The Homeschool How To

#139: Homeschooling an Only Child: Breaking Myths and Building Success with Jessica Waldock

• Cheryl - Host • Episode 139

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Join us for an inspiring conversation with Jessica Waldock, Florida homeschooling mom and founder of The Waldock Way, as she shares her 8-year journey homeschooling her only child.

In this episode, we explore:

  • How to successfully homeschool an only child without feeling isolated
  • Overcoming the "socialization" question and finding community
  • Creating flexible daily routines that work for one child
  • Interest-led learning and unit studies approach
  • Navigating teenage years while maintaining strong family bonds
  • Building a homeschool business around your unique journey
  • Why you don't need to follow traditional curriculum paths

Perfect for:

  • Parents considering homeschooling an only child
  • New homeschool families seeking encouragement
  • Anyone interested in unit studies and interest-based learning
  • Working parents wondering if homeschooling is possible

Jessica breaks down common myths about only child homeschooling and proves that having one child isn't easier or harder - it's just different. She shares practical tips for creating structure while maintaining flexibility, finding the right community activities, and tailoring education completely to your child's interests and learning style.

Key Takeaways:

  • Nobody is more invested in your child's success than you are
  • Interest-led learning creates deeper engagement than forced curriculum
  • Homeschool socialization can be more natural and less pressured
  • You can build a business around your homeschool expertise
  • Traditional educational "requirements" may not serve your child's unique needs

Whether you're just starting your homeschool journey or looking for fresh inspiration, Jessica's story will encourage you to trust yourself and embrace the unique advantages of homeschooling an only child.

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SPEAKER_00:

Welcome. And with us today, I have Jessica Waldock from Florida. Jessica, thank you for being here. Thank you for having me. And you are a homeschooling mom?

SPEAKER_01:

I am. I'm a homeschooling mom of one. She is at the time of this recording 13. And we have been homeschooling since the beginning. That's so cool.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay, so you're in the state of Florida. Um, I get asked this a lot from people. I either get questions saying, I'm a working mom. How can I homeschool? Or I only have one child. How can I homeschool with one child? And I've talked to a few parents with one child, and there's actually a lot of benefits to this. So look.

SPEAKER_01:

So when we were like first, okay, first let me back up. Emily is my rainbow baby. Like, I wasn't supposed to be able to have kids. My husband's 20 years older. She was not planned, but there were obviously bigger plans than what we had. So, like when preschool rolled around and it was time for her to go, if I'm being honest, I just wasn't ready to let go. She was a preemie, so she's young for her age. She was small for her age, and we live 45 minutes from the nearest preschool. So it was just kind of like, wouldn't it be easier than driving 45 minutes one direction to just keep her home? I mean, it's barely ABCs and one, two, threes. And you know, anybody can do this. So I kept her home for preschool. And by the time kindergarten rolled around, we realized we just liked the lifestyle. We liked being able to like learn as a family. We liked being able to stay up later if my husband's hours changed. We just, we really embraced it. So we were just kind of like, okay, let's try this out and we'll evaluate year by year. I mean, we didn't know any other homeschoolers. My husband and I both had traditional schooling backgrounds. So it's not like we had any plans or set out to homeschool. It just kind of fell into our laps. And if I'm being honest, we haven't evaluated again. Like we always said, we'll talk about it at the beginning of each school year and we'll see how we feel. And we just started eighth grade and we still love it as a family. Like, I can't imagine missing out on those hours and the things that like those light bulb moments. I wouldn't want to give those to anybody else.

SPEAKER_00:

And I know what you mean with those too. Like there's so many frustrating moments, but for every frustrating moment, there's also a light bulb moment that you're like, I will I would have missed this. How did your daughter kind of react to it as she got older and understood that her friends, a lot of her friends, were probably going to traditional school and she was not?

SPEAKER_01:

Actually, she's always been very, very pro homeschool. She loves, like, she knows that she gets to sleep in and she can do school in her pajamas. And I would say probably about 90% of her friends are actually homeschooled as well. We just happen to be in a really rural area where it's kind of a big deal, like a big thing here. But her cousins went to traditional school. And so that was always an eye-opening experience for her. My sister is a teacher, my stepmom is a teacher. So she has a lot of like knowledge. I won't forget the very first time my stepmom took her with her to work on like it was like Martin Luther King Day or, you know, one of those days where they had a Monday off. And she took her, and Emily thought the classroom itself was really, really cool. She was, I think, six, and she said, Mom, I want to go just for the classroom. I don't want to go to learn. I don't want to go, you know, for anything else. I just want to go play in the classroom. And I was like, okay, but the funny thing about it is everything that was in my stepmom's classroom were toys that Emily had passed down to her. So it wasn't even like this new exciting stuff. It was just that it was her stuff in a different environment. But she's really enjoyed it. She embraces the uniqueness of it. She knows that she can have so much more free time to do things like right now, she's really into archery and guitar and she can practice for hours a day that maybe she couldn't do that otherwise because you know, traditional school, you get home, you do homework, and it's kind of time for beds and bath and start it all over again the next day. She's never really expressed like a desire to, you know, do anything other than what we do.

SPEAKER_00:

That's really cool. And she's at that age now where if she were in school, the majority, probably 99% of the people in her class would have cell phones and, you know, be doing the internet stuff. How has that kind of shaped your family? Has it been hard or because her friends are homeschooled? Is nobody that you're around really exposed to that, anyways?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, to be perfectly honest, Emily has a cell phone, but it's very much like she's at that age now where she's going out and doing things without my husband and myself. And so it's for safety. She does not have any social media. She doesn't have, you know, so her cell phone is very much just for mom and dad's contact. She does have Facebook Messenger Kids where she chats with other friends her age. But the majority of, in fact, not even cell phone related. We were at Target like six months ago. And there was a woman there buying something for her niece, and she asked how old Emily was. And Emily told her, you know, I'm 12 at the time. And she's like, Oh, that's perfect. Can you help me buy something for my niece? And she was telling her something that she was interested in. And Emily is standing there like a deer in the headlights. I don't remember what it was, but she had no clue whatever this popular thing was that this lady was talking about. And I had to explain to her, I'm like, ma'am, I'm not trying to be mean, but my daughter might not be the best person to help you. I said, she's homeschooled, all of her friends are homeschooled. She's not in that environment where there's pressure or like where everybody likes the in thing. I said, she likes what she likes, and there's nobody to tell her that like it's not cool or it's not the popular thing right now. Which I actually in that moment was like, this is so cool that she gets to be 100% her, like with no pressure to like like the it new thing or be clicky or whatever. Like she just gets to no questions asked, be who she is.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Because how many of us, even at like 40 years old, don't know who we are? Because it's always been this is the popular show on TV and this is the popular designer bag, or you know, whatever it is, you're always influenced. And it is so nice to just naturally come to that. And oh, I want to follow that further. Cause I always thought, what would we do if we're homeschooling? Like we we would just sit around and read all day. That really doesn't sound interesting to me. But now that we're in it, I'm like, oh, we barely even have time to sit down with a book. We have to like make a conscious decision to do that because there's always so much to do. I'm not echoing back to you. Hmm. All right, I'll edit that part out. I don't know why I'm echoing back all of a sudden. Like and you didn't switch anything just now?

SPEAKER_01:

No, I didn't touch anything.

SPEAKER_00:

Hmm. Maybe it's the government listening in.

SPEAKER_01:

All right, so if I go low, that's probably too low. We talk about homeschooling too much.

SPEAKER_00:

But and if I do that, yeah, I'm still echoing. So weird. It says that I have an echo cancellation, but I can't turn it on while recording.

SPEAKER_01:

Uh yeah, mine mine's on, but mine was on before we started.

SPEAKER_00:

I see yours is on. Well, now I don't hear it. All right. Well, I'll note to edit that part out. Okay, so things like proms and stuff, like that was also one of my things in the very beginning of oh, could I ever homeschool? I'd would my kids resent me for missing a prom or a homecoming game or you know, the homecoming dance or little Halloween parades and in school. And then I think as you get into homeschooling, you realize that's so trivial and you can recreate that stuff, anyways. But how has that shaped your daughter and like her theories on that stuff? Or is it just like, well, if I don't even know it exists, I don't care to be a part of it anyway. Like kids in like Guatemala probably aren't worried about a prom.

SPEAKER_01:

That's probably very true. Uh, when we first started homeschooling, I mean, I had those those thoughts, but then again, what's so funny is I never went to mine. I went to, I think, my freshman homecoming, but I've never, I mean, I never went to prom. And here at almost 40, I have to say, the thought or the regret or the like, man, I really wish I had gone to prom, it's never occurred to me. Like that thought has never happened. So I wasn't really, really concerned about it. However, in the state of Florida, you can, there's multiple different ways how you can homeschool. And I'm sure it's like this in many different states, but you can homeschool like through your county or under an umbrella. If you homeschool through your county and you submit your intent to them, you can still participate in any of the public school. Like Emily could go to extracurricular activities, she could play sports, she could still go to homecoling, homecoming or prom, or I think I don't, I don't know because we haven't researched this enough, but I think she can even walk like at graduation, because technically we're homeschooled under the county, even though I get a free say in everything. And so that was like, I guess, a secondary peace of mind for me. Like, okay, if when she turns 15 or 16, she wants to do this, we have the option. There's also a local, I mean local-ish, like an hour away, where they do a homeschool prom. And she had an older friend who went last year. And I have to admit, Emily was like, I don't think I'm gonna do that. And I was like, Are you sure you might want to? And she's like, I have to wear a dress and heels and get my hair done. She's kind of a tomboy. So the idea of none of that appealed to her. And it was so funny to me, like in that at that point, that that was even something I was concerned about when we started six or seven years ago. Like, I was so worried about making sure I made that an available option. And she's like, I don't want to do it. Like, there's multiple ways she could do it now. She could do it with the county, she could do it through the homeschool, and she's still like, no, I don't think I want to wear heels or wear a dress or do my hair or, you know, whatever. She's like, I'd rather stay home with a book.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, oh, I love that. Well, okay, why don't you break it down? What does your day-to-day look like? Um, you can just kind of like over the years or what you're doing right now.

SPEAKER_01:

So our day-to-day has looked very similar over the years. Um we've kind of always had like blocks of time that things fit into. So Emily, um, I'm gonna just say she's quirky because we homeschool, we've never had to use labels, and she likes dependability and routine, where I'm more of a fly by the seat of my pants. So, like having blocks makes her happy, but I can change what's in those blocks and she doesn't care. So our days have kind of always started with morning basket, which is originally started from me not being a morning person and needing to have something preset and like done for me to just wake up and do. That's where the majority of anything that we're gonna read is at, anything that doesn't require her to write, typically lasts an hour to an hour and a half unless she gets hooked on something and we go down a rabbit trail and then that looks more like two hours. And then we've kind of always used games as a transition. So we transition from our morning basket time to table time, which is where any kind of writing lessons happen with a game, because that's an easy way for me to always like pull her over from the comfy couch to like, hey, let's sit at the table now and do some writing. So we use like games to do that. And then our afternoons have always been our activities. So after we have whatever tabletime lessons that might be, which could be language, arts, and math, or maybe we're doing a you know, art project or a project with a unit study, we always have lunch and then some sort of afternoon activity. And that's where we like kind of dig into subscription boxes or those larger, messier projects that maybe aren't going to be finished in one day, or um, I don't know, maybe it's a rainy day and we just spend the rest of the afternoon playing games. But that's kind of been the always the basic for our day. Now the same things happen, but now that she's older, they happen later. So lunch happens now kind of even during our morning basket because she's a teenager and so she sleeps later than she did when she was younger. What about co-ops? Do you do anything like that? I did when she was very young. In the very beginning, I felt intimidated by the fact that I was homeschooling and only child. If there are anybody homeschooling and only child, I promise you the first question anybody ever asks is, What about socialization? How is she gonna meet kids her age? And even though I in my mind knew better, I let that influence me and I kind of like pushed us into a co-op. Um, and it wasn't a great fit. And I knew that it wasn't gonna be a great fit beforehand, and I did it anyway because I felt that pressure. Now she does guitar lessons twice a week. Those happen later in the afternoon, so around five. She does archery through 4-H. Um, and then my dad is also an archery coach, so those kind of go together. And she was doing karate last year, twice a week. She switched karate for archery. So she still gets plenty of socialization, even though I really don't love that word. She gets plenty of time with kids her age. But co-op was just never the right way for us to do it. And I'm I'm glad I'm secure enough now in what I know as a homeschool mom, even though it took me 10 years to get there, to be able to say, that's great. I'm glad it works for you. That's not what's best for us.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Did you ever have, like, I know we have a couple groups that will do, they're not technically a co-op, but like a meetup, like, hey, we're always gonna be at so-and-so's house Mondays from uh 11 to 4. Come if you want, or hey, we're always meeting at a different park, or maybe a field trip day. Do you have anything like that where they're not technically co-ops, but meetups with other homeschoolers in the area?

SPEAKER_01:

We have a much more relaxed version of that because again, I'm a fly by the seat of your pants. So the every Monday at 3 p.m. thing, just I have enough scheduled things. I'm not trying to add anything else. So we have a very low-key group of homeschool moms that kind of all have, you know, kids around her age or within three or four years of her age. Some have youngers that tag along and we'll do park play dates or like one person will host at their house for maybe a holiday, like, hey, I want to do a Christmas party or Christmas exchange, or hey, let's do, you know, Valentine's Day something. But it's just a lot more low-key than like pre-scheduled every Wednesday or Monday. And it is great for field trips too, because there are a lot of places that you can get a discount, or you know, you can schedule things when you have a larger group. So that does make it nicer to be like, there's 12 of us kids, you know, 12 kids coming and five moms, and you can get, you know, those discounted rates.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, for sure. And I like those too just because um they go to places in our area that I didn't even know existed. It's like it's like, you know, you're like, oh yeah, we can do a meetup at that little nature hike. I didn't even know it was there. So that's cool.

SPEAKER_01:

Um, I always I always find the field trips interesting. Like I in Florida, this is not a thing throughout the whole US, but Publix is a grocery store here. And I mean, it's a grocery store. We've been there a thousand times. But one of our other homeschool moms scheduled a field trip there, and I was like, We're going to a grocery store. I mean, I just, you know, I'm like, I don't think my 11-year-old's gonna want to do that. But we did it, and it was super cool because they did like behind the scenes tours, like they let them help make floral arrangements in the floral department and like make a sandwich in the deli and ring things up in the cash registers. And I was like, I never in my I never would have been like, let's go on a field trip to Publix. But somebody booked it and I thought, wow, this is so great. And so I love that as well. Cause like you said, they're going to different areas, or when you have moms together, you think of different things, you know, things that you might not have thought of or things that they can expose your child to that maybe you would have never exposed them to otherwise.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, a thousand percent. Like the one um group that we do, and you know, you don't have to go every week, but I look and see where they're going. The one time they went to a cemetery, and I'm like, this is weird, but I was like, all right, let's go. It was a nice day out, so I took the kids. We all went to the cemetery. Well, it turns out one of the presidents had been buried there, and we saw a hawk that was just like sitting there trying to um like pounce on I don't know, I don't know, a squirrel or a chipmunk or something. So we'd watched that for a while, and it was really just a beautiful place, and you you know, start looking at the headstones and how old people were when they died. And I'm like, this was actually a really cool trip. I never would have gone on this on my own.

SPEAKER_02:

On my own.

SPEAKER_01:

I don't think I would have gone on a I definitely wouldn't have booked a cemetery-filled trip, but that does actually sound pretty cool.

SPEAKER_00:

It was so okay, what are your long-term plans for your daughter? Like, does she want to go to college? Is this something that you guys talk about, or is it kind of like, if we stayed out of the system this long, maybe we don't need it at all?

SPEAKER_01:

So she jokes about me homeschooling her for college because she's like, I mean, she obviously knows that's not an option, but she jokes about it. She's like, I think you should just homeschool me all the way through. She does want to go to college, she's not sure what for yet. In fact, that is her current pet peeve because for whatever reason, she's like, once you turn 13, you're a teenager, everybody thinks you should have the rest of your life figured out. And like everybody is like, So what do you want to do? Like after high school. And she's like, first, I'm not even in high school yet. So can we just like take a breath? And I told her, I said, you know what? I would just start asking them because she gets really annoyed. I'm like, I would just start asking them, like, what do you want to do with the rest of your life? Because I promise you, most of us adults don't know either. Yeah, for sure. Did you have to live a career to homeschool? It was a professional photographer when I was pregnant with Emily, and I maintained a more part-time status after she was born, but I was still a stay-at-home mom for the most part. I mean, I would did weddings on the weekend and my husband would take care of her, but I did quit altogether when we started homeschooling. I didn't have to do that, it was just a lot to juggle. And I kind of at the same time, I decided that I would rather go back to school full-time. And going back to school full-time, homeschooling her and running a business was a little much. So I went back to school for the first two years that we homeschooled and finished my bachelor's degree. And then after that, I started the Waldoc Way as a way to share just kind of our journey with other homeschool moms because I felt like there wasn't a lot of only like homeschooling and only child out there. And I knew I wasn't alone and I just wanted to like find others or show that it could be done. And then that grew into its own business to the point that actually my husband and I both now work from home and run it. So I didn't have to leave, but now I'm a full-time working mom who also homeschools.

SPEAKER_00:

That's so cool. So did you have to go get your bachelor's in order to do that or just kind of you wanted the bachelor's and then that formula?

SPEAKER_01:

I don't even have a reason for why I quit. I just did. And I thought to myself, you know, after I got pregnant, I was like, one day, this little girl is gonna come to me and she's gonna want to quit something. And I want to be able to say, like, you finish even when things are hard. And so even with her as a baby, I just wanted to, you know, be able to like lead by example and not be that mom who was like, do what I say and not what I do. So that's the only reason I went back and finished.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay, so tell us all about the Waldock Way. How does this even turn into a business? How did it start? And where did you go from there?

SPEAKER_01:

Okay, so Emily would have been six. And when she was, like I said, this was first grade, I felt like there wasn't a lot of only child. Like everything that I saw at that point, because you have to remember this is seven years ago, was very much large families. Um, the, I mean, homeschool had become a bigger thing, but the movement that we're living through right now had not happened yet. And I said, you know what? I'm just gonna share for a couple of reasons. Number one, I was a little bit lonely, if I'm being honest. And I kind of wanted to know that I wasn't the only one. And I thought if if I share, I'll find, I'll at least find somebody else. So it started as me just sharing like our day-to-day on Instagram. That was my preferred platform at the time because again, photographer background, I liked that it was all pretty pictures. And I just kind of shared the day-to-day, the basics. And we were obsessed. I mean, like, well, Emily was very, very obsessed with the magic treehouse books. Jack and Annie were like her heroes. We had read them so many times. And I didn't even know that there was a name for what we do now. We do unit studies, but I didn't know that we were just doing what felt natural. So we would read the magic treehouse book about dinosaurs, and we would like learn about dinosaurs or the letter D, or I would find a museum, you know, nearby that had dinosaurs on display. So we would go see the dinosaurs. Um, I mean, just like little things. Like I was just naturally doing this, and I started having people message me on Instagram asking like what curriculum we were using. And I was like, We're not. I mean, again, I'm just doing what felt natural. And um, we're like, Well, can you share what you're doing? Can you keep sharing what you're doing? So eventually by the end of that school year, I took what we did naturally and I put it into a format that I could share with other people and I put it on teachers pay teachers. I don't even remember what the price was at this point, but it was Memorial Day of 2017, so seven years ago. And after a year, I mean, we had made a decent amount on it. And I thought, well, maybe I should make a website so that I can sell it on my own website and not be giving teachers pay teachers 40% of you know the income. So I did. And then it felt weird to have a website without blog posts. So I started writing blog posts that were very generic, but very like the questions I was asked all the time, like, can you really homeschool an only child? And, you know, just answering those questions so I could direct them to that instead of saying the same thing 50,000 times. Then the following year, Emily was having some anxiety issues and she, I don't remember what exactly it was, but there was something she was scared of doing. And I said, you know, you can do big scary things. And she said, You can too, mommy. And so I started a YouTube channel because that felt big and scary to me. Um, it was. In fact, if you go back seven years and watch some of my first videos really closely, you can probably see hives on my neck because it was not something that I was comfortable with at all. And then from there, I just kept writing unit studies. Anything that Emily was interested in, I would turn into a study that she would be able to do. So from Magic Treehouse books to Harry Potter to topic-based, we've done space, we've done ocean, we did survival based off of bear grills. And slowly but surely it has grown into um just this huge business where we help other homeschool families and we hopefully bring a lot more joy to their homeschools with topic-based learning.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, I love that. I love unit studies too. I'm gonna have to now go through all of yours and see what I can pick up because I thought of that too. Like, oh, I would love to like create a unit study for this or that. And but then it seems so heavy and daunting to think like, but to make it good enough that other people want to do it too. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01:

It um it has its moments. I mean, I love what I do. I absolutely love it. I can't imagine a better job. But there have been times when I have felt like, man, this is like you know, you get that one because you can't ever make everybody everybody happy. So you get that one person, and I'm like, man, that was my heart and soul was put into that, you know, like it hurts me physically.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So okay, if somebody were to buy one of your unit studies, what would that typically look like? Would it be a week long, a month long, five days, would it take an hour a day, five hours a day? What does it entail?

SPEAKER_01:

So I like to say that our unit studies are extremely flexible. Like I write them as if it's a buffet or a feast, and you get to pick and choose what fits your family. Because even the studies that I write, like I physically write them and we don't do them in their entirety because there are parts that work better for our family. Like we love the books and the games, and we love, you know, different parts, but neither Emily nor I are huge into arts and crafts. Well, she's probably bigger into arts and crafts than me, but I'm not one of those, like that's there's no glitter in my house. That's not my thing. That would give me hives. So I don't do those parts of our studies, but I make sure they're there so that if that's your thing, you can do them because every homeschool family is different. All of our unit studies differ. So we have mini unit studies. I would say those are about a week. Most of our other unit studies are somewhere between 12 and 14 weeks. And then we have some that are closer to year long, so 24 to 36. Um, it just depends on what you're looking for. And as far as ages, we have something from six to 16 probably, because I've created them for Emily as she's as she's grown up. And so there's something for everybody. They always include books, YouTube videos, games, like fun printables. My husband is an artist, like an amazing artist. So there's always custom coloring pages that he's drawn that are phenomenal. He does all of the illustrations for all of our studies. Human Body is actually my favorite because his illustrations, like they were made for young kids, but they look like they could be in college textbooks. And I absolutely love that because he just put so much detail into them. But we just we try really hard to make sure that there's something for everybody, but that it's also not the kind of checklist curriculum that you feel like you have to check every box and feel like less of a homeschool mom if you don't.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay, so how does it fit into like a regular school year? Say, like I'm in New York, we actually have things that we have to meet as far as not necessarily off the top of my head, math, science, geography. Um I think that patriotism is one of them. But how implemental thing were you explaining you might have to add some other topics through the year?

unknown:

Through the year.

SPEAKER_01:

Um, math definitely is not included in any of our studies because that's the one thing that you kind of have to have sequentially. So it's not family style. Like you can't do math with your the same math with your six-year-old that you can with your 16. I'm gonna use what we're currently doing in our homeschool right now. We're doing our Egyptian heroes and myths study, which is based on the Cain Chronicle books, which think Egyptian version version of Percy Jackson, because it's by the same author. So, with that study for geography, obviously we're doing a lot of Egyptian geography and mapping Egypt and Africa and that location. For history, we're getting into ancient Egypt, how the pyramids were built. Do they know that?

SPEAKER_00:

I didn't know that they knew how they were built.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, the the uh like the structure of it and the stones, and then like the science of it, because they moved these stones through the desert and they were so heavy, but they learned that they started pouring water in front of these sleds, and somebody would pour the water as they would drag the sled with the heavy stones on it. And much like going to the beach because the water was wet, it was harder and it would work. So that's kind of some of the science that we're touching on. When you start talking about like mummification and all that, that's the science side of it. The literature side is the fact that we're reading this book series and there's comprehension questions and writing prompts that go along with that. So that is kind of how we take one topic and can like dissect it to cover all of those different subjects. I will say phonics also is not included in the unit study, in my opinion, because much like math, that's sequential. But I think all other language arts or English skills could be approached through it. Like whatever you're learning about, there's ways to do writing prompts, or there's ways to, you know, do comprehension because you're reading a book that goes along with that topic. But math and phonics definitely would need to be, I mean, you can do supplemental things along that topic, but I think you need curriculum for those.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. And that and that was always a big realization for me when I first started. It was like, okay, your kid doesn't actually have to know X, Y, or Z by a certain age. So, you know, I talk to some homeschooling families and they're like, We're doing Latin this month, and you know, or this year, and another one that's learning about ancient Egypt, or you know, where sometimes I'm just like, I don't know, that would bore me. I don't I don't think my seven-year-old would find that fun, or even when he's eleven. But then it's like, wait, do they even have to learn that? Like, I guess it depends. If you're not taking a regent, you know, they really don't have to. You're just setting up for what you want them to know in life and what they find interesting. So can you kind of elaborate that? You know, elaborate on that for me. I'm sorry, I'm still hearing my echo. I don't know if I'm asking this and making any sense.

SPEAKER_01:

But do you know what I mean? Do you know what I mean? So that's actually one of the very first conversations that my husband and I had when we started homeschooling because he, again, 20 years older than me, so he's a little more old school. So he was like, I need to see paper when I come home every day from school, and I need it to be in math and language arts and science and history. And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute, back up. Okay, let's find a happy medium. And then eventually we had the discussion where I was like, can we just talk about what you actually like you, what do you remember from your 13 years in school? And then me from even like 13 years in school plus four years in college. Like, what do you remember? He remembered a ton of history because he loved history. I remembered a lot of math because I loved math. But that was it. Like, if you start quizzing me on history or he started talking to me about the things that he remembered, I was taught the same things, but I didn't remember any of them. And I had never used any of that knowledge because it didn't interest me. And so eventually, after having that conversation with him, I was like, so think about if you could teach all of the things and it all be based off of your interest. Like that would be so much more beneficial, not just for the person who's being taught, in this case my daughter, but for me who is the person who's doing the teaching. Because now I'm not having to teach the same thing over and over and over or even be wasting my breath and it going in one ear and out the other. I can take math, language arts, you know, all of these subjects, and I can make it pertain to whatever she's interested in. So for years when she was younger, it was animals. Like if I could figure out a way to tie it to an animal, if I wanted to learn about Africa, okay, we're gonna start with the African animals. Or if I wanted, you know, to talk about, again, like when she was four or five letters, she learned her letters. A is for alligator, B is for B, C is for cat. I mean, because that's what worked for her. It's what she was interested in. And I also think we always talk about gaps. Like, as homeschool moms had something we're worried about is gaps in education. It is impossible, absolutely impossible, for you to teach your child everything they're gonna need for the rest of their life. Like, I'm I'm 38 years old. I did 13 years in public. Public school. I did four years in college, and I promise I am still learning new things every single day. So we put this pressure on ourselves to like, I don't know, keep up with the Joneses, keep up with the public school, teach them everything. And it's impossible. So instead, why not just have fun, teach them what they're interested in? And like you said, maybe even things that you're interested in. Because if you enjoy it as a teacher, they're probably gonna enjoy it as the student.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. And I think really paying attention to what lights them up throughout the day because it's so easy to say, well, I don't know what they're interested in because I'm not exposing them to every little thing, like Latin or you know, whatever. But when you when they watch a movie or when they're playing with friends or asking you a question as you're driving in the car, you will start to notice those things that actually spark them. And then you can move forward with that.

SPEAKER_01:

So on that same topic, I have to go back to this for just a second because I'm really like I'm huge on interest level learning. So the biggest thing I hear is always, I don't know what my kid's interested in. And I feel like there's two reasons for that. Number one, it's because typically when we want to know what our kid is interested in, instead of paying attention, like you just said, we ask them. We look at our kid and we're like, hey, what do you want to learn about? Which I don't know about you. But anytime my husband looks at me and goes, hey, what do you want for dinner? My answer is always, I don't know. So when you ask your kid that, they're like, I don't know, because you're putting them under like this weird pressure to have an answer and they don't have it. And then the second thing is sometimes they have an interest, but we don't see the value in their interest. So for example, maybe your son's interest is video games or Minecraft, and we are like, well, that can't be educational. We can't learn about that. So we don't see the value in it when really there is a ton of value in it. You just have to sometimes get creative and not discredit it. And maybe your son who's in love with video games is going to be a video game programmer, and by allowing him to follow those interests, you've opened more doors for him. So I think one is don't ask them what they're interested in, you know, like actually, like you said, pay attention. And the other is don't discredit something just because you don't like it or you don't see the value in it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. My son is building a tiny house in the backyard right now. He's seven. But the little boy next door, he's 11, and he was doing it for you know a couple weeks over the summer. And so then they started building one for my son, and it was like I mean, it's like pallets and some wood together, you know. But it's it's just cute because like in his mind, this is gonna be a house that he's gonna live in someday. You know, you know, it really got me thinking too because now it's it's the beginning of September, and the neighbor is off at school, and the weather here is beautiful, and that poor kid is stuck inside all day, can't be outside working on his tiny house building the next thing, you know. Um, it was eye-opening just to see what kids will do when they're bored and creative. And now, you know, seeing the school system swooped him right up at 6 a.m.

SPEAKER_01:

and he doesn't come home till three, and then he's got homework and stores and yeah, yeah, it is and your son's who's seven, his tiny house is probably gonna be complete, and the other, you know, 11-year-olds is gonna be sitting there all sad. He's gonna have to invite him over. You can come stay in my tiny house.

SPEAKER_00:

Till the coyotes go, and then they'll be like, okay, we're inside. Um, what have been some of the let's see, like the hardships of uh homeschooling and only child, and then some of the pros and that you've seen.

SPEAKER_01:

The biggest hardship or challenge um is that you're their everything. I mean, I can't ever say, like, go play a game with your siblings or go do anything. I'm her mom, I'm her teacher, I'm her playmate, I'm the person she plays the game with, I'm the only person she has to talk to. And that can be extremely challenging because you never get any like downtime. And I don't even mean physical downtime, I mean like mental downtime.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes.

SPEAKER_01:

When she was younger and my husband was still working, like out of the house for 12 and 13 hour days, I instituted what I called a learning lunch, which meant she had to either watch a TV show, listen to a podcast, or listen to an audiobook just so that she wouldn't talk to me for 20 minutes. And I know what that sounds like, but I don't even care because my sanity was worth more than that 20 minutes of screen time that I needed her to have so that we can make it through the rest of the afternoon. Happy. I was joyful because I took that 20 minutes to recharge. And I think that's the biggest challenge, other than the fact that for whatever reason, people are a lot more judgy. You know, like that you're only homeschooling one, like I'm doing a disservice to her because I'm I'm keeping her home and keeping her away from her peers, or even sometimes other homeschool moms who claim that I have it easier because I only have one. And my biggest thing is it's not easier, it's just different. I don't think it's easier whether you have two or ten or one. I think our situations just look different, no matter how many you have or whatever your situation might be. You know, maybe you have one in public school and one at home, and that's just different. You know, it's not easier or harder, it's just different than what somebody else has. So I think those are probably the biggest challenges. I think the biggest benefits are that she gets one-on-one everything. I mean, her her entire homeschool is tailored to her. Like it doesn't have to be where I'm teaching to the middle because I have, you know, a six-year-old and a 10-year-old, or where um I have to pick a book that would appeal to both of them. Like everything is tailored to her. It's her interest, it's, you know, her desires, it's her whatever. Um, and while she might not necessarily see it yet, I know that that is a humongous benefit for her. And then also the the relationship and the connection. Like it's always her and I or her and my husband or the three of us, and our family has benefited so much because of that. Like, and I don't just mean like the little things. Like I can see where a lot of people started warning me, like, oh, when she turns 13, you might as well say, you know, bye to her because you're never gonna see or hear from her again. She's gonna be locked in her bedroom or off with her friends. And I I mean, I've seen the shift, right, to where she's spent more time with friends. But what I see in other kids versus what we have, and I don't know if this is an only child thing, maybe it's just a homeschool thing in general, but it's still, I mean, she hasn't like left us, right? Like we're still cool, she still enjoys spending time with us, she still wants to watch movies with us and play games with us. And so I think that foundation that we built, you know, she like we're friends, even though we're also family. And I wouldn't, I wouldn't trade that benefit for any of the the challenges.

SPEAKER_00:

I love that. Any parting words or inspiration that you have for prospective homeschooling families or new homeschooling families?

SPEAKER_01:

Um, I think I would probably just say that if you're considering homeschooling, you're always going to feel like you're not doing enough or you're not enough, or you know, you could be doing something more or something better. But the thing that I try to remind myself, like especially at the end of the day, is there is literally nobody on earth who is more invested in my child than I am, invested in them as a person, invested in their future, invested in their academics. So you are quite literally, no matter what, the most equipped and the best person for the job.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, I love that. All right, Jessica, I'm going to put your website and your YouTube channel in the show's description so that people can find you. But if you'd like to just shout that out right now for anyone listening who wants to jot it down, I will let you do that as well. And I will put this in the show's description as well, but let's just uh say it out loud.

SPEAKER_01:

The easiest place to find me is my website, which would be www.thewaldokway.com, which is my last name, W-A-L-D-O-C-K. All right, awesome.

SPEAKER_00:

And we can find your YouTube channel and your unit studies through there. Yeah, you can find pretty much everything as well as social media too. Awesome, awesome. Well, we will follow you and uh support you and all that you're doing. I love this. I've had the idea in my head to, you know, different things that I want to learn about. I'm right near the Hudson River, and I said on so many episodes, I'm like, oh, I will make a unit study on the Hudson River one day. I have passed it a million times in my life, and no teacher in school has ever taught me anything about it.

SPEAKER_01:

But see, think about this. You've got the history because you can learn about Henry Hudson himself and you know how it became named that. You've got the science of the river and you have the animals that live in it. You've got the geography of it. Like, I'm telling you, the revolution, like it was awesome.

SPEAKER_00:

The revolutionary war was like right here, and it pushed trade to Western America because of this. And then it's the 200-year anniversary of the Erie Canal right now, which they but like I didn't know anything about that until I took out a book from the the library, a children's book, no less. And I'm like, there was so much cool stuff to learn that they never taught us in school.

SPEAKER_01:

It's just so much. So much. We've did we've done like local field trips, we've done road trips across the country. And I'm like, first of all, I never you know saw anything, but also the coolest thing I've ever experienced was we read about the Alamo. I didn't know, I mean, if they taught me anything about the Mexican-American War, I don't remember it. I don't think I was taught at all. Then so we read about the war, we read about the Alamo, and then we went and like toured the Alamo. We went on a road trip. And I remember Emily was like standing there and she's like, Mom, think about where you're standing and like what was happening X amount of years ago in this exact, like in this exact spot. And I was like, you know what? I've never like thought of it through that lens before. But I was like, that is actually really, really cool. And again, I didn't like history. In fact, history was the one subject that I didn't even want to teach in my homeschool. I hated it so much. And it's actually my favorite subject now for that reason because there's so much I wasn't taught. There's so many cool things that happened and so many cool places to visit and things to experience. That I mean, why were we just taught names and dates? Like, who was gonna like that?

SPEAKER_00:

They didn't relate it to anything in our life, and they made it seem so long ago that it was like, well, what does it matter? That was just a million years ago, and it's like, no, really, like you know, the Holocaust was within the last just a couple of decades, and then before that, you know, America was only established a couple grandparents ago, guys. Like nothing was in context, everything seemed ancient. And I I'm right with you. I love history now, and I learned most of it through children's books.

SPEAKER_01:

Same. They never made it relevant, and their famous tagline when it was like, Why do we need to know this? History repeats itself, which okay, it does, but they never explained that in a kid friendly way or a child-friendly way either. Because I'm like, I don't think so. The Revolutionary War happened, I don't think it's gonna happen again, you know. Like, yeah, little did we know, yeah. Had they explained it a little better or broken it down, I think I would have remembered a lot.

SPEAKER_00:

One day we're gonna tell you all you have to stay in your homes and six feet away from family and cover your face and inject you with something. They didn't tell us that that was gonna happen.

SPEAKER_01:

No, no, they didn't explain it like it might not be the exact same thing, but trust us when we say these things are going to, you're gonna see them again in your lifetime.

SPEAKER_00:

I would have been like, oh, well, then maybe I should pay attention. Exactly. I think they're banking on that we didn't pay attention. Jessica, thank you so much for being here today. This was so much fun chatting with you. I can't wait to see all the work that you do and uh grab some of it for myself so we can experience this fun in our homeschool too. Thank you so much for having me.