Jesse Maxwell is gonna homeschool

[YPestis]

Interestingly enough, I think Nathan Maxwell has a schedule. In the book "Redeeming the Time", they provided several samples of men's schedules and Nathan's was included. I don't know why Steve doesn't include his (maybe it's a Maxwellian secret!) but there's no Maxwell prohibition against husbands having schedules.

[latraviata]

Looking at the schedule, they wake up at 4.15?

The life of a nun in an enclosed contemplative order is extremely frivolous compared to Terri's and poor Sara's life.

Every minute has been scheduled, tooth brushing, hair blowing. Steve wrote to me yesterday that they are having a blast, well he certainly didn't schedule 5 minutes of fun.....

What I read in this schedule is pathological fear, obviously they are so afraid to lose control, it is pathetic. What an oppressive and joyless existence, you can't call it a life.

[twin2]

Can't remember which one I opened, but in one of Teri's blocks of life was "Make Steve's breakfast."

I don't understand why Steve can't make his own breakfast, it is not hard and it is not like he has anywhere to be at any particular time.

At least Teri' didn't have time on her schedule to "put toothpaste on Steve's toothbrush."

[NotALoserLikeYou]

Ahem.

Beth, wife of Dog the Bounty Hunter, commented. If only I could have worked the word dog into it without sounding weird.

Beth says:

January 23, 2014 at 2:09 pm

I started homeschooling in Colorado but then stopped when we moved to a nice area in Hawaii. That was a mistake and I soon realized it! Even my husband hunted around for the best education and finally agreed that homeschooling is the only way. And you definitely reap the bounty of the Lord. God bless!

[yewnique]

I'm not sure why the link isn't bringing you to their schedule.

But, you can go to their home page, click on "Resources" at the top of the page. On the resource page scroll down to the Master Lists link and that will take you to the schedule page.

I got the home page as well. I copied and pasted the extension /downloads/maxwell-schedules.html then I was able to see the page.

However, I could not view the schedules. Something about corrupted files.

[SPHASH]

I also feel bad for Teri. I looked at one of the older schedules and in the entire week, it seemed like she had one hour per week to pursue her own interests (scrapbooking). I mean, there are weeks where I'm so busy I don't have time to participate in my hobbies, but I also have weeks where I can do nothing but veg in front of the tv every evening, if I wanted to. Where's the spontaneity? The ability to say, you know what? I've had a long week and I don't feel like cleaning the toilets. I'm gonna read a book all afternoon (or go for a walk or knit some slippers or whatever it is she likes to do). Or, even so much as I don't feel like cooking tonight. Let's order in.

My life is pretty dull and routine, but I get claustrophobic just thinking about theirs.

Ironically January is Hobby Month. I couldn't imagine not having a hobby. Coin and currency collecting, camping, fishing, traveling, roadtripping, sports, and working on my blog "Sarah Palin has a serpent's heart". Even FDR said this-“I OWE MY LIFE TO MY HOBBIES—ESPECIALLY STAMP COLLECTINGâ€. When FDR was recovering from polio he would sit in his bed and look at his stamp collection. That helped him get out of his boredom.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

I have been blessed too. We corresponded about 2 years ago. He included that tombstone saying too, which I've seen before.

You inspired me to check my own email archives, I also had a response from Steve (from before I found FJ) and it had that same quote in it. It's just his .sig I guess (though he doesn't properly delimit it with --).

I just had a nerdy bus question.

[anjulibai]

Ugh, Mary's schedule...her math consists of "accounting with Dad", which is also combined with music (so she doesn't even get it regularly), and she has no science whatsoever.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

I couldn't imagine not having a hobby. Coin and currency collecting, camping, fishing, traveling, roadtripping, sports, and working on my blog "Sarah Palin has a serpent's heart". Even FDR said this-“I OWE MY LIFE TO MY HOBBIES—ESPECIALLY STAMP COLLECTINGâ€. When FDR was recovering from polio he would sit in his bed and look at his stamp collection. That helped him get out of his boredom.

Seriously this.

I can't imagine a life where you have no hobbies, no nerd interests, and your reading/general inquiry is restricted.

I mean, NO BOOKS. No pleasures of an extended google binge on some random topic that lasts for days and days. I would not survive. Only reading essentially the same book day after day after day after DAY...

Ugh, Mary's schedule...her math consists of "accounting with Dad", which is also combined with music (so she doesn't even get it regularly), and she has no science whatsoever.

And no science? Another arrow to the heart right there! No obsessing over some weird thing you noticed in the world and trying to find the pattern in it? Why trees are the way they are? Again I would just die.

...though I suppose they don't know any different, so maybe they don't miss it, but...

[Coconut Flan]

Ugh, Mary's schedule...her math consists of "accounting with Dad", which is also combined with music (so she doesn't even get it regularly), and she has no science whatsoever.

The hazards of why parents should not be allowed to set their own graduation requirements without some state oversight for minimum standards. Since her education appears to be so minimal it's even more surprising that she hasn't "graduated" yet.

[lilith]

The hazards of why parents should not be allowed to set their own graduation requirements without some state oversight for minimum standards. Since her education appears to be so minimal it's even more surprising that she hasn't "graduated" yet.

I suspect they are holding off on graduating Mary til Abigail is old enough to officially start first grade, so they always have a current homeschooler and can continue to claim to be homeschoolers for their conferences. I really hope Melanie keeps control of her girls curriculum and education.

[Tangy Bee]

Ok folks don't get mad at me...but Jesse seems very sincere about wanting the best for his kids. I'm shocked he even knows about bullying and school shootings! I guess they must get a chance to really talk to people who attend their conferences. Or maybe it's Steve telling them about all the "horrible" stuff that goes on in public school. Either way, Jesse must truly believe that his life is great and that he isn't missing out on anything. You can't miss what you have not had. Does anyone have the guts to ask Steve how he prepares his sons "emotionally and physically" for marriage? I hope they don't do like Gil & Kelly and give them a book to read a month before marriage!

[gardenvarietycitizen]

Teri and Steve don't "teach". The kids self teach via workbooks. (I'm pretty sure they wrote about this.)

They use workbooks, yes. A big part of Teri's book on homeschooling was giving scriptural references to support the idea that it's okay to teach from textbooks and workbooks.

A lot of self-described Christian homeschoolers (on USENET and elsewhere) are very taken with a romantic sort of less obviously structured education that involves the children reading a lot of "regular" books and getting the lessons out of them. Charlotte Mason, the various versions of "classical education," that sort of thing. This means a lot of work for Mom (if Mom is serious about doing a good job) because there aren't any pre-packaged homework assignments or tests or anything like that, plus if you lean more toward the child-led end of even Charlotte Mason type things, you need to really keep track of what bits your kid did already and what parts you need to push the kid to still.

And importantly, a lot of those people would make a lot of really disparaging remarks about parents who didn't use those systems, going on about how the "better" homeschoolers were using "living books" and how workbooks were just a bunch of low-quality junk food for the worker bees, that sort of thing. Implied was, it's the Godly thing to use the living books and all that (just as it's the Godly thing to pretend you live in Victorian times in so many other areas of your life, according to those same people).

So, there was quite a market for someone who would stand up and say, "actually, you know what? It's okay to use textbooks and let your kids just work through the pre-packaged assignments and curricula. If you are overwhelmed and that's all you can manage (while keeping your meek spirit) then you should do that, and God is okay with it, here is the proof via endless scripture references."

I can easily imagine a certain audience finding that very liberating.

But yes, so the Maxwell kids used textbooks/workbooks with some set curriculum. They could do the assignments on their own for the most part, while on the bus, in the corner at conferences, that sort of thing.

Interestingly then, just what level their education was would really depend on what textbooks they used. As far as I know they did go up to algebra in math, but some commenters reviewing the homeschool book have mentioned that they didn't go much beyond that, and they didn't have literature (or now apparently science?) and so part of the magic of the easy scheduling is that their family just plain had less material to cover than a lot of other homeschoolers who want their kids to pass the entrance requirement for a standard state college or whatever.

I don't know what texts they used, though. Still, if they do ONLY that, it's gotta be dry, whatever the content is...

While I do think it's important for children to learn to work things out on their own, the idea that a parent would want to invest a minimum amount of time in their child's education or wouldn't want to provide help if the time needed exceeded the fucking schedule is just astonishing.

You gotta remember, this was a depressed woman, who unfortunately was not given the option (either by Steve or likely by herself either, just due to beliefs) to send the kids out to school (public or otherwise). So likely this was the only way she could manage (and she's written about it being very hard for her to manage, even as it was - and she can't even be negative or "unmeek" about THAT!). She didn't want to homeschool but felt she had to. So yeah, it shows. (Personally I think if this extreme "I don't have to be involved! Yay!" method is what she had to do, she should have sent the kids out, or gotten some other help for homeschooling them, if it was that bad, but...)

In Kansas the way you homeschool is you make essentially a private school at home, hence the "Flowing Streams" thing (seriously, that name!). But it's 100% totally unaccredited so probably if they ever did want to get real jobs somewhere other than the family, they'd need to get GEDs, and well... yeah. That'd be a lot of fresh studying, I suspect!

As you can probably guess, the one subject they do seem to take really seriously (which Steve-O personally leads, IIRC) is... Bible study. For the kids to graduate, they have to do a long project on it, basically making preacher's outlines for large parts if not all of it, presumably to use in their future lives as fundie preachers.

I too suspect that once Mary graduates they will just keep up the homeschooling talk by discussing how the little cousins are now being homeschooled.

[YPestis]

I suspect they are holding off on graduating Mary til Abigail is old enough to officially start first grade, so they always have a current homeschooler and can continue to claim to be homeschoolers for their conferences. I really hope Melanie keeps control of her girls curriculum and education.

Shouldn't Abigail start kindergarten soon? Technically, that would qualify as "school" so Mary could graduate by then. Then again, Melanie and Nathan aren't touring with the Maxwells so I'm not sure how Teri can say she's still homeschooling if Melanie is doing the work. I actually think the Maxwells just want to stretch out their homeschooling days a bit longer with Mary. Their main sellers are still homeschooling products so it sounds better to still call themselves a "homeschooling family".

I've always noticed that the Maxwells' schedules were very light on academic work and heavy on Bible, Bible reading, praying, more Bible time. Even if we assume that the subject matter taught was rigorous (haha), the academic schedules and offerings are what I've seen in medicore students back in high school. Hardly the stuff expected out of critical thinkers and high achievers that fundies like to think they are producing. There's barely any science except some biology or earth science scattered here and there (and it's fundie based so I'm not sure how much science is actually in those courses!). Even if we discounted most high school English due to Maxwell reading restrictions, where's the chemistry? physics? calculus? European history? Debate? I don't think a single Maxwell child took any of these courses. You can't tell me eight children and not a single one would be interested in something beyond 9th grade science or middle school history, right? Where's the advanced course offerings? What do the Maxwells think public school students take if not these courses?

Re: Textbooks.

I think textbooks are perfect for the Maxwells. It's literally "by the book" way of learning. Everything's based off a preset schedule, every chapter is the same format. You can't get more bland than that.

In Teri's writings, she says her time is spent outlining what to read and which questions to answer. She marks out anything "objectionable". The children just go through their books, read and answer book questions. They take the textbook exams which are just rehashed book questions and then Teri grades them. The older kids grade themselves and retakes it if they get below a 70. For math, Teri has them do half the set of math problems, then take the end of chapter test and they keep marching onwards until the book is done. If the children are done early, they get to start on the next chapter early (yippee!). The Maxwells basically replaced the teacher with a textbook. There's no discussion. The only papers are those sporadically selected by mom (it seems Teri prefers kids just answer book questions). There's no other resources to look at.

Teri spends most of her time outlining schedules for the children to follow in their textbooks. As I remember in high school, the textbooks were almost always used as supplementary to actual teaching. The Maxwells say that is because their children are self-learners, unlike us stupid public school kids who have to be spoon-fed information by a teacher. However, I think it's the Maxwell kids who are spoon-fed materials. They lack the ability to synthesize original thought, rather, they depend on regurgitating what their textbooks say. They are never exposed to alternative methodologies and differing opinions because all their resources come from a parents-approved textbook. There are poor kids in third world countries that are forced to study like the Maxwells because they lack teachers and facilities. The Maxwells make their kids do this out of ignorance and contempt for the learning process. Despite whatever issues their local public school may have, the Maxwell kids would get a far superior education just by sitting in a classroom with a live teacher than they ever could at home.

[flojo]

Looking at the schedule, they wake up at 4.15?

The life of a nun in an enclosed contemplative order is extremely frivolous compared to Terri's and poor Sara's life.

Every minute has been scheduled, tooth brushing, hair blowing. Steve wrote to me yesterday that they are having a blast, well he certainly didn't schedule 5 minutes of fun.....

What I read in this schedule is pathological fear, obviously they are so afraid to lose control, it is pathetic. What an oppressive and joyless existence, you can't call it a life.

I think it's only Teri, the others get the luxury of sleeping in till 5-something.

Adding up, Teri only gets a little over 6 hours sleep. I have ahn anxiety disorder, and one of the biggest things for me is sleep. It can literally make the difference between functioning well or not (coupling it with insomnia makes thigns fun). I genuinely wonder what effect that sort of sleep deprivation has on her depression. I know some people need less sleep than otherws, but still...

[Jana814]

Looking at the schedule, they wake up at 4.15?

The life of a nun in an enclosed contemplative order is extremely frivolous compared to Terri's and poor Sara's life.

Every minute has been scheduled, tooth brushing, hair blowing. Steve wrote to me yesterday that they are having a blast, well he certainly didn't schedule 5 minutes of fun.....

What I read in this schedule is pathological fear, obviously they are so afraid to lose control, it is pathetic. What an oppressive and joyless existence, you can't call it a life.

Agree!

[nelliebelle1197]

Wow, he uses the workbooks because its the most learning they can get with the least effort he has to spend his time teaching them??

If you are too lazy to invest as much as your time as possible in homeschooling your kid, put them in a proper school. They deserve an education. Steve's lazy lack of homeschooling really shows him up, his adult children's writing is terrible and is as good as the average public schooled or decently homeschooled 11 year old. Sarah's books only got published because they chose someone to publish it that has very low standards. Any ordinary publisher would reject it because it is badly written and stilted, and sounds like it was written by a young child. She is 32 and should be a way better writer than that. Jesse's post is terribly written and shows no logical thinking or proof to back it up, most people his age are in college, and if he handed that in as a college paper, he would fail. If he handed that in as a high school paper he would fail too. I would guess at maybe 10-12 years old. If that is what you get when you have finished homeschooling, I bet by now Mary writes like a 5 year old.

These kids are a terrible example of homeschooling and wont make anyone think it is a good idea.

You fail Steve. Go buy a proper homeschooling curriculum and try again. Its not like your poor kids have any adult things to do all day.

All Maxwell books are self published

[Evilbad]

It's like, homeschool bingo. He checked all those boxes of things people say to justify homeschooling. He's young and fairly ignorant and has no idea how the world really works. I'm a little sad for him, because this is all he knows.

[Jana814]

He's young and fairly ignorant and has no idea how the world really works. I'm a little sad for him, because this is all he knows.

True of Jesse & the rest of the Maxwell kids.

[Handmaiden of Dog]

The schedule that I looked at had Teri getting up at 4:15 to do her back exercises and then later on there is "make dinner or rest back" so maybe she has trouble sleeping through the night because of her bad back. God, life on the road on the bus must be hell on her back.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

They definitely seem to fetishize waking up early.

I understand the idea of wanting to be productive and so having a nice healthy long day of work, and then a solid block of sleeping, but if you're not tied to some office or project schedule made by an outsider (i.e., you don't work for someone else) I don't see the need to insist on waking at zero dark thirty. They go to bed at 9, so it's not as if they work particularly long days, or anything. They just keep weird hours.

When I had a job that started at 6:12 AM (yes, they measured time in TENTHS of an hour!) I would wake up around 4, but no way in hell am I doing that voluntarily :) I now wake up at 6, I too have to do physical therapy in the morning, and then I have a job(!!) that keeps more normal business hours. Still, I'll just say that 6 is not my ideal choice if I was the only person involved in the decision :lol:

I suppose looking at things from the other side, because they don't have to interact with anyone else they're not required to keep normal hours either (odds of someone wanting to contact them after 9PM is pretty much zero).

Still, there's a crowd into it I guess. I get mail from my local park district telling me of the great new opportunities to take yoga starting at 5:30 AM. Thanks, but I'll pass on that!

[Joan of Snarc]

The schedule that I looked at had Teri getting up at 4:15 to do her back exercises and then later on there is "make dinner or rest back" so maybe she has trouble sleeping through the night because of her bad back. God, life on the road on the bus must be hell on her back.

Do we know if she ever gets to see an actual doctor for her back? Or is she only allowed to pray about it? I guess she has at least seen a physical therapist if she's got exercises to do. If she could be helped by back surgery or epidurals or something but Stevehovah doesn't allow it, well, that would be criminal.

[sparkles]

I'm an early riser, so I don't really find much fault with them for that. My normal wake-up time, even on weekends, is 5 am. I freelance in addition to my full-time job and I just find that I'm far more productive early in the morning than I am after I get home. Also, just before dawn is my favorite time of day. I love the quiet and watching the sun rise, and on weekends, it's also a great time to start bread baking (one of my hobbies). It's ME time. Of course, ME time that doesn't involve prayer or reflecting on one's sins is verboten in Maxwell land. And I get up early because I WANT to, not because it's part of a rigid schedule that was set for me by mommy and daddy, even though I'M AN ADULT. Big difference.

We all know, however, that following the schedules and living the same unvarying lives day in and day out with the same people is what the Maxwells choose to do, right?

ETA: Like Palimpsest, I'm also toast fairly early in the evening and I'm usually in bed by 9 to unwind, read, listen to music and and for online learning (hobbies and professional development, both for pleasure). I know I've had enough when my iPad hits me on the nose.

[Palimpsest]

Early wakeups were one of my beefs as a night owl fundie-lite teen. Why on earth is it more Godly to go to bed at 9:00 pm and get up at 6:00 am than to go to bed at 1:00 am and get up at 9: am? It's 8 hours of sleep either way. I never got a sensible answer.

Of course these days I get up at 5:00 am and enjoy the early morning hours, but you can't get a sensible word out of me after 8:30 pm -- I'm headed for bed and any attempt to force me to stay awake makes me snarly.

The Maxwell rigid schedules are ghastly. I bet they all get twitchy if they fail to keep to them exactly. Teri got very nervous and apologetic when she ran a couple of minutes over in the presentation I went to last June. It was no big deal, except to a Maxwell.

[mirele]

You know, going into the military would probably be something of a liberation for any Maxwell that attempted it. My dad grew up on the farm and he would regularly say that going into the Army and being sent to Korea (and shot at!!) was MUCH easier than being on the farm. He had no idea what the work world was like before that because everyone in his small town worked from way before sunup to way after sundown, even the little kids.

On the other hand, the Maxwells would have to be with people of the opposite sex and there'd be other dangers, so the military is right out.

ETA: The US military wouldn't take the Maxwells unless they graduated high school or passed the GED. So the military doesn't even want the Maxwells.