 Hey everybody, welcome to the Waldoch Way. I'm Jessica. And I'm given in today's video is the return of our homeschool show and tell series for the 2021-2022 homeschool year. So if you are new here and you don't know what the homeschool show and tell series is, it is an open collaboration hosted by Abby from Rooted and Rest and myself. We bring homeschoolers together from around the world to really just show that there's no right way to homeschool. So each month we have a topic and all of us come together and we all talk about it so that you can see many different takes on the same topic. This month's topic is a meet the teacher tag because Abby and I really wanted to meet all of you guys. And since there are two teachers in our homeschool, that's why I have a co-host today. All right, so if you want to join us, there will be a link in the description box. You can just click on it and it will take you to the 2021-2022 schedule as well as the meet the teacher tag questions so that you can see what we're answering today. You ready to get started? Sure. Okay, the first thing is introduce yourself. So why don't you go first? Alrighty, I'm dad Kevin. Basically a military veteran, truck driver, always worked in the trades, labor, never home, missed out on all the good stuff. Last year came home. Now I get to do science and math so I really got the easy best part of everything I think. So that's pretty much us. I mean we live in Florida. Everybody knows that. Yeah, very hot sunny in the middle of the nowhere woods is what Emily calls it Florida. I like it. I do too. We live in the middle of nowhere on a very nice piece of property though. Yes. So I'm Jessica. Most of you guys know that we have homeschooled since the beginning. We are homeschooling an only child. Emily will be going into fourth grade if we're keeping grade level. She's nine. I was a photographer who loved what she did and had a baby, didn't want to let her go. Somehow we ended up homeschooling. It was never our plan but I'm so happy that that's where we've ended up and we love it. It's become who we are and it's like our lifestyle and it's just part of what we do. It's part of our everyday life I would say. Definitely everyday. Yeah. Okay question number two. How many years have you been homeschooling? Like I said we've homeschooled since the beginning. Emily is going into fourth grade so I have been homeschooling for five years going on my sixth. I haven't been homeschooling with them but for about a year now but before that I was the explainer. Let me explain. Basically if there was useless information to be had I've got it stored and I would get asked some very random crazy questions and give them the answer and that's where I became the explainer and now I get to explain all the time because I'm home. And what's so funny about that is before we got married I would I would call it useless knowledge because his head is just full of all the stuff and then we got married. We had Emily and we started homeschooling. I'm like you know all that useless knowledge is finally like it's finally getting used and for the longest time I would check behind him. He'd give an answer and I would like be googling it behind his back. She's not the only one. Mother-in-law is everybody. There's no way. How do you know it all? Yeah it's funny. It's a personal challenge and I like accepting personal challenges. And you just know so much random stuff. Yeah it's because I'm old. Okay we'll go with that. Okay. All right next question. Do you have a homeschool style? I would say our style really is that we live a learning lifestyle. It really does just kind of weave itself into our day and it just is what we do. It's like our family culture almost. I have to get up my wallet on this one. I'm gonna go with the 50 cent word. I probably won't pronounce it right. Eclectic? Yeah is that it? Yeah that's right. I was gonna say if we have to put like an official homeschool style I would say eclectic. Yeah. Leaning more heavily towards unit study and maybe even unschool. Like if you had to put you know like homeschool style words we would be eclectic. Leaning more towards unit studies. And man did I freak out when you were talking about unschooling. I'd break a mortar. Unschool. That sounds like the opposite of school. Yeah. When we first started homeschooling I will say this since we're talking about homeschool styles. When we first started we were very traditional because that's all I knew. Like our homeschool room looked straight up like a preschool. ABCs one two three and a rainbow. Yeah it was exactly like a preschool because that's all I knew. And then as I learned more I loosened up more but Kevin wasn't ready to loosen up yet and so he would come home from work every day and he would expect a pile of papers on the table. Like what did you guys do today and what we did needed to be in physical form. You needed to see it. That's that's the way I know that yeah that's what I expected. I needed it. Like what we did our fruit of our labor was worksheets for you. Yeah and I really held on to that for the longest time and I gave grace and and I was understanding and I was supportive. Yeah you weren't rude or mean but you would just like hey what have you guys been up to lately. Yeah yeah I wanted and then when you know she's reading the book to me and it's brown bear brown bear and she nails it. At three and a half years old. Yeah and certain things you know you can't argue with that as facts but I think what really kicked it off is when we started playing games as a family. I mean like religiously we were playing games all the time and I think what sealed it for me was taking Yahtzee and doing math and watching in a Christmas holiday her math skills just bloom and blossom. Growing leaps and bounds in six weeks of time that we were not even doing school. Right. Yeah and I will say after that you like you would loosen up like in every school year I think we both have loosened up more and more. I tend to be even more loose than you and so I'm kind of dragging you along with me but I feel like we are we're opening up and we're more we're being more confident in ourselves each year. I think too it's weird it's if you stand back and watch and I could do that a lot yeah they're in school and they're loose and relaxed not all the time. At the beginning right around August when we're getting ready to go back to school it's nuts. We have like we have like a seasonal flow laying it up getting it planned out everything's cookie cutter everything's in the box everything's ready to go and then up until about Christmas you're hitting it so hard it's unreal and then you go on Christmas breaking it's like okay we're doing the holidays and we never really completely come back from that and you don't but then the spring hits spring and summer and you're thinking it's the end of the school year and you pick up pace everybody's panicking but it's not just her and it's not just me it's I'm watching on you know the the groups and I'm watching these other moms going through the same thing and it's like did you get it all in did you do it? Which it's funny now because I can say that looking back because we've been doing this for five or six years I don't really panic as bad anymore because I mean I still panic don't get it wrong but not nearly as bad as before because I know like from August till like November we are like gung-ho then from November to like March it's like hey we're not going to get anything done and then from like April to like June or July we're gung-ho and it's like it just kind of like ebbs and flows and now I'm okay with that but it yeah it took a while to get there. Okay so the next question is a what is your favorite subject to teach? My favorite subject to teach is anything language literature reading. I love why I love books but I really just like the English language so anything that I get to read aloud or read along with her or write or really any linguistic type of thing I love which also means that I love history because we do most of our history through read aloud so as like a like a sub like you know bystander type of thing I love history too but if I had to pick only one subject that I would teach like for the rest of my days it would be literature and language. What about you what's your favorite subject to teach? Hands down science I enjoy the eye-opening moments on the crazy messy ones the taking it out of the box and we do a lot of the the boxes where we'll get the stuff in we'll kind of talk about what we want to do we'll pick through pick the ones that we're really interested in and then you open them up and have fun make a mess and I think one of the things that's so funny about that is the one thing that I always felt like our home school was lacking before you came home was like the messy part of science right not the knowledge part because I'm really great about teaching it through books I'll read it aloud all day long yeah you about the part that she would take it was a sensory man because it was yeah it was contained yeah I didn't like messes so I clean them up afterward but I like like literally you guys I'm not kidding I have pictures not video I'll insert a picture here see they did they did elephant toothpaste the other day and if you've never seen our home school room there is like a cutout where it goes in like in the wall where it goes into the kitchen the elephant toothpaste exploded so much it went onto the ceiling and through the window and we were like finding it in the kitchen the next day it was all over us the ceiling it was in Emily's hair I would never have done that experience but he cleans it up they had a blast and she's still talking about it weeks later so it was a win-win for me because I don't have to clean it up and a win-win because Emily loved it right no and all the new science kits there's so many new toys out there and if you're like older and you never got to play with toys a lot especially you're living vicariously family oh yes yeah that was worth coming home for yeah it was okay next up if you could only choose a three home school tools what would they be oh can I choose the whole home school room as one no I'm gonna have to stick with first and foremost my love which is art so anything art related and we'll just put that in one all art supplies right all art supplies um I like tablets and computers and all that stuff it's okay but I get frustrated with them so yeah you have technology illiterate sometimes yeah yeah I came and beat it with club I manipulate I like trying to explain something but having something that I can represent my idea with it seems like it comes across better so I like manipulatives and then I think my go-to is like I said the boxes the subscription boxes you oh yes yeah I love them they come in they're prepped already it's a surprise when they come in and what's going to be in them and how far you get to take it and yeah we do crazy stuff we we look for stuff when I go out I'm looking and I think what we'd pick up the other day we picked up lemons where you can do oh yeah the lemon clock yeah we'll do a lemon clock so I can't wait to do that let me just crazy stuff just having fun with it and you know exposing her to these new things and I mean they're old things but for her everything's new and you like to play with the toys yeah I guess if I have to pick three things and I don't get to pick the whole homeschool room I think my three things like that I couldn't live without would be books and games like hands down books and games and then if I can put them together and say my laptop and my printer like we're gonna call that my third one because with books and games I can do almost anything and where that fails my laptop and my printer I can make everything else so I mean I think books and games are probably honestly I would say between the two of us if we had to pick three things it would be books games and subscription boxes like I think we could totally homeschool with those three things and nothing else like no curriculum no nothing just a whole bunch of really great books fun games and all the subscription boxes all of them especially the science one oh yeah the food ones yeah we like food and science okay next up what inspires you as a teacher I think what inspires me most is the teacher as is the aha moments is seeing the when the light bulb comes on those moments those oh my gosh I get it moments is like worth all of the in between all of the headbutting and hair pulling out and frustration and like dull drums and it makes it all worth it so even if it's only like once or twice a year those moments those I get it the light bulb comes on it's it's worth it it makes it all worth it it's like the best payday in my opinion I'll just be honest what inspires you with the toys no I would say close to what you said but as a as a dad in the experience normally I've been used to getting up and going to work those hours that you're gone yeah you're providing for your family you're doing what you're supposed to do but what all did you miss out on so for you it's just getting to be here yeah because you know when you get up one morning you go to work and they're seven and the next morning you get up and go to work and they're nine and you've missed a whole lot in the middle and you live in the same house so I'm going to go with being around being being able to experience stuff in weird hours of the day or even at night because we do a lot at night so yeah we do which is funny because that leads us into our next question are you an early bird or a night owl I think this is no surprise that we are yeah you're a night owl I'm a yo-yo you're yo-yo I'm a yo-yo so you say that why though well because after basic training after I graduated high school I went into the military every job I ever had was a graveyard shift the whole time I was in the military so I must have really done something bad but I'm not sure but they didn't tell me and actually even when we first started dating you were working in graveyard like when we were first together all hours all hours and then every job that I had after that was and actually as a driving job it's it's preferable because there's less people on the road less aggravation less supervision less everything it's acquired a world at night so the only drawbacks is that it's hard to live your life yeah going to the bank and going to the doctor and normal living stuff that aren't going to be open at midnight or after so yeah but if you got to pick not your job would you be an early bird or a night owl like not not influenced by anything kind of a mix my my best creative periods are after the sun goes down for some reason when the sun goes down my brain turns on and I can do more artwork more projects and I mean it's weird I can go out to my shed because we are living in the woods and I can produce a piece of furniture for a family member in the dark um out of my shed and be twice as productive temperature-wise it's more comfortable yeah the bugs are a little aggravating but you can deal with that um but like I said less interruptions and you just you roll through it and my neighbors probably don't like the noise of the saws and stuff that I well luckily we don't have many I think one of the things that I like the most about homeschooling is that it gives us that flexibility like I can't honestly imagine the fight that it would be if we had to get Emily like out the door by 7 a.m. like it would literally never happen that's not even realistic is most if you look at a brick and mortar most kids are getting up at you know five o'clock six o'clock in the morning trying to get out the door um and if they're riding a bus because like we live in the woods um yeah it would be an hour drive if you're looking at hour and hour and a half on a bus going to school in an hour and hour and a half on the bus coming home from school that's a big chunk of your day and so you have to get them up bright and early and then by the time they get home they're wore out and do dinner and it's bedtime and that would never work for us yeah I would say the earliest that our homeschool ever starts is like 10 a.m. and that's like a jam up morning like we got up we got everything ready to go like we got ourselves and everything ready to go but more realistic I take the garbage can and like the air force I throw it down there and scream and yell and hoop and holler and they just roll over put the bill on the head and keep on sleeping yeah that part would be true we totally are not we're not waking up like okay in all seriousness yeah they like everybody who knows this knows that there's like a rule if you want us to attend whatever it is it cannot happen in single digits and by that I mean like 10 a.m. is the absolute earliest we're moving and if for some reason we have to get up in the single digits the only way that's happening is if you take us where where do you have to drive through if we get up in single digits oh that's Chick-fil-A yeah we're getting our Chick-fil-A except for Sunday's thing happening well then we just don't get up on Sunday but seriously our homeschool starts on average between I would say 10 a.m. and noon yeah we have an understanding if anything has to happen before that in a single digit it's uh volunteer it's easier and since argue we are definitely night owls okay you're gonna like this one what is your favorite teacher treat teacher treat you can be honest okay Rome I give my vitamin C I mean I put lime in it but Rome Captain Morgan makes a world go around yeah it really does it definitely keeps you sane so my favorite teacher treat is peanut butter m&m's and I don't mean like just a few I mean like the really big bag that says share size that I most definitely do not share and Dr. Pepper you guys know that and then if it is like cooler weather I really really love a chat latte but that's only for like three months all the year because we live in Florida this is that was for three days yeah okay so do you plan in prep or do you go with the flow you just do whatever you're told for the most part it's safer that way yeah we'll just go with that and I do both she plans it to death she writes it in stone and then she pulverizes it and goes with the flow yeah so I I enjoy planning and prepping and for the longest time I would plan and I'd prep and then I would beat my head against the wall when the planning and the prepping didn't work and it wasn't painting out after all these years I have now learned for the most part I still have to remind myself that I can plan and prep until the cows come home because I enjoy it and that my planning and prepping is for me and it's because I enjoy it it's therapeutic and I enjoy it and so that's why I plan and prep but then I know that I'm not I mean I'm very much more than likely not gonna follow that plan in the prepping that I did I mean it may help me I may follow some of it but guidelines yeah it's very it's it's very broad guidelines well that's well it's true too because we've embraced a long time ago that we do like Emily led so if you're too rigid and you have it all in stone there's no flexibility how can you be led anywhere so I plan and prep and then I follow her lead and go with the flow and if you're into something and the interest of spark you just stick with it longer if there is no fire lit then you may move to the next subject or something may present itself that has nothing to do with anything you planned um but that's usually the best time to jump in and that's like what the way creola happened for us yeah remember we went to the creola experience we had a really good time she enjoyed it wanted to know more we read the book and we created the unit study for her but that was not on our summer plans at all no not at all but she learned so much but she learned so much because she was interested in it at the time yeah so yeah I plan and prep and then go with the flow so both all right last question are you ready yes okay what is something you really enjoy outside of being a homeschool parent well I'm gonna be selfish on this one for sure uh the fact that my whole life my whole life I've been drawn to drawing artwork painting pen and ink watercolor I don't past it I don't care anything um you can't do that behind the wheel of a of a truck you can't do that if you're working um so you know I've always put it on the back burner because you know you have bills to pay you like to eat not being in the rain it's nice have a roof over your head so there's sacrifices that everybody has to make growing up and being an adult so now I'm being an adult but I get what all so yeah I my biggest thrill is the fact that I get to do what I love um and just like with her creating the curriculum for Emily so it's personal and it's for her I can turn around and do artwork and stuff to throw into it and just make it that much richer but I'm doing what I love to do anyway so it's I would say honestly it's kind of difficult because when you say outside of homeschooling both of us really really well we really really enjoy the creative part like I enjoy creating curriculum like that is something I love doing because like he said planning is therapeutic for me so I enjoy planning and creating these unit studies in these curriculum for Emily and then sharing it with you guys like that is what I do in my free time and it is work but I literally am doing something that I could not love anymore so while it's work in homeschool I'd still be doing explaining and you would still be doing art and I would probably still be planning and prepping in just different way yeah and then we'd still be even if I was working we'd still be going on field trips on the weekends and you know going to the lake or going to the beach or going to a theme park or doing something you're gonna be doing something so it's just we have more time together yeah to do everything and I think that's what it's all about being together and it's like what would we say team walled up everything we do it's it's all three of us so I think the only thing that you ever do like for you even though that it is technically mostly homeschool related is art and the only thing I ever really do for me is read a book yeah like I love to read sometimes I'm reading so that I can write and learn more about the things that we're going to be doing with upcoming unit studies or curriculum and then other times I'm reading total smut just for me like on our vacation I read like six books and they were fantastic I loved it it was the best vacation ever and you just finished an amazing art piece that has nothing to do with school it was just for you and that's pretty awesome too right yeah that I'm ready to do a model yeah all right you guys so that's it I hope you enjoyed getting to know us a little bit more and I would love it if you would join us if you don't have a youtube channel and you want to enjoy us anyway go ahead and just leave a comment in the comment section and answer all these questions