Everyday Educator - “A World of Possibilities” –– Part 2 with Sam Sorbo
00:00:00.000 | (soft music)
00:00:02.420 | They don't see the dangers.
00:00:05.680 | I think a lot of the parents, Sam, that I talk to
00:00:09.640 | think that school now is a lot more like school was
00:00:14.640 | when they were in school than it is.
00:00:20.720 | And they don't see the danger partly
00:00:24.520 | because they don't explore it and they don't want to know
00:00:27.200 | because that would demand that you make a difference.
00:00:29.840 | A different decision that you have to change.
00:00:33.000 | But I think that people don't recognize the danger
00:00:38.000 | that public education, that modern public education
00:00:46.880 | is doing to our children and thus to our future.
00:00:51.880 | - You know, part of the reason that they don't recognize it
00:00:54.440 | is because they don't recognize the damage
00:00:56.880 | that it's done to them.
00:00:58.080 | - Absolutely.
00:00:59.480 | - And if they do recognize the damage that it's done to them
00:01:03.680 | then they have some reconciliation to make
00:01:08.680 | between them and their parents,
00:01:10.840 | between them and their children so far.
00:01:12.960 | Like there's so much damage to unpack
00:01:16.560 | and it's a difficult road.
00:01:19.160 | Like I understand that it's hard for people.
00:01:22.160 | And they'd rather not look at it.
00:01:24.920 | A lot of people are just focused on
00:01:26.960 | where's my next meal coming from?
00:01:30.040 | - Moving ahead, not looking back.
00:01:32.600 | And if looking back is going to jeopardize my moving ahead,
00:01:36.720 | then for a lot of people,
00:01:37.720 | they don't feel like they have the freedom to do that.
00:01:42.000 | - Yep, fair enough.
00:01:43.440 | - And so a lot of us who do,
00:01:46.640 | a lot of us who do think, wow, a system...
00:01:51.640 | If I am saying I don't think I'm capable
00:01:56.160 | of homeschooling my children,
00:01:58.960 | why would I send them to an institution
00:02:01.760 | that made me incapable of educating another human being?
00:02:06.760 | And so we do come out
00:02:08.200 | and we do pursue this home centered education
00:02:11.040 | and we reclaim our own educations as we go.
00:02:16.040 | I mean, how did you learn to teach your children?
00:02:18.820 | - Well, I learned the wrong way, right?
00:02:21.600 | So, and I did it wrong.
00:02:23.760 | And I don't say that, look, I don't mean much by that.
00:02:28.440 | I did a grammar curriculum that involved a lot of writing.
00:02:34.080 | And so I forced my firstborn to do all the writing.
00:02:38.480 | And then when the second one came along,
00:02:40.800 | I didn't force him to do all the writing
00:02:42.820 | because at that point I'd figured out it was a lot.
00:02:46.520 | - This is not the best thing.
00:02:48.460 | - Once you go through it once, you're like,
00:02:50.360 | well, wait a minute, we don't have to do all of that stuff.
00:02:53.640 | Like, thanks, but no thanks.
00:02:55.260 | So, but then again, my firstborn has written
00:02:59.080 | and published a book and my second child has not.
00:03:01.720 | - There you go.
00:03:03.220 | - I don't know, maybe there's some math to do on that.
00:03:05.720 | - Right.
00:03:06.740 | - So I guess I figured it out as I went along.
00:03:11.740 | I know a lot more now than I did before.
00:03:15.560 | I've become much more brash.
00:03:17.380 | I didn't realize how damaged I was by the system.
00:03:21.840 | I didn't realize, I thought that it was just the school
00:03:26.280 | where I was just wasn't that good,
00:03:29.080 | but other schools might be good.
00:03:31.740 | Now I understand it's the system of schooling
00:03:35.380 | that is the hazard for our children.
00:03:37.920 | That's why I say just don't institutionalize healthy children
00:03:40.740 | like that's insane.
00:03:42.940 | And we should see it as insane.
00:03:44.640 | The only reason we don't see it as insane
00:03:46.560 | is because everybody does it.
00:03:48.420 | But everybody used to, I don't know, shave their heads.
00:03:53.280 | - Right.
00:03:54.120 | - Like everybody used to sacrifice their children.
00:03:58.220 | Well, I guess we still do that.
00:04:00.260 | Everybody used to something, right?
00:04:03.740 | Just because it's popular doesn't mean that it's right.
00:04:06.700 | Everybody used to wear floods.
00:04:08.620 | - That was it.
00:04:09.460 | - That was the popular thing to do
00:04:10.780 | was to roll your pants up so your ankles showed.
00:04:13.340 | - Yeah.
00:04:14.980 | - Now loafers with no socks is like the new thing.
00:04:18.500 | And there are a lot of people who adopt that.
00:04:20.320 | And there are still a lot of people who say,
00:04:21.680 | "No, that looks weird.
00:04:22.660 | "I'm not doing that."
00:04:23.800 | (laughing)
00:04:25.380 | So I think part of education,
00:04:29.380 | and for instance,
00:04:31.420 | I don't think education should have the modifier Christian.
00:04:33.880 | It shouldn't need that.
00:04:34.780 | It's either truth or it's not truth.
00:04:36.860 | And if it's truth, then it's Christian.
00:04:38.500 | - Then it's Christian.
00:04:39.980 | Right, 'cause all truth is God's truth.
00:04:42.060 | - But education ought to be pursuit of truth,
00:04:45.460 | beauty and goodness.
00:04:46.580 | And as long as you're pursuing that,
00:04:49.020 | you're not gonna be distracted.
00:04:50.540 | In fact, I would go so far as to say our schools
00:04:53.980 | and what they offer are only distraction.
00:04:57.140 | So why would we want our children in that?
00:05:01.820 | - Right, 'cause they're pursuing other things,
00:05:05.200 | not truth, beauty and goodness.
00:05:08.180 | - Right.
00:05:09.220 | - Yeah. - Exactly.
00:05:10.500 | - Not freedom.
00:05:11.860 | Well, let me ask you this.
00:05:13.180 | I know that when we homeschooled,
00:05:18.180 | I learned at least as much as my children.
00:05:23.280 | And I'm not talking about just academically.
00:05:26.120 | I mean, there were lots of things that I had learned
00:05:29.060 | in my public school and in my private college.
00:05:33.220 | And I would have said I was a pretty smart girl.
00:05:40.420 | - But there are a lot of things that I learned
00:05:43.060 | along the way of homeschooling about God,
00:05:48.060 | about his word, about his world, about myself,
00:05:52.940 | about my children, about the truths
00:05:55.580 | that he was trying to teach me.
00:05:57.400 | What did homeschooling teach you?
00:06:00.300 | - It taught me that I was enough.
00:06:04.220 | It taught me to be a better parent.
00:06:08.300 | Oh, this is huge.
00:06:10.860 | When you send your child into an institution every day,
00:06:14.420 | you begin, it necessarily, it just happens,
00:06:17.820 | you begin to abdicate your responsibilities as a parent.
00:06:21.100 | And there's a chapter in my book about this,
00:06:24.100 | They're Your Kids, where I talk about
00:06:26.780 | everything becomes a learning opportunity.
00:06:29.620 | And my goodness, if that isn't the joy of life.
00:06:32.520 | - Yes, yes.
00:06:34.040 | - It isn't teaching a child something.
00:06:36.620 | I don't know where you get your joy,
00:06:38.380 | but boy, that is your joy to me.
00:06:41.620 | So I distinctly remember teaching my child
00:06:45.340 | how to answer somebody who says, how are you today?
00:06:49.500 | - Yes.
00:06:50.340 | - Because she just looked at them
00:06:51.980 | and kind of whispered, fine.
00:06:53.980 | She was so shy.
00:06:55.780 | And I said, actually, when somebody asks you
00:06:58.460 | how you're doing, the proper way to answer them
00:07:01.100 | is to say, I'm fine, thank you, and how are you?
00:07:04.120 | - Yes.
00:07:04.960 | - Go ahead, try it right now.
00:07:06.400 | And the woman was kind of like,
00:07:08.280 | well, that's not what I signed up for,
00:07:10.340 | but okay, we'll go with that.
00:07:12.980 | And my daughter said, I'm fine, thank you, how are you?
00:07:15.340 | And the woman played along.
00:07:16.420 | Well, I'm fine, thank you so much for asking.
00:07:18.340 | What a sweet young girl.
00:07:19.340 | Like she totally played along.
00:07:21.100 | - Yes, yes.
00:07:21.940 | - The next day it happened again.
00:07:24.640 | And my daughter quick as a whip said,
00:07:26.460 | I'm fine, thank you, how are you?
00:07:28.860 | And the empowerment in her, just from that,
00:07:33.340 | and guess what, I'm the hero because I taught her that.
00:07:36.600 | - Absolutely, I love that story.
00:07:39.440 | I love that story.
00:07:41.240 | We used to practice before birthday parties.
00:07:45.120 | Okay, birthday parties are fraught with peril
00:07:48.680 | when you were an outspoken child like I had.
00:07:51.600 | And so we practiced before birthday parties.
00:07:54.520 | Okay, if you open the present from your friend
00:07:57.600 | and you hate it, what will you say?
00:07:59.860 | What do you say if you open a present you don't like?
00:08:02.680 | What do you say if you open the present
00:08:04.800 | and you already have one?
00:08:06.740 | What do you say if you open the present
00:08:08.940 | and you just unwrapped one just like it?
00:08:11.700 | And so we would practice the response.
00:08:14.260 | Well, what could you say?
00:08:15.720 | How would that make your friend feel?
00:08:18.240 | How can you say something true but affirming to your friend?
00:08:22.280 | And that's what homeschooling allowed us to do.
00:08:25.420 | We practiced being kind people.
00:08:29.960 | - Well, you used the word allowed,
00:08:33.180 | but I would even say it encouraged you to do that, right?
00:08:36.440 | It encourages better parenting
00:08:39.080 | because you recognize then
00:08:42.960 | the responsibilities on you 24/7,
00:08:46.080 | like you're not handing your child off to somebody
00:08:48.840 | to learn whatever.
00:08:50.280 | - And if you don't teach them, nobody will.
00:08:53.000 | - Which by the way, Lisa, I don't recommend Sunday school.
00:08:58.040 | I recommend to parents as of the age of three,
00:09:01.780 | I get it, if it's a baby and a toddler
00:09:03.920 | and they're just whatever
00:09:06.320 | and you really wanna sit in church, then fine.
00:09:08.880 | But as of the age of three,
00:09:09.960 | your children can learn to sit with you in church.
00:09:12.280 | - Yeah, yes, and then they learn what worship is like
00:09:17.160 | and what congregational singing is
00:09:20.400 | and what responsive readings are
00:09:24.000 | and they know why people stand up
00:09:26.220 | when we read the scripture at this church.
00:09:28.640 | - More than that, they recognize
00:09:30.960 | because they see it every day,
00:09:33.300 | mommy and daddy take this seriously,
00:09:35.980 | this must be important.
00:09:37.680 | There's a big transfer that happens
00:09:39.680 | when your child sits in church with you
00:09:41.340 | as opposed to you dropping them off for pizza
00:09:44.440 | or goldfish and veggie tails.
00:09:47.640 | - Yes.
00:09:48.480 | - And by the way,
00:09:49.320 | if you're dropping your child off at Sunday school
00:09:51.400 | and you're not asking the Sunday school teacher,
00:09:53.260 | what did you cover today and drilling your child
00:09:56.520 | when you pick your child up, I started there, right?
00:09:59.360 | So I told you, like I did a dozen things wrong
00:10:02.340 | because I've learned so much since then
00:10:04.440 | that to do it again, I would do it differently.
00:10:07.600 | But I used to pick my kids up and I'd say,
00:10:09.600 | well, what did you learn in Sunday school today?
00:10:12.880 | And we actually had, the church was pretty active
00:10:16.780 | and they had some nice things going on,
00:10:18.640 | but it was never really that great.
00:10:20.480 | And so when I started reading the Bible
00:10:23.740 | with my kids every day, I made them a deal
00:10:26.860 | because they really liked going and helping
00:10:29.220 | in the Sunday school at that point.
00:10:31.100 | I said, okay, every other week you're in church with me.
00:10:34.180 | - There you go.
00:10:35.260 | - And they appreciated that.
00:10:36.620 | It was really interesting.
00:10:37.460 | It was like this negotiation,
00:10:38.580 | well, mom, last week I was in church with you,
00:10:41.060 | so this week I do get to go to the,
00:10:42.980 | or well, I did help out in church last week,
00:10:46.180 | so this week I guess I'll be with you in church.
00:10:49.620 | But they liked that I was including them,
00:10:53.040 | like that I needed them or something.
00:10:55.960 | We don't value, I think we've forgotten
00:11:00.960 | how valuable we are to our children
00:11:04.680 | because of the culture has taught us
00:11:07.820 | that parents are superfluous or something along those lines.
00:11:12.040 | - Or that parents and children, yeah,
00:11:14.480 | that they have different interests
00:11:16.320 | and they don't belong together.
00:11:18.360 | - And so when you are a part of your child's life
00:11:22.000 | in whatever, in all capacities,
00:11:25.340 | it extends to all facets, I guess.
00:11:30.460 | So, but if your child is really interested in astronomy,
00:11:35.460 | you ought to take an interest in astronomy.
00:11:40.920 | You're the adult. - Absolutely.
00:11:42.660 | - Like you're the one driving the relationship.
00:11:45.200 | So don't expect them,
00:11:47.160 | because you're the one driving the relationship,
00:11:48.960 | don't expect them to become interested in politics
00:11:52.960 | because you're interested in politics.
00:11:55.320 | Although every child should have an interest
00:11:58.040 | in some of the politics that are happening
00:12:00.360 | because they ought to have a knowledge of current events.
00:12:04.400 | - Yes, absolutely.
00:12:05.700 | - Like I was on the radio, so I had to read articles
00:12:09.140 | just to keep up with what was happening.
00:12:11.000 | - What's going on.
00:12:11.940 | - So I would print out the articles
00:12:13.600 | and I would have my children read me the article
00:12:15.440 | in the car while we were driving.
00:12:17.040 | - There you go.
00:12:18.000 | - Which was a great education for them.
00:12:19.640 | They were forced to read big words
00:12:21.420 | and big sentences and stuff to me.
00:12:23.980 | And then I would explain it to them
00:12:27.720 | so that they felt involved.
00:12:29.800 | Like, you know. - With what you're doing.
00:12:31.640 | Yeah, they're a part of your life.
00:12:33.560 | - Right, these things are, this is the difference, right?
00:12:37.440 | Because your children then become a part of your life,
00:12:40.900 | like you've just said,
00:12:42.920 | in a way that the school actually actively prevents
00:12:47.160 | from happening.
00:12:48.480 | - Yes, yes.
00:12:50.480 | They actually don't want parents to know the ins and outs
00:12:54.440 | of what we're talking about with your children every day.
00:12:57.600 | - Well, that, but what I'm saying is just the idea
00:13:00.760 | that your child spends that much time away from you
00:13:02.700 | prevents this kind of relationship from forming.
00:13:06.760 | But yes, the same for the other stuff.
00:13:09.160 | The school is now, we're in charge.
00:13:12.120 | Your children don't belong to you.
00:13:13.780 | That's why the name of my book is they're your kids,
00:13:15.940 | not anyone else's, they're yours.
00:13:17.800 | - Yes.
00:13:18.640 | - But the school maintains, nope, they're ours
00:13:20.640 | and you can't have them back, basically.
00:13:22.580 | Like the states are now getting involved
00:13:24.880 | in separating children from their parents
00:13:27.240 | if the parents don't affirm.
00:13:28.760 | - Terrible. - Are you kidding me?
00:13:30.620 | My children didn't get to decide
00:13:32.300 | what they were gonna have for dinner,
00:13:33.600 | much less their gender.
00:13:35.240 | - I mean, my children didn't decide
00:13:36.640 | what books to check out from the library
00:13:38.440 | till they were double digits, come on.
00:13:41.320 | - Exactly.
00:13:42.840 | - I want, and I love what you're saying,
00:13:45.340 | that we are inviting our children into our lives
00:13:48.920 | because we're living our lives with our children.
00:13:53.000 | We know what, we have connections with one another
00:13:57.020 | and with the pieces of one another's lives
00:14:00.360 | that we necessarily miss when our children
00:14:03.640 | are away from us six or eight hours a day.
00:14:05.800 | - Right.
00:14:07.200 | - That's awesome. - Right.
00:14:08.800 | - That is so awesome.
00:14:09.640 | - It's a deep dive.
00:14:11.440 | It's funny because we have children.
00:14:16.400 | I struggled to have children.
00:14:18.040 | I went through a lot and it was hard
00:14:20.260 | and I finally had my kids, right?
00:14:24.160 | - Blessings, yes. - And then I turned them over
00:14:26.380 | to the school, well, my oldest, right?
00:14:29.280 | And that was hard for me.
00:14:31.200 | There's a reason it was hard for me
00:14:32.620 | 'cause I shouldn't have done it.
00:14:34.040 | - Right, right, right.
00:14:35.920 | - And boy, I'll tell you, like I said,
00:14:38.780 | I've said it several times, I did it wrong, right?
00:14:41.040 | So I did a year and a half of homeschooling
00:14:42.940 | and I loved it so much but I felt so insecure
00:14:46.920 | because I came to Christianity later in life.
00:14:50.020 | I was not raised a Christian
00:14:51.240 | and I wanted my children to have that.
00:14:53.180 | - Yes.
00:14:54.020 | - So I put them in a little Christian school,
00:14:56.400 | a little classical Christian school.
00:14:58.320 | It was a hybrid model.
00:14:59.680 | So I was homeschooling two days a week
00:15:01.440 | and then they would go to class,
00:15:03.240 | well, maybe I homeschooled three days a week,
00:15:05.160 | they did two days in class, I can't remember.
00:15:07.680 | And it was a disaster.
00:15:08.960 | Six weeks in and I go and interview the teacher
00:15:13.420 | just to make sure that, honestly,
00:15:15.100 | I was talking to her to make sure
00:15:16.480 | that I was holding up my end of the bargain
00:15:18.520 | because I was the good student.
00:15:20.200 | - Right, that you're matching up with what she's doing.
00:15:23.220 | - Right, and she spent five minutes telling me
00:15:25.220 | how well-behaved my little boy was.
00:15:27.280 | And I knew how well-behaved he was.
00:15:30.600 | I raised him, he was a very well-behaved boy.
00:15:32.440 | He was the self-punisher.
00:15:34.220 | - Yes, yes, yes, yes.
00:15:36.820 | - And I just kept thinking,
00:15:39.260 | I wish I was hearing that he was misbehaving,
00:15:42.600 | that he was asking too many questions,
00:15:44.580 | that he was too excited to be there.
00:15:46.740 | - But he always wanted to be hands-on
00:15:49.660 | or he always wanted to talk about it
00:15:51.240 | or he always asked why, sure.
00:15:53.540 | - That's what you want to hear about your children.
00:15:56.440 | And she was telling me that.
00:15:58.120 | And boy, I'll tell you the day that I dropped them off,
00:16:00.760 | the first day, I cried.
00:16:02.760 | - Oh, absolutely. - Oh, absolutely.
00:16:04.760 | - That might have been the second hardest day.
00:16:06.900 | It's still not as hard as the debate day,
00:16:08.840 | but it was pretty hard.
00:16:10.800 | And so I took them out after six weeks.
00:16:12.960 | I was like, well, that was a failure.
00:16:16.000 | And then somebody at one of my speaking events
00:16:18.480 | came up to me and said,
00:16:20.080 | "Wasn't it beautiful that God allowed you to fail
00:16:23.900 | "in that way to show you that you are enough?"
00:16:26.560 | - Oh, wow.
00:16:29.140 | - And that set me free.
00:16:30.920 | That was amazing. - Isn't that,
00:16:31.760 | that's a great way to look at it though.
00:16:33.960 | - That is a very freeing way to look at it.
00:16:37.880 | And then you were free to learn with your children
00:16:42.840 | and you were free to design this education
00:16:47.840 | that would really meet you where you were
00:16:53.160 | and meet your children where they were.
00:16:56.280 | - So my daughter is, she's not inclined toward math,
00:17:02.800 | which is a hardship for me because I love math.
00:17:05.280 | - Oh, wow, yes.
00:17:07.120 | - And so her sophomore year, I finally said,
00:17:11.060 | "You know what?
00:17:11.900 | "I'm gonna stop pressuring you with the math."
00:17:14.600 | And I was tutoring her because I love math.
00:17:19.640 | Why shouldn't I tutor her?
00:17:21.280 | But her brain works entirely differently
00:17:23.440 | than most people, I would say most people's brains.
00:17:27.140 | She has a very different brain
00:17:29.240 | and it's not a typical math brain, certainly.
00:17:33.280 | And so I decided to take the pressure off.
00:17:35.300 | I said, "You do one lesson a week if you want.
00:17:38.260 | "If you don't do it, I'm not even gonna check.
00:17:40.240 | "I don't even care.
00:17:41.580 | "I'll give you the rest of the year."
00:17:45.000 | This was early on, so she had a year basically math-free.
00:17:49.080 | She went back to it and started teaching herself math.
00:17:52.760 | - That's beautiful.
00:17:55.720 | - And the reason is because I took the pressure off.
00:17:58.520 | There's no way to coerce learning.
00:18:01.300 | Your child's learning has to be self-motivated.
00:18:04.640 | And if you are standing over them with your finger out,
00:18:07.400 | admonishing them to learn whatever it is,
00:18:11.120 | I won't say it will backfire, but it is not as effective
00:18:19.160 | as allowing their innate curiosity to drive the boat.
00:18:24.080 | - Yes, yes.
00:18:26.640 | - Not beautiful, not freeing, not joyful.
00:18:31.640 | Yeah, I love that.
00:18:33.500 | I am looking down and am shocked.
00:18:38.480 | We have been talking about this for an hour.
00:18:41.960 | And I really, really wanted to talk
00:18:45.440 | about "Miracle in East Texas."
00:18:48.080 | I really want, so I wanna ask you about this movie,
00:18:54.880 | "Miracle in East Texas," because I think,
00:18:59.880 | especially now that all your new friends
00:19:04.800 | here on the Everyday Educator podcast audience
00:19:07.760 | will want to know what you've been up to,
00:19:10.020 | I want you to tell us about this story.
00:19:13.680 | How did you even find out?
00:19:15.380 | 'Cause all the trailers say it is a tall tale,
00:19:23.160 | but an absolutely true story.
00:19:24.960 | So how did you find out about this story?
00:19:28.820 | - So the story came to us as a script already.
00:19:33.280 | - Okay.
00:19:34.120 | - And that's kind of the beauty of it.
00:19:37.000 | We heard about the script.
00:19:38.760 | We know the writer.
00:19:40.160 | He's a brilliant writer.
00:19:41.960 | He wrote the movie for Paul Newman and Robert Redford.
00:19:46.040 | - Oh, wow, wow.
00:19:48.040 | I can see them in those roles.
00:19:50.580 | - Yeah, yeah, really.
00:19:52.140 | They could never get the time right
00:19:54.680 | to do the movie together.
00:19:56.020 | So it then went on a shelf and we know him,
00:19:59.940 | and so he brought it out.
00:20:00.780 | He said, "What about this?"
00:20:02.320 | And Kevin and I just fell in love with it,
00:20:04.900 | not realizing the magnitude of the story.
00:20:09.900 | And that's what's so beautiful about it
00:20:14.260 | is once we had done the movie,
00:20:16.300 | I started learning all the other parts of the story
00:20:19.820 | that weren't contained in the movie.
00:20:21.280 | The movie itself is the nut of the story,
00:20:25.580 | but there was a lot that obviously
00:20:27.360 | couldn't be part of the movie
00:20:28.440 | 'cause you can only tell--
00:20:29.840 | - So much.
00:20:31.140 | - An hour and a half, right?
00:20:32.180 | - Yeah.
00:20:33.020 | - So the story is of the East Texas oil strike,
00:20:36.860 | which was the largest oil strike in the history of the world.
00:20:40.820 | This is big, big news, right?
00:20:43.460 | But it was discovered by these two scoundrels
00:20:46.160 | who weren't real oil men.
00:20:48.720 | - And so they kind of discovered it by accident.
00:20:52.340 | - They discovered it by accident.
00:20:54.000 | And by the time they discovered it,
00:20:55.620 | they had oversold the well because that was what they did
00:20:58.620 | was they got people to invest in their oil drilling
00:21:03.020 | and then they would oversell it
00:21:05.360 | because they would never strike oil.
00:21:06.860 | It wasn't that easy to do.
00:21:08.940 | And so they never believed that they were gonna strike oil.
00:21:11.620 | - One of the funniest lines I saw
00:21:14.200 | was where one of the characters is saying,
00:21:18.120 | "We sold 500% of this.
00:21:20.720 | "You can only sell 100.
00:21:22.820 | "You can only ever have 100% of a thing."
00:21:26.100 | That was hilarious to me.
00:21:27.660 | - Right, and they had done it before.
00:21:29.900 | They oversold the well.
00:21:31.780 | Then they would just say, "Well, it's dry.
00:21:34.360 | "Thanks for your investment, but there's no return.
00:21:37.460 | "Bye bye now."
00:21:38.420 | And then they'd move on.
00:21:39.620 | But they ended up here in Texas and they struck oil.
00:21:44.760 | So then they had to figure out
00:21:46.220 | because if they declared, if they brought the oil in,
00:21:50.220 | all of the investors were gonna come for the percentage
00:21:52.980 | that they owned, which would equal 500% of the well
00:21:56.920 | or five times the well, which, you know.
00:21:59.360 | And so the true story is there's a guy named,
00:22:03.480 | there was a guy named Hunt at the time
00:22:06.320 | who became, he came in and he bought up all the shares.
00:22:10.920 | Now, that was a very risky play.
00:22:13.440 | He was a gambler of sorts.
00:22:15.840 | He had been involved in oil.
00:22:17.280 | He was no longer in oil, but he knew the business
00:22:21.200 | and he took a gamble and he went and he made a deal
00:22:23.560 | with every one of the investors.
00:22:26.520 | - Wow.
00:22:27.660 | - And gave them basically, not pennies on the dollar
00:22:31.140 | because they all became very wealthy in the end,
00:22:33.600 | but he gave them 1/5 of what they thought
00:22:37.700 | that they had invested.
00:22:38.880 | He gave them, sorry, he bought up the shares that he could
00:22:44.000 | because some people just wanted to see their money back
00:22:46.680 | and for the rest, he made them investors,
00:22:49.140 | but at only 1/5 of what they thought that they had bought.
00:22:52.320 | - Right, right.
00:22:53.760 | - Or something, he worked the deal.
00:22:55.080 | In any case, he just worked a deal with everybody
00:22:57.640 | and brought the oil in.
00:23:00.200 | And if you fast forward 10 years,
00:23:04.040 | that is the oil that helped us win World War II.
00:23:07.640 | - That is so amazing.
00:23:09.580 | - That is why the German tanks ran out of gas
00:23:12.520 | before the Allied troops tanks ran out of gas.
00:23:16.680 | - Man, that is an inspiring story.
00:23:20.840 | No, I never heard that.
00:23:22.440 | - Because the oil was shipped through the Gulf of Mexico.
00:23:27.440 | There were German U-boats in the Gulf of Mexico
00:23:35.720 | and they torpedoed 72 out of 73 tankers.
00:23:40.080 | Think about that, that's a lot of tankers
00:23:42.280 | that got torpedoed by the Germans
00:23:44.800 | because the Germans knew the value of that oil.
00:23:48.040 | So then we built a pipeline.
00:23:50.060 | In less than 14 months,
00:23:53.080 | we built a pipeline from Texas to the East Coast
00:23:55.920 | and that's how we ended up getting our oil over there
00:23:58.200 | and that's why Winston Churchill even agreed
00:24:01.320 | that the Allies "floated to victory
00:24:04.200 | "on a sea of East Texas oil."
00:24:06.560 | So that's the importance of that oil field
00:24:09.120 | and the significance of that story,
00:24:12.680 | the fact that God...
00:24:13.740 | Oh, and the miracle was not the discovery of the oil.
00:24:18.740 | The miracle was the redemptive story
00:24:22.680 | that we tell in the movie.
00:24:24.620 | I don't want to spoil the entire movie.
00:24:26.160 | - No, don't spoil it, yeah.
00:24:27.320 | - Because people should see it.
00:24:28.720 | But the joy of all of that is that
00:24:31.600 | when I discovered all that, I'm like,
00:24:33.940 | well, this should be a homeschool curriculum.
00:24:38.380 | So I made a homeschool curriculum based on the movie.
00:24:41.880 | So you can watch the movie with your kids
00:24:44.640 | and then have an economics lesson,
00:24:47.680 | a history lesson, a little bit of math.
00:24:50.120 | It's a whole curriculum.
00:24:51.700 | It's very short.
00:24:52.720 | It's not a big deal, but it's a lot of fun to do.
00:24:56.380 | And you start to realize this was supposed to be...
00:25:00.000 | I'm using it as basically part of a homeschool starter kit
00:25:03.240 | that I'm offering for families
00:25:05.080 | because I want them to understand that as parents,
00:25:08.620 | they have a great deal of value.
00:25:10.640 | Their life experience and their knowledge
00:25:12.900 | is not to be diminished
00:25:14.200 | just because they don't have a college degree
00:25:16.900 | or because they never got the gold star in math class.
00:25:20.640 | They have a lot of value to bring to their children.
00:25:23.660 | And one of the ways that they can be shown their value
00:25:27.720 | is by watching the movie with their kids
00:25:29.620 | and then just doing the curriculum with their kids.
00:25:33.100 | And in that way, they can see how much they really do have
00:25:36.720 | that they can share with their kids as a home educator.
00:25:40.000 | And so that was my idea was to help parents recognize
00:25:45.000 | how easy homeschooling is and how rewarding it can be.
00:25:49.960 | - That is awesome.
00:25:50.880 | I love it that you found a story that was worth telling.
00:25:55.880 | This is definitely a story worth telling,
00:26:00.000 | but then you're using it as a vehicle
00:26:03.520 | to start amazing conversations with your students
00:26:07.380 | about things that you've experienced together.
00:26:09.640 | You've experienced this movie together.
00:26:11.940 | Now let's mine it for all it's worth.
00:26:14.000 | Let's talk about all these different lessons.
00:26:16.760 | And you're right, when we do that with our children,
00:26:19.280 | we see that we do have the quote unquote credentials
00:26:24.280 | to be teachers of our children because we have thoughts
00:26:29.580 | and we can communicate and we can wrestle down
00:26:32.960 | the ideas together.
00:26:35.800 | That's very empowering.
00:26:37.980 | There's something so special about a good story too.
00:26:42.980 | Why do you think stories are so powerful?
00:26:46.920 | - Oh, I don't even ask why.
00:26:49.480 | I just know that they are.
00:26:50.960 | Jesus was a storyteller.
00:26:53.260 | The why is because we were created really
00:26:56.980 | to seek out the story.
00:26:59.680 | What's funny is people are under the misapprehension,
00:27:04.680 | let's say, because they went to school,
00:27:06.920 | that science is anti-religion.
00:27:10.080 | Science is religion affirming.
00:27:12.640 | And why do I say that?
00:27:14.660 | Because the only reason that science exists
00:27:17.560 | is because of man's innate desire
00:27:19.960 | to understand the world around him.
00:27:22.500 | That's the creation of the scientific mind,
00:27:26.700 | is this desire to understand the world around him.
00:27:29.480 | Well, who put that desire there?
00:27:30.720 | God.
00:27:31.560 | And what is man trying to understand?
00:27:33.480 | God, because God created everything.
00:27:37.000 | And so science is actually the act of seeking God.
00:27:42.000 | - Yes, you're right.
00:27:44.520 | You are absolutely right.
00:27:46.280 | That is why we ask the questions
00:27:49.360 | and that is why science exists,
00:27:51.460 | because we have questions and we have curiosity
00:27:55.520 | and we are seeking the answers that, you know what,
00:27:58.900 | the cool thing is God really wants to reveal himself to us
00:28:03.540 | through his world.
00:28:04.380 | So it's not like he's hiding the answers.
00:28:06.980 | He wants us to know.
00:28:08.700 | I do think there are mysteries that God reserves for himself,
00:28:12.320 | but by and large, I think he loves to talk to us
00:28:15.440 | about the mysteries of the world.
00:28:17.660 | - Yes, and that's why so many scientists,
00:28:22.800 | the deeper that they go into their field of study,
00:28:25.480 | the more devoutly religious they become.
00:28:28.540 | - Yes, yes, that is so true.
00:28:31.760 | That is really true.
00:28:32.600 | - Because the world tells you something else, right?
00:28:34.720 | - Absolutely, and we just believe it
00:28:36.860 | because that's what we've always heard
00:28:38.200 | and that's what we've always thought.
00:28:40.560 | So what is it?
00:28:42.920 | I love the fact that you have this guide,
00:28:46.020 | this free discussion guide.
00:28:48.260 | People can download this discussion guide
00:28:51.160 | and we're gonna put a link to that guide
00:28:53.660 | in our podcast show notes so people will have access to that.
00:28:57.880 | What do you hope that families will learn
00:29:02.520 | from using this guide?
00:29:04.080 | I think that you pointed to a couple of things already,
00:29:08.100 | but I wanna give you the chance to say
00:29:10.160 | what is it that you hope families will learn
00:29:13.820 | by using this guide and watching this movie together?
00:29:17.540 | - So for the curriculum for the movie,
00:29:21.120 | my main point was that they learn that they can
00:29:25.000 | educate their children.
00:29:26.800 | It's really that simple.
00:29:28.280 | That's my entire mission is to emancipate parents
00:29:33.280 | from the enslavement that our schools have forced on them.
00:29:38.440 | They are slaves to the system.
00:29:41.560 | Any parent who says to you, "I couldn't homeschool my kids,"
00:29:44.660 | on a level is beholden to the school.
00:29:50.140 | - Yes, yes.
00:29:51.380 | - And whether it's economic slavery
00:29:53.680 | or just enslavement in the mind, it doesn't really matter.
00:29:57.960 | Like it matters and the solution obviously needs
00:30:00.640 | to address the cause, but yeah.
00:30:04.220 | So my plan is to get as many children out of school
00:30:09.220 | because when you set them free, then they love freedom
00:30:15.520 | and they will try to preserve it.
00:30:17.680 | And that's what we need these days
00:30:19.320 | because we are slowly being enslaved by the entire system.
00:30:23.500 | I don't know how to put it any less bluntly
00:30:27.920 | than that, frankly.
00:30:29.180 | And the only way we're gonna get out of this with freedom
00:30:32.900 | is for freedom-loving young people
00:30:35.160 | to be willing to fight for it.
00:30:37.840 | - Yeah, yeah, I agree with you.
00:30:41.180 | And that's kind of a grave note as we draw to the end
00:30:45.540 | of our podcast, that's kind of a grave note to end on.
00:30:49.120 | But I think that it is true and I can tell
00:30:54.120 | that it is a cause that really resonates with you.
00:30:57.280 | It is something that's very personal to you
00:31:00.160 | that you feel very deeply about.
00:31:02.720 | That's very cool.
00:31:06.320 | - Yeah, well, it's been the greatest blessing in my life.
00:31:09.440 | The Bible tells us that children are a gift of God
00:31:12.420 | and the gift is given to you to open.
00:31:18.840 | Don't think that you can give somebody else your gift
00:31:21.600 | and then that the gift will bless you, right?
00:31:25.480 | - Yeah.
00:31:26.320 | - So that's my mission and well, not all of my books.
00:31:34.040 | I mean, I wrote "Words for Warriors"
00:31:35.700 | because I'm tired of people taking our language
00:31:40.700 | and perverting it.
00:31:43.160 | I think words have power.
00:31:45.760 | God spoke existence into being.
00:31:49.960 | So words have power.
00:31:51.100 | There's a reason that the Bible said that God spoke.
00:31:53.380 | He didn't draw it on a piece of paper
00:31:56.000 | and then it came into being, he spoke it into being.
00:31:59.080 | Our words have great power
00:32:00.360 | and that is why there's a war on words.
00:32:03.680 | And so I wrote "Words for Warriors"
00:32:05.440 | for people to understand our language
00:32:08.640 | and understand the words that have been obfuscated
00:32:11.680 | and perverted.
00:32:14.880 | - Frankly, the idea that we've now got
00:32:16.880 | a Supreme Court Justice who cannot identify what a woman is.
00:32:21.140 | - Yes, insane, insane.
00:32:24.400 | - So and "Words for Warriors" I had a lot of fun with.
00:32:27.100 | I'm pretty sarcastic in the book
00:32:28.680 | and in fact, even one of the definitions I wrote,
00:32:33.680 | duh, at the end of it.
00:32:35.200 | - You know what?
00:32:37.480 | I think that I would love to be face-to-face with you.
00:32:40.700 | If I was gonna write a long book,
00:32:44.420 | I would write, I write in the margins of all my books,
00:32:47.160 | comments like that, oh, really, please,
00:32:49.760 | and duh, I actually do, so that's very fun.
00:32:53.440 | - In fact, I recorded it so it's audio as well.
00:32:56.640 | People have told me how much they love listening to it
00:32:59.120 | in their car.
00:33:00.240 | It's a good bathroom book 'cause it's like,
00:33:02.040 | it's just one word with the definition after the other
00:33:05.040 | but the definitions get pretty,
00:33:06.560 | some of the definitions get pretty gnarly
00:33:08.480 | and pretty hilarious, frankly.
00:33:10.760 | - A little snarky there. - A lot of great notes
00:33:11.600 | in there so that was a little bit of a sidestep
00:33:15.820 | from my mission which is the education of children
00:33:20.160 | but in fact, it starts with the education of the parent.
00:33:24.420 | - That's absolutely true.
00:33:25.660 | - I don't have any effect on the child
00:33:27.580 | unless I can affect the parent and so that's my goal.
00:33:31.600 | I have Teach From Love which is a school year devotional
00:33:35.160 | which trains your children in virtues
00:33:38.420 | and that's really what we want.
00:33:40.380 | We wanna be able to have virtuous children
00:33:43.020 | but there's only, there are two ways of getting there, right?
00:33:45.420 | So the phrase is that things are caught, not taught
00:33:49.860 | but in fact, it's both and yes, they are caught, right?
00:33:53.740 | Your children will model your behavior,
00:33:55.740 | they will do what they see you doing.
00:33:57.880 | - They're imitators. - But we also owe it
00:33:59.900 | to them to teach them and so that's what this book offers
00:34:03.140 | and at the same time, I wrote the book, it's a devotional
00:34:07.700 | so you've got a little story, you've got a Bible verse,
00:34:10.240 | you've got a little summary
00:34:12.320 | and then it's always followed by two open-ended questions
00:34:16.180 | because the learning happens in the discussion.
00:34:19.180 | That's why Classical Conversations
00:34:21.920 | has the conversations in its name
00:34:24.680 | because it's in the discussion that it gets cemented
00:34:27.800 | and learned not just by the storytelling, right?
00:34:32.800 | And so there's that one and then there's the playbook
00:34:37.080 | for home learning which is just trying to get parents
00:34:41.640 | to think about what they really mean when they say education
00:34:45.340 | 'cause they don't necessarily know
00:34:48.260 | because they went to school.
00:34:49.940 | - Right, right. - And so they know
00:34:50.980 | what they mean by school but do they know what they mean
00:34:53.660 | by the word education because the two are not synonymous,
00:34:56.660 | not anymore, not ever really.
00:34:59.260 | - And sometimes people know that they don't want
00:35:01.580 | to replicate what they had but they don't really know
00:35:05.480 | how to start thinking of it in a different way.
00:35:08.460 | And so you're right.
00:35:10.100 | If we really want to affect the children,
00:35:15.020 | we engage the parents and we give them the help
00:35:18.500 | and the support and some illumination
00:35:21.060 | of what education at home could mean to their family
00:35:26.060 | and to their children.
00:35:29.220 | - Yes, and so that became a 15 video series.
00:35:33.700 | - Wow, that's cool.
00:35:35.440 | - Yeah, so it's like a whole course.
00:35:37.900 | But it's fast, it's seven hours or whatever.
00:35:41.000 | And then the book is basically just a notebook
00:35:45.240 | that goes with it.
00:35:46.280 | And people seem to really love it
00:35:49.100 | so I'm very happy about that.
00:35:50.660 | - That's so good.
00:35:51.980 | - Because I can't tell you how it warms my heart
00:35:56.660 | to have people walk up to me and say,
00:35:58.060 | "I heard you speak three years ago
00:35:59.640 | "and we pulled our daughter out of school because of you
00:36:03.420 | "and we can't thank you enough."
00:36:05.780 | Like it's been the greatest thing for our family,
00:36:08.140 | that kind of stuff.
00:36:09.380 | - Man, did you ever think that you would have
00:36:12.260 | this kind of influence?
00:36:13.420 | When you were a young woman starting your own career,
00:36:17.300 | did you ever have an idea that you would affect
00:36:21.740 | so many families?
00:36:24.280 | - No.
00:36:25.640 | - Isn't that amazing?
00:36:27.040 | Because God had that idea.
00:36:28.940 | He knew always, Sam, that you were gonna do this.
00:36:31.920 | - That was God's plan.
00:36:33.220 | It wasn't my plan, but I'm very happy.
00:36:35.940 | I started stepping out in faith about 15 years ago.
00:36:40.160 | Oh no, I suppose it's longer than that.
00:36:43.260 | Yeah, I suppose it's longer than that.
00:36:46.860 | But I guess I really sort of thought about it and said,
00:36:50.380 | "Okay, you know what, if I hear it from three people,
00:36:54.980 | "then I'm gonna trust it," that kind of thing.
00:36:58.100 | And I started hearing things.
00:36:59.740 | And I think if you just open yourself up,
00:37:01.540 | I think if you pray and you seek God's face,
00:37:04.940 | He will shine His face upon you.
00:37:07.140 | - That is lovely.
00:37:09.900 | And that's the perfect place for us
00:37:11.980 | to draw this conversation to a close.
00:37:15.300 | I have loved our time together.
00:37:17.220 | I feel like our listeners have loved getting to know you
00:37:21.320 | and your story.
00:37:22.900 | Sam, I really appreciate you sharing your heart
00:37:25.100 | with us today.
00:37:26.860 | - I so appreciate being here.
00:37:29.020 | Thank you so much.
00:37:29.940 | This will save me on my therapy bills.
00:37:31.980 | - Yes, absolutely.
00:37:34.020 | We've saved everyone a therapy week.
00:37:37.020 | That's awesome.
00:37:38.060 | I do wanna let our listeners know
00:37:41.720 | that "Miracle in East Texas" is now streaming
00:37:45.260 | and you can engage this with your family.
00:37:50.220 | You can use the discussion guide that Sam mentioned.
00:37:54.120 | You can dive deeper into the themes
00:37:57.080 | and the colorful characters of "Miracle in East Texas."
00:38:01.020 | You can have some really thought-provoking conversations
00:38:03.920 | with your kids.
00:38:05.660 | You can download the free discussion guide.
00:38:09.360 | And it's a really long link name.
00:38:12.280 | So, listeners, the link is posted in the show notes.
00:38:17.280 | So this is a perfect Friday night thing
00:38:20.360 | to do with your family this week.
00:38:21.880 | Stream "Miracle in East Texas."
00:38:23.980 | Download the discussion guide and have at it.
00:38:26.700 | Go and build some great conversations with your family.
00:38:31.660 | Sam, thank you again.
00:38:32.900 | This has been great.
00:38:34.060 | - Just before we jump off, because it is audio,
00:38:37.140 | I will tell people they can go to sorbostudios.com.
00:38:40.940 | That's sorbostudios.com.
00:38:43.900 | And sign up for our newsletter.
00:38:45.400 | - Oh, that's perfect.
00:38:47.220 | - It's the best way for us to stay in touch with people.
00:38:49.140 | You can find out what other Christian movies
00:38:50.760 | are coming down the pike.
00:38:51.700 | And then you can find all the information
00:38:54.500 | about homeschooling and the movies at that site.
00:38:57.780 | So there you go.
00:38:58.740 | - That is super, and that, oh, that is super.
00:39:01.820 | Thank you, that's way shorter.
00:39:03.420 | I think I could even remember that
00:39:04.820 | without writing it down, sorbostudios.com.
00:39:08.340 | That's awesome.
00:39:09.180 | All right, thank you, Sam.
00:39:10.620 | And thank you, listeners.
00:39:12.060 | And I will see you guys next week, okay?
00:39:15.100 | (gentle music)
00:39:17.680 | (music fades)
00:39:20.180 | [BLANK_AUDIO]