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I was homeschooled for 10 years and while most of it I view very positively, there's three main things that I wish
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could have been done maybe a little bit differently. Hey, my name is Jacob Gooden and uh if you're new here, this
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is the Exhomeschoolers club, the best exhomeschooler podcast this side of the internet. Normally I've got guests on.
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We chat about the good, the bad, and the ugly of growing up a homeschool kid. So
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if that's you, you're in the right place. Okay. And for anyone who's
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returning, hey, how's it going? Welcome back. You heard me right. I'm going to
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talk about three things that I would do differently in my homeschool experience.
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I want to preface with this. I was homeschooled for 10 years from second grade all the way through high school. I
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think my parents did a decent job. I think it turned out okay. I'm not the dumbest guy in the room. Also, maybe not
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the smartest guy in the room, but I made it. I'm an adult. I'm surviving. We're
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okay. That being said, I think that there's three things that if I could go back in time and tell my my parents at a
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younger age be like, "Hey, I think maybe do these." These are them. So, number
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one, I think just a better understanding of how our country works. And I'm speaking from a United States of America
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perspective here, but how does our country work? I sometimes question that dayto-day. And you know, I have a decent
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understanding of history, right? I understand how this country came to be. I understand the founding documents. I
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understand. I've read all that stuff. I understand there's three branches of
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government. Like, I get it. I think what was missing was maybe not so much of the
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class aspect of like here's how government works. What I think was missing was seeing how it plays out and
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affects our day-to-day lives. So for me, I look at that and I go, I think the missed opportunity was an involvement in
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local and state politics. Now, that doesn't mean like I wanted to be governor of California or,
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you know, even serve in local government, but I think it would have been really cool to do field trips to
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state capital. I think it would have been really fun to meet elected officials, be able to ask them about
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their job and what they do and how they vote and how they listen to their constituents. Going to town hall
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meetings and like learning about what that looks like and how do we stand up and you know these are our elected
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officials. We put them in office to enact the will of the people and we are the people. So, how do we communicate
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that best to them? And I think it would have just been really cool to have a lot
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of those real hands-on experiences, right? And homeschooling is a hands-on experience. A lot of people cite that as
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being one of the main reasons they want to homeschool, right? Is that ability to
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give their kids like unique experiences. What better way than like teach them how
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the the world works. So I think that now as an adult and getting much more heavily involved in politics and an
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understanding of how this country works, I look at it and I go this would have been so easy to accomplish. It's
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timeconuming obviously but it would have been the the information is there so to
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speak. It's just a matter of actually like going and doing it. So that's
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number one. Number two is that I would push back on my parents a little bit of involving religion in
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every curriculum that we had. Now, I think religion is can be important and for a lot of homeschool families,
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religion is like a key proponent of why you homeschool your kids. For the person
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I am today, that's not a good enough reason to homeschool your kids is religion solely. But I do understand it,
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right? I understand wanting to have a little bit more control over the things that your child is learning. When you
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limit everything that you're being taught into a bubble, and religion to some degree is a bubble, you block out
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voices that could have compelling arguments. And so for me, I think being able to as as
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I've gotten older and being able to explore a more diverse look at the world
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and ask questions of other religions and other belief systems and and things like
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that, it's been very eye opening to kind of just like feel it out, right, and figure out
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what I believe on my own. So, let me give you kind of an example, right? because I can talk hypotheticals all
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day, but let me give you an example. Science for a lot of Christian homeschoolers is very Bible- based,
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right? And so you have this historical part and this faith-based part, right? And they work together to to reconcile
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it, right? So we believe in like young earth. We believe in, you know, literal 7-day creation as a Christian. I'm
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speaking as a Christian at this at this point. We believe in things like Noah's
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ark, right? and Noah's ark being a key catalyst in the laying down of a ton of
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fossils that we find today, right? And so I grew up believing all of this and yeah, there was maybe a little bit of an
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emphasis on like evolution, but it was always from a standpoint of yeah, but evolution has already been debunked. We
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know that that's not true, so kind of don't worry about it. Which creates in itself its own
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problems of like evolution is not debunked first and foremost. Um, some people would argue it
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is, but but I don't think it is. It's it's a commonly held belief by many
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people that that's what happened, right? And so rather than just kind of like
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pushing it off to the side and saying, "Oh, that's an already debunked theory.
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We don't really need to focus too much on it. Here's like an overview of of
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understanding it." I think that being able to look at Let's talk about creation. I think being able to look at
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an account of here's what we here's how we think the world started, right? from
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a from a biblical perspective of God spoke it into existence and it was a literal seven days and he built all of
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these things in in those days to looking at like an evolutionary perspective and
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understanding okay so the big bang like let's talk about that and let's look at
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the the intricacies of of what would need to happen to to do that right can we replicate that is that being
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replicated in other galaxies those types of questions and then you talk about the
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evolution of like where do trees come come from? Where does where does human come from? Where does human come from?
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Where do humans come from? Another really interesting one, and I learned more about this when I got to college
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because I took geology when I was in college. It was a rocky time, uh, if you will. Um, but I thought one of the most
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interesting parts about that class was we were discussing how rock layers were were laid down over time and how to
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assess the amount of time between rock layers. And so I grew up believing again the Bible
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and believing in Noah's arc and the worldwide flood, right? And also believing that that was a massive
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catalyst in the world that killed thousands, millions, I don't know, lots of living beings and they were, you
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know, buried underwater and under soil and and things like that, right? And so when we are looking at like the fossils
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and we're looking for fossils, we can find stuff from that time. And then I took this geology class and like I said
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it was it was interesting to talk about the length of time and understanding how
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if you've ever looked at a rock structure. Let's talk about the Grand Canyon. Like if you've ever been to the
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Grand Canyon, you look at the Grand Canyon, it's like all these lines up the
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Grand Canyon. And it's really fascinating how it's time, right? It's a
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symbol of time that's going up. And so to look at the opposition of Christianity, which you know is that
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these layers get laid down over thousands, hundreds, thousands, millions of years, things get trapped inside of
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them. And what that means, right? And how do things get trapped inside of them? Sometimes it's quickly by rushing
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water. Sometimes it's slow by dying out in the wilderness and rotting away. And
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then, you know, over time just dust blows and, you know, maybe some waters come through and whatever else. But that
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diversity of like thinking I thought was really interesting. And again, I went to
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a Christian college, so a lot of this still steeped in religion when it comes to the
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sciences, but starting to ask those questions of like, well, what if, you know, and some people would argue those
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are really dangerous. Is it really dangerous to ask questions? I don't think so. I think it's I personally
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think it's really fun because it pushes you to find answers, right? And the strongest argument I always hear for
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faith is that well at some point you just got to believe, right? You just got to take a
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leap of faith, so to speak. And this episode is not meant to be, you know, sway you on
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religion or anything like that, but I just I always find it interesting because uh in conversations I have with
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friends who are still believers and still believe in like literal 7-day creationism and young earth theory and
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things like that. It's always interesting because they get we get to a point in the conversation where
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sometimes they just go, "Well, okay, but at some point you just got to like have
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faith that this is what it is." And ultimately, yeah, I understand. like I also have to have faith that in whatever
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I believe of like how did the world really start? So anyway, the reason I bring this up as a point that I would
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change in my curriculum is not so much of being like, oh well now I'm not a Christian and I wish that my parents had
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given me the knowledge beforehand. No, I I bring it up because initially when I was presented with these
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ideas, they became really good talking points for me to like discuss and ask questions about. And I think that that
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was so much lacking in my my curriculum growing up of everything was faith-based
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from science to English to math to just everything was just had this layer of Christianity in it. Once I stepped
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outside of that and I started to be able to ask questions about other religions.
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I loved Greek mythology growing up. But it was just that. It was mythology. It was a storytelling mechanism, right? And
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it was an explanation as to why the world was the way it was. Why did it thunder? Oh, well, it must have been
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Zeus, right? And what happens when you die? Well, you go to the underworld and there's u Hades, right? And I loved
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Greek mythology because I looked at it as this kind of an explainer of the world before we
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had modern day science. As humans, we put these characters, so to speak, and on these pedestals to look at. But I was
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never I never really understood why we didn't actually look at it from the perspective of there were
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people who fully believed this who were dedicated to this type of religion. Why was that? What led them to
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that? And so I think just the diversity aspect of it would have been really cool
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to understand argue modern day religion. Why do Buddhists believe what they believe? Why do Mormons believe what
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they believe? How is it really all that different? And less so from a combative spo space. Um because I think maybe
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that's more what I have the the issue with is the combative place of religion in our
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curriculums where it was always Christianity is right 100% of the time. All other religions are fake. And so you
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go into it with a jaded knowledge that all other religions are already fake. So, I don't really h they hold no
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authority over me. And I I don't know. I just think it's an interesting thing if
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you can teach somebody to maybe put that opposite thinking on temporarily to be like, "Okay, what would it take for me
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to actually believe this other thing?" Maybe that's more what I'm getting at.
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So, you could disagree with me. That's fine. I'm totally down for that. And
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this again is some dude on the internet just sharing his thoughts of what he would change about his homeschool
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experience. The la the last point I wanted to talk about was less from an education perspective in the traditional
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sense of like a curriculum and more from like an emotions and psychological perspective and that was I think that my
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parents could have done a better job of teaching me boundaries. My homeschooling experience
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was I'm not going to say unique. I think everybody's is unique. There was four of
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us that lived in that house and two of us were homeschooled and two of us were the adults. None of us I think were
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super emotionally healthy people. And so I don't hold anything against my parents. I think they did the best they
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could with what they were given. And what's cool is now as we've gotten older
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and we've become much more emotionally healthy, I think we are just in better
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places with each other to some degree or we understand ourselves better, maybe know how to communicate it better. So I
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want to kind of preface with that. But boundaries for me is something that is one of my big focuses for 2025.
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And as I've been working on it and learning the power of no and and things like that, I keep getting reminded of
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experiences from when I was a kid. And when I was in high school and junior high, one of my friends dads was just
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like a very hugging person. He was very like he just liked hugs. And that doesn't necessarily sound really bad on
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the surface, but I remember feeling uncomfortable hugging him. And I never for a long time I don't think I really
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understood why that was. And now that I'm maybe a little bit more emotionally
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healthy and I can kind of look back on the time I realized that it was more than just like hugs. He would just he
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would hug for too long. He would always make comments to me and the other guys about like you know how strong we were
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and how he wanted to wrestle us. Maybe it was a sexual thing now that I'm saying this out loud. I don't really
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know. But it made me uncomfortable. Let's just say that. And I think I never
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I would remove myself from situations sometimes to try to get away from it. Didn't always escape. But I think
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looking back on it, I go, man, I wish I would have just had the power to say no.
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I don't do that. I don't hug adults. You know, I don't feel comfortable with
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this. You know, I don't feel comfortable going to this person's house. I don't
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feel comfortable being around their dad. Whatever might have been, right? But there was a lack of skills and language
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with the ability to set that boundary to say, "No, this is my personal space.
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You're invading my personal space." And I feel uncomfortable. And I think I would have probably
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benefited from some therapy as a kid. Like I said, my family was not the most emotionally healthy family. I think any
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of us would be pretty quick to tell you that. But as I look back and I go, man, those
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boundaries would have been nice to have. I also look back and I go, for the closeness that my family has now and the
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ability to to converse about things, my my dad and I in particular, my mom and I, they've been on this podcast. We've
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talked about this before. If you're interested in that, go check out those interviews with them. I think they're
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really good. But our ability to communicate now, the three of us, and talk about the things that were hard and
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painful that we disliked, we have that now. And I look at it and I go, man, could we have done this when I was 12?
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Uh, and so I say that not so much from a place of like longing to go back. It's but from a
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place of like for those of you who are where you are now and you feel that way. Go do it. Go get the help because man,
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the ability to have conversations with difficult people sometimes. And mom, dad, I'm not saying
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you're difficult, but the ability to to know the skills that you have, to have those
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conversations, to put words to the emotions that you feel is absolutely incredible and has been, I think, one of
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the biggest game changers in my life and is still growing. It's still I'm not
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perfect at it. We're getting there. So yeah, I think encouraging emotional health in school would have been a
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gamecher. I think those are the main three things. One, a better understanding of how our country works,
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the government played out by actual like experience going to those places, asking
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questions of elected officials, getting involved in, I don't know, town halls,
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protests, understanding how our voting system works. Number two, I think it would been really cool to have
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curriculum that expanded upon the religious beliefs of others and from a neutral point, not a jaded
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one-sidedness of Christianity is always right and these rest are already debunked beliefs.
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I think having that expansion of being able to look at them and put those shoes on, those hats on, whatever you want to
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call it, to look through the eyes of someone who believes something a little bit different would have been really
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cool. And also access to people to ask questions. You know, most people are very friendly. Most people want to share
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what they believe with you. And if you do it right, you can do it in a non-hostile type of way and still walk
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away being friends. And then the third thing, setting boundaries for myself. more than just saying no. But, you know,
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I look at my life even today and and recognize that like I struggle with the clients I work with sometimes telling
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them no and ending up working extra hours for things that I don't get paid enough to do, you know, and so looking
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at that and going, man, is this a skill that I could have learned back at a younger age? And so emotional health and
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learning how that plays a role in your education and being the healthiest version of yourself. And so yeah, those
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are really the main three things. I know it's hopefully it's not anything too
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shocking. Thank you for listening. Thank you for supporting. And uh yeah, I don't
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know. I got anything else? I don't think so. Uh tune in next week. We'll have
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another great episode. And if you stayed this long, maybe think about joining my
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newsletter. All right. Uh until next time. All right. Peace. [Music] [Music]