THESE are the CHANGES I Want to See in Homeschool Culture | Homeschool Mom Chat
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- Опубліковано 3 жов 2024
- As a lifelong homeschooler, I have noticed the ugly side of homeschool culture. Today, I wanted to chat about just 3 things that I would love to see change within homeschool culture.
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I'm Rachel, a mom of two and the oldest in a family of 8 kids. I'm a second-generation homeschooler who is passionate about education. I'm originally from Michigan, but am living overseas. My two young boys and teaching homeschool lessons to my youngest sisters keep me busy, but I make time for writing and for making UA-cam videos, too! On this channel, you can expect videos featuring books and homeschool curriculum, homeschool tips for hard days, our journey raising bilingual kids, and vlogs about the intentional adventure that our homeschool lifestyle allows! Subscribe to join our family here:
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I don’t know you but I think you’re my new best friend! Lol 😂
We are second generation homeschoolers but I was 40 when I had my child so I have many friends that don’t realize I was homeschooled. Because of this I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been in a conversation with a friend that reacts negatively when I tell them we have chosen to homeschool and they start with the ‘socialization’ thing and I say ‘well, you know I was homeschooled right?’
They are utterly shocked. I’m an outgoing person, involved in several ministries and well liked in my circle.
I’ve had people tell me that knowing me has changed their view of homeschooling.
It happens one person at a time
Absolutely, it's one person at a time that minds are changed. That's how we will prove homeschool, not by arguments and social media posts...but by raising homeschool kids who have that good relationship with themselves, their education, their faith, and their family. My husband had a pretty dim view of homeschool till he met me. Glad I made a new best friend! :)
Love ALL of it! Especially as Christian homeschoolers how we invest in and disciple our kids is SO important and can be so watered down.
Yes! It's important for us not to get distracted by 'cuteness' (everyone loves nice illustrations!) but to remember that faith should shape ALL of our lives.
THAT LAST PART 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽 RACHEL, you’ve said so much so elegantly!!!!!! God bless YOU!!!!
Thank you so much for taking the time to watch, and listen! I appreciate YOU!
One of your best videos! I felt your passion throughout the whole thing.
Thank you so much!
Awww, you got me so fired up! I've not encountered the first 2 homeschooling attitudes you outlined but was definitely homeschooled myself with the 3rd. I try to teach my kids very differently than that. I find reading about the lives of saints to help give them and I examples of how to worship with our whole life highly beneficial. I also schedule and plan all our schooling around the liturgical calendar and have Christ at the center of our lives.
I think many who grew up with Christian homeschool materials can recognize the 3rd point--our faith deserves better than being boiled down to devotions, good moral character, and being against evolution. It's so much more, truly allowing our kids to understand what having Christ at the center of our lives means.
Oh, man! You hit so many GOOD points. I think learning not to be so distracted by defending homeschooling is essential! Perhaps as second-generation homeschoolers, we have seen the good outcomes and so really don't feel the need to prove homeschooling to anyone?
I agree with all of your points. Character training has its place but it can easily become a danger when our children feel as though their worth or salvation is tied up in their behaviour.
I'm also not a fan of Bible curriculums per se. I want my kids to be able to go straight to God's Word and be able to find out for themselves what it says instead of depending on a man's interpretation of it.
Obviously, devotionals and the like have their place but the cookie-cutter Christian curriculums can give parents a false sense of security in thinking that that's all their kids need when it comes to studying God's Word.
"Defending" homeschool can take up a lot of emotional energy without really changing anyone's mind...and you're right, I do think 2nd-gen homeschoolers have that extra bit of confidence and are less likely to feel like we need to 'defend homeschool's honor.' Thank you, 1st gen moms, for your hard work! Exactly what you said about a "false sense of security"....especially for those kids who are naturally good at "school" types of things...getting all the answers right on Bible tests and memorizing all the verses can make them very happy and pleased with themselves but they might miss the point of the deep, transforming work of faith.
You are such an eloquent and poised speaker. I kept agreeing out loud with everything you said! And you brought about great points I hadn’t considered before about the wonder of creation. Thank you for another well-thought video!
Thank you so much for taking the time to watch, Lauren!
Yes to all of this!! I love the way you respect children and see them as children of God, while holding them to their highest good AND without sacrificing gratitude for who they are today. It is such a rare combination but it is something we should all strive for.
Those beliefs are very important to me. I love that you were able to recognize those strains of thought throughout this.
I LOVE the part about a woman's education!!
So glad to hear that!
Thank you, thank you, thank you, for mentioning that girls can be taught to be homemakers and value their education. I fell into the wrong mindset as a teenager. I have always loved learning, but I became arrogant and thought, "I don't need any of this Algebra stuff, all I want to do is be a wife and mother." I can do both and I want to teach my daughter to put effort into both endeavors.
Oh I'm so glad to hear that you were able to shift back to the realization that you can do both, and a love for learning (even academic things!) need not take anything away from motherhood! I am so, so grateful for the sons I've been blessed with, and I love spending all my days with them...but I'm also grateful for the brain God gave me and the education I was given, and the ability to keep learning.
Thank you for talking about this difficult topic! You brought up so many great points!
Glad it was helpful!
RACHEL!!!!! Yes!!!!! This was such a beautiful message for all homeschooling families to hear!!! 🥰 Love it !!
Thank you so much, Brittany!
AMEN!!!! Especially the knowing how to study the Bible and where character comes from!!!! 👏 👏 👏 devotionals are overused by adults also. I love a good devotional, but it absolutely does not replace a deeper Bible study. This is why we’ve always had a good study Bible and I teach my kids how to use it as early as possible. (It helps to have a church that also teaches your kids these things. Does your church encourage you to open your Bible while you’re in worship? Or do they just put all the verses on a PowerPoint for you? Do they show your kids the context in the Bible or do they just teach a quick little lesson in the midst of children church surrounded by fun activities? The Mama Bear Apologetics book addresses this very well! But these types of situations in our church influence a members relationship with his Bible. Is it the precious word of God that we will always be learning from or is it a book that we pull from messages here and there -and as you said- an out of context verse slapped here and there. I recently came across a UA-cam video is a former Mormon and how they were saved during their Mormon mission trip bc they met a Baptist minister who simply challenged him to read his Bible as a child. So he did. And over the course of a year and half, he simply read the Bible and let IT transform him. His testimony was amazing!!!! The power of Gods word will never return void but will accomplish what it was sent to do. It was an encouragement to me that we don’t have to know everything in the Bible we are continually learning. But reading and coming with a sincere heart, and truly studying it with the ability we have is all God needs to transform.
I also listened to a Paul Washer sermon recently and he discussed Bible reading as getting to know God. The more you know and learn, the more you want to know and learn. And the more you fall in love. Like a new couple in a new relationship….they can’t get enough of learning about each other. And married couples will often say that they love each other now, more deeply than they did when they first got married. Why? Because they’ve spent more time with each other, they’ve been through tough times together. They’ve struggled together. They know more of each other. Do we have that with God? And is that what we are teaching to our children even through our example? Do they see that love and zeal in us? As Heidi St John always says, you can’t give your children what you don’t have. (I could go on and on about this…..❤️)
I like you! 😉😎
Yes, the Bible is a book we can never really finish learning. I love the marriage illustration. We'll never finish, but it's so worth it to study deeply and teach that to our kids as well. So important!
To your last point, wow YES!
Thanks for watching!
YES RACHEL!!!!!! 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽
WOW!! Preach!! 🙌🏻 I hadn't thought much about the academic vs life skills talking points before, so those are good points! I'm so encouraged to hear you talk about better ways to have a faith centered homeschool! That weighs on me a lot! I'm also encouraged to hear you say that worship is so much more than singing and prayer! Most churches have made the word worship have such a tiny meaning and it's only relegated to Sundays...that's not how God wants his people to worship him - you're right on there! 🙏🏻 💕 this was a courageous video to make 👏🏼👏🏼
Thanks for taking the time to listen!
What strong words! I completely agree!
Thanks so taking the time to watch!
Always always LOVE your insight and perspective! These things NEED to be said...thanks for "going there"😊
It's always a little scary to "go there", I'm sure you know!
@@SevenInAll sometimes we gotta do it SCARED, right 🙌🙌!
As always, you hit the nail on the head and even challenged me in a few areas! Thank you for this video!! 💕
Thank you so much for watching, Christie!
🙌🏻 Right on Rachel! “All skills are interconnected.” 🙌🏻
Yes! Skills, even in vastly different areas, feed on and build on each other.
I love that you do edgy homeschool videos :) I agree you can have life skills and academics. I just grew up with the opposite extreme of 0 life skills because anything besides academics took away from time getting A's. Asian parents :) So yes let's do both and personally I wish I'd had the space and time to pursue my own interests whether they be academic or anything else. And I still don't know how to be a homemaker so that actually is a problem personally and maybe ADD related 😅
Ah, yes, that is the other extreme--and it's familiar to me, too, from the years we have lived in Asia. Kids go to school all day, have extra tuition in the evening, and more tuition classes on Saturdays, too. The gift of TIME is one of my favorite things about homeschool--we can have an excellent education but it doesn't take up nearly the whole day, and leaves plenty of time for more pursuits. :)
Great point about character!!!! I’ve been planning to work on character with my kids this year using pretty nice cards and all that kind of stuff. This is a great reminder of how character is actually transformed from the inside out. 💕.
And I do not mean any digs about the cute character cards, at all! I might get a set of those someday. :) But!! We must be so cognizant of the WAY we talk about these matters with our kids, because when we put all the emphasis on character and what WE can do...we might forget to emphasize what we CANNOT do, what we need Christ for, the transformative work of faith in our lives that goes so, so far beyond simply controlling ourselves through our own strength.
@@SevenInAll yes! I completely agree. I think I may still use them but do as you say with emphasizing it being Jesus’ transforming work in is. 💕
Thank you for sharing these! It's funny. My husband (when we first met and started dating) thought it was really odd that I was homeschooled. He made it clear that he would probably want any children he had to be public schooled. Since we were still getting to know each other I didn't argue. As we dated and he saw the academics and life skills and critical thinking skills that I had (and my closest friends many of whom were either homeschooled or private schooled with lots of parental involvement had), he changed his mind. Now, years later, we're married and expecting our first baby and he wouldn't even consider putting our baby in any school environment besides homeschool! And his sister is a public school teacher! We both acknowledge that there are some really great teachers and schools out there, but we want to be more involved in educating our children than public school would allow.
And amen on worldview! I was really blessed that our worldview curriculum actually involved learning about a wide variety of religions and their backgrounds. Our worldview classes involved everything from the Greek classics to understanding the origins of new age spirituality. These were really great conversations that didn't end up weakening our faith, but rather gave us the ability to interact and engage with other cultures and worldviews in a respectful way.
Hey, I was also just about the first homeschooled person my husband ever knew, he was very skeptical of homeschool, but knowing me and my family led him to be a very big fan of this approach to education. Those worldview classes sound absolutely excellent! I think those conversations and being able to engage with worldviews different from your own is such an important skill.
This is hands down THE video every homeshooler/educator needs to watch! When we can ask ourselves WHY and answer truthfully and not expectedly, there is hope of better! Thank you for starting this conversation. X
Oh, wow! Thank you so much for your words! What an encouragement. I was a bit nervous about releasing this video--I've been very encouraged to hear that it is indeed a conversation we should be having.
🤗 Rachel , we’re on the same page. And i like your colorful top !
Thank you! I think I often wear this shirt in videos because I like it, too! :)
I SO agree with all you said. I’ve lamented these exact same issues with my husband. I didn’t know others felt this way too. Thank you for making this video. It was so validating. I appreciate your channel. I’ve watched for a long time, but never commented. This time I had to let you know your points really resonated with me.
Thank you so much for taking the time to comment! You are definitely not alone. By having these conversations...I think change will come, though not instantly.
I really like your last point! Yes to really training our kids to have a biblical worldview! Definitely isn’t done by just choosing to use curriculum labeled as Christian or saying that we are Christian homeschoolers.
I honestly think how we approach this with our kids is a reflection of our own faith.
Yes! It's complex and I know it can be intimidating, figuring out how to teach about the big ideas of our faith to little kids. But it can happen in many small moments, in countless conversations and choices.
I love this!! You hit a lot of excellent points. I think I hear homeschool parents defending what we do more than I hear people criticizing what we do. Some homeschool parents are inadvertently steering their children down a narrow path with fewer options. The benefit of homeschool is that our kids can have the one on one education that checks off scholastic needs, with a Biblical worldview, plus enriching their education with skills for the future while meeting their interests. I don’t aim for a 2 or 3 hour “school day.” The goal is to look for learning opportunities in everything we do. And that, to me, is what sets homeschool apart from traditional education.
I appreciate your approach so much--I, too, am not looking to have a 2 or 3 hour schoolday...but a "lifestyle of learning" and also a rich experience of learning from books. I love that homeschool allows us to give our kids a truly excellent education, and a wonder of God and what He made.
Rachel, I appreciate this video so very much. Thank you for this! I think defending my homeschool decision was a very hard one for me (and still can be on occasion), given the crowd. I appreciate your thoughts and words on these tough topics, so very much! Always learning and always growing over here! 💕🤗
I think homeschool itself helps us to learn to that even though we're the teachers, we have to contantly be learning and growing.
We love both the academic and life skills in our homeschool!!! I’m definitely a pusher when it comes to education but I take my kids lead!!! My kids are dyslexic but it doesn’t stop me pushing them but finding ways of teaching!!! I know my oldest daughter is going to medical school and I bet my youngest daughter will get a higher education, at 4 it’s hard to say what she’s going to do yet!!! We got married at 16 and both got an education, we didn’t move out as soon as we got married but lived with family for a few years while we got an education and we also learned how to live as a couple as we had an example who guided us!!! We discuss evolution with our older kids even though we are young earth creationists!!! We listen to a song in our house talking about how God changes our hearts then it’s shown out and we discuss it!!! We discuss worthship as worship meaning that life is worship as we live 4 him!!!
Love hearing some of what your family does!
Wow yes, yes, and yes! And I can't wait to use your bible history curriculum, btw. I'm going to favorite this video just to listen to number 3 over and over again.
I think it was probably pretty obvious that #3 is the point I'm most passionate on. Definitely wait till your kids are old enough before jumping into that Bible history study (I'd say above 3rd grade, although a friend used it with her academically-inclined 1st grader and they loved it), but I think it's so helpful for kids to have a solid understanding of where the Bible came from and what it took for the Bible to exist in the form that it exists today.
@@SevenInAll Yes, That's why I haven't purchased it yet, we need to wait a few years. But I'm most excited because I don't know much about it myself, and I want to learn.
Love this! Especially point three. It’s actually one of my big soap boxes as well 😅😂 it’s one of my main focuses in my own online ministry.
I think it was probably pretty obvious that #3 is the one I'm most passionate about. That's great to hear that you're having that conversation, too!
Love this!!! The last point is very true, especially because even among Christians, rejecting evolution is not standard. We are Catholic and we embrace evolution, so accepting evolution doesn't make you not a Christian!! 💕
Yes!! Rejecting evolution in nearly any form has grown to be seen as a core doctrine in large circles of Protestant Christianity, and very much in the homeschool community...but...it really needn't be that way. Believing that God is the Creator of all should be a core doctrine, and should change the way we live.
@@SevenInAll 100%! In Catholicism, we believe the creation story is not a scientific account, but rather meant to clearly profess that God created everything, He created it from nothing and He created Earth for us and entrusted it to our care. That's the core of it, so I am right there with you! I have always felt that the vehement defense of young Earth and anti-evolution is rooted in insecurity..."if everything in the Bible isn't literally true (meaning no figures of speech or literary devices), then how will I know what is or is not true in the Gospel?!" If you truly know the Bible and have studied it, you won't have those doubts. How do you think your Bible history curriculum would go over in a Catholic setting? I am assuming that it would be usable for us up until the Reformation???
@@TheTaradactyl7399 "If you truly know the Bible and have studied it, you won't have those doubts." Amen! The Bible History curriculum has 11 lessons. The first 7 lessons cover the period from the oral histories of the ancient Hebrew people up until the age of Bibles produced by hand in monasteries. Lessons 8 and 9 would be probably the most troublesome ones (although I did not write it to be antagonistic to a Catholic perspective, and talk about the problems and complexities of the time...not super in-depth [because people have written entire books on these issues in church history] but at a basic level), those cover the efforts of Wycliffe, Luther, and Tyndale toward Bibles in vernacular languages. Lesson 10 covers early English Bibles that included a great deal of commentary that was influenced by the denomination of the translators (The Geneva Bible for the Protestants and the Douai-Rheims Bible for the Catholics). Lesson 11 brings us up to modern-day and covers the impact of technology on Bible access and modern translations, as well as different translation approaches.
@@SevenInAll Perfect, thank you!!!
Love all your points but especially the last 2 ❤️
Thanks so much for watching!
Oh man, I was saying AMEN to each one of these things! Just let the results of your homeschooling speak for themselves. Walking the walk is so much more convincing to people than talking the talk, and talking the talk with an air of superiority at that. And YES...slapping out-of-context Bible verses all over curriculum cheapens both the curriculum and the Bible. Curriculum doesn't need the Bible all over it for your kids to develop a strong faith. We use mostly secular curriculum, but we have organic conversations about how we see God working through all these subjects we are learning about all the time. That is much more likely to stick with my kids and change their heart. And I don't get the creation/evolution obsession. To us, learning about evolution is showing us the amazing awe-inspiring way in which God has created. The deeper we dive into science, the more we see the fingerprints of God. Thank you for making this video. Great stuff!
Yes ! Yes to all of it ^
Except as a Muslim.
My thoughts exactly!
Yes girl, yes! Yes to it all 👏👏👏
@@SevenInAll ❤️❤️❤️
Thank you ❤️ You beautifully explained so many topics!!
Thank you so much for watching!
Love this!
Thank you for taking the time to watch!
would like to see the curriculum gluttony reduced
That's a really good point! I've done a fair bit of book shopping for homeschool myself recently...but that's because we're rarely in the US where we can buy books, and I don't have a public library to borrow from. But--going overboard on curriculum is not the most helpful activity!! It can lead to stress and clutter.
@@SevenInAll girl we do ebooks - saves space and sanity
YES! I agree with every word of this, especially the part about girls and education. I was raised in a fundamentalist church, and girls were not allowed, in many cases, to work. Sadly, so many of them have gotten separated or divorced because of abuse or addiction, and then had no higher education or work experience. This puts them in a horrible situation financially. But here is another gripe that I have with homeschoolers. Can we be respectful of others' time and show up on time to events?! I realize that a lot of homeschool moms have many children, and it's hard for me to get somewhere on time with just 3. But I see this more and more. Just because we have freedom in our day to do whatever we please, that doesn't mean that everyone else does. A friend offered her church as a place for the kindergarten graduation this year, and the people in charge showed up almost an hour late to set up and then wanted to stay later afterwards to have an extended lunch with family. The friend's husband is on staff there and she felt horrible that she'd asked him to go there in his day off and the moms treated him this way. It gives us a bad reputation as homeschoolers, along with the fact that it's just not nice.
I absolutely think that's important--timeliness! It's important for us to teach our kids, too. I come from a big family (one of eight kids) and timeliness was very important to my parents--so we just started getting ready to leave earlier than other families might have. That would be a positive cultural shift--a value for being on time!
Wonderful video!💜
Thank you so much for taking the time to watch!
Yes yes and…..yes
Thanks for taking the time to watch!
I’m too tired to say all I want to say, but I’ll just say that this is my favorite video of yours.
Get to work. Yup. A lot of homeschoolers run away from work. There. I said it.
Thank you, that comment truly means a lot! And yes, I think an aversion to doing the work is a big issue (and I think it's an issue that extends beyond just the homeschool community...which makes it all the more important for us to show our kids the value of just doing the work.)
Yes to life skills, academia and the 3rd vital leg on the stool is growing wisdom. Humility/faith is the beginning of wisdom and self control which will know how to manage all the skills gained in homeschool when living in a hostile environment. It will grow the resiliency to thrive for a lifetime.
You've just said the same thing in your wonderful, thoughtful video. It's so easy to get off track when handed a beautifully illustrated virtue book or a wonderful unit study on singing hymns. It's so important to evaluate our teaching emphasis, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly to ensure we are giving the right Biblical message and building solid Bible study skills.
It reminds me of the value of creating a school mission statement that includes all your ideas. This way, it will help our teaching goals be keep on track.
In many ways, this should be seen as a pyramid where faith, Christian worldview and Bible study skills grows our wisdom. How we approach achedemic and life skills (the tiers above this) should all be influenced by our faith. We worship and honor God not just by how well we clean our room but how we master algebra facts. We express the fruits of the Spirit by our attitudes used while gaining difficult or boring skills: when we fail a marvelous opportunity to go to God and help us depend on His patience and long suffering (both parent and child).
It's the Spiritual lessons, the applying of faith, accessing God's grace where we come up short is the most vital of all lessons. Life skills and academia are the means to come to an end of ourself and discover how magnificent a God we serve to meet us just where we are.
What a great comment! Thank you so much for adding to the conversation. I want to write some of your words down in a notebook I keep for reminding myself of just what you said--what is our purpose and goal, so that we don't get distracted.
"How we approach academic and life skills (the tiers above this) should all be influenced by our faith. We worship and honor God not just by how well we clean our room but how we master algebra facts. We express the fruits of the Spirit by our attitudes used while gaining difficult or boring skills: when we fail a marvelous opportunity to go to God and help us depend on His patience and long suffering (both parent and child)."
"Life skills and academia are the means to come to an end of ourself and discover how magnificent a God we serve to meet us just where we are."
Very well said!
What a refreshing view of homeschooling! Sometimes I feel like a double headed dragon in the homeschooling community for believing some of the same things you talked about in this video. There is so much fractioning, so much need to prove and justify, and so much "this is the only way of doing it", that frankly is just as close minded as believing that all kids should be in the school system... I am a new sub, but I've been binge watching your videos, so you will see a few comments from me...here to learn more about gifted homeschool education.
A "double-headed dragon"--haha, yeah, I can relate!
Beautifully said!! I'm pretty sure there are many who feel this way about Bible study, scripture memorization, and apologetics. That they should all be rooted in our relationship with Christ; and transformation stems from growing in our knowledge in Him, through the Holy Spirit. But I think they just don't understand how to express it as poignantly as you do.
It can be hard to understand quite how to communicate that big, core idea of faith to kids. So I understand why many families default to leaning more heavily on the "outside" things of faith, hoping that they will lead to that inside transformation. All of this does work together...but it's the inside transformation that leads to meaning and purpose in all of those "outside" aspects of our walk of faith. When we aren't very careful and intentional in how we teach, it can be easy for kids to miss that part and start to believe that it's more of an outside-in process.
I love the last one. To be honest, I’m struggling with how to make my homeschool have an authentic “biblical worldview” I’d love to hear more about your methods with littles. I either feel like my attempts are too simple and young for my 6 year old or they go over his his head.
That's a good video idea, and I feel like that's a hard age--because by 6 they really can understand a great deal about God and faith and how that shapes the way we look at our world, but there's still quite a bit that's a little too conceptual for them/over their heads. (I'm working on getting my mom to write an "Elementary Exegesis" study...an intro to exegetical concepts for little ones...gotta keep working on her...). I believe that natural conversations, bringing God and concepts from the Bible, into conversations when it makes sense is a really powerful way to not keep these topics stuck in "Bible time" but have them inter-woven throughout life. Ideally not in forced or cheesy ways...I grew up this modeled to me quite a bit, so it feels 'normal' to me that God comes up in many little conversations as kids make many little right and wrong choices throughout the day and slowly learn that on their own, their hearts are sinful, their hearts want to do what is wrong. And we have conversations about how they need Jesus, they won't be able to try hard enough to do what is right,...and many other millions of conversations. Bible time and devotions are great...but we can weave in the awe of God and the way He calls us to live into every other "subject" throughout our day--to me, I think that's key: helping our kids to understand how our faith changes what we do on an everyday, every moment basis...not JUST sticking Bible verses about positive moral traits on math pages and Bible verses from Gen 1 and 2 on our science textbooks.
@@SevenInAll I wish I grew up with that example. It wasn’t the case for me and it can feel somewhat forced for us. I hope that changes this year. Thank you so much for your insight.
Yes! I just told my husband last week that if I heard one more homeschool person use the terms "biblical world view" and "biblical parenting" my head would explode. I'm glad I am not alone. A bilbe verse out of context slapped on a worksheet is a poor substitute for living a life serving others.
Also love your point that "the proof is in the pudding" when it comes to defing our choice. 100% agree.
"a poor substitute" indeed. A Biblical worldview means so much more, understanding God as Creator should be totally transformative in the way we live and interact with all of His Creation. Thank you for your comment!
I don’t think homeschoolers don’t believe in their kids or that they think they aren’t smart enough academically. It’s the opposite. LOL. Most homeschoolers think their kids are extremely smart & smarter than the average public school student. I think it’s because we’ve seen that doing the higher maths and challenging academics doesn’t even matter in the real world. Colleges are mostly indoctrination centers. Doctors at the hospital will google your symptoms right in front of you🥴 knowing how to be less dependent on big daddy government will help you far more than a degree.
🥰💕💞 your comment.
I think it is incredibly important for people to learn higher level mathematics even though it doesn’t have a “practical” use.
First, in my opinion, learning math is another way to learn about God. He is Order, and mathematics is about order and method. There is no subjectivity to it, there is an absolute truth. There is a wonderful beauty to it that has been diminished because it can be difficult and challenging. Just because something is hard doesn’t mean it isn’t valuable or worthwhile to learn.
Second, mathematics should be learned because it is intrinsically valuable. Just because there isn’t a daily use of the higher levels, it has an intrinsic value in its own state. If you learn only that which is on a practical and useful level, then you strip the fascinating and innovative dignity of a person, treating them as though they are strictly utilitarian.
Finally, learning the higher levels of mathematics trains the brain to think methodically, strategically, and builds critical thinking skills. Math is one of the best ways to teach critical thinking skills, something highly sought after within the homeschool community! This has become so much of a buzz word that it’s lost on some of how to actually attain these skills.
Overall, we as homeschoolers should strive to offer our children an academically rigorous and thorough education especially when it most often isn’t given to the general population. Even though it is not valued in the real world, the benefits, just on a human level, for our kids to possess such a higher level of education will help our children fight against the insipid relativism and immorality that is rampant in our society.
@@katieknapp9223 never said it wasn’t important. At all. I said a degree will never be superior. In MY opinion. Her thoughts are hers and important. I was just sharing mine.
Homeschool has many subcultures, I must admit, and the subculture I'm much more familiar with is the one that's leans very heavily on life skills, and is wary of pursuing academics too eagerly. I, personally, delight in academics, in "book learning" of all sorts, it's how my own brain is wired. Not everybody needs a college or a higher degree, but I do believe that kids ought to get a chance at a delightful, ambitious education. Life skills are so important, but what I'm saying that homeschool gives us enough time to do both! I see a great deal of messaging in homeschool instagram that says--leave the math books alone for a while and just let your kids bake with you in the kitchen, that's what they really need. I lean more on the side of--hey, homeschool gives us enough time to: work through some math books, read some math stories, AND bake in the kitchen. AND do a whole bunch of other things, too. Homeschool means so much less wasted time....so, we don't have to see academics and life as enemies, but as friends, that actually build each other up. :) We can actually grow in our skills of doing life as we grow in our academic skills because skill feeds on skill.
@@SevenInAll thank you for your kind response & for clarifying.
The tendency to react to excess (over correct) is the problem. Our American society has over emphasized schooling and made it THE main concern in regards to kids. Leading that is mostly the government or private entities. Home schoolers react to that excess but can fall into the error of throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Homeschooling has its inherent weaknesses too (like going crazy jumping from curriculum to curriculum and creating confusion in the kids) but God knows no method is error free and no parent limitation free either. We can only do our best and let God use it for the greater good.
Truly, no method is error-free! We can seek to be faithful in the work that is in front of us (raising and educating our children).
LOL, decades ago when my home schooled high school aged daughter would be asked "but what about socialization" she'd decided to reply "I know your kids are socializing in school, but what about education." Truth be told, whether kids are in home school, public or private school, there will be a spectrum from introverted to extroverted. There are all types of kids in all kinds of education situations. Let that socialization comment go in one ear and out the other.
Yep! Playing defense all the time...doesn't really help as much as some might think it does. The opportunity for a really excellent education is one aspect I really love about homeschool!
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Thank you for watching!
PREACH🔥❤️
Thank you so much, Anna!
I think the "my girls don't need academics etc, etc, etc" is a sentiment stemming from religious factions.
I personally wish people would stop tying their religious views to home education - it paints the whole homeschooling community as religious cultists. Religion should be separated from education.
@Tuatha De Sidhe Yes, that idea is very much tied into a religious/cultural idea that women have a special calling to be wives and mothers, and, I believe it's some sort of fear that if women were too well-educated, they won't want to be "good" wives and mothers (I think that fear is unfounded, I don't think quality education or critical thinking skills would necessarily make a mother any less interested in loving her children). I am a person of faith myself, and for me, I don't think I could separate my faith from education, because it's woven into every part of life--so I very much understand why many different religious communities don't separate faith from learning. But--I would argue that sometimes, faith gets mixed in with cultural ideas that aren't necessarily true, and that can be harmful.
@Kayla Henderson I'm sorry that it came across as an "all homeschoolers" type of thing--that was not my intent. It was more as a "this exists much more than it ought to, and I wish it didn't exist at all". I'm truly glad to hear that in your circles, homeschoolers are educating their kids with rigor and excellence. I want to grow the community of homeschoolers who find delight in rigor. Because I'm a person who finds it delightful. :) And much of my real life homeschool community has been very laid back about education.
Homeschooling is a philosophy. Getting more out of life AND just plain having fun.
Absolutely! I find homeschool to be SO fun.
YES RACHEL!!!!!! 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽
Thanks for solving a personal question I've had. 😀 Where are all the nay sayers? Where are all the snarky comments? I very rarely get them at all and when I have occasionally been asked questions I felt like it was coming from a place of confusion or curiosity and not out of a desire to attack me. Your video just made it click for me that it's because I let people know I was homeschooled and since I've had a relatively successful personal and professional life, they can't really say anything mean, can they?! 😆
Love all of this Rachel. You are brave and I love that. It has been strange for me as I start homeschooling my kids to know how to handle all the defensiveness and overspiritualization that I see in some homeschoolers around me. Thanks for starting this very needed conversation! I can't wait for part 2!