Things We Wish We'd Known Book Review by ChristineMM

Title:? Things We Wish We'd Known: A Guide to Abundant-Life Homeschooling

Edited by: Bill & Diana Waring

Publication: Emerald Books, 1999

ISBN: 1 883002 42 7

Note: I wrote this book review in 2004.

This is an essay collection by 50 different experienced Christian homeschoolers. They share their mistakes and how they fixed them. The goal is to help homeschoolers not repeat the mistakes the writers made.

It is not mentioned on the front or back cover of the book but this is written from a Christian perspective and is a religious book. If you are looking for secular materials you should know this. If you want Christian based homeschool help, you?will be happy to know this is?not secular.

Many of the homeschooling parents wrote that they started homeschooling with a rigid format of ?school at home?. Some parents even required the Pledge of Allegiance, had school style desks and took attendance. These parents learned over time that learning can be fun (which was a revelation to them). Many ditched the rigid schedule for a looser or very loose learning environment. Some people seem to remain shocked that learning can be fun and are trying hard to get that point across to the reader. If you are already in that groove you will not learn much by reading this book.

I found many of the essays to be repetitive, with the same issues and the same resolutions. Some of the contributors are popular names in the Christian homeschooling world, curriculum writers and magazine columnists for example.

This book is geared toward the mother who is burning out and is using a highly structured form of homeschooling. If you want a book that is Christian in nature and seeks to give permission that a more relaxed form of learning is effective then this book is for you. If you are not burning out and if you like your structured way of homeschooling then you probably won?t like this book, and you probably don?t need it either.

Note: This book was published in 1999, before blogs existed and before the boom of information that free homeschooling websites and homeschool blogs was at our fingertips. This was published back when we were forced to purchase books in order to get our hands on the homeschooling information we needed. Since this was published some new names in the Christian homeschool world have gained popularity and they are not included in this book.

Source: http://thethinkingmother.blogspot.com/2011/05/things-we-wish-wed-known-book-review-by.html

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