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hey welcome into the inaugural episode of the ex homeschoolers Club I am your ring Master General Jacob Gooden and I
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figured what better way to kick off this podcast than by kind of introducing myself sharing my homeschool journey and
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really breaking down a couple myths and questions that people have around homeschooling so my homeschool Journey
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started way back in 2004 I was 8 years old and I was going into second grade I had just moved brand new house brand new
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new town and for whatever reason my parents thought now is the time to homeschool our kid I'm not going to lie
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I hated it to begin with okay I was used to going to public school I'd gone to
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kindergarten in first grade in a regular classroom setting with a teacher and all
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of my fellow students so 5 days a week I was seeing my best friends I was playing
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with my best friends so go to go from that to all of a sudden I'm stuck at home seven days a week with my mom and
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my sister and my dad on the weekends it just was not great okay it was not what I wanted I wanted to be with my friends
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I wanted to be hanging out with them having fun playing on the playground uh doing school together and that just
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wasn't the case but things did eventually change and uh I fell more and more in love with being homeschooled so
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much so that by the time I was graduating in 2014 can't believe that's been a decade ago but uh by the time I
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was graduating I loved it right I was involved in a bunch of extracurricular stuff I had my own businesses I was
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really like self-educating myself so my parents handed me the curriculum and just said roll with it gave me a
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syllabus and I would you know turn things into them and get things graded and uh but I was really kind of
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self-taught and you know self-sufficient I then graduated and went to college did
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College in three years graduated with a bachelor's degree and uh it was such a
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shift to go from really being like a self-reliant self taught person to then all of a sudden again I'm in those
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School room settings I have other students I'm doing group projects so it was kind it was definitely a shift um to
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say the least and I missed the ability that I had in high school to really just kind of like do things on my own time
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because all of a sudden I was like I had to be a class at a certain time I had certain things that were due certain
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days you know um I had commitments right I had jobs I had all these things so definitely tricky um but the skills I
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learned in homeschooling have definitely come in clutch so many times both in college and then after college uh it's
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crazy I've been out of school now for seven years but uh I'm going to break
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down more my story as we go through some of these myths and talk about my experience kind of combating or
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experiencing some of these right so I think the most common myth that most homeschoolers hear is that homeschool
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kids lack socialization right we lack social skills this can for sure be true right
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we've all met that kid who can't look in the eye they don't know how to shake
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your hand when they're talking to you they Mumble under their breath they're
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hard to understand right it's very clear that they just kind of want to like go
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do their own thing I've been this kid and one of the things that my family did
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thankfully to combat this was my parents pushed me to be in a bunch of extracurricular stuff right uh which
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kind of plays into another myth which is that homeschoolers don't do extracurricular activities this in my
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experience with my family and my friends was just not true right we did things we
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were in sports uh speech and debate dance class music we did all kinds of stuff outside of home uh Church groups
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all that kind of stuff to be around other people right when you put yourself around other people you start to learn
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what is socially acceptable and what's not and uh so yeah to talk about my favorite extracurricular activity uh it
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ended up being swing dance to be to be quite honest when I was 12 years old my mom put me in a dance class I absolutely
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hated her for it I begged her not to go uh I was 12 years old and uh you know starting to hit puberty I felt really
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weird in my body I didn't want to be dancing with girls I didn't want to
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touch girls I didn't want to be anywhere near them right um but within a couple
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weeks it was just kind of like I I kind of fell in love with it right and I and by the time I was graduating by time I
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was 18 I loved swing dance so much so that I was helping put on school dances I was putting on dances at my own house
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uh I was teaching swing dance I was like super involved in it I learned a bunch of different styles East Coast West
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Coast Lindy Hop Charleston I'd gone into ballroom dance so i knew how to do the
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Walts and the tango and the chaa and uh even was involved in some English country dancing which uh if you don't
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know what that is that's basically like Pride and Prejudice era line dancing uh
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so a little doy do uh very very fun also very cringey to look at um we had our school dances were not like regular
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school dances where you know we had a DJ or anything that like that our school dances were very much like swing music
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ballroom music and English country dance and uh we did a couple themes like sock
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hop which was always super fun very like 50s we did an English country dance where people would dress up kind of in
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that like Renaissance uh era fashion so big ball gowns and guys would wear long pet coats and stuff like that and uh
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it's funny to look back on and find photos of that and be like we really did
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that that's so cringy but uh but I loved it that was like my favorite favorite
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thing about being a homeschool kid and my extracurricular activities I guess so another myth surrounding homeschooling
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is the idea that homeschoolers have an inferior education and that they're taught by unqualified teachers in my
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experience I don't have an inferior education I think I have a fine education I also have a mom who worked
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really hard to make sure that I had the right level of Education to get to college that was her goal from day one
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of hes schooling me uh was I need to make sure that my kids have enough education to get into college right and
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good enough grades to get into college I don't know if that's true of every
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homeschool family that was just true of mine my mom also had a college degree with she was going to be an
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English teacher so she had she knew how to teach kids uh primarily high school and college level but she was able to
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translate a lot of that into what we were doing uh and so you know I don't know again it's one of those myths where
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I think it is true I think there are parents out there who are not qualified to teach their kids but I think more
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likely than not most parents are completely qualified and with the amount of educational resources now uh
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surrounding like on YouTube and that colleges put out and things like that yeah your kid can get a great education
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from the luxury of their home right this myth of you know inferior inadequate education also plays into the myth that
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homeschool kids can't get into college right I'm living proof that that's not
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true um and granted you know I didn't go to Harvard I didn't go to Stanford
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nothing like that but I applied to six colleges and I got into all six and got offered scholarship opportunity at all
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six of them on not a brainiac I'm not the smartest kid uh in the classroom you
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know I'm not this this sharpest tool in the shed right but I I was able to do it
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I think where this comes from is that a lot of my friends as I talk more and more to them is like they're their
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parents viewed the education as like the goal is to get you through high school and so
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there was no prep there wasn't a lot of prep for college right it was like we'll
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figure out when we get there but but you know unlike a public school or a private
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school you don't have uh an adviser who's walking you through the whole time
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you're in high school walking you through the process of like this is what college applications look like this is
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what the faf cell looks like this is what college classes are going to look like right here's how to prepare for it
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here's how to do community service here's how to make yourself look the best you possibly can right so I think
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that because of the lack of understanding from parents on that front then it leads to a lack of homeschool
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kids not going to higher education or getting stuck in a community college situation um at least in my experience
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that also to say like I had a lot of other friends who they did go to college they did do four-year College some of
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them are in master's degrees now um they're like doing incredible things
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right when it comes to the actual process of getting into a college if your parents have done it right and kept
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transcripts and things like that then honestly you're not really going to have
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a problem because well like every homeschool is kind of looked at as a private school right and so it's like
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transferring from a private school or moving on from a private high school into college all right let's transition a
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little bit another myth surrounding homeschoolers is that homeschooling is only done for religious
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reasons I don't think this is as true anymore um you know it kind of plays into that like homeschooling is a new
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trend kind of a thing I know people who have been homeschooled since like the '90s
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uh since like the early 9s um but I don't think it's always for religious
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reasons especially today right I think Co taught a lot of parents and a lot of families that you can do school at home
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and it gives you sometimes the availability and the freedom to travel right to go see the world to go visit
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grandparents and I know that was a big part in my life too was like I did school at Disneyland one day you know we
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decided hey let's go to Disneyland uh and in between roller coasters I would
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do a math test or I would do a worksheet or you know I do some different things throughout the day right kind of one of
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the funnest coolest experiences um I think I've ever had uh doing school at an amusement park but also gave me the
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availability to like go visit my grandparents for a week in the middle of the school year and stay with them and
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do school at their house right um things that Normal public school kids didn't
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have the ability to do another example of this is the fact that by the time I was junior senior in high school you
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know I was driving I had jobs um I had my own businesses and so I also with homeschool I had the freedom to say I'm
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going to do school at night or late in the evening um you know in the afternoon I'm going to do it on the weekend this
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week or whatever and I was able to build my schedule to be a little bit more of its own like
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you know a little bit more of like an adult schedule I guess you could say like I could go to work in the morning
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or I could you know have a client take guitar lessons from me at you know uh 3: in the afternoon um kind of a thing you
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know so it gave me more freedom to kind of do those things getting back into religious reasons right
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okay most homeschoolers are homeschooled for religious reasons I have a hard time pushing back
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on this because my experience as a homeschool kid was that of a Christian homeschooler I was a part of acheve
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which was the association of Christian Home Educators of Ventura County so everybody who was a part of that and
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which was most of my friends we were all Christians right and even the the other
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homes School groups in the area were religious whether it was Catholic or just other uh another Christian
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Homeschool Group that maybe was a little bit a few more Towns over uh things like
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that but so so every for the most part every homeschooler I knew was a Christian and that dictated a lot
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of the way we looked at education right science was done from a religious aspect
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so creationism uh versus Evolution right creation wins over Evolution every single time right uh looking at history
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right through a religious lens of uh looking at math through religious lens weirdly enough uh not studying other
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religions as much that kind of thing that Trend also that myth kind of also lends itself to homeschool kids
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being sheltered right which is another myth that a lot of people have and that's like very true in the case of
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like religious homeschool education for the most part because when you have that
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religious Viewpoint you want to protect your kids from anything that you would view as unbiblical sinful right sex
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drugs and alcohol kind of a thing and uh that was true in my case I I always tell
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the story I laugh about this all the time but like my growing up you know there was movies have bad stuff in them
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right they've got language they've got sex scenes they've got drug usage
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they've got whatever and so there was a website uh that was done by focus on the
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family and they would rate all these movies and talk about anything that was problematic in them right whether it was
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cuss words uh you know language sex scenes you know uh in modest clothing all that kind of stuff and so so my
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parents could go on and they could read a review of this movie from a Christian lens and say yes you can go see this or
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no you can't go see this right and so it lent itself to me not being able to see
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a lot of movies uh but thankfully I had a friend who had this DVD player that was amazing basically you could put this
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like USB drive into it that you've downloaded files for certain movies and you could dictate what got taken out of
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the movie right so it would bleep out bad language it would take out sex scenes it could skip whole scenes that
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involved like you know uh drugs alcohol whatever so it was great because all of a sudden we got to start watching all
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these movies that were deemed inappropriate or we weren't allowed to watch but we got to watch an edited
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version of them this also kind of led to some weirdness because then later watching those movies it was like I
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don't remember this scene or I don't remember all this language being in this
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movie but uh but you know it was like it was cool in the moment right um especially when you're a kid and you're
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like well I want to go see this movie and you you can't right because Mom and
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Dad say it's got too much bad language in it sorry you know I think the sheltered thing it's hard I understand
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parents want to protect their kids right they want to keep them safe from the big
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bad world but I think that it also can hinder their kids a lot of times and so what I always encourage people to
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do and my family is not the perfect family to look at for this because it hasn't been until recently where we've
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been really open with each other to talk about things like sex like addiction uh
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you know like alcohol things like that religion even to explore ideas openly with one another and have conversation
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and have debate around those things and so rather than shelter your kids from a lot of things I think it's almost better
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to be open because a lot of that stuff is out in the world right but be open and have an environment for your kids
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where it's safe for them to talk to you about well why is this bad or why do we
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view this as wrong or why is this good and this is bad and you know all these different things so anyway I'll get off
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my soap box when it comes to that but I don't think that all homeschooling is
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done through the lens of like it has to be religious I think that is you know I think that was uh a period of time for
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sure but I think now less so um and yeah I don't think all homeschoolers are
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sheltered but I do think there a good number lastly getting into our final kind of myth is that homeschoolers are
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lazy and lack discipline I really don't think this is true uh from my experience it's not true
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um my mom had to work really hard to get us on a schedule I'll give her that you
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know but we we got there right it took a couple years but we figured out this is
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how we operate in school this is when this happens this is the time frame all those types of things so much so that by
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the time I was entering Junior High in high school a lot of my education really just came from my parents handing me a
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syllabus and a textbook and saying okay here's what you're going to do you're
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going to read this textbook you're going to fill out these worksheets you're
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going to turn them in and you know depending on where your grades are at you know we can come back and review
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with you or not if you're getting straight A's well we don't need to
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because obviously you understand the information so they put a lot of that expectation and need to to kind of
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self-discipline yourself to get things done on me which that is not lazy right that is the opposite of lazy uh you know
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I had a lot of discipline when it came to I've got to turn in XYZ by certain
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times I also by the time I was finishing High School worked multiple jobs uh I owned my own business um I did odds and
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ends jobs for people too and so I had kind of arguably like an adult schedule right I had places that I had to be at
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certain times and I was responsible for all of that I was not relying on my parents to get me there on time um I was
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not I had my own car so I was not relying on you know can I borrow the car I have it at this time you know and then
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I had the expectations of school and applying for college right so there was deadlines associated with all of that
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stuff and when I dropped the ball that was my responsibility so for instance I dropped the ball in Spanish uh so much
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so that it became well you're going to have to do Spanish during the summer right you got to make this up uh that
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was on me that was my laziness uh but you know I really don't think that homeschoolers are lazy there are stories
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obviously of people who you know they claim their homeschooling their kids and they're not they're just letting their
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kids sit around the house all day and watch TV I think that's very few and far
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between uh my experience with me and my friends was like we were all super super
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responsible and you know we took our education pretty seriously I think for most of us but you know I can't say
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that's part of what this podcast is for is to talk to people and find out uh
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their own experiences but it overall I don't think that that myth is true um in
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fact I think it's quite the opposite because to be a homeschool family you really do have to have discipline and
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not be lazy uh because you know there's no school bus coming at 6:00 in the morning to pick you up it is you got to
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get your butt out of bed uh and get yourself to the dining table or the school room or whatever uh to to get
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things done so anyway that's just a couple of the myths and questions that people have surrounding homeschool you
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know this I'm excited for this season um you know if you haven't seen the trailer
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this season I'm interviewing all my best friends from growing up and we're asking
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questions around their homeschool experience and you know The Good the Bad and the Ugly of it right it's not all
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rainbows and unicorns so I'm really stoked for you guys to hear it you know if you enjoyed this episode please you
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know follow subscribe you know leave a rating if you feel so inclined but I'm
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really stoked for this season it's going to be a lot of fun and uh yeah until
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next time I'll see you guys [Music] [Music] [Music]