The Small Branch

I feel the need to answer this question.  Homeschooling is not only doing what you would do in a classroom at home.  Many people say they are "homeschooling" right now because schools have had to move to an online format.  While there are some homeschoolers who use online schooling to "homeschool", in my limited experience, most families who homeschool exclusively using online schooling don't last at home very long.  Online schooling can be frustrating and can circumvent real learning.  The beauty of homeschooling is that it doesn't have to follow any kind of pattern.  There are as many ways to homeschool as there are homeschool families.  Some families totally unschool - just learning through life and rich experiences.  Some families spend all morning sitting at the dining room table doing workbooks and using textbooks.  Most fit somewhere in between.  The thing is, as homeschoolers, we can remember that the goal is LEARNING, not grades...

     We are doing a study called Job: A Story of Unlikely Joy  by Lisa Harper (Lifeway Press 2018) in our Bible study at church.  Job is a book about suffering.  It tells us that the "health and wealth" gospel has been around for a long time and was just as much a lie then as it is now.  This week, we have been looking at "wound care" using Elihu's discourses from chapters 32-37.      I have been struggling with one main thing this week - what is suffering?  Job suffered the loss of his children, his wealth, and his health, not even to mention the loss of respect and friendship that seems to go along with those.  His were huge, obvious sufferings.  Lisa Harper mentions some huge, obvious traumas in her life as she discusses these sufferings.  But what if we haven't had the huge, obvious sufferings?  Personally, I think I have lived a pretty charmed life.  I was never abused in any way.  My parents love...