The Four-Hour School Day: How You and Your Kids Can Thrive in the Homeschool Life

She writes from the heart and is real. She make you feel better about your choice to school your children and is really down to earth.

The 4 Hour School Day by Durenda Wilson will be my first recommendation for anyone considering homeschool!I haven’t posted about it yet because it was SO good, I’m afraid my words won’t articulate how incredible it was for me. Full of encouragement, thought-provoking questions, and all of the affirmations a homeschool parent needs and longs to hear, I blazed through it in a day during our beach vacay.Two years ago, I would have laughed in your face if you told me I’d be a homeschool mom. I’d followed curiously friends’ journeys of homeschool, but always with the “I’m glad it works for you” mindset, convinced I couldn’t do it myself.Enter: Covid. 🙄Our time of school-from-home (NOT the same as homeschooling!) was awful for us and the kids, so when it came to looking ahead at the 2020-2021 school year, the pull of having control over what and how and the HEART behind homeschooling grew exponentially. We dove in with @sonlightcurriculum and after an amazing year (with overnight field trips, learning adventures, lunches with daddy, tons of hands-on/real-life learning, and vacations during slow-season on the farm…we’re loving the freedom and flexibility it offers. Watching our kids thrive and grow is all it took for me. We’re gearing up for year 2 and we absolutely LOVE it.In this book, @durendaleewilson articulates all the things my heart and soul couldn’t. She doesn’t bash traditional school, but asks thoughtful questions about the intention and heart behind it (it’s not the teachers, bu the system!) and how the experience prepares our kids for real life…the same questions we ask about homeschooling.I highly recommend this book - whether your kiddo is still growing in your belly or about to start school or is already years into learning and your heart has a tug you can’t ignore. I promise you’ll love this one!“At our house, school revolved around family life, not family life around school. Education was a priority, but education wasn’t limited to reading, writing, and math. It was about learning how to live and love well. The goal was to live a balanced life with biblical priorities as a foundation.” pg. 174Pumped for year two of homeschool! 🙌🏼

The best parts of this book are the inviting cover art and the title, which I interpreted to indicate that this book would be filled with practical tips to help me as I homeschool my children. The cover promised a lot and admittedly set my expectations high.In reality, the book was filled with generalizations and platitudes about homeschooling: you can teach your child, you the parent know your child best, boys are wiggly and developmentally slower than girls, etc.The author often highlights the importance of spending lots of time with your children but then, somewhat paradoxically, discusses how her children were supposed to just do their own workbook pages and essentially teach themselves (but come to her with questions). Then she would send them outside to play all afternoon. To me, that doesn't sound like a recipe for quality relationships or education, but that's my opinion. Also, I was 67% of the way through the book before I saw any information that I considered a practical help.For readers looking for truly helpful, practical homeschooling information and encouragement, I recommend Sarah Mackenzie's book "Teaching from Rest." (I also recommend her book "Read Aloud-Revival" and her podcast.) I also enjoyed Sally Clarkson's book "Awakening Wonder."

Loved this simplified approach to homeschooling. This is our first year homeschooling our kids and it has been a challenge. After making all the rookie mistakes (trying to recreate public school at home), I was desperate for help. I stumbled upon this book, and thank goodness I did. We have put many of her suggestions into practice, and we are thriving.

This was a great book for any homeschooling mom! I highly recommend it. It talks a lot about how to enjoy homeschooling.

Loved this book! Never have I ever highlighted so much inspiration, encouragement and questions before. Needs a spot in your library today.

This book is full of Durenda’s veteran experience in homeschooling and you will be blessed and more confident after reading it. I cannot recommend this book enough as well as her other book, the unhurried homeschooler. I also listen to all her podcasts as she always sounds so relaxed and has a soft spoken voice and full of knowledge and encouragement on the podcast as well. Her books have been such a blessing to me. With her knowledge over 25 years of homeschooling- it is a priceless amount of knowledge, wisdom, and encouragement that she is sharing. If you want your homeschool to be Jesus Christ centered and want to teach your children independence and a love for learning this book is a must read. I was struggling on multiple levels and she puts a series of real life application questions at the end of each chapter and that gave me clarity how I will move forward that best suits my families needs. The questions are heart probing and makes you do some soul searching to remind yourself what is most important and why you started to homeschool in the first place. Thank you for sharing your story Durenda and pouring your heart, love and time into this book and thanks to your family for sharing you with the world( I know it takes lots of time to write a book). Your character shows that you are a Titus 2 woman for the next generation. Your books are a blessing beyond what words could say.

I am a homeschooling mom and I found this book to be very refreshing and encouraging. The basic message was do your best with God’s guidance, pray for your children and encourage them to follow their interests and let God produce fruit in their life. I liked Durenda’s sense of humor and she’s very relatable. Also listen to her podcast, it’s full of great parenting and homeschooling advice!

I appreciated that this book was a kind of an overview on homeschooling with some helpful tips and direction. It was full of really helpful wisdom and encouragement on what to keep most important. Would gift it to anyone and everyone remotely interested in the education of their kids.

As some other reviews have pointed out, this book is not as much about homeschooling as is it infused with ideology around culture and education. Some helpful perspectives at the beginning. It is clearly written from a Christian point of view and talks about God frequently, which should be expected if you look at the publisher but is not clear in the book’s description at all. The final chapter is about passing along faith to your children being a key part of homeschooling. What really turned me off though was the quote from Jordan Peterson in chapter 13 referencing the “crisis of masculinity” in our culture. This is not the book I thought I was buying based on the description, and I would not recommend it to others. There are many other inspiring, practical books on homeschooling that are not as ideologically narrow as this one is.

It was not clear in the book's descriptin that this book is incredibly focused on Christianity! God is mentioned several times on almost every page. There are several pages of scripture and many sections are entirely focused on faith (one section is called "Children are God's Blessings", for example).Near the middle of the book, there are 10 stories about why people chose to homeschool their kid. 10 out of 10 stories mention God as a motivating factor (most say it was "God's will" or "God's plan" for them to begin homeschooling).As a secular homeschooler, I cannot continue reading this book. I wish it was advertised as a homeschooling text for Christian families, as it will be a perfect fit for them. This book is basically unreadable if you are not a Christian (which is totally fine, just advertise it as such!).Although I have only read half this book, it can easily be summarized by saying that the author clearly had too many children to devote any really time to homeschooling and just "winged it" until the children could be in charge of their own education. For example, the author fully expects an 8 year old to work independently throughout the day with one daily "check-in" to keep them on track. This is unrealistic.Additionally, there is no concrete guidance to achieving a 4 hour school day other than the author recommending your children do school work in the morning and do whatever else you or they want in the afternoon.Lastly, the font is horrendous.