The Benefits of Homeschooling, Part 2

“Anxiety in teens is higher than it’s ever been. Because these kids are having to perform at a standard that is a generalized standard that they don’t necessarily fit into and it does make sense because when we remove God’s design and plan, we end up with these things like depression. Because the Bible tells us that the joy of the Lord is my strength. And so when I’m sent into a place every day where, well, God is there but where I’m not allowed to be taught about God or speak of God or see God or do things God’s way, then it’s not going to be a joy-filled place. When you remove the Lord from the school, you’re also removing joy and strength.”

Yvette Hampton:           Hey, everyone. In case you didn’t read the previous post, The Benefits of Homeschooling, Part 1, make sure you go back and read that one.  Aby Rinella is back with me today and we are talking about the benefits of homeschooling. We talked before about “The Why of Homeschooling” and today we’re building on some of those ideas. We recorded that episode several months ago, but this is the second part of that conversation about the many, many benefits of being able to keep our kids at home and disciple them.

The Bible passage that we have parked on for this episode is Matthew 6:31-33, but really focusing on verse 33. But it starts out, “Therefore, do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ for the Gentiles seek after these things, and your Heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”

“I think in the beginning, I would look at other kids who parents would talk about the struggles that they had with their children but also the blessings of it too. But I thought, well… Homeschooling’s going to be different in our house. It’s going to run smoothly. And as I had this fairytale in my mind of what it was going to look like, we were going to just have this perfectly scheduled-out day. My children were going to just sit so compliantly in their desks and they were going to just do the work that I asked them to do. And they were going to learn everything the first time and they were not going to argue with me. I mean, I had this idea of how it was going to unfold and then I started homeschooling!”

Aby Rinella:      I love talking about what these things are that are going to be added when we’re obedient to God in raising our kids, and last week we talked about all the academic benefits, all the things that moms panic about. “Can we really do this academically?”, and how we’re seeing that academically, homeschooled kids are thriving. We talked about all the reasons why, so I’m excited to get into a lot of the other benefits and all the other things that are added on to us when we choose to obey God’s call to homeschool.

Listen to this conversation on The Schoolhouse Rocked Podcast. (10/8/2019 episode)

Yvette:             Yes. We talked a whole lot about the principle, “obedience brings blessings.” God is a God of blessings. He loves to bless his children and he hears our prayers. And he loves to listen to us as we cry out to him on this journey of homeschooling and parenting and just trying to figure it out. I know for myself, it has been… You know, before you have kids, you think you know it all.

Aby:                 Everything, yes!

Yvette:             You see other kids and you’re like, “My kid would never do that. My kid would never throw a tantrum in public. My kid would never say no to me.” And then you have kids and you’re like, “Oh, so, let me take back everything”-

Aby:                 It’s universal.

Yvette:             Right. It’s universal. And the same goes with homeschooling. I think in the beginning, I would look at other kids who parents would talk about the struggles that they had with their children but also the blessings of it too. But I thought, well… Homeschooling’s going to be different in our house. It’s going to run smoothly. And as I had this fairytale in my mind of what it was going to look like, we were going to just have this perfectly scheduled-out day. My children were going to just sit so compliantly in their desks and they were going to just do the work that I asked them to do. And they were going to learn everything the first time and they were not going to argue with me. I mean, I had this idea of how it was going to unfold and then I started homeschooling!

Aby:                 Reality.

Yvette:             Reality hit. So there are things that are hard about it, but in looking back, I also didn’t get to see all of the blessings that would come from it. And so it’s been… We’re in our ninth year of homeschooling now. And it’s so amazing to just see how with Garritt and I having been obedient to the call that God has put upon us to homeschool our kids and to have them with us day in and day out and discipling their hearts and training them. He has just blessed that beyond belief and I love what it’s brought. You and I, in the last episode we talked, like you said, about many of those things. One of the greatest things we talked about was marriage and sibling relationships. And I’m so grateful for what the Lord has done in our family through those things. So, let’s keep on talking about this. What are some of the other benefits that you’ve seen through homeschooling?

Aby:                 Okay, we’ll keep going through the list. One that I have seen hugely and I never expected and now I’m so passionate about it is health. We are a family that’s really health-oriented and I never equated that homeschool would have anything to do with health and it’s kind of blown my mind. Which everybody knows and science has shown that too much sitting leads to all sorts of issues, increase of diabetes. It kind of slows your brain. They say it actually gives you lethargic thinking, increase of heart disease. Obesity has tripled since the ’70s as more people are going to computer-oriented jobs rather than more labor jobs. So, sitting causes a lot of health issues and so, when you have the kids in a classroom from the day that they’re four all the way forever and they’re sitting for endless hours, it is not good for their health. And I am seeing in classrooms now they’re trying to do all these creative things. Like, let’s say you want to bounce the ball or let’s say you want a swivel chair. But we’re still sitting and we’re just sitting on different things.

So, that’s a huge benefit with homeschool. We did an episode before on the benefits of getting outside. And we talked a lot about that, about how it’s important to get up and move our bodies and physically outside. So, that’s when everybody can go listen to hear the health effects of that. Aside from just kids being able to move more, which helps their brain, especially if you have a kinesthetic learner. But even non-kinesthetic learners, it helps our brains when we’re moving.

So, in addition to that, sleep. This is one that has hit me and I have seen that with health, like a lack of sleep brings on illness. They’ve said that, I mean, if you’re listening to this and you’re a homeschool mom, that means most likely you’ve had babies. And that means you know what it’s like to sleep, to not sleep for long periods of time.

Yvette:             Right?

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Aby:                 And that does affect our health. It affects our attitudes. They say a lack of sleep can lead to depression, it leads to a lowered immune system. So with homeschool, we can let our kids sleep when they need to. And I’m not saying that if you want to get your kids up at 7:00 AM and start school, that’s fine but that’s your option. That’s your privilege, that’s your freedom to decide how much sleep your kids need. And so, we run by our own clock in our own home, not somebody else’s. So, just the beauty of not having to get my kids up, yelling and screaming at them to get dressed, hurry up, and shove food down them and get them out the door when they’re exhausted. That can take a toll on a child’s health.

The other thing that just is brand new to me and you’ll relate to this, is when kids hit that pre-puberty, their whole circadian rhythm changes, like all of the sudden, they’re staying up later and they’re sleeping in. And I didn’t see it coming. All of a sudden, I have a daughter that’s entering into that and she’s up later. And it’s not that she’s just trying to be up later like her body is, it’s just her whole rhythm is different. That’s a scientific thing that happens when you’re going through those pre-puberty. So, again, we can let our kids sleep when they need to sleep according to their body and their season and when they are. When kids aren’t tired, they learn better.

And that’s something I saw as a public school teacher. I would have kids that were so exhausted, little teeny tiny five-year-olds coming in so tired because they didn’t get a nap because now we’re doing full-day kindergarten in most states. These kids were so tired and then we expected them to learn. And that just doesn’t… That’s not healthy. So the beauty of homeschooling, one of the blessings is that physically, it’s so much healthier.

Yvette:             Yeah. And not just kids but for mom too. You know, mom having to get up early to get her kids up and ready and out of the house and fulfill all those responsibilities. Then mom is tired, and we talked in the last episode about marriage when mom’s having to get up and she’s exhausted from the day. By the time her husband’s home and kids are in bed and now it’s finally time for you and your husband to spend time together.

Aby:                 Yes.

Yvette:             You’re exhausted and you want nothing to do but sleep. And that’s not healthy. That’s not healthy for your marriage. It’s not healthy for your kids. It’s not healthy for mom. And so, I mean, there are often days with us where Garritt or I or our girls will just say we just need a nap today. And it doesn’t happen often. But sometimes, I’ll just say, “I really need to sleep. I can’t even focus on what I need to do right now. I’m going to go just take a power nap.” I’m good at power-napping. I can take a 20-minute power nap and be refreshed for the rest of the day. Not all of my family members can do that but I love the benefit of being able to do that. And my girls, every once in a while they do that too. Lacey, my little one, we call her the Energizer bunny because she requires so little sleep. We don’t know how she does it but that girl, I feel like she could be one of those adults who can survive off of four hours of sleep at night. I don’t know.

Aby:                 She’ll handle newborns well.

Yvette:             She will. I mean, from the time she was about, I think, a little older than two, she didn’t even nap anymore. Because if she did, she wouldn’t go to bed till 11 or 12 o’clock at night. She just does not require a lot of sleep but many do.

Aby:                 But many kids need a lot more than the average kid, too.

Yvette:             They do, yep.

Aby:                 Again, when we try to fit all the kids in the same box, well, every kid has to be up at the same time to make the bus at the same time. And we’re doing this herd thing where I don’t care if you need more sleep or less sleep, you’re going to get the average amount of sleep that everybody gets because the bus hits it this time.

Also, when kids are sick, I saw so many times, moms bring kids to school sick because they couldn’t stay home from work. And then they would be sick week after week because they never got the rest they needed for their body to heal.

Yvette:             Sure, they couldn’t fully recover.

Aby:                 They couldn’t. So again, when you can just rest, when you can just say, “You don’t have to do school today because you’re sick.” And our kids are healthier, they can heal faster. Their bodies can do what God designed their bodies to do.

Yvette:             Yeah, that’s great.

Aby:                 And another physical health benefit is… Can you tell I’m passionate about when it comes to kids’ health?

Yvette:             Yes, I love it.

Aby:                 Is food. I think, I look at an adult schedule, we all get hour lunch breaks. Well, those that work outside the home. I just can eat all day.

Yvette:             Right.

Aby:                 But most adults in settings an hour lunch break and we’re giving kids 20-minute lunches. The average lunch in an American school is a 20-minute lunch. And those kids are so amped to get up and out of there to the playground that most of them aren’t even eating their whole lunch because they want to get out the door. So they’re eating too fast. And again, when you look at the medical side of things, it is eating too fast, has been linked to high blood pressure, cardiovascular problems. And actually, not getting enough food that you actually need nutrient-wise because you’re just shoving it in and your body isn’t being able to balance what you’re eating. This is what we’re setting. We’re setting these habits in our kids at such a young age that are going to stick to them through a lifetime. And food choices too. Even just what the kids are eating when they’re rushed out the door and hurry up and grab.

So, there’s just so many health, just physical health benefits that are secondary reasons, secondary benefits to homeschool when we… Not the reason to homeschool, the reason to homeschool because God has called us to, but these are benefits that come with it.

Yvette:             That’s right.

Aby:                 So, also physically, ADHD symptoms drop and that’s an incredible one. ADHD is through the roof now and it’s growing every single year. But you’re finding that, this is really interesting. Early childhood school enrollment is a primary culprit with the ADHD diagnosis epidemic. The earlier kids are registered for school or in schools, the younger the age, the higher rates of ADHD. And that’s really interesting. So, we now have all-day public kindergarten. You’re in kindergarten all day and now we’re taking it down to preschool. So right now, putting kids in at four years old.

Yvette:             Oh, they’re just babies.

Aby:                 They’re babies and the rates of ADHD, which really, just a kid, a four-year-old can’t sit still all day, anyway. Just, their bodies aren’t made to do that.

Yvette:             No.

Aby:                 So, the ADHD symptoms drop when kids can get outside, and we talked about that before, when we play outside. And so that’s a benefit. This is interesting, I’m just going to read this. A Harvard study found that in states with a September 1st enrollment age cutoff, children who entered school after just turning five were 30% more likely to be diagnosed with ADHD than children born later about to turn six.

Yvette:             Wow.

Aby:                 So, that’s a 30% increase.

Yvette:             That’s huge.

“I can’t stand to sit all day. It drives me crazy. I mean, I have to get up every now and then. If I’m sitting and working and doing stuff at the table, I have to get up every probably 30 minutes at least and just move my body. I need to grab a snack, go outside, and get some fresh air or something. And no one is made to sit all day, every day at a desk and have to focus on what it is that you’re supposed to focus on.”

Aby:                 With putting these little tiny ones in school. So, obviously we see with a lot of this, and I’m not negating ADHD. I’m saying that there are ways to help that and some of these studies show that immaturity is really the real factor, not pathology. So, that’s a huge benefit that we have. If our kids aren’t ready to sit all day, that’s okay. We don’t have to make them sit all day. We have the freedom to change that up.

Yvette:             Sure. And it’s not just the preschool kids who aren’t ready to sit all day.

Aby:                 If you had a teenage boy, just look at them.

Yvette:             It’s all kids, even me. And I’m not a super… I’m an outgoing person but I’m not a super crazy high-energy person. But I can’t stand to sit all day. It drives me crazy. I mean, I have to get up every now and then. If I’m sitting and working and doing stuff at the table, I have to get up every probably 30 minutes at least and just move my body. I need to grab a snack, go outside, and get some fresh air or something. And no one is made to sit all day, every day at a desk and have to focus on what it is that you’re supposed to focus on.

Aby:                 No, it’s not healthy. It’s not healthy. So, those are some of the physical benefits. And then, the mental benefits are absolutely incredible. So, adolescent anxiety, depression, and suicide declines during summer when they look at the statistics. So all those things go down in the summer. It’s different for adults and I’m not sure why but when they study adolescents, then they find that those things spike right at back-to-school time. So that seems pretty obvious. Suicide has more than doubled since 2007. Then we’re just… The more the testing, the more the requirements. But I just find it very interesting that all those symptoms go away in the summer and then they spike back up when it’s time to go to school. And that’s pretty obvious. So, a Boston college psychology professor that writes frequently about the problems with this other kind of schooling looked at the statistics and stated that the available evidence suggests quite strongly that school is bad for children’s health. That kind of blew my mind but psychologists are saying this isn’t a place where kids are going to mentally thrive in, in that health department.

Yvette:             And when he says school, he’s talking about sitting in a classroom all day. He’s not talking about academics, of course.

Aby:                 Not academics. No, no, no, no, no. Although sometimes trying to teach subtraction makes me lose my mental health but that’s not what he was talking about.

Also, fear is eliminated. Because when kids are home with mama that loves them and they’re safe and they don’t have to fear the bullying that goes on. There’s, again, an epidemic of bullying going on in our schools. The programs, when I was just stepping out of the school, a huge part of our days were spent with an anti-bullying program that was being put in because bullying is such a problem. Safety, drugs, the temptations that are out there that kids have to battle every day. I was a public school high-schooler, and the temptations that I faced every day just caused severe depression in me. I stood for my faith. I was able to stand for my faith but it just was a pressure that I wasn’t mature enough to handle. And so, kids are dealing with that every day. Constantly having to perform for someone else’s standards. That is a lot of pressure on kids and that leads to depression and anxiety.

Anxiety in teens is higher than it’s ever been. Because these kids are having to perform at a standard that is a generalized standard that they don’t necessarily fit into and it does make sense because when we remove God’s design and plan, we end up with these things like depression. Because the Bible tells us that the joy of the Lord is my strength. And so when I’m sent into a place every day where, well, God is there but where I’m not allowed to be taught about God or speak of God or see God or do things God’s way, then it’s not going to be a joy-filled place. When you remove the Lord from the school, you’re also removing joy and strength.

Yvette:             Sure. Sure, it’s a very dark place to be.

Aby:                 It’s a very dark, a very dark place. And I know because I was there. And the other thing that you just did an awesome podcast with Heidi St. John, which was amazing. You guys spoke about something that really hit me about how when we educate kids collectively as opposed to individually. And when we’re not able to educate the independent, individual child, which is the child that God created to be unique with a purpose and a plan, with unique interests, with unique strengths. When we have to educate kids as a collective, we’re kind of forcing them into this peer-pressure situation. And I got to thinking about that when I was listening to you and Heidi speak, where we’re kind of telling kids, “You have to be like everybody else. You need to have the same scores as everybody else. You need to learn the same thing as everybody else.”

And then, that carries over with kids too. “Okay, well then I need to dress like everybody else and act like everybody else and talk like everybody else and have the same gifts and talents as everybody else and the same hobbies.” We’re kind of shoving our kids into this state of peer pressure. And then, we’re acting confused as to why there’s all this peer pressure yet these kids that were trying to be a part of the collective that we’re forcing them into, they have a unique independence inside of them because God made them that way. Because whether they’re believers or not, they’re still created in God’s image.

So, then they have this battle of, “I want to be independent and I want to fight for my independence, but I need to be a part of this collective and fit in.” And you see these teens and it’s just like extreme mental anguish that they want to stand out and be unique. So they’re going to do these extreme things to be noticed. But then they want to be a part of the crowd and fit in. And it’s an unhealthy thing that you don’t really see elsewhere besides this setting. So they vacillate and that leads to depression and anxiety and bullying and a lot of these social issues that we see because we’re setting up this artificial setting for kids to try to be socialized in.

Yvette:             Sure, sure. Which you can also see that sometimes in the church and in youth group and homeschool co-ops, things like that.

Aby:                 It’s part of our nature.

Yvette:             It is part of our nature but at the same time, it’s different when they’re not faced with it all day, every day for 40 hours a week.

Aby:                 Yes. Yeah, that’s for sure. And the thing is, homeschool is not a savior and that’s not what we’re saying but God’s way is. Doing things God’s way will lead to a much better outcome. So, we want our kids to be able to embrace their uniqueness.

Yvette:             Yep, that’s right.

Aby:                 The Bible, we’re told in Corinthians 12 that we’re a body created all different with different unique traits and different talents. Yet we are part of the body. So, we are created unique but we are all being part of this collective. But if you do that void of God, which is what’s happening, we end up with a terrible mess. Because anything we do, void of God, no matter how natural it is, it ends up being a mess because it’s void of the one that designed it.

Yvette:             That’s right.

Aby:                 Anyway. And so I guess lastly, this is a big one. What’s the number one thing people ask you about homeschool? The big “S word”.

Yvette:             Oh, socialization for sure.

Aby:                 Socialization. What about socialization?

Yvette:             Awkward unsocialized homeschoolers.

Aby:                 Right? Totally. Which all you have to do is go hang out with them. So the definition of socialization, I love, it’s the process beginning during childhood by which individuals acquire the values, habits, and attitudes of those they’re being socialized by. So that’s the habit, the values, and the attitudes. You can be socialized anywhere by anyone. You’re just getting the attitudes, the habits, and the values from those people.

So, my husband was in law enforcement previously and he always said, “The closest thing that we have in our society that looks like the school system as far as socialization goes is the prison system, incarceration.” And he worked in the prison system. We segregate these people in the prison system based on… They have parameters. They can eat when they’re told to eat, they can socialize when they’re told to socialize. But they can only socialize with a certain set of people that are in the same pod they are, right? And they have to move as a group where they’re allowed. So it’s interesting that that social setting is very similar to what we see in the schools.

And so a blessing with homeschool, one of the secondary advantage when we seek first God’s way is that our kids can be socialized anywhere and with all ages and it’s a more natural way because they’re interacting with people of different socioeconomic status, people of different ages, people of different class. It’s a much more natural way, which leads to kids having, we’re talking about health, a healthier way of socializing.

Yvette:             Yeah, that’s right. One of my favorite answers when people ask about socialization and “Don’t they need to be in school so that they can socialize?” is, “Okay, well, tell me exactly which character trait you want my child to emulate of those kids who are in the public school system because pretty much none of them.” And I’m not saying there aren’t great kids in the public school system. There certainly are. And in private school as well, there are many, many great kids. But overall, I’ve seen those kids. You’ve seen those kids, you see them when you go in public anywhere. You go to the mall or Walmart or anywhere. Why would I want my child to emulate that? And you don’t see a lot of godliness going on, at least not a lot of godly examples happening in the public school system.

So, that is not where we want our children to be in order to be socialized. I will say on that point though, that even today, we have seen that there are homeschool parents who are so afraid of the world out there that they really still continue to keep their children isolated at home. And I don’t think that that’s healthy. Parents need to have their children out there. But one of the great benefits of homeschooling is, in a sense, we often get to choose our kids’ friends and at least we can better direct who they’re going to be spending their time with.

So if you’re part of a co-op or if you’re a part of your church youth group or their sports teams or whatever it is that they’re part of, you can really encourage them because you get to know their friends better and you’re around them more. And so you have a whole lot more control over it. Not full control, of course. And especially as they get older, they’re going to hang out with kids who maybe you don’t know as well. But I don’t think isolating our kids from other children is healthy for them.

Aby:                 No. And that’s not seeking. We’re going back to our whole point is seek first the kingdom of God. So, if you’re homeschooling because you’re afraid of what’s out there then you’re not seeking first the kingdom of God. And if you’re homeschooling because you don’t want your kids to be exposed to certain things, which granted we don’t. But if that’s your primary then that’s not seeking first the kingdom of God. So when we seek first the kingdom of God, we’re not afraid of those things. But just because I don’t fear it doesn’t mean I want that to be the primary influence in my child’s life.

So, we seek first the kingdom of God and all these other things. God will guide us and direct us. And, again, we’re not saying that kids in the public… I was a public school system child and I love God with all my heart and I had to overcome a lot of things. We’re not saying that homeschool is the save-all end-all. Because if we were saying that then we wouldn’t be seeking first the kingdom of God. We’d be seeking first homeschool. And that’s not the message that we or Schoolhouse Rocked or anyone that follows Jesus wants to send.

But we do know that when we seek first the kingdom of God that all these other things will be given to us and he gives us discernment and he gives us wisdom. He gives us clear instruction in his book as to how to do these things. So, it only makes sense that when we remove God from the way, from a huge chunk of our kids’ days that we are going to be seeing so many of these social issues, so many of these health issues, so many of these academic issues. Because we’re separating our children’s daily life and God. And that’s not how it’s supposed to be. Those two things are supposed to go together. So seek first the kingdom of God and then all these other things.

Yvette:             And his righteousness.

Aby:                 And his righteousness and you can kind of chill out on the rest of the stuff. It’s just going to naturally happen.

Yvette:             Yes.

Aby:                 That health will naturally come. You’re naturally going to let your kids sleep in if you’re a sane woman.

Yvette:             Because you’re going to want to sleep in yourself.

Aby:                 Exactly.

Yvette:             Yes. Oh, and there are so, so many other benefits to homeschooling and I would encourage those moms who are still… Maybe they need some encouragement. Maybe they haven’t started homeschooling yet and they’re thinking about it. Maybe there are those moms who are just exhausted. Find a seasoned homeschool mom and just ask her, “What are some of the benefits?” And ask, “What are some of the things that you would have done differently?” And that’s really one of the reasons why we have the podcast is because we want to bring on moms who will encourage the homeschool community and just say, “Just keep at it.” There’s so many benefits to having your kids at home and discipling their hearts and training them and working through the relationships, working through the academics, working through the character training, working through those life skills that we’re trying to instill into our children.

And find a mom who will walk alongside you. Don’t do it on Facebook. You and I talked about that. No, I should… There is some good encouragement on Facebook but I feel like the further we go with social media, the more detrimental it has become. And one of my favorite things is, well, I shouldn’t say my favorite things. One of the most annoying things to me is when you’ll pop onto one of the Facebook homeschool pages and it’ll say, oh, what did they say? Not homeschool related but, “Can you please tell about?” Well, shouldn’t there be another page for that? I feel like these homeschool pages should really be just that. They should be for encouraging homeschool families. And I’m not saying you shouldn’t talk about anything because, I guess, homeschool related is life. Homeschooling is life for those who do, are part of their life for those who do it. But anyway, it seems like everything, people talk about it.

Aby:                 Totally, and we can fall into that same trap even amongst homeschool moms of comparing our kids and forgetting that God made our kids individuals. So it’s going to look different in my home than it is in yours. And we need to guard ourselves because that’s our human nature. I mean, our human nature is our human nature, whether we’re in one setting versus another setting. So we just need to guard ourselves and keep going back to, “Am I seeking first what God wants from me as a wife, as a mom, as a woman, as a homeschool teacher?” And if I’m seeking first God then I don’t need to get hung up on, “Hey, all you other moms, how would you handle this?” I can seek God and then he will guide and direct me to women who are truly going to give me wisdom, not just opinions. Yes. That is good cautionary. Don’t just throw it all out there because it’s a little overwhelming when you get 50 responses and they’re all different. So, seek God first and then ask discernment and where to seek second.

Yvette:             Sure. That’s right. That’s right. And there’s a lot of good encouragement on there, I should say. So, I’m not trying to devalue everything that’s said on social media. A lot of people have a good heart and they really want to help those. But I’m just saying, not everything that you see on there is worth taking to heart.

Aby:                 Yeah. Just be cautious and discerning.

Yvette:             Yeah, that’s right.

Aby:                 And remember that if God’s called you to do it, he’s going to equip you to do it. It doesn’t matter how anybody else is doing it. And it doesn’t matter how you feel on one day versus another. He will give you everything you need for what he’s called you to do. And you will see all the blessings flow from there.

Yvette:             Yeah, that is right. Well, I feel like we could talk about this forever but we are out of time for the show. So, Aby, thank you again for coming on. You are such a huge blessing to me, to my family, and to our listeners. So thank you for your time and just for all the research that you put into this episode. I love listening to the things that the Lord has shown to you.

Aby:                 Well, thank you. Thank you. We’re in it together. We’re all in it together.

Yvette:             That’s right. That’s right. The body of Christ working together.

Ready to take your children back? Stream Schoolhouse Rocked: The Homeschool Revolution for free tonight and learn how. After you have watched the movie, download the Free Homeschool Survival Kit. This free 70+ page resource will give you the encouragement and tools you need to start strong and finish well.

Read more from Aby Rinella at CalledToTheTop.com and on the Schoolhouse Rocked blog.

Photo by Mike Scheid on Unsplash

The Benefits of Homeschooling, Part 1

“God’s way is best. God has a best design. When God designed us to be parents and he laid out in his word as to what it means to be parents, he gave us directions to go with that, that would guide us to be the best parents we can be. He does that with everything. How can you best manage money? How can you best be married? How can you best even run a business and a government? It’s everything that we need for life and godliness is in his word. And so with that is also how can we best raise our children? And the Bible is very clear that to best raise our children to serve and honor and worship him is to do it according to his word in everything that we do all day long.” – Aby Rinella

Yvette Hampton:           Hey everyone, this is Yvette Hampton and I am so excited to be back with you again today, and I’m super excited to have my friend Aby Rinella on with me again. As most of you know, if you’ve listened to the podcast for any length of time, Aby has become just a regular guest on the show but also has really kind of filled the role of being a cohost with me. We are having a lot of fun together getting to talk with homeschool leaders and just regular moms and dads who are in the thick of this homeschooling journey with us and being able to bring encouragement to you. I am thrilled to have her back on the show with me again today.

Several months ago, we had a great conversation and we did an episode in which we talked about the why of homeschooling and it’s possibly our most popular episode, but for sure it’s been one of our most popular episodes. And so we talked about all the reasons of why we homeschool. Aby and I also did another one with Karen DeBeus. Together the three of us talked about the why, who and how of homeschooling.

On this one we want to take that a little bit further and we want to talk about the blessings and the benefits of homeschooling. So once people know and understand what their why is, we want to talk about the great joy and blessings that come from it. And the verse that Aby and I have been talking about a lot is Matthew 6:33, and for our family this has become a verse that has been very instrumental to us in this amazing journey that God has had us on with filming the documentary, and even just with life, with homeschooling, with trying to figure out this whole parenting thing. And so I’m going to read this verse to you again. Many of you already know it, but we’re going to start out with it.

It’s Matthew 6, it’s actually verses 31 through 33 is what I’m going to read, but we’re going to focus today on verse 33, specifically. Matthew 6 starting in verse 31 says, “Therefore, do not be anxious saying, what shall we eat or what shall we drink or what shall we wear, for the Gentiles seek after all these things and your heavenly father knows that you need them all. But seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”

Thank you for being with us today. Aby, welcome back to the show again and I’m thrilled to be talking about the blessings of homeschooling with you.

Listen to this conversation on The Schoolhouse Rocked Podcast (10/1/2019 episode)

Aby Rinella:                  Thanks Yvette. I’m excited to be here. I always love to be here and share with you as we share our hearts with other homeschool moms. And this is one of my very favorites. Well, my very favorite was the why, the reason that we homeschool, and that episode is available because that is the foundation of everything that we do is why we homeschool. We don’t do it because we want smarter kids, or that they go to a better college, or that they make more money or that they’re more successful, and I think when you look at that verse, if we flip flop it, we seek all of those things and then we’d fit God into that. And that’s not what God says. As homeschool moms, I think we do worry about the academics and are we going to do okay with academics.

Even though we know that’s not the primary thing that we should focus on, it is something we look at or met many other things that we’re going to talk about today. But, but really we homeschool out of obedience to God. We don’t do it for the blessings. We do it for a reverence for God and knowing that his way is always the best. We do it because we’re called to do it, regardless of the outcome. But, and like we said, we don’t obey God to get the blessings, but what’s really awesome is when we obey God, there are blessings. That’s just the truth. What’s neat is it’s almost like a trickle-down effect. When we obey God, the blessings fall into so many areas and I think of it almost like marriage.

The reason behind marriage, the reason God calls us for marriage, is it’s like a relationship. It shows us the earthly relationship between Christ and the church. God created marriage is one man, one woman forever. But the neat thing is there are trickle-down benefits, there are trickle-down benefits that is so good for our culture, it’s so good for our families and our kids. It’s someone to grow old with and have fun with and help carry life’s burdens. But those aren’t the reasons we get married. We don’t get married because we want to have fun with someone, we get married because God has ordained marriage and then the blessings come.

And it’s a lot like that with homeschool, we homeschool because God calls us to, and that the things that we’re going to talk about today and in the next one is … These aren’t the reasons or the drive or the motive, but they’re really exciting blessings and I’m really excited with you to share. Leviticus 26: 3 through 10 show tells us, “If you follow my decrees and you’re careful to obey my commands. I will send you rain in its season and the ground will yield its crops and the trees, their fruit.”

And then Luke 11:28 says, “Jesus said, blessed rather are those that hear the word of God and obey it.” So when we hear God’s word that says we’re to teach and train our children in righteousness and that we are to be their primary educators, and that we are to teach them his ways when we rise and when we walk. When we answer that call, when we’re obedient, then all these other things that we’re going to talk about are added.

That’s really exciting, but we just want to encourage the moms, don’t get it backwards. Always seek first God and then things will be added.

Schoolhouse Rocked Backstage Pass members can watch the full video of this interview.

Yvette:                         Yeah, that’s right. For those of you who are listening to this, if you have not yet listened to that episode that we did on the why of homeschooling, we’ll link that, of course, in the show notes so you can go back and I would maybe even pause this one for a few minutes, go and listen to that one, know what your why is, and then come back and listen to this one.

Let’s talk about this. You talk about the blessings that obedience brings. And we often, we’ve talked about this a lot on the podcast, you and I have talked about this, and that we tell our girls all the time, “Sin causes pain, but obedience brings blessings,” and when we are obedient to what God has called us to, there will be blessings in that. That does not mean that things will always be easy and that it’s just going to be smooth sailing, because we know we live in a fallen sinful world and things are hard. I mean, this is a pretty difficult world that we live in.

But it’s a different kind of hard. It’s different than the difficulties that come because of our sin, and the difficulties that come just because we live in a world that’s full of sin. I want to clarify, I’m not saying it, and I know you’re not saying that any person who has their child in school and doesn’t homeschool you’re sinning. That is not for us to judge. That is not our heart behind Schoolhouse Rocked. Our heart behind Schoolhouse Rocked – the podcast, the movie the blog – everything that we do is to encourage and equip people to be able to homeschool and to do it with excellence.

Because if God’s called you to do it, he’s going to equip you to be able to do that. And so we want to come alongside you and be able to do that. I just wanted to clarify that. But we talk about being called. And I know sometimes I struggle with that because it not being called, but it’s that Christianese lingo that we use, “God called us to do this.”

Really quickly, can you clarify when you say, “God called you to homeschool,” or, “God has called us to homeschool,” what do you mean by that?

Aby:                             I would say it’s God’s way is best. God has a best design. When God designed us to be parents and he laid out in his word as to what it means to be parents, he gave us directions to go with that, that would guide us to be the best parents we can be. He does that with everything. How can you best manage money? How can you best be married? How can you best even run a business and a government? It’s everything that we need for life and godliness is in his word. And so with that is also how can we best raise our children? And the Bible is very clear that to best raise our children to serve and honor and worship him is to do it according to his word in everything that we do all day long.

Answering the call really, that is Christianese to just to say, “I’m going to choose to do things God’s best way. I’m going to choose to follow his word and his examples as to how to do this thing, how to raise my kids.” That’s what I would say that would be. Any time you answer a call, there are going to be sacrifices that are made. I mean, I have yet to answer any call in my life that there aren’t sacrifices. Again, with this whole homeschool thing, there will be sacrifices. But the really neat thing is, is there are so many blessings that come with it that make those sacrifices … you almost don’t even notice them anymore.

Yvette:                         Right, right. That’s right. Let’s jump on that right now. Let’s talk about some of the blessings of homeschooling because there are so many, and again, sometimes homeschooling is really hard, and sometimes the process of educating our kids, and parenting our kids and discipling them is really a hard thing to do. But again, anything worth doing is often hard. And so let’s talk about some of the blessings that you’ve seen, that we’ve seen, that as we’ve interviewed people for the movie that they’ve seen through homeschooling.

“It’s not because we’re drilling our kids with academics, it’s because when we seek God first then I can chill out on the academics, I don’t have to be stressed. I say this because I started this out completely backwards as a teacher. I said, ‘Okay, I need to academics first, and then I’m going to consult God on the rest,’ and it was a disaster. When I stopped doing that and I sought God first, naturally, academically, my kids thrived.”

Aby:                             Okay. I would say what’s really neat is sometimes we get, what do they say? The cart before the horse, and when we answer the call to homeschool, then … I’m guilty, so I know this from personal. Then I realize, “Okay, I’ve got to get all this academic stuff figured out, I’ve got to get all this …” And it goes back to that verse, is we worry about all the other things, the peripheral things, the academics, all of those things. But really God says, “Seek me first.”

What’s so neat and what we’re going to talk about, is those things come naturally academically, homeschool children thrive. Not because we’re pounding academics into our kids, but because we are seeking first God. When we do that, the rest of that comes. It’s really neat because it was talking about in that verse that the Gentiles were seeking all these things. But God said, “Hey, wait a minute. Seek me and then I’ll give you these things. And look around in the world, it’s like academics is such a big thing. It’s such a big thing that our kids test well, and that they all follow all the same protocol, they all get into a great college, and that seems to be the focal point. But God says, “Wait a minute, wait a minute. Seek me first and watch what I’m going to do with the academics.” And so just to encourage moms who say, “Yeah, well show me that because I’m still panicking.”

I think what’s really neat is even the world around us, they cannot deny that when you do things God’s way it works better. So it’s neat. Business insider, this is to quote them, they said, “Homeschooling could be the smartest way to teach kids in the 21st century.” They are seeing the academic results of what we do, because even achievement, when we look at achievement, there’s huge nationwide studies that show that homeschool students are typically scoring between 15 and 30 points higher on average than non-homeschooled kids.

It’s not because we’re drilling our kids with academics, it’s because when we seek God first then I can chill out on the academics, I don’t have to be stressed. I say this because I started this out completely backwards as a teacher. I said, “Okay, I need to academics first, and then I’m going to consult God on the rest,” and it was a disaster. When I stopped doing that and I sought God first, naturally, academically, my kids thrived. Some of the reasons for that is, and you can jump in here too, but the curriculum options, we can customize our curriculum for our kids and we can customize how we teach them to who they are. That, right there, is naturally going to make them academically thrive.

Yvette:                         Let’s park on that for just a second, because oftentimes when kids are in a classroom – and you’ve been a teacher, so you know this to be true – when they’re in a classroom, you try to fit all of them into a box and you can’t do that because every kid is different. A couple of kids will fit into that box, but I mean, everyone who has kids, their kids are different. No one has two kids or more, and both of those kids are exactly the same, and so you can’t make them fit into this perfect little box. And so it does give us the opportunity to be able to alter and cater their education to who God made them to be and how he made them to learn.

“Time is definitely on our side with homeschooling, because our kids get to learn at their pace and they have so much opportunity to learn the things that God wants them to learn. So, time definitely is a big thing. We have the time for them to have individualized learning. We have the time to teach them according to who God created them. But the other really neat thing is it doesn’t take as much time to homeschool. You can accomplish more in a shorter period of time. I was just reading that the average public school student has 6.2 hours of homework every week, and I thought, ‘that’s another day, that’s an additional day of school!'”

Aby:                             Yup. And I think that does go back to God’s word, because when we understand God’s divine, that every single life was created on purpose, for a purpose, unique and we’re individuals, then it only makes sense that this, I like to call it the heard education, that that doesn’t work because God designed us uniquely and individually. He designed every life for a purpose on a purpose, so to be able to teach to that independent child, the individual child that God gave us, obviously when we’re seeking that, obviously it’s going to work. It’s just going to work. It doesn’t take a lot of …

I mean, homeschooling does take effort, but it doesn’t take as much effort as we think it does if we’re seeking God. Sometimes I think when it gets really, really hard and we feel like we’re hitting our head against a wall and we’re getting nowhere, it’s because we’re getting backwards. It’s because we have stopped seeking God. We’ve stopped looking at the why and we started looking at the how. We can’t do that. We have to look at the why first.

So, the personalized learning and, again, I’m just fascinated how the secular world is seeing the benefits of homeschool, which isn’t a surprise because when God says to do something, he has a reason because it’s wonderful and it works. But even Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, not that I support either of those men or agree with either of them, but the reality is they were businessmen that succeeded according to the world’s standards in a business capacity. They knew how to run a business, and both of them talked about, spoke out and use the terms, “Personalized learning,” and how that is so important that when we personalize learning. I just think it’s really interesting how God isn’t separate from the world, how God created things to work in the world.

And it’s really neat that people are seeing this, that the academic success. It’s a lot from the self-directed education. As we’re talking about blessings, academically self-directed education without the top down learning, that that doesn’t work as well. When there’s from the top to down learning. It’s a self-directed when kids are learning and that that flows over into colleges. They’re saying kids know how to learn. When you teach a kid how to learn, there’s nothing they can’t learn, and so that’s a huge academic benefit is that we have the ability as homeschool moms to let our kids have self-directed learning. And the time, we have the time to do it.

Yvette:                         Yeah, that’s right. Time is definitely on our side with homeschooling, because our kids get to learn at their pace and they have so much opportunity to learn the things that God wants them to learn. So, time definitely is a big thing. We have the time for them to have individualized learning. We have the time to teach them according to who God created them. But the other really neat thing is it doesn’t take as much time to homeschool. You can accomplish more in a shorter period of time. I was just reading that the average public school student has 6.2 hours of homework every week, and I thought, “that’s another day, that’s an additional day of school!” And they’re doing that with homeschool.

It’s interesting. Then you look at that and you’re looking at the studies of the statistics of the outcome of that, and it really isn’t warranting the extra time. They have a lot of extra time, but the scores aren’t showing. I think a benefit of a homeschool mom is all that extra time. We get to build relationships with them. We get to use to be together as a family. We get to use to get to know our kids and point them to Jesus. So time is a big one, like you mentioned.

Yvette:                         Sure, yeah, and they have the time to learn to do life. I mean, there’s so much importance. It’s so important to just learn the logistics of life. And I think sometimes we take for granted that, while our kids are obviously going to know how to do dishes, and do laundry, and take care of a house, and deal with doctor’s appointments, and deal with going to the DMV and all of the things that encompass adult life. And really as we’re homeschooling, we’re raising our children to become adults. And so they need to know how to deal with those things and how many kids come out of high school, jump into college or some kind of trade, and they really don’t know how to function in life.

Many do, but when you’re weighed down with being in school for 35 to 40 hours a week and then coming home with six plus hours’ worth of homework a week, you don’t have time. They don’t have time to be able to just learn the everyday workings of the adult life, and how to take care of themselves and take care of their families. That is another just great benefit that we’ve seen in our own family of having our girls at home with us.

Aby:                             Yeah. And that time, like you said, to do life and discover kind of who they are and what they want to do and what they love. I find that this new phenomenon of this gap year really interesting. When I was a kid, I mean when you graduated high school, there was no gap year. I’d never even knew what that was. But it seems like now kids are taking a gap year to learn how to do life, to learn how to do the things that really they should have been learning all along, or to figure out what they want to do, and who they are, and what they love and what they’re geared for. A blessing with homeschool is we can start that right off the bat and grow that in all their 12 years. So there isn’t that need of, “Oh now I need to figure out what this whole life thing is about in a year before I move on.”

You were talking about doing life. There’s so many incredible opportunities also that come, like apprenticeship. What we can do with this time these kids, they can do an apprenticeship. There’s entrepreneurship opportunities. I know that your girls are doing a family business with you. It’s incredible. I love listening to the ads where Brooklyn is on there, and the incredible things she’s learning and she’s part of that. She wouldn’t be there to do that with you and Garritt if it weren’t for this

There are ministry opportunities, which is huge. It’s not, “Okay, now that I’m done with school, I can get into ministry.” It’s part of life. Volunteering. If the kid is in school all day and then afterschool activities, where are they going to volunteer? Where are they going to learn to serve? So just this time that we get with our kids, there’s so many opportunities. And again, back to when we’re seeking God first we don’t have to come up with that time. It’s given to us. When we were seeking God first, we don’t have to pound the academics. We’re not saying don’t do it. Academics are important, but they’re going to come. It naturally is going to happen. The statistics show it. The outcome, if you look around, it happens because you’re seeking God first. He promises us that.

Yvette:                         Right. Right. And we’re not saying, “Go out and do everything else but academics and expect them to learn everything they need to learn.” It’s just that that doesn’t have to be the primary focus day in and day out of life. It’s not the traditional school day that we all grew up with, that most of us grew up with of sitting in a classroom for six or seven hours a day. I mean there’s certainly a schoolwork that needs to be done and we do those things.

But again, we talked a lot about this in the episode we did on the why of homeschooling. When looking at academics, the important part of that is using everything that they do to point them to Christ. Everything you teach them, even math should point them to Christ. Math is amazing when you think about God being a God of order, and he is a God of absolutes. Two plus two is always going to equal four. We cannot decide one day that two plus two is going to equal 17. It’s never going to happen. It’s always going to be four. Always has been. Always will be.

Aby:                             Yup. It does not get to identify with 17. It will be four.

Yvette:                         That’s right. And God is a God of absolutes and he is a God of order, and so being able to do math and helping our kids to see, you know what? Just like two plus two is always four, the absolute certainty of God’s word will always stand firm. God is the same yesterday, today and forever because he is God and he is unchanging. And so just like math doesn’t change, God doesn’t change, and his word does not change, and the culture is telling our kids something completely different than that. They’re telling them, “Well, you know, in …”

Sadly, I mean, we won’t off on this, but sadly, so many, even churches today are saying, “Well, this part of the Bible is irrelevant today,” or, “This part of the Bible is irrelevant.” Nope, it’s not. God gave us his word for a purpose. And so when we teach them at home, we get to be able to point them to Christ in everything that they learn.

Aby:                             Right. And then again, and I keep saying this, but it is so neat to see that when we do that, when we are obedient in that naturally, I mean I just love looking at the homeschool statistics of the kids. They are scoring higher, they just are. And when you go around and talk to homeschool moms, it is not because we are making our kids do nine hours a day and sleep on top of their textbooks and memorize. It truly is because God’s way works. It just works. And there is proof, and I know I needed to hear that. I, for some reason, I like to know. Show me that it works. And it’s like God’s way does work, and it’s not going to, I mean, you’re going to see it. And so when you seek first the Kingdom, speak first, pointing to your kids, pointing to God in math and in language and in science and in history, the academics will happen.

A couple of other before we have to wrap up. A couple of other awesome benefits of homeschool, again, not the focal point, not our drive but things that trickle-down from being obedient to God. We’ve talked about family relationships, but I think just marriage. I see that marriages tend to be stronger. I can’t imagine if there were five of us going in five different directions all day long, and then we could come together for only two hours in the evening. Then I’m divided my time between my kids and my husband, and it strengthens marriages, homeschool does.

I mean, there is a lot of pressure on a marriage too when you homeschool, but when you’re seeking God first and not your lesson planning at eight o’clock at night, when you’re seeking God first, then it naturally is going to bless your marriage. But again moms, you have to be seeking God first. Don’t seek your lesson plan book, don’t seek what your yearly annual goals are. Seek God and it happens.

“When I started homeschooling, homeschooling became my ‘number one.’ I’d get my Bible study done in the morning, and then I wanted to be the best homeschool mom I could be. And so that, in my mind, was ‘plan, organize, coordinate,’ and I forgot to seek God first.”

Yvette:                         Yes. Let’s talk a little bit about that, because and we’re actually going to do a podcast episode pretty soon on marriage, and I’m super-excited about that one. But about maybe if you can give some personal things on your end, in your marriage, and how you have seen your marriage strengthened because of homeschooling.

Aby:                             Okay. Well, I can first tell you how I saw it being destroyed because of homeschooling.

Yvette:                         Okay, yeah.

Aby:                             And I know I’m not alone in that, but when I started homeschooling, homeschooling became my “number one.” I’d get my Bible study done in the morning, and then I wanted to be the best homeschool mom I could be. And so that, in my mind, was “plan, organize, coordinate”, and I forgot to seek God first. And if I was seeking God first, I would know that my marriage would be a priority over my homeschool.

When we do that and we’re burning the midnight oil and ignoring our husbands because we’re planning, and ignoring our husbands because we have our giant to do list, you can destroy your marriage that way. And again, that’s because you’re not seeking God first. Then when I turned the ship around and I realized, “You know what? When my husband’s home, the books are away.” It was amazing how God honored that time. I could miraculously plan twice as much in half the time, because I was seeking God first, because I wasn’t staying up till midnight planning. Meanwhile, my husband is being completely ignored.

The first ingredient is, “get the priorities right.” Seek first God. Know what your primary ministry is. Homeschooling should never take precedence over any relationship in your family, ever. But then when we seek first God, and we do get those things right, and we do make our marriage more important than our homeschool, it will naturally bless your marriage. It just does. It blesses your relationship with your husband and your kids, and your kids’ relationship with your husband, and allows your husband to have time with your kids. You’re not just managing and running and shuffling.

When daddy gets home, we get to be together. We get to be together. I’m not juggling homework assignments. I’m not shuffling my kids every which way, and that brings a peace in our home. I also think I have helpers at home. I have helpers to help run the household, which just makes everything runs smooth. So that’s a blessing for the marriage as well. But whenever you’re seeking God it blesses every relation.

Yvette:                         Yup, absolutely. And we’re, you know, it’s interesting because we are in a different situation than you where Garritt is home all the time. He works from home. We’re making this movie where we are together all the time. Literally, for the most part, our family is together 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and we love that. He came from a job working the Hollywood film industry where he was gone all the time, and the Lord brought him out of that and we’re so thankful for that. But now we’re together always.

But we have to make an effort to get away, and not just Garritt and I. Oftentimes, we’ll say, “We need to just go on a dinner date, or a lunch date or something when we can.” Sometimes it’s spontaneous, but we recognize that we need to have husband and wife time alone apart from our girls where we can just talk and we can just fellowship with one another We’ll get to the point where we’ve missed that. You feel like, “I’m sitting next to you all day, but I miss you.”

But we also do that with our girls too. So oftentimes, where I’ll take one of my girls out for a date, or Garritt will take one of them out for a date, because we start to see that we just need some one-on-one time with each other, since we are together all the time. It’s just a different dynamic. Every family is different in that way.

Aby:                             And not that this is a marriage podcast, but I do also want to encourage moms. The word tells us that we are to be the wife of his youth and he is to love the wife of his youth. And he didn’t marry you because you were an incredible homeschooling teacher. That’s probably not why you married you. Just remember to be his wife first, so when you do get to go do those date nights, you don’t need to fill your time talking about curriculum. Love your husband and don’t let homeschool all consume you. Seek first the Kingdom of God, and those other things will be added unto you. We can get off the marriage thing because then we want everybody to come listen to the marriage podcast.

But the last thing, the last incredible blessing is the sibling relationship with homeschool. I want to debunk another myth. That does not mean that siblings are going to get along all the time and be best friends every day and never fight. I’ve heard that so many places where, “We homeschool and so our kids get along,” and I thought, “What am I doing wrong?” Then I sought first God’s word and I realized, you know what? There is going to be conflict. There’s conflict with children, there’s conflict with adults, there’s conflict in churches. I have the opportunity to teach and train my children how to deal with conflict biblically, and that’s the difference with the sibling. That’s a blessing with raising siblings in a home, and we get to work through conflict together. Not that there isn’t conflict, and I can promise you those relationships will be deeper, just they will naturally be deeper.

But what a blessing to be able to point our kids to God’s word when working through conflict, as opposed to maybe on a playground where you can just walk away and go find another friend, or you can go to the corner, or you can bully, or those things aren’t allowed in a home. You get to teach and train your children how God gives us direction on how to deal with conflicts. That’s an incredible blessing. It helps siblings with that.

Yvette:                         Yeah. And I think really, we’ve talked our girls a lot about this, and that helping them to learn to deal with one another in conflict with each other is helping them learn to deal with conflict with their future husband or their … Typically they’re not going to have a lot of conflict with their friends, but that’s actually one thing I tell my girls all the time, “Treat each other as you would treat your best friend,” but they need to learn to work through conflict. It’s okay to have differences and things, because you are going to have differences with your husband, or with your wife, or the other people that God brings into your life, maybe your boss. And so teaching them to deal with conflict with each other prepares them, again, for adulthood, and it’s such a beautiful thing.

Aby:                             It has to be taught because that’s not something … I mean, that has to be taught, because we naturally, our human flesh wants to either fight or flight, you know?

Yvette:                         That’s it, yup.

Aby:                             And in the school I remember thinking, “Oh, those two kids won’t be in the same classroom next year, so we won’t have to deal with this.” It has to be taught, and God has asked us to teach it according to his words. It’s a beautiful blessing that we get the privilege of doing that when we homeschool.

Yvette:                         Yes, yes. Oh, I love it so much. We are out of time for this podcast episode, but we will be back again next week. We’re going to finish this conversation talking about the benefits of homeschooling, so listen again next week.

And Aby, thank you for coming on again today. You are such a blessing and I’m so thankful that you get to be part of this ministry of Schoolhouse Rocked, that God has put on our hearts, and thank you for your wisdom. Thank you for your willingness to share your heart with us.

Aby:                             Thank you.

Ready to take your children back? Stream Schoolhouse Rocked: The Homeschool Revolution for free tonight and learn how. After you have watched the movie, download the Free Homeschool Survival Kit. This free 70+ page resource will give you the encouragement and tools you need to start strong and finish well.

Read the second half of this interview here.

Read more from Aby Rinella at CalledToTheTop.com and on the Schoolhouse Rocked blog.

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

20 Reasons to Homeschool

Note: This article is an excerpt from the upcoming Schoolhouse Rocked Homeschool Quick-Start Guide. Sign up here to get your copy as soon as it is released!

When the modern-day homeschooling movement started in the early 1980s, there were many skeptics. Today, through many studies and research from groups like the National Home Education Research Institute (NHERI), the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), and the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), we know, factually, that homeschoolers excel. On average, homeschoolers surpass their public-schooled counterparts in every measurable area (academically and socially).

Here are just a few of the dozens of valid reasons millions of families have chosen to home educate their children:

  1. You can pass on your faith and values to your children.
  2. Spending time with your own children is a priceless treasure.
  3. Students can specialize in, and pursue, their own unique interests.
  4. Homeschooling encourages socialization with all ages, not just same-aged peers.
  5. Homeschooling allows for a customized educational approach to fit each child’s learning style.
  6. Homeschooling offers a wider range of curriculum options than public schools.
  7. Homeschooling allows families to avoid Common Core curriculum.
  8. Homeschooling can provide better average academic outcomes.
  9. Homeschooling allows families to avoid bullying, violence, drugs, and negative peer pressure common in many schools .
  10. Students can learn at their own pace.
  11. Homeschooling provides the freedom to fit schooling hours around your lifestyle / schedule.
  12. Homeschooling allows for travel and “roadschooling” as a family.
  13. Homeschooling provides opportunities for students to contribute to family businesses and learn entrepreneurship.
  14. Parents direct sex education and what students learn when.
  15. Homeschooling accommodates special health issues or dietary needs of children.
  16. Learning-challenged students can use special resources just for them.
  17. Students are exposed to a wider range of beliefs and experiences than in a one-size-fits-all classroom.
  18. Parents can fill in gaps from your their public school education by learning alongside your children.
  19. Children learn from real-life experiences, not merely textbooks.
  20. Learning can be fun, creative and enjoyable, as opposed to “drill and kill.”

There are many great homeschooling support organizations, like HSLDA on the national level, as well as state and local homeschooling associations. These organizations can provide encouragement, information, networking, and social activities for you and your family. No parent, at the end of his or her life, ever regrets the time they personally spent investing in his or her child. People almost always find the time and money to do the things that are the most important to them. What could possibly be more important than our own children?

If you desire to give your children a quality education at home, you can! There are great homeschooling conferences in almost every state, and a surplus of curriculum options to choose from. You can find homeschooling conferences near you, hosted by your state organization, or you can attend a regional convention hosted by Teach Them Diligently or Great Homeschool Conventions.

Giving your child the one-on-one attention and customized opportunities they deserve is a great gift to them. No one knows your child better than you, no one loves them more than you. Therefore, no one is better qualified to help them walk through life than you. For all the best reasons, your child will benefit from you giving the best of your time and wisdom. May God bless you as you pursue academic excellence for your child and a relationship that can never be replaced.

Israel Wayne is an author and conference speaker. He is the author of the books, Education: Does God Have an Opinion? and Answers for Homeschooling: Top 25 Questions Critics Ask. www.FamilyRenewal.org