Why Smart Kids Shut Down In School #87

Homeschool vs traditional school: a former principal explains what helps kids learn (and what gets in the way).

If your child is melting down after school, refusing to listen, or suddenly “shutting down” around learning, this conversation will likely hit close to home. We unpack what’s really happening beneath behaviors like school resistance, emotional outbursts, and loss of motivation—and how factors like environment, pacing, and lack of autonomy can quietly overwhelm kids. Whether you’re considering homeschooling or staying in the system, this episode gives you a clearer, research-informed lens on how kids actually learn and what they need to feel safe, engaged, and regulated.

What You’ll Learn:

•  Why kids often fall apart after school (and what it says about their nervous system) 
•  What “learning” is supposed to feel like for toddlers and young kids 
•  How traditional classrooms can unintentionally block curiosity and independence 
•  Simple ways to advocate for your child inside the school system 
•  How to trust your child’s pace without constant fear of them “falling behind” 

This episode is grounded in developmental psychology and real classroom experience—from a former teacher and principal who saw firsthand how the system works (and where it breaks down). The goal isn’t to tell you what choice to make—it’s to help you understand your child more clearly, reduce daily power struggles, and respond in ways that actually support long-term learning and emotional health.

If you’ve ever second-guessed your parenting when your child resists school, or wondered if things could feel easier and more aligned, consider staying connected here. The more you understand what’s driving your child’s behavior, the more confident and calm you’ll feel in those hard, everyday moments.

Check out Mandy Davis' book: The Homeschool Bible: A Step-by-Step Guide for Beginners to Curriculum, Lesson Planning, State Laws, and Daily Schedules

Transcript

Jon @WholeParent 0:00

Most of us were raised not to question whether school is actually what is best for kids. But today, that's exactly what we're gonna do. Welcome back to the podcast. I'm so excited to be presenting this guest episode for you today. We are talking about school here on the podcast this week. We're gonna have another episode or maybe another couple of episodes talking about school coming up. But today I have a special treat because I interviewed Mandy Davis, who is a former teacher and school principal, who made the courageous and perhaps counterintuitive decision to turn her life upside down, to quit her job as a school principal at the school where her children attended, and become a homeschool family. And she's going to be sharing some of her insights today on how traditional education often fails to meet children's needs, and how homeschooling might be a formative opportunity. She also is going to offer us some insights into what we can do if we keep our kids in school, how we can fit with our child's needs, how we can advocate effectively for them. It's a fantastic conversation. I can't wait for you to hear it. And so, let's jump in.

SPEAKER_02 1:53

Thank you. Thanks so much for having me on.

Jon @WholeParent 1:56

So your background is pretty interesting. You homeschool your kids, obviously. You wrote a book book about homeschooling, but you were not homeschooled. And you yourself uh actually you were pretty involved in the education system. What did you do before you became a homeschooler?

SPEAKER_02 2:13

Sure. I uh was a teacher and then a school principal directly the year prior to becoming a homeschool.

Jon @WholeParent 2:21

That's awesome. So you have seen the inside. You've kind of gone through the ranks, you've learned all of the things that people tell us on how kids learn. What made you first question how we are taught how kids typically learn?

SPEAKER_02 2:39

Sure. Well, I'm I'm going to go back in time just a little bit because my public school experience, I think on paper I looked like an excellent student, but I struggled. I struggled through my own experience, um, both with bullying and just always feeling like I wasn't living up to the performative review of what a good student looks like and really pushing to be the straight A student, causing a lot of anxiety. And I initially became a teacher because I wanted to provide a better environment for students. So the things that I experienced, I wanted to get back in and give better experiences for children. And then as a teacher, I just very quickly learned right out of college my goals, they were not a part of the job. So the job was very focused on management, classroom management, managing parent expectations and managing what the administration was telling me I needed to do. And I worked with excellent teachers and I worked with an excellent admin, but I just had no control. I was told the curriculum I needed to deliver, I was told the timelines I needed to meet, the grades my students had to be reaching. And I was just very motivated at that time. Okay, I must need to get to a higher vantage point to actually make the differences that I set out to make in the first place. And so that's why um I then continued my own education and finally and eventually got into administration.

Jon @WholeParent 4:17

Yeah. So I mean, at that the story that I hear all the time from teachers. Sorry to cut you off. But you actually made the jump instead of just bailing out of the system, you went into administration to try and change these things.

SPEAKER_02 4:32

Yes, yeah. And another big change for me at that time was I was now a mom. And so, you know, coming in as a new 20-year-old teacher, I just it's so different once you become a parent and you're thinking of your own child, your own children, their education. Not only was I a mom, but my girls were at my school. So I was principal at my girls' school. And oh man, the red tape and bureaucracy as school principal. My name was on the door, but other than that, I really didn't have authority or voice. I mean, it was just more being told what it was I needed to deliver. Um, and at that point, seeing so much in the classroom in the school building, and knowing that based on the things that I knew children needed, and specifically my own kids needed from an education, but also knowing that as the school principal, I wouldn't be able to reconcile any of it. I knew I had to leave. And it wasn't, it wasn't a great environment, you know, for me either. I think something that we don't talk about a lot is how actually being in education is not a very family-friendly role. I had to miss out on so many firsts, first days, first field day, you know, all these experiences for my kids, I was missing out on. And as I chose to leave that environment, my husband and I had the big conversation of I don't think we can leave the girls there. If we're calling an environment toxic, if we're calling it not positive for the adults, how can we leave our kids there? And so the same year that I left, we pulled the girls and decided, you know, we're gonna give homeschooling a shot. Which coming from education, I had never even considered. It was never even on my radar. Like maybe one day I'll homeschool. That wasn't on my brain at all.

Jon @WholeParent 6:34

I hear that story a lot. We don't talk a lot about homeschooling on the podcast. You are the first person that I've had on who homeschools their kids, I think. I mean, that may not even be true, but we certainly has not been a topic of an entire episode. But I wanted to kick that off with you. I have more people, Dr. Peter Gray is coming on the podcast pretty soon, who who's who can kind of speak to these things. But this is the story that I hear over and over, which is teachers are taught, hey, obviously you do a lot of education to get to the point where you are. Obviously, you learn a lot about learning. And then so you so you kind of go go into this, and I've heard this on social media a lot, teachers essentially saying, like, would you let a uh would you let a guy who's never worked on a car just because, you know, would you would you work on your own car or would you bring it to a mechanic? Would you do your own heart surgery or would you go to a heart surgeon? Okay, well, that's why you shouldn't homeschool. But then when teachers actually get into the midst and they get into the bureaucracy and the red tape, they realize, oh, actually, I might know exactly how to teach. But that is not actually what I'm doing. That is not actually what's being given to me. And so increasingly I see, and this is totally anecdotal, but teachers leaving the classroom to start the classroom at home for their own kids. And that kind of gets back to that question of like with everything that you were doing, it really wasn't when I when I ask what made you question how kids learn, have you even questioned how kids learn? Or was it that you actually have known from the beginning this is the best way to do it, not necessarily homeschool, but this is the best way to teach. But that was not available to you in the public school system.

SPEAKER_02 8:19

Sure. I mean, so twofold, right? First, in a university experience for an educator, we're learning so much about classroom management. And we're learning a lot about reading data and the metrics behind it and state testing and administering that and the classroom. And so, first, when there's ever pushback, like a parent couldn't teach their child, you know, a parent's not qualified to teach. Okay, correction. A parent is probably unqualified to teach in a classroom. But when you homeschool, you are not teaching in a classroom. And so that right there is a huge nuance that we need to address first. Second to that, more and more research is and information is always coming out on the best way that children learn. And that goes for environment, for attention span and length, as well as, you know, group size and setting. And as we know more and more about that, this is not what a classroom offers. And so we have homeschoolers who are sharing, you know, it takes us two hours to get through formal learning. And that's definitely that's true in my home as well. And then, of course, push back there. No, you know, it should be longer. Kids are in school for seven hours a day. Okay, when I was in the classroom and when I was a school principal, the kids learning in a school environment are still only receiving actual formal instruction for two hours or less a day. A lot of the other time is waiting or transitions, or, you know, waiting, waiting not only for a class to start, but waiting because other students need attention because the classroom behavior, because of management. And that size of a class makes it really difficult. I think it's eye-opening to a lot of parents that their child in a typical classroom currently is receiving less one-on-one attention than a commercial break. And so you switch that and you bring your child home, it goes very quickly. For me, I knew a lot going in on what kids needed to learn, but being a part of it and not only seeing how difficult it was to deliver personalized learning to every, you know, kid in my classroom when I was a teacher, but also having so many restrictions and obligations and requirements as a teacher to also manage at the same time as trying to deliver the education. That was the boiling point.

Jon @WholeParent 11:09

So that was the breaking point for you, where you were just like, no, this is not gonna work. I think we hear, just to kind of change gears a little bit, but I think we hear a lot about smart kids in school, and we kind of hear these kids who are you hear the term increasingly on social media, twice gifted, where you have the kid who's really, really quick and intelligent, and they might be a really fast learner, but in school settings, they just sort of shut down. When you think you see a kid, and I get questions like this all the time on the podcast, when you see a kid who starts to resist learning or resisting school, what do you actually think is going on with that kid underneath that?

SPEAKER_02 11:52

Sure. I think that they're spending a lot of time trying to respond to an environment and pacing that doesn't fit them. And so much is suppressed. Something that, you know, we see a lot in schools is kids who are very docile during the day and non-reactive because they don't want to get in trouble, whether that's the gifted kid who's unable to work ahead because the teacher doesn't have the capacity in the classroom, or a struggling student who doesn't want to stand out and show that they're struggling because they don't want to get in trouble. They don't want to be called out. And then these kids get home, and the parent response to the building is you know what? I hear from the teacher that my child's very quiet in class or very well behaved or not very excitable at all, but they get home and they're screaming and they won't listen to me and they're crying. And why is that happening? Now, this reaction actually signals to parents, I could never homeschool because they're quiet in school. They're fine, they're holding it together in school, but they don't want to listen to me. Okay, so this is hard, but what's actually happening is the child's holding together their small nervous system all day and coming home and it breaks down. They open up, they crack open because they're in their safe space where they don't have to hold it together anymore. And so this is kind of the deschooling process that you hear homeschoolers talk about a lot. Okay, if you want to homeschool, but you and your child have been through the traditional model, give yourself space to come off of that extreme pressure that's been pushing on their nervous system and to get in the mode of actually, I can learn in a safe place at my pace in a relaxed environment. And that takes time. But going back to your question on the gifted kids, that's the response that we see a lot, that they've just gotten to the point where they can't move ahead anyway. They're not allowed to let their brain work in the way they want to. For example, you know, I'm an auditory learner and I need to make it into a song or a rhyme or poetry to make it work. But I've been told, be quiet, don't do that. Hey, this is the way we're solving the math problem. Why are you singing to yourself? Knock it off. Okay, so I'm just gonna shut up.

Jon @WholeParent 16:53

So I guess that begs the question, what is learning supposed to feel like? If you're if you're thinking about your own kids, but also just kids in general, coming from your perspective as a lifelong educator now at home, what's learning supposed to feel like for that young kid if it if it's not supposed to feel like in what you've described as school thus far?

SPEAKER_02 17:18

Right. Learning is supposed to feel like a positive experience. It should feel like curiosity alive. You should be able to feel some freedom in your learning experience. And you should be able to feel control over it because it's yours, right? So this is your learning, this is your education. It shouldn't feel forced down one path because that's just that's not reality.

Jon @WholeParent 17:50

Man, I I think that we're we're talking about the there's so many ideals here. I think that the the what a lot of parents run into, and you've mentioned a couple times here, like de-schooling. The first thing that the the main objection that I get when I talk about homeschooling on social media or other places, and I don't advocate necessarily for homeschooling per se, I tend to just be taking shots from the gallery at schools. Like the the way that we do school is so fundamentally broken, as you've kind of highlighted. For parents who are kind of stuck in that system because of economics or class or whatever, right? Like there's so many lots of parents will say to me, Well, that's great that you homeschool your kids, but like I have to be at work all day. Like, what am I supposed to do with that? For those parents who are fully in the traditional schooling system, what should those parents be paying attention to at home to know whether things are going well or whether they may maybe need to consider a change?

SPEAKER_02 18:47

Yeah, I mean, homeschooling is not going to be for every family, but I think the mentality of a home education of keeping the power of your child's education at home is very important for every family. And, you know, what that means is really understanding your own role as parent and the power that you have. A lot of times, I feel like as a society, we uh when our first child's born, you know, we're reading all of the sleep training books and we're looking at the toddler milestones. And then something has culturally taught us that a lot of responsibility is handed off at school age. And I think for some, it feels like a pressure lifted. Like, okay, now I don't have to worry about socialization because that's handled at school. I don't have to worry about education. That's the school's job. But really, we've not handed that off yet or ever. That's going to be ours to hold until the child can hold it for themselves and they're able to manage their own education. So keeping that in mind, protect your child's education and remember that you have the right to do that. You have the right to go to the school and say, you know what, I want to see the curriculum that we're going, I want to understand the curriculum. It means advocating for your child. You know what? They're way ahead. My child is way ahead in math. We've got to figure out how we can move ahead or how they can switch classes. What does that look like? Advocating for your family rights. Homework's not going to work for us. This is what I'm willing to do. I'm willing to, you know, review 20 minutes a night, and that's it. So we're going to get through what we can get through. I'm not going to review things that my child knows. I'm not going to do things just to check a box and complete it. You have the right to all of those things as a parent. And so I think keeping that in mind and just advocating, advocating and being the voice, that's your superpower.

Jon @WholeParent 20:53

That is something that I've never considered. Can I tell you that, Mandy? Like I have never once thought that a parent could say any of those things to a school. My next question was going to be okay, so if we feel like something's off, what do we do? But I think you've just answered it, which is like you there there is a there is a space between not to discourage anyone from homeschooling. And obviously, I want to get back to your book and talk about what specifically your book offers to parents, but not to discourage anyone from homeschooling, but for those parents who are kind of stuck in the system or or maybe they're they're in the system for now and they don't know how they're going to get out. There are things that you can do. And so just to list those things again, just because I want to have them in my in my tool belt. One first one that just stuck out to me, I think it was the last one that you said, calling the school and saying, hey, we're not doing homework. What a powerful, what a powerful thing to say. I I never thought that you could or would be allowed to do that. Maybe that's just because I've been conditioned to accept school as the ultimate authority. Calling and talking about advancing your kids in certain disciplines, calling and highlighting these things. Am I wrong to think that many schools and many administrators and many teachers are going to essentially just fire back with, look, I'm not going to tailor make your child's education for you? Or is that, you know, how how does that how does that fit in? Because I feel like that's what I would be met with if I if I called and essentially pretended or in their mind pretended like I knew what was best for their, you know, for my kid.

SPEAKER_02 22:24

Sure, sure. No, and I've had pushback even from parents saying, Imagine every parent did this. Imagine every parent reached the teacher and said, you know, I want to see, I want to see, but it's all right. And and that's why we have to be the voice to advocate because our our kids aren't going to. It could be met with some resistance or with some questions, but you've got to push it forward. You know, if something doesn't feel right, if something feels off, okay, that's my time to go in and push harder.

Jon @WholeParent 22:55

Well, and and just to sit on that for a moment, yeah, imagine. Like, imagine if you had a class of 30 kids and 20 of the parents called and said we're not doing homework. You wouldn't have to custom make 20 different plans. You would go, I guess we're not doing homework anymore. Like, you know, I think this is kind of the same thing when we talk about social change and and tipping points and things, right? Like, like, yeah, imagine if everybody wanted women to have the right to vote. What would we do then? Well, then we would give women the right to vote, right? Like, like this is like this is kind of one of those things where I think we are so we've been taught that we are so conditioned to be kind of accepting and and mild. And I think that is another piece of that school puzzle, you know, when we get into, and this is partially what I'm probably gonna talk to Dr. Gray about, but but why is school set up the way that it is? In part to gain compliance, right? To gain compliance of teacher or of students and parents, but also teachers and administrators, and that's what you find, right? You tried you went into the system to change the system and you were met with the system. And the system said, No. So, what was that like for you? I'm just interested, you know, curiously, uh what was that like for you when you pulled your kids out of school? Like, what did you say? I can't imagine what people asked you. Wait, you were the principal and you pulled your own kids out of that school? Like, what was that? What were those conversations like?

SPEAKER_02 24:29

They were hard. They were really hard. And nothing that my husband and I talked about ahead of time prepared us for what it was actually going to feel like because you have to remember. I had kids at the school. And so our job was also to protect them. We had to have a lot of big conversations at home first because we didn't know what the pushback would be on the girls and their friends. And we lost so much community. I mean, the whole reason I came onto social media in the first place is because I feel we were starting at ground zero with community. Where we lived at the time didn't have a big homeschool community. I didn't personally know anyone who homeschooled. And so it was time to build from the ground up. And it's one of those things I don't think I ever looked at it as look at everything we're walking away from, but more so I had to be walking towards my family and my kids the entire time. And it just made it all so worth it.

Jon @WholeParent 25:39

I want to ask you a little bit about your book, but before that, I want to ask if there's you know, what's something that you now believe about kids and learning that you think when you were a school principal, if you had said these things, you would have gotten pushback by the parents at your school. So what's one thing that you think now that you think most parents would who who listen to this podcast almost all send their kids to school that they would disagree with?

SPEAKER_01 26:11

Oh gosh.

SPEAKER_02 26:17

Kids know more about their learning experience than we give them credit for, and we need to listen to their behavioral signals. You know, I watch on social media the beginning of the school year, and you have the five and six-year-olds just breaking down, going to kindergarten, and you have the moms breaking down and dads alongside them. And I've seen the videos of the kids screaming, I don't want to go to school, you know. It's so easy for us as parents to write that off, you know. Oh, no, no kids want to go to school. It's that it's it's a rite of passage, it's they're young, they'll get used to it. But at this point with the research and what we know, you know, five and five and six year olds being told, you can't bring your stuffy to school. You're too old to take a nap. You'll get a break when we say you get a break. Right now, it's sitting at your desk learning time. Okay, there's a reason that they're sad. There's a reason that they want to stay with their parents. And more so as adults, we need to start listening to those behavioral signals. And same goes for our older kids. You know, I have a teenager now and their signals are similar. I can't imagine. Oh, here's one that people disagree with. Let your teen sleep. Let your teen sleep. If my daughter needs to sleep until 10, because her new rhythm and the way her brain works is I am up. I cannot make myself sleep, mom, at 9 p.m. I cannot make that happen. So if she's up late and she needs to sleep till 10, yeah, you got it. You have to do that. But that's another one. So just listening to signals, reaction, behavior. Because this isn't kids being dramatic and it's not kids trying to trick us or or make us feel something. It's a kid's honest reaction to an environment that wasn't built for them.

Jon @WholeParent 28:31

So what does that look like to trust your child's pace not only in life, like when they want to nap and when they want to sleep, but also in education without feeling like you're constantly falling behind. That's what I hear all the time. Well, what if my kid falls behind? What if they don't what if they're not on grade level, or what if they fall behind what they're reading, or what if they or what if they were good at this thing? This happens to my kids. They were really I had a four-year-old who could do advanced multiplication, which is like crazy because he was a three-year-old who couldn't talk. And and this is not like a neurodivergency, twice exceptional situation, like probably the most neurotypical of all of my kids, but um, but had a speech delay, probably because of COVID, like just all of the you know stuff that happened with that. He was a COVID baby born in May 2020. But so he had a speech delay, got speech therapy, talks great. Now can't can't shut up now. And but but he got really into number blocks, not necessarily the show, but listening to the music of the of the show, the number block show.

SPEAKER_02 29:32

And loved number blocks.

Jon @WholeParent 29:33

Yeah, so and um we're not big on the cognitive or the uh like the cognitive skill building, we're more on the social emotional at that age at four, but he really liked it. So like we weren't gonna shut it down. But net now he's almost six, and he can't do the multiplication that he could do at at three and a half, four. And so you hear all the time, well, what if they fall behind, or what if they lose their skills that they once had? How do you trust your kid in those moments and their pace?

SPEAKER_02 30:00

Yeah. So you need to trust your child, and you also need to trust yourself. From a research standpoint, when you look at state standards, when you look at where a child should be learning, so much of this is targeted to the middle. Like this is about middle of the road. It's interesting to me that we know a lot in education, and yet all state standards differ. It's interesting to me that what we will call normal one year can get changed the next year and immediately change state testing to meet that new normal. There are, of course, going to be times where there's an exception where you notice a pattern of behavior, you notice something is off or truly behind. And as a parent, you'll want to look into that. But more often than not, if a child's not excelling in one area to where you would say the standard line is, you need to look at the whole child and realize they're probably taking off in a different area. And so I always bring parents back to the toddler phase because it's just an easier one to look at. If my child is not speaking at X age, okay, we can be concerned with that, or we can look at the child and say, so what are what are they doing at this phase? Now, if across the board there are some gaps, sure, we dive in a little deeper. We take a look at what's going on. Maybe there's an external factor. Maybe there was a big move or a big life change. But I had a child who was behind with speech, but she was walking at eight months old. I had a child who was with speech, but she didn't walk until she was 17 months old. She never toddled. And to this day, she's a perfectionist. She waited to walk until she could just walk like she was 30. And, you know, it fits her personality to this day. So a lot of times, I just want to remind parents that growth and learning isn't linear. It's not going to look like a ladder that just moves up. And so instead, it's going to look a lot like a spider web that expands in different ways and thickens, and there's depth to it. And just because a child can do something one day and not another, that knowledge isn't gone. It's still there. They're just building on it in different ways. Sometimes it's a lot of trust in ourselves that it is growing, even if we can't yet piece it because they're not quite piecing it.

Jon @WholeParent 32:41

Yeah. And maybe we're going to go a little longer with this episode than I normally go because I have I have two more questions for you. What you just said, I think is really, really interesting in that like you you said that growth is not linear. And I think what you're saying here, and correct me if I'm wrong, is that we're not robots. Like we are not like human beings are not robots. We don't grow in these linear patterns. And what I think is so interesting, not to take us down a too deep of a rabbit trail, is that so much of the schooling system that we have now this sounds conspiratorial, but it really is grounded in in the data and the facts, and I'm sure that you probably agree with this, was set up to equip a base standard, kind of a the l lowest common denominator of education that was necessary for the industrial revolution. That we needed people to be able to do these basic fundamental things. And those were both cognitive things like reading and basic math, but also they were behavioral things. We needed them to be able to sit still for long periods of time. We needed them to be able to eat lunch in 30 minutes and then return to their task. We needed them to be able to switch quickly every 45 minutes to the next topic or to the next position on the factory line. And many of us then because it's like, okay, well, we built an education system to industrialize humans. And now when our humans don't fit into the same metrics that you would use for an industrialized robot, then now we feel like our kids failing because they're failing to meet a linear standard. But the only reason that we had the linear standard to begin with was because we were trying to automate humans. Right? We were trying to make and in an age of AI, I think that this is incredibly important that the more systematized we make our kids, actually the less prepared they are for the world that is coming.

SPEAKER_02 34:39

Absolutely. There's a reflexive obedience to it, and it's the compliance piece in itself versus actually knowing how to critically think and adapt.

Jon @WholeParent 34:52

I I couldn't have said it better. Exactly. So now to get to your book, because I wanna I wanna land here. If a parent has listened to this whole conversation and they are in a position where they can make that maybe they've been on the fence about homeschool or whatever, and they're decided, I'm gonna dive in. Why is your book the right resource for them to pick up to get so that they can kind of move into this? And I want to point out something that I asked you before we started. The name is a little bit, it could be deceptive because there are many people in the homeschool, the homeschool community is has an over-representation of very fundamentalistic religious people. But this is not your book. When you call it the homeschool Bible, it is not the Bible for homeschoolers or something like that. This is the homeschool Bible in the uh the more cultural sense of the word, that this is an all-inclusive resource and a necessary, sufficient resource to be able to. It's the primer to be able to homeschool your kid. Not a lot of religious content in there, from what I understand.

SPEAKER_02 35:57

No, no, it's non-um religious, non-political. It comes in from an educational standpoint of if I wanted to pick up a book to homeschool, this is it. Pick it up, read it, you can homeschool. And it takes you from very early pre-K all the way to what would it look like if I graduate a homeschooler.

Jon @WholeParent 36:20

And so, so where can people get your book? And what would you say to somebody who who's thinking about homeschooling who who might want to pick up your book? Like why you, why this book? Why, why, and and what other resources might they need to be able to make this plunge?

SPEAKER_02 36:34

Sure, absolutely. So you can pick up the book at Barnes and Noble, Amazon, anywhere, books are sold, Target. This is the book I wish as well.

Jon @WholeParent 36:43

We'll have a link in the so that everybody can get it there.

SPEAKER_02 36:47

This is the book I wish I had when I first started. Whenever I would go on and look for homeschool recommendations, homeschool books specifically, there were so many with big feelings and vague instructions. It was inspiration, or this is where, or one specific path, like this is what an unschooler would do, or this is what a Charlotte Masoner should do. I just wanted one book to understand it all and to apply it. And so this book isn't there to tell you, hey, this is how Mandy Davis homeschools. You should homeschool this way, because you should not homeschool the way that I homeschool. You should homeschool the way that best fits your children and family. And so this book really walks through it all. And also I love the glossary because it's pretty much all the terms that I initially heard but didn't understand, but nobody really tells you what they are. So it's just the ultimate book. You're not going to want to shelve it. You're gonna you're going to want to carry it with you.

Jon @WholeParent 37:49

I love it. This is one to buy and not get from the library. You want to mark it up? 100%. You want to mark it up and highlight it. Um, I want to I want to leave us with one thing, and this might make a great viral social media clip, but um, after our whole conversation, I'm I'm left with one question, which is as a school principal, now homeschool evangelist, what is one common expectation for young kids? You've already talked about letting your teens sleep, but for young kids that you if you could remove it. So let me say that again. What is one expectation that you would remove for young kids if you could in school?

SPEAKER_01 38:30

However you want to talk about it.

SPEAKER_02 38:31

Or in that's big in school, that they need to be sitting to be learning. Let these kids move. You do not need to sit still anywhere to learn. Let them stand, let them dance, let them fidget, let them hold things, let them eat when they're hungry, you know, just giving them free movement, giving the young kids free movement and learning. Overall, I mean, not basing their timelines on, I mean, I guess it goes back to school, but on a on a school day. Some days we learn in the morning because that's when we're focused. Other days the weather's so nice, we're outside in the morning, and we'll get to the learning when we get to it in the afternoon. But not having a set I have to schedule for the young age. I do think routine is really important for young ages. But just knowing that they can flex and so can you.

Jon @WholeParent 39:24

Mandy Davis, thank you so much for being on the Whole Parent Podcast.

SPEAKER_02 39:28

Thank you.

Jon @WholeParent 39:36

Thank you for your time listening to the Whole Parent Podcast today. I hope you got something out of it. I have a couple quick favors to ask of you as we end the episode. The first one is to jump over on whatever podcast platform that you are listening to right now and rate this show five stars. You'll notice there are a lot of five-star ratings on this show, whether that's on Spotify or Apple Music or Apple Podcasts. We have a ton of five-star ratings and it helps our podcast get out to more people than almost any other parenting podcast out there. And so it's a really quick thing that you can do if you have 15 or 20 seconds, and if you have an additional 30 seconds, I'd love to read a review from you. I read all the reviews that come through. If some if you particularly like one part of the podcast or you like when I talk about something or whatever, imagine that you're writing that review directly to me. The second thing that you can do is go and send this episode to somebody in your life who you think could use it. Think about all the parents in your life. Think about your friends, your family members who could use a little bit of help parenting. It's vulnerable to share an episode of a parenting podcast with them. I get it. But imagine how much better your life is as a result of listening to this podcast, of following me on social media, of getting the emails that I send out. You can share that with someone else too. And so I encourage you, just go over, shoot them a quick text, share this episode with them, or share another episode that you feel like is particularly relevant to them. The last thing you can do is go down to the link show notes at the bottom, and like I said in the mid-roll, you can subscribe on Substack. It's$5 a month or$50 a year. Uh, I don't have that many people doing it, and yet the people who are doing it have made this possible. And so if you like this episode, if you like all of the episodes, if you want them to continue, the only way that I can keep making them is through donor donor support, free will donations to the podcast. Please, please, please, please, as you're thinking about the end of this year, as you're thinking about your charitable giving. I know I'm not a 501c3. You can't write it off on your taxes, but if you'd like to give me a little gift to just say thank you for what you've done this year, the best way to do that is over on Substack. Again,$5 a month,$50 a year. It's not gonna break the bank. It's probably less than you spend on coffee every week. Definitely less than you spend on coffee every week. Maybe uh less than you spend on almost anything, right? Five bucks a month is very, very small, but it goes a long way when it's multiplied by all of the different people who listen to the podcast and sending that over to me. I get all of that money. It's just my way of being able to produce the podcast, spend money on equipment, spend money on subscription fees, hosting fees for the podcast, all of that stuff. Email server fees, all that. So if you're willing to do that, I would love it. Thank you so much for listening to this episode, and I'll see you next time.