's not, there is no good thing that can come from it
when you have understanding. And so if we don't understand
how to think rightly, anybody, anybody, we're susceptible to
manipulation, We're susceptible to bad, to fake news, all the
fake news. And who determines what's fake
(06:04):
news? Well, if you don't know how to
think, well, it's just whoever shouts loudest or whoever,
whatever comes across your social media feed the most or
whatever your political party issaying that day, because that
could change. Now that we say this.
As we have seen, as we have seen, and so it it's, you know,
(06:25):
James talks about a double minded man is unstable in all
his ways and tossed to and fro. And that's what I see happening
in society today. If you're not anchored in truth
and part of being anchored in truth means being able to
recognize it, knowing how to find truth, knowing how to
discover truth because I believethere is truth and we can know
(06:47):
it and it is the glory of man. The Bible says it's the glory of
God to to hide a matter in the glory of kings to search a
matter out. This is what we're designed to
do is we're designed to reason and to think and to use this
brain that God has given us to seek truth.
When we don't do that now we're susceptible there there is no
(07:09):
stability like James tells us, unstable in all his ways.
Well, what are we seeing a a massive explosion of is mental
instability, emotional instability.
People are that do not have a solid foundation of truth.
You're open to anything now any,any bad idea you if you can't
(07:30):
recognize that it's a bad idea, sure, do that.
Oh, now we're going to do this and now we're going to do this
and now we're going to do this. And there's nothing that you can
actually build a solid life from.
And here's the thing, there's noshortage of people out there who
are really excited to tell you their bad ideas to get you on
board with whatever it is that they're trying to sell to pass
(07:54):
like advertisements. Oh my goodness.
If nothing else, teach your kidshow to think well so they don't
get caught up and wasted a ton of money on stuff that's just
being over overpriced or sold tothem that they don't need.
And like, there's so many different ways that you've got
to be able to recognize these tactics.
You've got to be able to recognize when someone's trying
(08:15):
to manipulate you, when you're being sold something that you
really just don't need, but theyknow how to play on our human
psychology. All of those things happen.
And if we are to live a life based on that's stable and
that's true and have good mentaland emotional health, we have to
be able to think and reason and and recognize lies when we see
(08:38):
them. Because.
One of my favorite books is LiveNot By Lies.
I don't know if you've heard this one, so listen to it.
Back in I think 2020-2021. And I was like, you know, and
his whole thing is you, we just,you don't have to be the person
standing up shouting and, you know, making a big hubbaloo
(09:00):
hullabaloo about whatever it is you believe or don't believe.
But what you can't do is go along with a lie.
We will never side with the lie.And if you can just do that,
then you are going to save yourself a lot of pain.
Totally. You're going to save your kids a
lot of pain and it just really sets you up for having a
(09:23):
foundation that you can actuallybuild a life upon.
Right, and we can't settle for just the little lies that we
don't feel like are any big deal, like when when when our
kids were little and they'd watch I don't even know, but
like Dino trucks or I don't evenknow if we watch that.
So I'm not recommending that I've just heard of it.
I don't even know. But but the point is, I was
trying to think I'm think dinosaurs or land, you know,
they're always just a little lie.
(09:44):
The millions of years. It's just it's not well now do
you know it's billions of years because millions of years didn't
pan out for them. So now they have to make it
billions because like you said, if there's not a Plumb line, if
there's not a truth, if there's not a rooted foundation, if
there's not one truth, then they're going to waver, they're
going to go, oh, well, this lie isn't panning out.
So we have to add to the lie. But if we let those little
things go when our kids are little, like we don't address it
(10:06):
in the books and the shows and the the things that they see out
there, it will grow. And just like we said, you know,
OK, the evolution thing, it grewto something that is so
unbelievable. You know, people are like, oh,
it's not destroying anybody. No, but it is now.
It is now, it's that that line of thinking, that thought, that
initial thought of there is no God, God, we have no value.
(10:28):
It is now destroying lives in ina huge way.
And the other thing that you said is, you know, you've talked
about propaganda proofing our teens or, or spotting the lies
on the Billboard, right? We a couple weeks ago, a couple
months ago, I had Greta Eskridge.
I'm not sure if you're familiar with her, but she just wrote
this incredible book about it's time to talk to your kids about
porn and how she talked about how the world it has all this
(10:51):
propaganda to suck and allure our kids in to something that is
very destructive. And she talked about a
billboard. Got you guys can go back and
listen to that episode. It's phenomenal.
But about a billboard that she was driving by and all it was
was it was a, it was a billboardfor a chip, right, a potato
chip. And the potato chip was kind of
fuzzed out and it said somethinglike good enough to have naked
(11:14):
and meaning you don't need to dip it in a ranch dip or a sour
cream and onion dip because the chip is so good.
But what she was saying is because it was just blurred out
our, our, we have been taught that that means, oh, there's
something there that I shouldn'tsomething that I want to see,
but I maybe shouldn't like it's a little alluring, right?
And our kids would just drive bythat billboard and not even
(11:35):
think of it. But she was really talking about
how that subtle lie, that subtlepropaganda, it gets into our
kids minds. And then as as the porn industry
is pursuing our children, which they are, they're kind of,
they're not sensitive to those things because it's on every
billboard, every magazine, everywhere you go.
And so she was talking about thesame thing of we have to teach
(11:58):
our kids to think about every single thing, even those simple
billboards we drive by, right. Yep.
Yeah, and that's that's a it's apropaganda tactic.
It's a form of dog whistling where you a dog whistle, right?
It's a dog whistles like at a frequency that humans can't
hear, but the dogs can hear it. So a dog whistle kind of out in
(12:20):
society is where they'll either say or have images of very
certain things that you don't necessarily pick up on or
everybody doesn't pick up on it,but there's certain things that,
you know, it's associated with this like 1 version of a dog
whistle. What we just kind of talked
about is if you have AT shirt and it's got the the rainbow
(12:43):
colors behind it, Well, you without even saying anything,
you instantly know that there isa message behind it that it is
the, you know, the gay agenda orwhatever right is going to be
behind it because it's just there in the imaging.
And so that is the kind of thingthat if we can teach our kids,
hey, here's the propaganda tactics, this is what they're
(13:05):
going to try. There's nothing new under the
sun. Like we can tell them in
advance, hey, you're going to run into this, this, this, this,
this. There's names for it there.
It's not new. They're not tricky.
They're not sneaky. The only way they work is if you
don't know. So guess what, if we teach our
kids now, when they see it, they're like, there it is.
I know that it's got a name. Spot the lie I.
(13:27):
Just not going to work. Totally.
Yeah. And it's everywhere.
And so before we have to take a break, because when I come back
from the break, I want to talk about, I really want to talk
about a single homeschooling, a single child.
I have so many friends doing this right now and I know
they'll be encouraged. But before we do that it really,
you know, God in in his word, weare called to love God with all
(13:48):
of our hearts, all of our what our minds right?
It says that loving God with allof our minds.
So before we close this this part out for an ad, can you help
parents and encourage parents? How do we teach our kids to love
truth? How do we teach our kids to love
God with all their minds? And we're told to take every
(14:10):
thought captive, right? God actually says a lot about
our thinking. And it's not passive.
It is actually a very active thing that we are commanded to
do and that we're told to do. We are told think on these
things, OK, that's not a passivething.
How often do we think about whatwe think about?
How often do we choose what we're going to think about?
(14:32):
And so when we can train our kids, OK, what is the truth
here? How and to you said it, how can
we train our kids to love the truth?
Well, it starts with there is truth and.
And where we find it. And it is knowable.
And here that truth is a person.All truth is God's truth.
(14:52):
And if we can point them back tothat, then we can teach them,
OK, we're going to love truth. So when you love truth, what
does that mean? What do you do when you love
something is you protect it, youhonor it, you esteem it, you
value it and you make sure that you want to introduce it to
other people as well. When you when you love
something, you want to share it.And so to teach them that no,
(15:16):
this, this matters. The truth matters.
The truth is important. And if you can search that, that
is the Plumb line and it is a worthy pursuit.
We need to teach them that this is a worthy thing, even if you
have to wrestle with something for minutes, days, months.
I think about people who have been involved in the study of
(15:38):
different like theology pursuits.
I went to a Bible college and itwas 2 years and I came out
feeling like I knew everything there was to know about the
Bible, right? Little did I know, but there are
people who they have studied 1 aspect of scripture for an
entire lifetime, for an entire career.
(15:58):
So when we can realize that, no,it is a worthy pursuit to to
seek truth, regardless of how long it takes, regardless of OK,
this is going to be a lot of work.
Yeah, that's. Good.
It's a worthy. And at the end of the day, when
you wrestle with something and you wrestle with it and you
wrestle with it and you wrestle with it and you come out
standing on that truth, you are going to be so much more solid
(16:22):
because of the wrestling, right?And that's why it's so much more
important. And then we don't just tell our
kids the truth, which we have to, but then we teach them to
seek and find the truth and thatwe don't have to be afraid of
that because at the end of the day, their walk is going to be
their own walk. They're going to have to choose
truth on their own. You know, homeschool doesn't
save people telling our kids, reading them the Bible doesn't
(16:42):
save them. It is going to be an their own
personal decision to walk in truth.
And so if they can wrestle with it, they're going to come out
stronger. I mean, that's what wrestling
does. It makes you stronger, right?
I mean, that's, it's like a, it's this strength thing.
And the other thing, I think twomore things.
One, lies always hurt people. That's just a reality.
Lies hurt people. And so if we are called to love,
(17:03):
which we are, love God with all,you know, love God, love others,
then we are called to not hurt people.
And the truth is love. And so if you love people, the
world right now says if you love, you're going to care about
everybody. You know, making sure people
feel the way that they want to feel.
No lies hurt people and truth sets them free.
So if we do want to love people,then we need to tell them the
(17:24):
truth. And before we close out,
everybody knows that I have a huge passion for well, one of
our huge passions is getting kids outdoors off screens.
Like this is my passion, get kids off screens.
One thing that I see screens doing is nobody's quiet with
their thoughts anymore. Like if there's a lull in in, if
there is a lull, you see people grab their screen and start
(17:45):
scrolling. And when they're scrolling, what
they're doing is they're lettingother people feed into their
brain what they want them to know, right?
There is no thinking. There's just being told.
I'm being told that this is the fashion this week.
I'm being told that this is whatI should be doing for.
I mean, every woman wears A weighted vest now.
Why? Because we're being told that
you have to wear a weighted vestin perimenopause.
Like that's what I'm being told every single day.
(18:06):
Nobody is quiet with their thoughts anymore.
So I want to encourage parents, do not hand your kids a screen.
Don't do it because what you're doing is, you know, parents are
like, well, they're bored. Good.
Let them be quiet with their thoughts.
We have to be quiet with our thoughts because that's when we
hear the Lord. That's when we wrestle with the
(18:27):
questions. That's when we work things out
in our minds. So if you want to put a lot of
this into practice that we've talked about this week #1 go
find the podcast, Kathy's podcast.
Filter it through a brain cell to make it a priority to teach
your kids logic. Talk about it everywhere you go,
when you're standing, when you're sitting, when you rise,
right? In Deuteronomy, we have to point
(18:49):
our kids to truth and then have faith and peace.
When your kids wrestle with things, it's OK because the
wrestling will inevitably, I mean, God says if we seek, we're
going to find truth. If they're looking for truth,
they will find there. There is only one truth.
So Kathy, we're going to close out for a quick break and then
we are going to come back and weare going to completely switch
(19:11):
gears, which is a surprise to meand a surprise to you and a
surprise to our audience. But I'm actually really excited
about it. So just we're going to give a
quick add and then we'll be right back.
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That's ctcmath.com. We are back.
(20:40):
Okay, Kathy, we're switching gears.
You shared something at the beginning of this podcast that I
thought I knew everything about you because I spent every
morning with you. You didn't know it, but I heat
my second cup of coffee and thenyou and I hang out for 15
minutes with my kids. That's awesome.
So I thought I knew you, but butthat just goes to show you don't
really know someone just by watching them in the online
(21:00):
world. You have just one daughter whom
you just graduated, which is crazy.
I have a senior this next year and I will probably be calling
you because I'm laughing, I'm crying, I'm celebrating, I'm
devastated. It's like it is like every
emotion possible. Right.
And then you throw our season oflife into it and you're like,
maybe I do need a weighted vest and a high mountain to go climb
to work it all out in my brain. So just one child, though.
(21:24):
Which one? I just want to commend you
because I have heard so many parents say, well, you know,
because it's just one child, youknow, Then what about this?
What about socialization? What about friends?
What about just me and the kid? And I have many, many friends
who homeschool one child and I have many, many people that I
know that have stopped homeschooling for that very
(21:47):
reason. And clearly you didn't stop and
clearly it worked because you'vegraduated a child and she's
launching. So can you just talk to the
moms, a couple, one, those that want to homeschool with one
child but have a lot of apprehensions.
You more than anybody know thoseapprehensions.
And to the mom that is like, canI what, what are the challenges?
(22:07):
What are the struggles? What I want to preface it is
God's call does not change whether you have one kid or 10
kids. God's call is God's call.
And so when you answer that call, we're all going to have,
we're all going to have our things right.
And so share a little bit about your journey with homeschooling
one child. Yeah, a lot of people ask.
We used to joke that we had the homeschool starter kit with just
(22:32):
one kid because it, it does seemto be kind of the, not the norm,
but it, it, it's one of those things where there's going to be
hard things. If you've got one kid, if you've
got 2310, you know, 15 kids, whatever.
There's hard things about all ofthem and there's really great
(22:52):
things about all of them. And we didn't have one just by
choice. That was what we ended up like
what God gave us. So it's God's plan and.
And by the way, God's plan is always the best plan.
There is no Plan B like God's plan is the best plan.
And that's what I mean. That's that's what I love.
So if God's plan is the best plan, and God calls you to do
(23:13):
something, then you know it's going to have fruit and it's
going to be good. Yeah.
So for us, there were a couple things that really made a
difference. I feel like when you have an
only child, you do have to work harder at creating community.
You do. We were always very intentional
at creating friendships, at making opportunity for
(23:35):
friendships, at making sure thatwe were part.
We homeschooled with the community all the way through
because we knew we needed that. But she didn't have that.
She didn't have siblings, so there was not that built in.
Other kids to play with, other kids to interact with, fight
with. Yeah, exactly all of that.
So there's one of the benefits, no sibling fighting in my house.
(23:56):
So right, I mean, there's that. Another benefit is it's way
easier to just manage one kids homeschool than, you know, 8
kids homeschool. So I mean, there's some
blessings with it. It's easier to travel, to go do
really fun field trips and stufflike that.
But it it can be hard. It can feel isolating.
It's hard as a parent because any parent of an only child
(24:20):
knows that you're kind of in this position where you have to
be a playmate also. Yeah, I was thinking that
because you said hard. It's hard because a lot of
people like, oh, it's hard for the kid because the kid doesn't
have other kids. But I often think it's probably
hard for the mom too, because you now are all the things,
right? You are the mom, the teacher,
the playmate, the partner, the science experiment partner.
(24:41):
You're all the things. And so you would need community
as much as your child needs community, I would assume.
Yes, yes. So for us, we were very
intentional all of the years about community, about building
those friendships. There were even times that we
picked where we moved because itwas going to be around people,
around friends, around community.
(25:03):
We were very intentional about getting her into other things,
you know, curricular activity. She was involved with theater,
she was involved with welding and you know, you know, in
different things. So that's a commitment where you
say I'm going to be doing driving, I'm going to be signing
her up for this stuff. I'm going to be making the
commitment to get her there, youknow, until she can drive
(25:24):
herself, obviously. But that's, that's the, you
know, that's the trade off. That is the trade off.
So can it be done 100%? Now, different kids, depending
on their temperament are going to like it in different ways or
not like it in different ways. So there's going to be that.
And there came times where we had conversations with our
(25:46):
daughter like, you know, she's like, I hate being an only
child. I hate this.
And I'm like, I know, I know. It's, it's, and this is the
thing that you have to realize with the, you know, both as a
parent and for the my daughter, there was loss involved.
She has keenly felt the loss. I, I had a second pregnancy.
(26:07):
It was an ectopic pregnancy. I lost it, almost lost my life.
And we just weren't able to haveany kids after that.
And she has keenly felt that loss.
And so as a family, we have had to grieve that loss because it
is a loss of the potential of her to have siblings for a
lifetime. And, and you have to take that
(26:28):
into account. Now, there's some kids who they
love it. They love being an only child.
They love the fact that they don't have to share anything
with anybody and it's fantastic.But that's not always the case.
For some kids, it is a very painful thing.
And we there were different seasons of her life that that
came up more and we would have to face that as a family.
(26:49):
And it's just this is. Well, I think this is a it's, it
is what it is because God, just as every home school is
different and every kids learning style is different and
every kids passions are different, every family
structure is different. And like, I often think, you
know, I have, I have 3, but one of them is a boy.
(27:10):
And so that boy is at home all day, every day with us girls.
And so I have to be intentional to in the same way that you did
for a long time, I kind of was like, God, is this a, is this a
disservice? But then I'm like, who am I to
tell God like that my plan wouldbe better than his.
And what I'm learning now is theway that God set our family up
(27:32):
is for a great, for his glory and each of my kids good.
Like my boy is going to be an amazing husband, right?
And he's also, you know, very, very manly because he's the one
that's doing all the heavy lifting a lot of times around
the house. And like your daughter, God knew
from the beginning of time that she wouldn't have siblings and
he's going to use that for his glory and for her good.
And so I think so often as homeschool families, we get into
(27:54):
this, well, they have 6 kids andwell, they have an even amount
of kids. Like I always thought that'd be
nice because then they can partner up with things or they
this and and the reality is, is God has given all of us exactly
what he has given all of us and he has called all of us to
steward however many kids we have.
Well. And so for me, the encouragement
(28:14):
is don't not answer God's call to home school just because you
think the makeup of your family isn't what you want it to.
Because really at the end of theday, it's not about what we
want, it's about what he wants, right?
And so. Well, and there's and there's
great benefits. So some of the things that our
daughter has been able to do because we can either afford to
(28:34):
do it or we have resources to doit with just one kid.
She's been able to travel the world.
We've been able to she's go to camps.
She like there have been all these opportunities that she,
he's been able to take care of that.
Guess what, our friends that have 8 kids, they can't do it.
They can't do it. It's off the table.
And it's like, you know, I, I think we have to be so careful
(28:54):
in Christianity and in the homeschool world where we get
very prescriptive. We think that this is our
formula. If I do this formula, I will
have this outcome for my kid. And you know, you know, we put
it up on the pedestal and anything other than that, it's,
oh, I'm just a failure and I'm adisappointment.
It's like no, stop totally. No, this has no, you know,
(29:16):
everybody in this life has theirburden to bear.
Everybody there is something andwe can't take that from our
kids. If we took it from our kids, we
are doing them a disservice. This is something that my
daughter has had to wrestle with.
I didn't choose it for her. It is what it is.
But God meets her there and we have to realize I cannot out
(29:38):
circumstance God in her life. And we, we try to get so
formulaic and control this because we want the best.
We want the best for our kids. We want to set them up for
success. But ultimately, this is life,
and it's some good and it's somebad.
And if we focus on the good, then I mean, we can't we, that's
(29:59):
what we're called to do the goodand the lovely and the
praiseworthy. And I love that you said that
because so often I think, I think across the board, we, we
think that there's a formula, you know, and there was a post
that was just going around that it, it made my stomach sick.
But it was about, you know, not,not every mom's called to
homeschool because. And then he said, you homeschool
moms think that, you know, homeschooling your kid is going
to save them. And I was like, whoa, whoa,
(30:19):
whoa, no, that is not true. Nobody's ever, well, maybe
somebody said that, but I think.There are people that believe
that, right? I think there are.
But they think there's a formula.
There's a formula with how many kids, how to homeschool, which
curriculum to choose, how many hours, what and, and, and really
what it is. And we've talked about this in
other episodes. It's a need to control.
And really, when we talk about logic, it's not until we
(30:42):
surrender and until we release and then we just obey God with
what he's given us, right? Whatever that looks like with
that's one boy amongst 2 girls. Or, you know, I wrestled with
that for a while. Mikey needs a brother or else.
And then I was like, who am I right?
Who am I to think that I know better than God does?
And so. I it's an opportunity to say,
look, this is how we deal with hard things that happen to us in
(31:04):
life, 'cause this is not going to be the last hard thing that's
going to happen. This is not going to be the last
thing that she's faced with or that I'm faced with that I
didn't see this coming. I didn't choose this.
I, I can't control this. And now I have to walk in this.
This is life. And and so we can teach our kids
a lot by saying, yeah, I know. No, I hate it.
Also that you don't have any siblings.
(31:25):
Totally. That is valid, yeah.
And we get to choose how we're going to live with in this.
You sound like a woman who's learned a lot of logic.
Because I think that's another thing about studying logic is it
helps us. It brings us back to a reality
and a right thinking, right? Because when we're not logically
thinking, we have this attitude of everything is going to go
(31:46):
easy. Everything's going to go
wonderful. And if it's not, then I need to
manipulate the situation to makeit.
And like you said, no, this is real life like and this side of
eternity, we're going to have things that we struggle with and
there are opportunities to learnhow to deal with the next thing
we're going to struggle with because like you said, this
isn't the first nor the last. And so I love that I'm taking
(32:08):
away your your thing of it's, it's a lot of it was about
community and building community.
And I think whether you have onekid or six kids, we need that.
We need that as we're walking through a world that's feeding
us lies and a world that's giving us propaganda and trying
to manipulate our minds. We need like minded people.
We need community to help us think, right.
(32:29):
And that's kind of how I want towrap this up before I ask you a
few other questions is we do need community.
We need to find like minded people so that when we feel like
we're crazy, like during the 2020 when I felt like, am I the
only person you know? Then you find your people and,
and it's really important. And it's good for our kids to
have a group of kids to learn logic with and to talk logic
(32:50):
with. And I love that that's how how
you started this journey is justinspiring and encouraging a
future generation to to think well and filter everything
through the brain cell that God gave them and the truth that we
find in his word. And so Kathy, I'm going to quick
fire at the end of all of my episodes.
I like to quick fire getting to know you, even though clearly I
(33:12):
know you every morning I'm goingto ask you a few fun things and
we're going to go through this. So what's your favorite book?
OK, I would. I've got a couple.
I already said one of them live not by life, but I also this
year, the last semester with my daughter, we just read Mere
Christianity by that's on. My list this year to do with my
kids. Love love love so good because a
(33:35):
couple of things number 1 I had them trace the arguments he lays
out logically this whole argument so have her or.
Give it to you. Follow the argument each
chapter. What is the argument?
Even if you just do a little kind of diagram of what is the
argument that he's making, because he lays out this
(33:55):
beautiful argument for Christianity from a secular
perspective. So it's really interesting.
So that's one and #2 don't be afraid to disagree with him.
So ask yourself, push her, push her to think, man, do you agree
with that? Do you think he's right?
Because we took my daughter's class to this and there was some
(34:16):
of the things they're like, I don't think I agree with him on
that. That's fine.
Why I, I give it to me, like make a good reason for why he's
not infallible. I mean, I love CS Lewis, but
he's also and and we're living in a different time than when he
was living. And so how would you make the
argument today or would you evenmake that argument?
(34:37):
So that's so. Good, see you find a mom that's
not afraid to question, even see.
US. OK because like we said in the
first episode, it's OK to question things because it leads
us back to truth. I love that rather than making
our kids go, how dare you ask that or something's wrong with
you for not agreeing or for asking the question.
(35:00):
And I've been guilty of that. And then what that does is it
shuts my kids down from conversation with me, right?
It just shuts them down. I'm not going to say it again.
And so it shuts down that conversation.
OK, I love it. Mere Christianity live not by
lies. Favorite quote?
I put down this is a quote that my mom always used to tell us.
This too shall pass, right? This too shall pass.
You're never in a season forever.
(35:22):
And so therefore, how can you gothrough it with integrity?
How can you go through this withgrace based on truth?
So yeah. I'm just writing all this down
so good. This too shall pass.
And how can you go through with it?
And the fact that your mom said it, Those are always the gold
ones, right? Favorite Bible verse?
Right now I wrote down Lamentations 321 through 23 says
(35:44):
this, but this I call to mind. See, it's a choice.
Making a choice about what we'regoing to think.
This I call to mind, and therefore I have hope.
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases.
His mercy never come to an end. They are new every morning.
Great is your faithfulness. What's the address again?
(36:04):
Lamentations, 321 through 23. Oh, so good.
OK, if to to to, to close us out, if you could have moms take
one thing, I mean, we talked about all the things.
If moms could just take one thing away from our
conversation, what would it be? I would encourage them,
especially those of you who havemiddle school kids, take a deep
(36:28):
breath and welcome their questions and welcome their
arguments. I did a whole little miniseries
on how to argue and debate and do it well.
Teach your kids how to question well and how to argue well and
don't be afraid of them doing it.
We are so quick to label their argumentation as them being
(36:52):
disobedient or disrespectful. And yes, they need to do it
respectfully. So teach them to do it
respectfully. But we have to welcome it
because it is a, it is a developmental phase that if we
can teach them to do this well, they will have it for the rest
of their. Life that's convicting and you
said that in the very first episode.
And I, I, that is convicting to me because that age just can
(37:16):
like be nails on a chalkboard and, and I feel like, man, I
could, I could go back and do itbetter with my older 2, but I,
I'm a middle schooler now and I'm like, I'm going, I took
their argument as a, a challengeto me, right.
And I think that we could probably have you back and, and
help us with those middle schoolyears because we do as moms, we
take it as a challenge to us andmy authority and my knowledge
(37:37):
and my blah, blah, blah, blah, blah gag and we shut them down.
And so that was my big take awayfrom you is welcome it like it's
actually a good thing and it's going to set them up for success
in life. So I, I'm going to have you back
and we're going to camp on that mainly just for me because I I
need help with that middle school.
They get it. They challenge, but really like
(37:59):
what you're saying is it's good,it's welcoming.
God created their minds to do it.
And we can either, we can go oneof two ways and that depends on
how we respond to it. So Kathy, you are, I knew you
would be, I knew that you would be a wealth of wisdom.
And you are such a blessing, notonly just today for what you've
shared, but for every day that we get to listen to you.
(38:21):
And I hope families go find you on that podcast.
Work it into your school that you guys, she makes it.
She makes it easy for us to do our jobs right.
She opens the door. Kathy opens the door for us to
have these good conversations with our kids because a lot of
this stuff I wouldn't think about.
I don't know what these terms are, but Kathy Gibbons podcast
(38:41):
is, I would say, crucial in helping our children understand
and learn logic because we have to teach it.
So, Kathy, thank you so, so muchand remind everybody again one
more time, where can we find youand all your things?
Abby, thank you so much for having me on.
I appreciate it. The podcast is filtered through
a brain cell and you can find iton any podcast player.
(39:02):
And my website is filtered through through a braincell.com.
I am on Instagram filtered through a brain cell and Kathy
Gibbons on Facebook. So yeah, come and find.
Me, I love it. My kids are going to be super
excited. They asked who I was podcasting
with today and I told him and they were like, Oh my gosh, mom,
that's like the coolest. She's like you're famous.
(39:23):
Yeah, I love that. Celebrity in our home so.
It's the best hearing from the kids I love.
Hearing Oh my gosh. They are the.
Best, they're all about it. You make it fun, you make it
easy, you make it understandablefor all of us.
Hey, head on over to schoolhouserock.com.
Find everything that you ever needed to know about
homeschooling. What schoolhouse rock does,
podcast episodes. The movie is free on there.
(39:45):
Check it out. You can find me Abby Rinella,
Facebook, Instagram, our websitecalled to thetop.com and we will
see you back here next week witha new host and a new guest.
But always the same quality, pointing you guys back to truth,
pointing you guys back to Jesus,and encouraging and equipping
you in your homeschool walk. You're listening to the Biblical
(40:09):
Family Network. Hey, I'm Miki and I'm Will and
we're the Co host of the CultureProof podcast.
We want to invite you to join usevery week as we discuss what's
happening in the world and then 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 withinthe word of God.
(40:30):
So that's where we want to look.Amen.
When we resist those cultural trends that rival the truth, we
remain culture proof. I found myself vying for
control, right? We either put a high expectation
upon our husbands to be everything that we need them to
be at all times, or we put very little expectation on them and
(40:53):
we kind of take over. I think we've got to find that
right balance in how God has designed the home and the
marriage that we would come along as a helpmate.
And that doesn't mean that you as a helpmate don't do some of
the maybe more intricate detailsof your family life, but it does
mean that you come alongside as a partnership, not as ACEO.
There is no stability like Jamestells us, unstable in all his
ways. Well, what are we seeing a a
massive explosion of is mental instability.
People that do not have a solid foundation of truth.
You're open to anything. We're told to take every thought
captive. We are told think on these
(00:21):
things. Hey everybody, welcome back to
the Schoolhouse Rock podcast. I am Abby Rinella back with you
this week and I was with you last week also with my guest,
Kathy Gibbons. And this week we're going to
dive back into the topic of logic and the importance of
teaching our kids logic. If you did not listen to last
week's episode, go back and listen to it.
(00:42):
We had a lot, a lot of fun chatter about kind of where we
found our ways and in teaching our kids logic and examples and
and it was a lot of fun. And this week we're going to
dive into some of the nuts and bolts and the nitty gritty.
But before we do, I want to thank Apologia for sponsoring
this podcast. If you're looking for a trusted
homeschool resource to support your child's education with a
strong biblical worldview, you'll find it through Apologia.
(01:04):
For decades, Apologia has been ago to source for Christian
homeschool curriculum designed to educate, inspire, and build a
lifelong love of learning. They know the homeschooling
isn't 1 size fits all. That's why they offer a growing
catalog of resources to fit yourfamily's needs.
Dive into online self-paced courses, join live classes led
by incredible instructors, or stream engaging video lessons
(01:26):
anytime, anywhere. They even offer audio books
perfect for learning on the go. Apologia will partner with you
in your families educational journey.
Go to apologia.com. Kathy, this has been so much fun
and I, I, you guys have to go back and listen to last week
because we really discussed it As parents and homeschool
(01:47):
parents, we have to, it's not optional.
It's not a subject that we mightthrow in like maybe chemistry,
maybe not, probably not. We have to have to teach our
kids logic and logic is just a fancy pants way of saying
teaching our kids to think well,right.
Is, was that what you would say that?
Well, how would you explain whatis logic?
(02:08):
Yeah, logic is the ability to think well and to reason
perfect. And we discussed Kathy's podcast
and how I've personally used it in my home school.
Her podcast is thinking through a brain cell.
Sit right? Filter it through a brain cell.
Filter it through a brain cell. Kathy's podcast is filter it
through a brain cell. Go over check that out, work it
into your home school and go back and listen last week how I,
(02:31):
how my family has worked it intoours.
So I want to dive in a little bit on we, we kind of discussed,
we, we discussed a lot of great things, but I want to ask a kind
of a bigger, a bigger thing is how can bad thinking.
We talked a lot about teaching our kids good thinking, but if
we don't do this, how can bad thinking lead to bigger issues?
And I've, you know, it's really,I was just having some deep
(02:54):
thinking because you, you've inspired me to think deeper on
the bigger things. But I realize that say, you
know, for years and years and years, we've taught our kids
evolution and not we, not you, not me, but the school system
And I for years was like, peoplejust think, Oh, you know what,
that's the only bad thing there.This only lie they're teaching
in school. It's just evolution.
(03:14):
When they come home, we're goingto teach them creation.
No big deal. It's just one subject.
And I have fast forwarded and looked at this and gone.
OK, Ultimately the heart of evolution is to say there is no
God. You are not created on purpose
for a purpose. You're just no different than
the sludge in the street that might have a live bacteria in
it, right? And we Fast forward that however
(03:35):
many years evolution has been taught in our schools.
And I look at the abortion and the transgender stuff that's
being pushed now. And I really believe that it is
a direct effect from all those years of telling people you have
no innate value. God did not create you on
purpose for a purpose. If you're telling people that,
then why can't I be anything that I want?
(03:56):
Why can't I be a boy or a dog ora why can't I murder a baby
that's in my womb? Because it has no innate value.
And I think so often we think just little tiny lies, little
things like it's just my parentslearned evolution in school,
right? And they're in their 70s.
My dad is almost 80. And that was in their
generation. And it was like, oh, it's just
one thing. We can just let it go. 1
(04:18):
untruth, but those little untruths grow and grow and grow
and they end up causing major, major bigger issues, major
damage. And so can you kind of share
some either other examples or why it is so important that we
don't let those little bad thinking things go either in our
personal lives, in our kids lives or bigger picture in in
(04:38):
our culture? Yeah, there's a quote.
I'm sitting here trying to remember exactly how it goes.
It's by Bill Jack, and he says something along the lines bad
thinking leads to bad ideas, andbad ideas have victims, right?
It's something like that. I might not have that quite
exactly right, but the bottom line is ideas have consequences.
(05:00):
And when we don't understand what's behind these ideas and
when we don't take the time to think something out to its
logical conclusion. OK, so if we believe this is
true, then what does that mean? And then what is the
repercussions of acting on that as if that were true and you
(05:21):
follow it out? We see this with socialism.
Oh, socialism and communism, communism, it's just never been
practiced right. It's just never been done right.
If it was done right, well, let's follow the mindset, the
belief system that's behind thatout to its logical conclusion.
And it always ends in disaster, despair, death.
(05:43):
Like there's not, there is no good thing that can come from it
when you have understanding. And so if we don't understand
how to think rightly, anybody, anybody, we're susceptible to
manipulation, We're susceptible to bad, to fake news, all the
fake news. And who determines what's fake
(06:04):
news? Well, if you don't know how to
think, well, it's just whoever shouts loudest or whoever,
whatever comes across your social media feed the most or
whatever your political party issaying that day, because that
could change. Now that we say this.
As we have seen, as we have seen, and so it it's, you know,
(06:25):
James talks about a double minded man is unstable in all
his ways and tossed to and fro. And that's what I see happening
in society today. If you're not anchored in truth
and part of being anchored in truth means being able to
recognize it, knowing how to find truth, knowing how to
discover truth because I believethere is truth and we can know
(06:47):
it and it is the glory of man. The Bible says it's the glory of
God to to hide a matter in the glory of kings to search a
matter out. This is what we're designed to
do is we're designed to reason and to think and to use this
brain that God has given us to seek truth.
When we don't do that now we're susceptible there there is no
(07:09):
stability like James tells us, unstable in all his ways.
Well, what are we seeing a a massive explosion of is mental
instability, emotional instability.
People are that do not have a solid foundation of truth.
You're open to anything now any,any bad idea you if you can't
(07:30):
recognize that it's a bad idea, sure, do that.
Oh, now we're going to do this and now we're going to do this
and now we're going to do this. And there's nothing that you can
actually build a solid life from.
And here's the thing, there's noshortage of people out there who
are really excited to tell you their bad ideas to get you on
board with whatever it is that they're trying to sell to pass
(07:54):
like advertisements. Oh my goodness.
If nothing else, teach your kidshow to think well so they don't
get caught up and wasted a ton of money on stuff that's just
being over overpriced or sold tothem that they don't need.
And like, there's so many different ways that you've got
to be able to recognize these tactics.
You've got to be able to recognize when someone's trying
(08:15):
to manipulate you, when you're being sold something that you
really just don't need, but theyknow how to play on our human
psychology. All of those things happen.
And if we are to live a life based on that's stable and
that's true and have good mentaland emotional health, we have to
be able to think and reason and and recognize lies when we see
(08:38):
them. Because.
One of my favorite books is LiveNot By Lies.
I don't know if you've heard this one, so listen to it.
Back in I think 2020-2021. And I was like, you know, and
his whole thing is you, we just,you don't have to be the person
standing up shouting and, you know, making a big hubbaloo
(09:00):
hullabaloo about whatever it is you believe or don't believe.
But what you can't do is go along with a lie.
We will never side with the lie.And if you can just do that,
then you are going to save yourself a lot of pain.
Totally. You're going to save your kids a
lot of pain and it just really sets you up for having a
(09:23):
foundation that you can actuallybuild a life upon.
Right, and we can't settle for just the little lies that we
don't feel like are any big deal, like when when when our
kids were little and they'd watch I don't even know, but
like Dino trucks or I don't evenknow if we watch that.
So I'm not recommending that I've just heard of it.
I don't even know. But but the point is, I was
trying to think I'm think dinosaurs or land, you know,
they're always just a little lie.
(09:44):
The millions of years. It's just it's not well now do
you know it's billions of years because millions of years didn't
pan out for them. So now they have to make it
billions because like you said, if there's not a Plumb line, if
there's not a truth, if there's not a rooted foundation, if
there's not one truth, then they're going to waver, they're
going to go, oh, well, this lie isn't panning out.
So we have to add to the lie. But if we let those little
things go when our kids are little, like we don't address it
(10:06):
in the books and the shows and the the things that they see out
there, it will grow. And just like we said, you know,
OK, the evolution thing, it grewto something that is so
unbelievable. You know, people are like, oh,
it's not destroying anybody. No, but it is now.
It is now, it's that that line of thinking, that thought, that
initial thought of there is no God, God, we have no value.
(10:28):
It is now destroying lives in ina huge way.
And the other thing that you said is, you know, you've talked
about propaganda proofing our teens or, or spotting the lies
on the Billboard, right? We a couple weeks ago, a couple
months ago, I had Greta Eskridge.
I'm not sure if you're familiar with her, but she just wrote
this incredible book about it's time to talk to your kids about
porn and how she talked about how the world it has all this
(10:51):
propaganda to suck and allure our kids in to something that is
very destructive. And she talked about a
billboard. Got you guys can go back and
listen to that episode. It's phenomenal.
But about a billboard that she was driving by and all it was
was it was a, it was a billboardfor a chip, right, a potato
chip. And the potato chip was kind of
fuzzed out and it said somethinglike good enough to have naked
(11:14):
and meaning you don't need to dip it in a ranch dip or a sour
cream and onion dip because the chip is so good.
But what she was saying is because it was just blurred out
our, our, we have been taught that that means, oh, there's
something there that I shouldn'tsomething that I want to see,
but I maybe shouldn't like it's a little alluring, right?
And our kids would just drive bythat billboard and not even
(11:35):
think of it. But she was really talking about
how that subtle lie, that subtlepropaganda, it gets into our
kids minds. And then as as the porn industry
is pursuing our children, which they are, they're kind of,
they're not sensitive to those things because it's on every
billboard, every magazine, everywhere you go.
And so she was talking about thesame thing of we have to teach
(11:58):
our kids to think about every single thing, even those simple
billboards we drive by, right. Yep.
Yeah, and that's that's a it's apropaganda tactic.
It's a form of dog whistling where you a dog whistle, right?
It's a dog whistles like at a frequency that humans can't
hear, but the dogs can hear it. So a dog whistle kind of out in
(12:20):
society is where they'll either say or have images of very
certain things that you don't necessarily pick up on or
everybody doesn't pick up on it,but there's certain things that,
you know, it's associated with this like 1 version of a dog
whistle. What we just kind of talked
about is if you have AT shirt and it's got the the rainbow
(12:43):
colors behind it, Well, you without even saying anything,
you instantly know that there isa message behind it that it is
the, you know, the gay agenda orwhatever right is going to be
behind it because it's just there in the imaging.
And so that is the kind of thingthat if we can teach our kids,
hey, here's the propaganda tactics, this is what they're
(13:05):
going to try. There's nothing new under the
sun. Like we can tell them in
advance, hey, you're going to run into this, this, this, this,
this. There's names for it there.
It's not new. They're not tricky.
They're not sneaky. The only way they work is if you
don't know. So guess what, if we teach our
kids now, when they see it, they're like, there it is.
I know that it's got a name. Spot the lie I.
(13:27):
Just not going to work. Totally.
Yeah. And it's everywhere.
And so before we have to take a break, because when I come back
from the break, I want to talk about, I really want to talk
about a single homeschooling, a single child.
I have so many friends doing this right now and I know
they'll be encouraged. But before we do that it really,
you know, God in in his word, weare called to love God with all
(13:48):
of our hearts, all of our what our minds right?
It says that loving God with allof our minds.
So before we close this this part out for an ad, can you help
parents and encourage parents? How do we teach our kids to love
truth? How do we teach our kids to love
God with all their minds? And we're told to take every
(14:10):
thought captive, right? God actually says a lot about
our thinking. And it's not passive.
It is actually a very active thing that we are commanded to
do and that we're told to do. We are told think on these
things, OK, that's not a passivething.
How often do we think about whatwe think about?
How often do we choose what we're going to think about?
(14:32):
And so when we can train our kids, OK, what is the truth
here? How and to you said it, how can
we train our kids to love the truth?
Well, it starts with there is truth and.
And where we find it. And it is knowable.
And here that truth is a person.All truth is God's truth.
(14:52):
And if we can point them back tothat, then we can teach them,
OK, we're going to love truth. So when you love truth, what
does that mean? What do you do when you love
something is you protect it, youhonor it, you esteem it, you
value it and you make sure that you want to introduce it to
other people as well. When you when you love
something, you want to share it.And so to teach them that no,
(15:16):
this, this matters. The truth matters.
The truth is important. And if you can search that, that
is the Plumb line and it is a worthy pursuit.
We need to teach them that this is a worthy thing, even if you
have to wrestle with something for minutes, days, months.
I think about people who have been involved in the study of
(15:38):
different like theology pursuits.
I went to a Bible college and itwas 2 years and I came out
feeling like I knew everything there was to know about the
Bible, right? Little did I know, but there are
people who they have studied 1 aspect of scripture for an
entire lifetime, for an entire career.
(15:58):
So when we can realize that, no,it is a worthy pursuit to to
seek truth, regardless of how long it takes, regardless of OK,
this is going to be a lot of work.
Yeah, that's. Good.
It's a worthy. And at the end of the day, when
you wrestle with something and you wrestle with it and you
wrestle with it and you wrestle with it and you come out
standing on that truth, you are going to be so much more solid
(16:22):
because of the wrestling, right?And that's why it's so much more
important. And then we don't just tell our
kids the truth, which we have to, but then we teach them to
seek and find the truth and thatwe don't have to be afraid of
that because at the end of the day, their walk is going to be
their own walk. They're going to have to choose
truth on their own. You know, homeschool doesn't
save people telling our kids, reading them the Bible doesn't
(16:42):
save them. It is going to be an their own
personal decision to walk in truth.
And so if they can wrestle with it, they're going to come out
stronger. I mean, that's what wrestling
does. It makes you stronger, right?
I mean, that's, it's like a, it's this strength thing.
And the other thing, I think twomore things.
One, lies always hurt people. That's just a reality.
Lies hurt people. And so if we are called to love,
(17:03):
which we are, love God with all,you know, love God, love others,
then we are called to not hurt people.
And the truth is love. And so if you love people, the
world right now says if you love, you're going to care about
everybody. You know, making sure people
feel the way that they want to feel.
No lies hurt people and truth sets them free.
So if we do want to love people,then we need to tell them the
(17:24):
truth. And before we close out,
everybody knows that I have a huge passion for well, one of
our huge passions is getting kids outdoors off screens.
Like this is my passion, get kids off screens.
One thing that I see screens doing is nobody's quiet with
their thoughts anymore. Like if there's a lull in in, if
there is a lull, you see people grab their screen and start
(17:45):
scrolling. And when they're scrolling, what
they're doing is they're lettingother people feed into their
brain what they want them to know, right?
There is no thinking. There's just being told.
I'm being told that this is the fashion this week.
I'm being told that this is whatI should be doing for.
I mean, every woman wears A weighted vest now.
Why? Because we're being told that
you have to wear a weighted vestin perimenopause.
Like that's what I'm being told every single day.
(18:06):
Nobody is quiet with their thoughts anymore.
So I want to encourage parents, do not hand your kids a screen.
Don't do it because what you're doing is, you know, parents are
like, well, they're bored. Good.
Let them be quiet with their thoughts.
We have to be quiet with our thoughts because that's when we
hear the Lord. That's when we wrestle with the
(18:27):
questions. That's when we work things out
in our minds. So if you want to put a lot of
this into practice that we've talked about this week #1 go
find the podcast, Kathy's podcast.
Filter it through a brain cell to make it a priority to teach
your kids logic. Talk about it everywhere you go,
when you're standing, when you're sitting, when you rise,
right? In Deuteronomy, we have to point
(18:49):
our kids to truth and then have faith and peace.
When your kids wrestle with things, it's OK because the
wrestling will inevitably, I mean, God says if we seek, we're
going to find truth. If they're looking for truth,
they will find there. There is only one truth.
So Kathy, we're going to close out for a quick break and then
we are going to come back and weare going to completely switch
(19:11):
gears, which is a surprise to meand a surprise to you and a
surprise to our audience. But I'm actually really excited
about it. So just we're going to give a
quick add and then we'll be right back.
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That's ctcmath.com. We are back.
(20:40):
Okay, Kathy, we're switching gears.
You shared something at the beginning of this podcast that I
thought I knew everything about you because I spent every
morning with you. You didn't know it, but I heat
my second cup of coffee and thenyou and I hang out for 15
minutes with my kids. That's awesome.
So I thought I knew you, but butthat just goes to show you don't
really know someone just by watching them in the online
(21:00):
world. You have just one daughter whom
you just graduated, which is crazy.
I have a senior this next year and I will probably be calling
you because I'm laughing, I'm crying, I'm celebrating, I'm
devastated. It's like it is like every
emotion possible. Right.
And then you throw our season oflife into it and you're like,
maybe I do need a weighted vest and a high mountain to go climb
to work it all out in my brain. So just one child, though.
(21:24):
Which one? I just want to commend you
because I have heard so many parents say, well, you know,
because it's just one child, youknow, Then what about this?
What about socialization? What about friends?
What about just me and the kid? And I have many, many friends
who homeschool one child and I have many, many people that I
know that have stopped homeschooling for that very
(21:47):
reason. And clearly you didn't stop and
clearly it worked because you'vegraduated a child and she's
launching. So can you just talk to the
moms, a couple, one, those that want to homeschool with one
child but have a lot of apprehensions.
You more than anybody know thoseapprehensions.
And to the mom that is like, canI what, what are the challenges?
(22:07):
What are the struggles? What I want to preface it is
God's call does not change whether you have one kid or 10
kids. God's call is God's call.
And so when you answer that call, we're all going to have,
we're all going to have our things right.
And so share a little bit about your journey with homeschooling
one child. Yeah, a lot of people ask.
We used to joke that we had the homeschool starter kit with just
(22:32):
one kid because it, it does seemto be kind of the, not the norm,
but it, it, it's one of those things where there's going to be
hard things. If you've got one kid, if you've
got 2310, you know, 15 kids, whatever.
There's hard things about all ofthem and there's really great
(22:52):
things about all of them. And we didn't have one just by
choice. That was what we ended up like
what God gave us. So it's God's plan and.
And by the way, God's plan is always the best plan.
There is no Plan B like God's plan is the best plan.
And that's what I mean. That's that's what I love.
So if God's plan is the best plan, and God calls you to do
(23:13):
something, then you know it's going to have fruit and it's
going to be good. Yeah.
So for us, there were a couple things that really made a
difference. I feel like when you have an
only child, you do have to work harder at creating community.
You do. We were always very intentional
at creating friendships, at making opportunity for
(23:35):
friendships, at making sure thatwe were part.
We homeschooled with the community all the way through
because we knew we needed that. But she didn't have that.
She didn't have siblings, so there was not that built in.
Other kids to play with, other kids to interact with, fight
with. Yeah, exactly all of that.
So there's one of the benefits, no sibling fighting in my house.
(23:56):
So right, I mean, there's that. Another benefit is it's way
easier to just manage one kids homeschool than, you know, 8
kids homeschool. So I mean, there's some
blessings with it. It's easier to travel, to go do
really fun field trips and stufflike that.
But it it can be hard. It can feel isolating.
It's hard as a parent because any parent of an only child
(24:20):
knows that you're kind of in this position where you have to
be a playmate also. Yeah, I was thinking that
because you said hard. It's hard because a lot of
people like, oh, it's hard for the kid because the kid doesn't
have other kids. But I often think it's probably
hard for the mom too, because you now are all the things,
right? You are the mom, the teacher,
the playmate, the partner, the science experiment partner.
(24:41):
You're all the things. And so you would need community
as much as your child needs community, I would assume.
Yes, yes. So for us, we were very
intentional all of the years about community, about building
those friendships. There were even times that we
picked where we moved because itwas going to be around people,
around friends, around community.
(25:03):
We were very intentional about getting her into other things,
you know, curricular activity. She was involved with theater,
she was involved with welding and you know, you know, in
different things. So that's a commitment where you
say I'm going to be doing driving, I'm going to be signing
her up for this stuff. I'm going to be making the
commitment to get her there, youknow, until she can drive
(25:24):
herself, obviously. But that's, that's the, you
know, that's the trade off. That is the trade off.
So can it be done 100%? Now, different kids, depending
on their temperament are going to like it in different ways or
not like it in different ways. So there's going to be that.
And there came times where we had conversations with our
(25:46):
daughter like, you know, she's like, I hate being an only
child. I hate this.
And I'm like, I know, I know. It's, it's, and this is the
thing that you have to realize with the, you know, both as a
parent and for the my daughter, there was loss involved.
She has keenly felt the loss. I, I had a second pregnancy.
(26:07):
It was an ectopic pregnancy. I lost it, almost lost my life.
And we just weren't able to haveany kids after that.
And she has keenly felt that loss.
And so as a family, we have had to grieve that loss because it
is a loss of the potential of her to have siblings for a
lifetime. And, and you have to take that
(26:28):
into account. Now, there's some kids who they
love it. They love being an only child.
They love the fact that they don't have to share anything
with anybody and it's fantastic.But that's not always the case.
For some kids, it is a very painful thing.
And we there were different seasons of her life that that
came up more and we would have to face that as a family.
(26:49):
And it's just this is. Well, I think this is a it's, it
is what it is because God, just as every home school is
different and every kids learning style is different and
every kids passions are different, every family
structure is different. And like, I often think, you
know, I have, I have 3, but one of them is a boy.
(27:10):
And so that boy is at home all day, every day with us girls.
And so I have to be intentional to in the same way that you did
for a long time, I kind of was like, God, is this a, is this a
disservice? But then I'm like, who am I to
tell God like that my plan wouldbe better than his.
And what I'm learning now is theway that God set our family up
(27:32):
is for a great, for his glory and each of my kids good.
Like my boy is going to be an amazing husband, right?
And he's also, you know, very, very manly because he's the one
that's doing all the heavy lifting a lot of times around
the house. And like your daughter, God knew
from the beginning of time that she wouldn't have siblings and
he's going to use that for his glory and for her good.
And so I think so often as homeschool families, we get into
(27:54):
this, well, they have 6 kids andwell, they have an even amount
of kids. Like I always thought that'd be
nice because then they can partner up with things or they
this and and the reality is, is God has given all of us exactly
what he has given all of us and he has called all of us to
steward however many kids we have.
Well. And so for me, the encouragement
(28:14):
is don't not answer God's call to home school just because you
think the makeup of your family isn't what you want it to.
Because really at the end of theday, it's not about what we
want, it's about what he wants, right?
And so. Well, and there's and there's
great benefits. So some of the things that our
daughter has been able to do because we can either afford to
(28:34):
do it or we have resources to doit with just one kid.
She's been able to travel the world.
We've been able to she's go to camps.
She like there have been all these opportunities that she,
he's been able to take care of that.
Guess what, our friends that have 8 kids, they can't do it.
They can't do it. It's off the table.
And it's like, you know, I, I think we have to be so careful
(28:54):
in Christianity and in the homeschool world where we get
very prescriptive. We think that this is our
formula. If I do this formula, I will
have this outcome for my kid. And you know, you know, we put
it up on the pedestal and anything other than that, it's,
oh, I'm just a failure and I'm adisappointment.
It's like no, stop totally. No, this has no, you know,
(29:16):
everybody in this life has theirburden to bear.
Everybody there is something andwe can't take that from our
kids. If we took it from our kids, we
are doing them a disservice. This is something that my
daughter has had to wrestle with.
I didn't choose it for her. It is what it is.
But God meets her there and we have to realize I cannot out
(29:38):
circumstance God in her life. And we, we try to get so
formulaic and control this because we want the best.
We want the best for our kids. We want to set them up for
success. But ultimately, this is life,
and it's some good and it's somebad.
And if we focus on the good, then I mean, we can't we, that's
(29:59):
what we're called to do the goodand the lovely and the
praiseworthy. And I love that you said that
because so often I think, I think across the board, we, we
think that there's a formula, you know, and there was a post
that was just going around that it, it made my stomach sick.
But it was about, you know, not,not every mom's called to
homeschool because. And then he said, you homeschool
moms think that, you know, homeschooling your kid is going
to save them. And I was like, whoa, whoa,
(30:19):
whoa, no, that is not true. Nobody's ever, well, maybe
somebody said that, but I think.There are people that believe
that, right? I think there are.
But they think there's a formula.
There's a formula with how many kids, how to homeschool, which
curriculum to choose, how many hours, what and, and, and really
what it is. And we've talked about this in
other episodes. It's a need to control.
And really, when we talk about logic, it's not until we
(30:42):
surrender and until we release and then we just obey God with
what he's given us, right? Whatever that looks like with
that's one boy amongst 2 girls. Or, you know, I wrestled with
that for a while. Mikey needs a brother or else.
And then I was like, who am I right?
Who am I to think that I know better than God does?
And so. I it's an opportunity to say,
look, this is how we deal with hard things that happen to us in
(31:04):
life, 'cause this is not going to be the last hard thing that's
going to happen. This is not going to be the last
thing that she's faced with or that I'm faced with that I
didn't see this coming. I didn't choose this.
I, I can't control this. And now I have to walk in this.
This is life. And and so we can teach our kids
a lot by saying, yeah, I know. No, I hate it.
Also that you don't have any siblings.
(31:25):
Totally. That is valid, yeah.
And we get to choose how we're going to live with in this.
You sound like a woman who's learned a lot of logic.
Because I think that's another thing about studying logic is it
helps us. It brings us back to a reality
and a right thinking, right? Because when we're not logically
thinking, we have this attitude of everything is going to go
(31:46):
easy. Everything's going to go
wonderful. And if it's not, then I need to
manipulate the situation to makeit.
And like you said, no, this is real life like and this side of
eternity, we're going to have things that we struggle with and
there are opportunities to learnhow to deal with the next thing
we're going to struggle with because like you said, this
isn't the first nor the last. And so I love that I'm taking
(32:08):
away your your thing of it's, it's a lot of it was about
community and building community.
And I think whether you have onekid or six kids, we need that.
We need that as we're walking through a world that's feeding
us lies and a world that's giving us propaganda and trying
to manipulate our minds. We need like minded people.
We need community to help us think, right.
(32:29):
And that's kind of how I want towrap this up before I ask you a
few other questions is we do need community.
We need to find like minded people so that when we feel like
we're crazy, like during the 2020 when I felt like, am I the
only person you know? Then you find your people and,
and it's really important. And it's good for our kids to
have a group of kids to learn logic with and to talk logic
(32:50):
with. And I love that that's how how
you started this journey is justinspiring and encouraging a
future generation to to think well and filter everything
through the brain cell that God gave them and the truth that we
find in his word. And so Kathy, I'm going to quick
fire at the end of all of my episodes.
I like to quick fire getting to know you, even though clearly I
(33:12):
know you every morning I'm goingto ask you a few fun things and
we're going to go through this. So what's your favorite book?
OK, I would. I've got a couple.
I already said one of them live not by life, but I also this
year, the last semester with my daughter, we just read Mere
Christianity by that's on. My list this year to do with my
kids. Love love love so good because a
(33:35):
couple of things number 1 I had them trace the arguments he lays
out logically this whole argument so have her or.
Give it to you. Follow the argument each
chapter. What is the argument?
Even if you just do a little kind of diagram of what is the
argument that he's making, because he lays out this
(33:55):
beautiful argument for Christianity from a secular
perspective. So it's really interesting.
So that's one and #2 don't be afraid to disagree with him.
So ask yourself, push her, push her to think, man, do you agree
with that? Do you think he's right?
Because we took my daughter's class to this and there was some
(34:16):
of the things they're like, I don't think I agree with him on
that. That's fine.
Why I, I give it to me, like make a good reason for why he's
not infallible. I mean, I love CS Lewis, but
he's also and and we're living in a different time than when he
was living. And so how would you make the
argument today or would you evenmake that argument?
(34:37):
So that's so. Good, see you find a mom that's
not afraid to question, even see.
US. OK because like we said in the
first episode, it's OK to question things because it leads
us back to truth. I love that rather than making
our kids go, how dare you ask that or something's wrong with
you for not agreeing or for asking the question.
(35:00):
And I've been guilty of that. And then what that does is it
shuts my kids down from conversation with me, right?
It just shuts them down. I'm not going to say it again.
And so it shuts down that conversation.
OK, I love it. Mere Christianity live not by
lies. Favorite quote?
I put down this is a quote that my mom always used to tell us.
This too shall pass, right? This too shall pass.
You're never in a season forever.
(35:22):
And so therefore, how can you gothrough it with integrity?
How can you go through this withgrace based on truth?
So yeah. I'm just writing all this down
so good. This too shall pass.
And how can you go through with it?
And the fact that your mom said it, Those are always the gold
ones, right? Favorite Bible verse?
Right now I wrote down Lamentations 321 through 23 says
(35:44):
this, but this I call to mind. See, it's a choice.
Making a choice about what we'regoing to think.
This I call to mind, and therefore I have hope.
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases.
His mercy never come to an end. They are new every morning.
Great is your faithfulness. What's the address again?
(36:04):
Lamentations, 321 through 23. Oh, so good.
OK, if to to to, to close us out, if you could have moms take
one thing, I mean, we talked about all the things.
If moms could just take one thing away from our
conversation, what would it be? I would encourage them,
especially those of you who havemiddle school kids, take a deep
(36:28):
breath and welcome their questions and welcome their
arguments. I did a whole little miniseries
on how to argue and debate and do it well.
Teach your kids how to question well and how to argue well and
don't be afraid of them doing it.
We are so quick to label their argumentation as them being
(36:52):
disobedient or disrespectful. And yes, they need to do it
respectfully. So teach them to do it
respectfully. But we have to welcome it
because it is a, it is a developmental phase that if we
can teach them to do this well, they will have it for the rest
of their. Life that's convicting and you
said that in the very first episode.
And I, I, that is convicting to me because that age just can
(37:16):
like be nails on a chalkboard and, and I feel like, man, I
could, I could go back and do itbetter with my older 2, but I,
I'm a middle schooler now and I'm like, I'm going, I took
their argument as a, a challengeto me, right.
And I think that we could probably have you back and, and
help us with those middle schoolyears because we do as moms, we
take it as a challenge to us andmy authority and my knowledge
(37:37):
and my blah, blah, blah, blah, blah gag and we shut them down.
And so that was my big take awayfrom you is welcome it like it's
actually a good thing and it's going to set them up for success
in life. So I, I'm going to have you back
and we're going to camp on that mainly just for me because I I
need help with that middle school.
They get it. They challenge, but really like
(37:59):
what you're saying is it's good,it's welcoming.
God created their minds to do it.
And we can either, we can go oneof two ways and that depends on
how we respond to it. So Kathy, you are, I knew you
would be, I knew that you would be a wealth of wisdom.
And you are such a blessing, notonly just today for what you've
shared, but for every day that we get to listen to you.
(38:21):
And I hope families go find you on that podcast.
Work it into your school that you guys, she makes it.
She makes it easy for us to do our jobs right.
She opens the door. Kathy opens the door for us to
have these good conversations with our kids because a lot of
this stuff I wouldn't think about.
I don't know what these terms are, but Kathy Gibbons podcast
(38:41):
is, I would say, crucial in helping our children understand
and learn logic because we have to teach it.
So, Kathy, thank you so, so muchand remind everybody again one
more time, where can we find youand all your things?
Abby, thank you so much for having me on.
I appreciate it. The podcast is filtered through
a brain cell and you can find iton any podcast player.
(39:02):
And my website is filtered through through a braincell.com.
I am on Instagram filtered through a brain cell and Kathy
Gibbons on Facebook. So yeah, come and find.
Me, I love it. My kids are going to be super
excited. They asked who I was podcasting
with today and I told him and they were like, Oh my gosh, mom,
that's like the coolest. She's like you're famous.
(39:23):
Yeah, I love that. Celebrity in our home so.
It's the best hearing from the kids I love.
Hearing Oh my gosh. They are the.
Best, they're all about it. You make it fun, you make it
easy, you make it understandablefor all of us.
Hey, head on over to schoolhouserock.com.
Find everything that you ever needed to know about
homeschooling. What schoolhouse rock does,
podcast episodes. The movie is free on there.
(39:45):
Check it out. You can find me Abby Rinella,
Facebook, Instagram, our websitecalled to thetop.com and we will
see you back here next week witha new host and a new guest.
But always the same quality, pointing you guys back to truth,
pointing you guys back to Jesus,and encouraging and equipping
you in your homeschool walk. You're listening to the Biblical
(40:09):
Family Network. Hey, I'm Miki and I'm Will and
we're the Co host of the CultureProof podcast.
We want to invite you to join usevery week as we discuss what's
happening in the world and then 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 withinthe word of God.
(40:30):
So that's where we want to look.Amen.
When we resist those cultural trends that rival the truth, we
remain culture proof. I found myself vying for
control, right? We either put a high expectation
upon our husbands to be everything that we need them to
be at all times, or we put very little expectation on them and
(40:53):
we kind of take over. I think we've got to find that
right balance in how God has designed the home and the
marriage that we would come along as a helpmate.
And that doesn't mean that you as a helpmate don't do some of
the maybe more intricate detailsof your family life, but it does
mean that you come alongside as a partnership, not as ACEO.
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