How old is he? The Language of God, by Francis Collins (the founder of Biologos). He was in charge of the Human Genome Project, so he knows his stuff. Quantum Physics and Theology by John Polkinghorne. He is a both a theoretical physicist and an Anglican priest. John Walton's books on "The Lost World of..." These do not specifically address evolution, but they show from an orthodox Christian perspective, how Genesis can be read in an intellectually and theologically honest way that supports theistic evolution. Quesions of Truth: Fifty one responses to Questions about God, Science and Belief. By John Polkinghorne and Nicholas Beale. The Language of Science and Faith, by Karl Giberson and Francis Collins. This has a lot of short chapters about different science/faith questions. It is a follow-on to Language of God. Where the Conflict Really Lies by Alvin Plantinga. This book is a bit more scholarly, in that it is not a light read. He taught at Calvin College for 19 years. That is what we thought as well, until we read the above books. It was very helpful to learn that this is mainly an American problem, and one we have exported. NT Wright speaks about this, and he is one of the leading Christian theologians alive. According to Wright, the way that Americans force this dichotomy is not a problem in Britian. I had no idea how American much of my Christianity was until I started reading theologians from other cultures.

Thank you for this encouragement. I dont want to come across as the opinionated interloper.

In the "What would a minimalist homeschool education look like", @prairiewindmomma said "Back in the 80s everything was classroom based---then it swung to being all literature based/multi-level in the late 90s/early 2000s---and now we're swinging back to things designed for specific grades with lots of components. I think part of this is because of the influx of charter school dollars, but that's a different thread. 🙂" And I wanted to start a separate discussion on this. @prairiewindmomma, I would love it if you would elaborate on this statement. I have no experience in "back in the day" curriculum, so this is an idea I am unfamiliar with. However, I have seen the specific everything and it kind of drives me nuts. The further along I get I get in homeschooling, the more I lean toward wanting to educate myself so that I can competently design curriculum for my kids. How this looked practically is that I purchased WWE levels 2 and three for my kids...and ended up regretting it. I appreciate the curriculum and it helped me gain a solid understanding on scope, sequence, and writing goals. But I really wish I had just purchased the instructor text. That way I could still get the scope and sequence, but with the materials I am already working with. I have realized that I needed some hand-holding, especially at the beginning, but not as much as I thought I would need.

This is going to be a weird comment, but if you do Tom Sawyer, I would also do Roll of Thunder, if you havent yet. This is because both books use the n-word a fair amount, but they are used in different ways, and I think it is an important distinction to teach the kids. In RoTHMC, every time it is used, it is clear that it is derogatory and a dehumanizing word. I was able to teach the kids that the word means, "I dont think you are fully human (or fully in God's image if you are Christian)" and their stomachs should clench up when they hear it. We practiced having that terrible gut feeling when hearing the word. We listened to it as an audiobook, so there was no getting around it. With Tom Sawyer (we listened to Tom Sawyer, Detective), the n-word isnt really used like that. It is more used as a substitute for "black person," but with something extra. Because of the time period it was written in (and that it was written by a white man), all the characters say it, but there seems to be an undercurrent of derision. After all, there is a reason it is a highly offensive word today. By listening to both books, it was the first time I really understood how context matters with the n-word. I in no way defend its use, but I think that it is an important part of our history to understand.

I think that is what my kids think when I make them deep clean the house. If ever TLC gave me a TV contract, this might be the title. In my defense, children are gross. And we live in a small house which concentrates the grossness.

I know! Of all the things, I am not surprised it was a post on cleaning. To misquote Jerry McGuire (I think), "Shut up, just shut up. You had me at cleaning." I get a deep sense of satisfaction over cleaning. And I cannot wait to watch my kids clean their footprints and handprints off our walls.

I had to buy two ikea bookshelves for all the books I have purchased since I began homeschooling😍. Reading you and others on here is how I really grasped the importance of teaching myself to teach my kids. Writing curriculum can be helpful, at least initially, but books about writing are what have been the most valuable. Similarly, learning how to teach phonics (thanks @ElizabethB ) has been much more valuable than any phonics curriculum. Sorry this is a total derail. It belongs more in the minimal homeschooling thread.

(You said no series books, but have you done Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles of Prydain series? We love it as a read aloud! And it feels and sounds like a classic) Bud and Me: The True Adventures of the Abernathy Boys This is a fascinating book that you can easily incorporate US geography into it. i cannot recommend this book strongly enough. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry (difficult topic, lots of the N-word, but used in a proper context, if that makes sense) Bud, Not Buddy is same time period as Roll of Thunder, but much more palatable, which dealing with difficult topics (no n-word) Island of the Blue Dolphins (great as a car audiobook; Scott ODell is author)

Amazon should pay you commission for all the books you have recommended that I have purchased over the past year.

This post is really helpful, but the bolded, in particular, is encouraging to hear. I am in my fourth year and only now am I grasping where I am headed. I am over the initial shock of homeschooling, I am mostly beyond the newbie worry of "what am I doing" and I am settling in for the long haul. I have more confidence in myself and my abilities. I believe that teaching kids how to read is one of the greatest gifts I have given my children, and that if I could teach them to read, I can do a lot more than I thought I could. And now I am in the process of developing my teaching skills. The bolded italicized I would love as a different thread!!! I am a bit gun-shy, because I am a new here and have already started several topics. Pretentious upstart😜

Thank you for saying this. This has been my children's attitude, so it is nice to hear from someone who has launched children! I did teach my 4th grader how to write paragraphs with a topic sentence, supporting details, and a closing sentence by writing up his observations from the experiments (demonstrations?) in the Optical Society of America's optics kit. That proved amazingly successful. I think everything I listed has been curated as Christmas/birthday gifts from family members over the last decade, so our cost has not been much. Something I did right when the kids were little was a strict no screens rule. Once they got to be school-age, I allowed documentaries. What this meant for my kids was that they think that a science or history documentary is a real treat. Here is a list of some family faves in science (we also enjoy the ones lewelma listed): How The Universe Works, How the Earth Was Made, Steve Spangler DIY Sci, Inventions that Shook the World, Magic School Bus, Jim Al-Khalili. I know I am forgetting some, but those are great! All can be found either on youtube or Amazon Prime. I also allow screens for computer programming and chess. I allow screens for Great Courses Plus, because it is like getting a college lecture in the comfort of one's home. Our subscription has easily paid for itself. My kids also love hiking, camping, and exploring the outdoors. I trash-pick electronics for them to take apart (nothing with a CRT or capacitor). In addition to a ton of DVD players, VCRs, CD players, printers, etc, they have also taken apart three dishwashers.

I only have 6th grade and under, so take this for what it is worth😁. We are a science family, but I "unschool" science thus far. However, the science things we own include and are not limited to: telescope, microscope, field scope, all the snap circuits, KNex, Lego, Lego Mindstorm, Lego Boost, Thames and Kosmos, loads of rocks, minerals, fossils, random collected animal parts, magnets, dissection kit, chemistry 2000 kit, a ton of geography books, arduino, optics kit, etc. And these all get regularly used, because they are easily accessible. We then watch a lot of documentaries and Great Courses Plus lectures on our current interests (currently extreme weather and infectious diseases). Oh, and we go to a bunch of different science/natural history museums. One of my kids is really into bones and we live in an urban area. He is getting a taxidermied animal skeleton for Christmas that he has to assemble. This will teach him more about the skeleton than I have ever known.

While doing Mad Libs, my kids had to list 2 famous people. They got into an argument over which 2 of the three were more famous: JK Rowling, Brandon Mull, or the #1 chess player. Someone asked my kid who his favorite super hero was. He said, "Paul Revere." The person said, "Are you homeschooled?" They heard the "We are farmers" jingle for Farmers Insurance and got super excited. "Sumus agricolae, bum ba da bum bum bum." They do not know what grade they are in. My 7yo asked me to buy the book, "Bud, Not Buddy" for his future children. They have told me that they want to marry someone who enjoys read-alouds. "Mom! Grandma didnt know (insert any Greek myth). But dont worry, I narrated it for her."

I like the ETC workbooks except for the badly-drawn pictures. I have no idea why they look so terrible. I have found, however, that I need to be sitting next to my son and hear him read the words because he can still get the right answer while having read some of the words incorrectly. We hated, HATED, ETC online. It was like a timed version of the books that punished a child for a lack of computer skills. Have you looked at the book, "Why Johnny Can't Read"? The book itself is a manifesto on phonics, but the last 70 pages are lists of words broken into appropriate phonics categories. I found that going through a list a day and repeating it for as long as needed helped solidify phonics rules that he needed more practice with.

I agree with this. I find fascinating from reading these boards and reading lots of well thought out writing, how much some adults practice and enjoy writing. There are people on these boards who do more useful writing for free and for fun than they probably did in college. Or at a job. They easily push out several thousand words on a somewhat obscure topic. I would love it if my kids grow up to be as articulate in their field/hobby as some of the posters here. I want my kids to be able to have deep and satisfying conversations about interesting books. I did a lot of writing in high school; the writing taught did not transfer into skills I actually use now.

I just went through his book and I think I have a case of confirmation bias. He has been getting the problems with number solutions pretty "easily", but there is a disproportionate amount of angst over the proofs (which he can do, he just hates the writing part of them). I also seem to think that review sections have lots of "prove obscure things" , and my son seems to have a phobia of drawing diagrams at a size where they are actually useful for comprehension. Math tends to start out with "Mom! I dont get what this is asking!" Me: "Did you draw it out at a size you can easily label and understand?" Crickets. 5 minutes later, "Now I get it."

And this is why I love AoPS. And also why I am an engineer by training and not a mathematician😁.

My kid is in AoPS geometry this year and he just finished ch 13. I love AoPS and I love that their geometry is heavy on proofs, but good heavens, we are both sick of proofs! I think I am just going to have him say the proofs to me for half the remaining proof problems. All I want is some answers with honest-to-goodness numbers in them.🤣

Thank you for this! The search function here is challenging, and I know there is so much wisdom to be gleaned from old threads. And I dont think you are crazy😁.

I fully agree with this statement! The longer I homeschool the more I realize that the bolded is what I think has killed most adult's desire to learn deeply. I read on here a while before jumping in to the conversations, but you and 8filltheheart have always inspired me with how you have rejected the bolded, painstakingly forged your own path (and watched your kids blaze their own trails), lived in the uncertainty, and ended up with young adults who are interesting and self-directed. That takes guts.

I dont know if my answer is really in line with the question, but when my kids (6th, 4th, and 2nd) are asked how much school they do every day, they tend to answer a time that doesnt remotely reflect how much education is being done (I began homeschooling for academic reasons and lean rigorous). But they are answering truthfully because what feels like school for them is a small fraction of their academic day. None of them count reading, history (audiobooks, documentaries, discussions, books), science (we are a science kind of home), read-alouds (carefully selected by me to reflect our history focus for the year), or the hours we spend walking and talking every day about what they are learning. This means that my kids only count math (and they like and are good at math), grammar, and writing as school. Minimalism can be a lot of work, but it is mostly behind the scenes, so to speak. What is experienced by others is the end result. But there is effort done by the minimalist: curating their stuff, saying no to stuff, etc. My kids experience the end result of my behind-the-scenes work.

"Mom, you are so much happier with us when we don't complain and fuss." "Mom gets frustrated when I fuss over a page of math." Says my 7yo to my DH. "Phonics only takes 10 minutes if I do it without complaining." My child is some kind of genius. With observations such as these, I should get him tested for giftedness😂

That is very helpful, thank you. I just put "In search of Deeper Learning" on my homeschool Amazon list. I love how deep conversations are both relational and educational. I love how I can prioritize what is valuable to me, guide my kids towards deeper thinking, and it "counts" towards their education, without nary a worksheet in sight. The gift of time sounds so...trivial and obvious, perhaps (I hope this does not read as a slight to you - it is an observation of the current zeitgeist). However, in modern society I think it is often taken completely for granted. The gift to exist in one's own head and have the space to think one's own thoughts. Modernity confers a lot of advantages, but there are serious drawbacks as well. Solitude is a lost art.

@lewelma, which book are you reading? I have been homeschooling for 4 years and for the past year I have realized the necessity of shielding my kids from the crazy pressure and testing. Andrew Kern has a audio lecture on the Circe site that discusses assessments that bless. I found his ideas helpful and similar to what you described. I often think about the hobbies I pursue as an adult and how it would kill the pleasure if I were regularly assessed on my proficiency of my learning. That is a soul-sucking way to live.

Lecka, you just described my entire high school experience. A masochistic pissing contest.