Teaching Rest Homeschoolers Guide Unshakable Reviews Summary

Religious Perspective

Pros:

• "This book saved my homeschooling career!"
• "Sarah speaks of the essentials of homeschooling, guiding our children to love learning about God's great big world and to foster family relationships along the way."
• "It’s written so spirit led and absolutely love how it reminds us of what homeschool is and means."
• "It gives an excellent reorientation toward a God-dependent commitment to the souls of our children."
• "Christianity and serving the Lord is the focus of the idea 'teaching from rest'."
• "Sarah keeps the main thing, the main thing, while encouraging and reminding us moms that it is possible to home school our kids with unshakable peace!"
• "I appreciate the gospel being intertwined into the pages of this book!"

Cons:

• "I found the book to be limited to homeschooling from a Christian perspective."
• "I didn’t realize this was so heavily faith-based, like really really heavy."
• "I wish I had read other low reviews to see that this book was extremely steeped in religion."
• "It's heavy on the Catholic."
• "You have to read 2-3 pages about God or bible verses to get to one paragraph that might apply to you if you are secular."
• "The ideas are just coated with Christianity and then resold as a new idea."
• "It's just a tiny book of religious spewing nonsense.. bible verse upon bible verse."

Practical Homeschooling Advice

Pros:

• "Great book with useful advice for living!"
• "This book helps you to identify the key areas where you can simplify and pull back so that there is peace in your homeschool."
• "I wish I had read this book when I first started homeschooling! Not only did it challenge the way I was approaching my homeschool, but it offered practical ways to put concepts into action."
• "So excited to start implementing some of her very practical tips!"
• "Sarah had great ideas for helping me to focus in on these priorities and use the time I have with my children wisely."
• "This was an inspiring book filled with practical advice and tested methods."
• "It definitely offers practical strategies for effective homeschool and more peace as a homeschool mom."

Cons:

• "I agree with others who have mentioned the repetitiveness, the many catholic references, and the bloggy feel."
• "Also the fact that the author teaches Latin (and mentions that multiple times) seems to be an antithesis for the topic of simplifying your curriculum."
• "Her thoughts are scattered, disorganized, and full of feigned humility."
• "This book never seems to get past the motivational fluff into the real meat of what teaching from rest actually looks like and how one might accomplish it oneself."
• "However, her approach to schooling seems so loosey goosey that I wonder when the time to really buckle down and work hard would come."
• "This book has a few good tips in it, but it is so engulfed in wordy poetic language that it renders it less practical."
• "No actual tips to glean knowledge from."

Quality of Writing

Pros:

• "It was inspiring and wonderfully written."
• "Sarah Mackenzie has packed so much goodness into this little book I wanted to reach through the pages and hug her!"
• "The wisdom shared is honest, validating and 'food for the soul'."
• "It's comforting. It's soothing. It's encouraging."
• "This is the inspiration I have been looking for!"
• "I cannot say enough good things about this book. It came at just the right time for me it didn't take forever to read and it was super packed with encouragement that my weary heart needed."
• "The author’s writing style makes me feel like I’m being encouraged by a good and experienced friend."

Cons:

• "I would only very loosely define this work as 'Christian'."
• "The tone of book and overuse of flowery language grated on my nerves."
• "By the end I was so bored I gave up."
• "Maybe all the hullabaloo over the book is from her fans."
• "I didn’t want to read this narrative laced with an attempt at poetic language."
• "Because of the poetic nature, it is at times difficult to understand the point the author is trying to make."
• "There is a lot of word vomit (repeating words/sentences and filler words) that needs to be edited."

Book Durability

Pros:

• "Love the book."

Cons:

• "Was a little disappointing that it fell apart so quickly."
• "The binding didn't seem to be very well made."
• "The issue I have is that I am nearing the end of the book and pages are literally falling out of the book."