Iād like to take a moment today to say THANK YOU!
Thank you to all of my faithful subscribers and readers. And a special thank you to those of you who have chosen to use my curriculum in your homeschools. My family has been greatly blessed by your generosity and encouragement. I whole heartedly pray that my printables have blessed your family and your homeschooling endeavor.
Thank you!
To those of you who have gotten caught up in the popular groups that condone illegal file sharing, today my prayers go out to you.
Unfortunately there are groups of homeschoolers who are choosing to come together and āshareā files they are not permitted to share. It greatly saddens my heart to think that homeschoolers would do something like this. Maybe you simply arenāt aware, but hosting and sharing files (paid or free) that were not made by you is illegal without the express written consent of the author. Downloading these files is also illegal. What you are doing is called āstealingā in the online world.
You may have even justified your actions due to your budgetary constraints, or simply out of the desire to āget a good deal.ā I wonder how many of you would be able to walk up to your child and say āHoney, I really wanted this curriculum, but wanted to save money, so mommy stole it.ā Conversely what would you say if your child did something similar? I hope you can understand there are no excuses for this type of behavior.
Homeschooling isnāt just about academics, but instead it is our way of imparting our character, values, morals, ethics, spiritual beliefs, and life skills onto our children. Today my prayer is that you would be encouraged to check your ways and think twice before participating in these āsharingā groups. What you are doing is not only illegal and unethical, but you are also taking advantage of all of the bloggers and homeschooling companies that have put their valuable time and energy into creating products to help your homeschooling be more successful.
My pastor has always said that ācompromise always leads to more compromise.ā I pray diligently that you do not allow this small compromise to creep into other areas of your life. And most importantly I pray you are not passing down these values to your children.
Instead I encourage you to trust God to provide for you as He has lead you into this homeschooling journey. He will provide for your needs and make your paths straight. ~ Proverbs 3:6
Now may the God of peaceā¦make you complete in every good work to do His will. (Hebrews 13:20-21)
I have to tell you that I have been casually following your site for years. But now that my son is 4, I would like to start “formally” teaching him at home. I have been researching so MANY MANY sites on ideas and you are by far my favorite! Thank you for all your hard work! It truly shows how much time, effort, and care you put in!
We bought the “packet” deal of your curriculum that included a bunch of other ebooks. What an awesome purchase! I am always confused when I get letters that talk about stealing. I search myself to see if I had inadvertantly used someone’s material w/o permission. Actually, I had not. It was a good reminder to be careful what we are using and it’s purpose or permission.
Unfortunately, those that share do justify and I am not sure how much help they can be given. However, the rest of us that have not crossed over into the darkside will be duly reminded to walk in the light and truth. Knowing that we will be blessed with being able to buy it, or knowing that we just really didn’t need it and there will be something around the corner that works for us. š
I know I’m late in chiming in – but well said, girl. Well said. š
It makes me so sad that people would take advantage of you like that š And after all of the wonderful freebies and great ideas you already give us!!! I had no problem paying for your curriculum (and I purchased just about all of it when you had your 30% off sale š ) and I’m so excited to use it with my kiddos next year!! I also share your blog any chance I get to other homeschool mommas, in hopes that they will be blessed as I have been….and I hope and pray that in spite of people’s bad judgement, you and your family will be blessed tenfold for all you do!!! THANK YOU š
Erica,
I have not been aware of this illegal file sharing. I am stunned. But I wanted to say thank YOU for what YOU do. I bought your K4 curriculum and use it with my boys and it is amazing. I organized my school room based on your tried and tested items. I am a new hoomeschooler and just want the best for my boys and I thank you from the bottom of my heart. You are such an inspiration!
Dear Erica,
Thank you so much for taking the time to write this! I have purchased your LOTW curriculum and appreciate all you do! I have not started homeschooling yet but this has really helped me with understanding how file sharing works.
Thanks for being such a blessing to the homeschooling community!
Rachel
As someone who was misinformed and guilty of sharing I want to say here in front of the world. I AM SORRY! I did not realize it was illegal and since finding out not only do I no longer share anything but I have tried to inform others. I posted a message on a facebook group I help run to help inform other homeschool families. I have also tried to contact other groups on facebook to inform them. Personally I didn’t realize and I have prayed for forgiveness as well as you wonderful ladies. Maybe by being someone who admitted I was wrong and is attempting in some way to right that wrong I can find peace in my own heart. I truly am sorry even though I feel sorry is not enough to say. I know that my group was told by someone who said they were a copy right lawyer that it was legal as long as we did not sell the material. Now I know that is not the case. I have tried to contact Erica personally to apologize via email and I hope she did get that message, if not I hope she reads this one and knows just how sorry I am. The real wrong would be to continue to share after knowing that it is not right to do so. Again I am so sorry! Rayne
Rayne,
I am MOST certain that Erica has accepted the apology and think that your publicly posting here is a HUGE step. Thanks so much for your honesty and openness. š Praying for peace in your heart. {hugs from afar}. ~ Jolanthe
Jolanthe, Erica and I have spoke in private message since I wrote this and I have made it my mission to try and inform as many homeschool families that also may have been misinformed that it is wrong and illegal. Hopefully the more we speak out the less it will happen. Learning from a mistake is the best way to spiritual grow,lol. Thank you for your kind words.- Rayne
What an incredibly brave thing to do, Rayne. I applaud you a thousand times! ~Kim
So well said. I have tried to make a few of my own resources here and there, and wow, I have a lot of respect for those of you who take the painstaking time to turn all those idea into cute printable materials. It’s incredibly time consuming so it is absolutely worth paying for! I have all the resources to make my own materials, but I would be a wreck if I had to!
Your article blessed me, Erica, as have the many homeschool moms whose comments here reflect hearts of integrity. I wrote an article about copyright and consumable workbooks for Practical Homeschooling Magazine, and the backlash was incredible. I cannot tell you how many homeschoolers–Christian homeschoolers–tried to argue that their purchase gives them full rights to photocopy at will, regardless of what the copyright states. Thanks for being a fellow paddler in the uphill swim against copyright infringement!
If anyone is interested, here’s a link to the article: http://www.writeshop.com/blog/2013/04/18/copyright-consumable-workbooks/
I also love your materials and will be using several of them this coming year with my third-grader. Keep up the good work, and if there are a few bad eggs out there who don’t appreciate the value of your work, and cause problems for you, there are many more of us for each one of them who are more than happy to spread your blog posts far and wide all over Facebook for you!