Hello, everybody. This is Lisa Nehring from It's Not That Hard to Homeschool and True North Online Academy. And today I am super excited to introduce you to Cheryl Daley, who has the Home School How to podcast. She has interviewed dozens of guests at this point about why they decided to get into homeschool. And I just want to take time today to ask Cheryl that very same question. So, Cheryl, welcome to the podcast. Thank you, Lisa, thank you for having me. I'm so glad you're here.
Tell us how you got into homeschooling because you were a career woman for years. Yeah, I didn't even know if I wanted kids. So that's how like, far fetched this life was from my viewpoint. Yeah. I worked for the government actually for 16 years, right out of college on the trajectory there, I had taken all the civil service exams, done a decent job, worked my way up and was like, okay, cool, I can't wait to retire because that's how you know, every government worker.
How many more years till retirement? How many more years of retirement. That's all you really talk about, guys. And, you know, just figured I'd retire and get to go to Aruba every year or travel different places. You know, 2020, hit like a ton of bricks when you kind of saw things that were like, well, this doesn't really make sense. And is this how school really works? This is really what goes on.
And my kids were super young, but what I didn't like that actually affected our lives in New York was that they started masking three year olds. And I was like, well, that's ridiculous. He's just learning how to talk. And I remember his daycare provider saying to me, we think he's having a delay in his speech and at that time, just she was wearing the mask. And I said, well, take off your mask. He's with you for like 40 hours a week. These see how you form your words.
It was just bizarre. And then when they started masking the kids, my husband and I pulled them from daycare and we're like, well, you got to figure something out. I had him home with me and, you know, kind of worked with family that was home. And and I still worked. But at that time we were working from home and we did that for a little bit. And then I was like, well, I want him to be socialized because God forbid, he's not socialized as a three year old. He only knows his family.
So I started going to homeschool playgroups. You know, I would take an afternoon off of work or morning off and bring them. And I just started asking other homeschooling parents, kind of like what I'd ask on my podcast. And after talking to all these different families, I said to my husband, I think I should start a podcast about this. And he never really thinks my ideas are all too wonderful, but this is the one that he says.
That's a good idea. So I said, I better run with this. So that's initially how it started. In my first episode, I went over ten different reasons why I was afraid to homeschool, but also why I wanted to homeschool. And they varied from different things like, well, I don't want my kid to wear a mask in granite today, most kids do not have to wear a mask in school, but I didn't like the fact that parents who didn't want their kids in masks, or kids that didn't want to wear a mask had to.
Anyway, it kind of took that layer of like being the parents, and they in the school said, we just don't care what the parents want. This is what we're going to do. And if whether you have science and articles to back up or not, back up our you know, what we're making you do we're getting funding for it. And so I really started connecting the dots with funding and school systems.
And then you start getting into books like John Taylor got those books dumbing us down and Weapons of Mass Instruction and, different books like Free to Learn. Yeah. And you're like, well, maybe there's a different way to this. This is interesting. Maybe we shouldn't be sitting at a desk our entire childhood. Yeah. And so, you know, being out in the sun, what the sun can do, what nature can do for you. And I started realizing all the things I was never taught in school.
And then you get down to even the bare things like, well, in New York we have very strict laws regarding, the CDC schedule and the injections that, you know, you're required to have. And I never thought twice about it, but then I started looking into that. And, you know, we're one of the five states that you have to have everything on the schedule in order to go to school. So, you know, that was another reason. And even down to school lunch and breakfast are now free at the school in our area.
Yeah, at least so I could pack my child with all the organic food and everything, and there's nothing guaranteeing me that they're not going to throw that out and get the free lunch and free breakfast, which is going to be like pancake eggs and, you know, artificial dyes, artificial everything, stuff that disrupts their endocrine system and the way they act, their behaviors could cause cancer and and even the, the shooter drills. I had a problem with that too.
I why would I send my child to a place where they have to learn how to shelter in place if it's that unsafe, maybe they shouldn't go and and even just even if oh, but the likelihood is so small that a shooter would ever come in. Okay, well, then why do you need the drill at all? Because the drill itself is doing a little bit of trauma to them. Yeah, exactly. And you're talking like a little kid here. You're talking to elementary, early elementary, right? Yeah.
Well, yeah, I have a six and a two year old you just listed, like, so many good reasons, but it's almost like you start thinking about one aspect of education, and it just uncovers so many different ways that our government run school system affects our kids. Yeah. And and it's physical. It's mental, it's social, it's emotional. It adds up. It's not a small thing. So you started a podcast before you even started homeschooling? Yes. Because the premise was should I homeschool my kids?
So I was asking all these families, like, what is your day actually look like? And why do you homeschool? And can I really do that? Are your kids weird? Yeah. How many yeses did you get to that question? I got some yeses, but they were like, your kids are only going to be as weird as the parents are, you know? So we're all a little out there. The ones who don't trust the government. We're a little out there anyway. Yeah, I love it. That is really funny.
What was what was the big question or the big answer that just stood out to you? Like, wow, I did not expect that. We were talking a little bit before the show and you said you got a lot of answers you didn't expect. Is there any that really stands out to you? Well, I think one of the things that really stands out to me is the amount of teachers that leave the system to homeschool their kids. Wow. It just speaks volumes.
Yeah, because they see on a day to day basis and, you know, they know that they're understaffed, under resourced. They're not taught in college how to be behavioral therapists or psychologists. And they've got all these kids in their class and, you know, 25, 30 kids in a classroom. A lot of the kids do have behavioral issues, whether it's something that they're dealing with at home or even just like I mentioned, about the foods that they're eating and they're or they're not getting enough sleep.
So there's so many different things going on and just social media and video games and how all that impacts them and how they behave during the day and, and the fact that they just like, don't want to sit there for six hours. Right. So teachers, yes, they are taught how to teach and what's going to be on the tests and, and, you know, maybe how to read. But that's really hard to do. Well when you have 30 different behaviors going on in a classroom room.
Teachers, they just see this. They're like, this is all tied to funding. This is a scam. You know, you got to think about that. When we lived in Los Angeles, the amount of of money every district had for a kid per kid was like around $9,000, but 600 of it went to the classroom. So all the rest of that money went to bureaucracy and curriculum development and all that kind of thing. So even though the state had a lot of money per student, very little of it actually touched the student.
And in a personal way. Do you know what I mean? I'm probably not stating it really well, no, you are. And that's exactly what the teachers I've talked to have said. Yeah, it's crazy the amount of money floating around. It goes up to the administration. Yes, yes. So when did you decide to, school after doing all these interviews and podcasting and about education? Yeah, I started the podcast in February of 2023. So my son was still four, and, I had just had my daughter six months earlier.
So when it came around to register him for kindergarten, I was like, yeah, I, I don't, I think we can skip this year and we don't have to report kindergarten in New York anyway. So I was like, let's just keep them home. I mean, what can can't do anything too badly and really delving more into the homeschool like playgroups and co-ops in our area and just finding out what fit, what group fit, what what kids he like to play with, kind of experimenting.
I tried to do some curriculum with him in his kindergarten year, and like most families, it resulted in arguing and yelling and crying and like, well, I can't do this. I'm going to send you to school.
After talking to more families and people like yourself, we took the step back and stopped the curriculum and really just tried to incorporate learning and just things that we did, whether it was cooking or taking a walk outside or even just jumping on the trampoline, just asking little questions like, why do you think we go back down? Every time we jump up, we come back down or yeah, what do you think the springs are for?
You know, and just little things that we don't realize as parents. It's all around us. It doesn't have to be book work that we're required to do, especially on years that you don't have to report. Right. Exactly, exactly. So are you having fun with home school? Do you feel are you on this trajectory now, or are you taking it year by year? I mean, I think that's a big question for a lot of parents. Like if you homeschool, do you have to do it forever? What what's your response to that?
Yeah, I think for myself it is what I'd like to do. And unless my children tell me otherwise and that will be I have to be a conversation, you know, that my husband I have with them, because I do talk to parents whose kids decide that they want to go back to school. And, you know, in some of parents, some of the parents, like myself, kind of build this brand on, like, hey, I'm promoting homeschooling and now you're in school. So did I fail school brands with that kind of background, you know?
Yeah, but it's not failing. It's just your kids wanting to experience something different. They want to know what the the you know, traditional way of learning is like, a lot of kids go to school and then realize, wow, I had it way better before and come back home. And, you know, it's like that grass is always greener kind of effect. So for myself, I like to stick with it the whole time.
I, I think our, our country and the world has we're at just a very of cusp of something bigger than, you know, what has been going on. You know, so I don't even know what schooling will look like in another ten years. Yeah. So I think I think it's going to change dramatically anyways.
You know, I see lots of things I see just in our area alone, but even around I talk to, you know, podcasters and other homeschooling families and like yourself, you know, you starting these micro schools and online school so that there's so many different options. I think that going to public school is going to be kind of like the welfare of education. Okay. And I'm only saying that because I've worked in welfare for the last ten years working for the government.
It is going to be what? Well, this is just what everybody's required to pay in and this is what you get out. And like you said, it's all going to administration. The parents see the kids aren't reaping any of the benefits. So they're going to take their money and do something else with it. Yeah, we're probably still going to be required to pay school taxes, but I think parents are going to say it's still worth it for me to pay extra to send them elsewhere.
I just did a training on AI and they're like, the world will be different next year. And the tools, the resource for this little $29 training was 495 lines long, just the AI resources available. So if you start applying AI to things like education, I mean, it's going to blow wide open. And I think we're really seeing that with parents are feeling dissatisfied and like they don't have a voice. They're not the primary person being considered in relationship to their child.
And when it comes to things like vaccinations and what happened during the pandemic, parents are just told there is a greater good here that you will follow, whether it was good for their kids or not. And so that I think we're in a time of real disruption. Who knows what it's going to look like? Yeah, feel like really different and yet still the basics literacy that that's not going away. Right. So how's that all going to work out. It's an interesting time for sure. Do you miss work?
Do you miss going to work and being a professional and all the perks that came with that? Do you know what I miss? I miss taking walks and listening, listening to podcasts on my breaks. That is what I miss. I say this all the time. I know I work way harder now, but it's so much more fulfilling. But you know, it's funny that you ask me that because nobody ever does. I ask other people that all the time. Yeah. Yeah.
I don't miss the hustle and bustle of getting out of the house in the morning. God, that was so awful. I did it for so long, and now I just feel so bad for anyone that has to, like, rush their kids up and out of bed and they have to rush around and you're flying. I mean, I rush my kids just to get them to my in-laws so that I could record this podcast. And it's 1:00 in the afternoon and I'm like, yeah, can you imagine if I had to do this every day at 6 a.m. in the morning in the like?
Definitely don't miss that part. Yeah. Being in an office, I mean, I was in a just a drab state building and, you know, in Albany, New York, it was just you think that that would be beautiful with all the architecture around? No, it's homeless people outside asking for money all the time. There's just smells like urine everywhere. And, you know, your building smells disgusting. Who knows what you're breathing in? There's no open windows.
My husband does Hvac for state offices and hospitals and schools and stuff. So he's like, you don't even want to know what you're breathing. And all day. We probably don't. Yeah. And the people I just know I don't miss, I there's like a few select people that I, you know, got along with. But no, these were not people that are like thinking about tough questions or the meaning of life or like, anything beyond, okay, how many days till I retire? Yeah. Or when's are we getting our raises?
Or, you know, even people that were, like, happy about doing the job they did, they weren't fulfilled. Because once you once you complete the task, you see it goes nowhere. And that's probably 98% of our government work. You complete the task and it either means nothing or goes nowhere or what you think you've done like, oh, hey, we'll brand this like we're helping the less fortunate. We're not, though, because they're the way they're the route they're taking to get there.
It was like, well, we had to hire a contractor, and that contractor was our governor's golf buddy, and they can't handle the job. So now we are behind and now we're all stressed out because we're not meeting these quotas. And it's just that I'm out of it. I look at it and I'm like, what a waste of life. Nothing I did ever mean anything. We're here. Okay? You're with your kids all day.
Maybe sometimes a stay at home mom might feel that way because it's like just you're going through the motions, and now everybody has kids. But when when you see, like, your kids actually getting along and playing and you're just, like, watching and you're like, wow, I did that. I made those people. Well, when you see your child learn something, whether you homeschool or not, you're going to see them learn things. You're teaching them things all the time.
When you see that, you're like, wow, I did that. I really like contributed. So long and short. I miss the little breaks that I would get because I was at least getting two 15 minute breaks and a half hour lunch every day. But, I don't miss the fake life that that felt like. That's a thought provoking answer. Thank you. I I'm really curious. How are you going to focus your kids education?
Are you going to focus more on what they want to learn more entrepreneurial, or are you going to focus them towards going the traditional route of college and getting a job, or going straight to work? If you had asked me, you know, 15 years ago, if I had kids, was I going to push them to college? Of course it would have been we. Yes. Oh, what idiot wouldn't go to college?
But now that I have more of a, perspective on it, a well-rounded perspective on it, no, I wouldn't push them to college unless what they really wanted needed that degree. Having a goal for your child, even if your child is six and even if you send them to traditional school, having a goal for your child is so important. That because you're going to want to guide them that way, right? I, you know, my husband and I thought about what is what is important to us.
Well, I think that the fact that our grandparents all knew how to make food, create, grow food, find water, build shelter, and we've just lost all of that in a matter of a generation or two is insane. Absolutely insane. When you think how long people have been on Earth and they've all known how to do it before us, and I think that that's by design. It's absolutely by design. We hear these people talk about how we're overpopulated and, you know, we, you know, eugenics and that sort of thing.
And, you know, to push every one of these 15 minute cities. But, when it comes down to even if you don't believe in any of that, we all saw Hurricane Helene hit North Carolina. Yeah. Those people did not have any help coming from FEMA or the government or anything for a long time. So you can be without power and without a food source so easily. Yeah. Okay. It doesn't take the government conspiring against you to make that a reality for your life.
So you have to think, as a parent, what am I responsible for? I'm responsible to keep you alive and then make sure you can keep yourself alive when I'm gone. And then you can keep your teach your kids how to keep themselves alive when we're all gone. Right? So that will be the forefront of what we we learn learning about nature. You know, we have chickens now. We'd like to grow and expand that to, you know, the beef and stuff.
We went from at least like buying all our meat at the grocery store to buying from a local farm. So it's like it's little by little, you know, nobody's going to do this overnight. And it doesn't have to be. And you learn right along with your kids, which is, yeah, you don't have to learn it on a weekend so you can teach them for, you know, the whole year, you learn right along with them and that inspires them so much more.
So it's really getting into touch with, like our roots, with nature, what we really need to survive. And then as, as he grows, you know, I can also already see my kid is really into mechanical stuff, so I'm sure we'll go towards that way for him. My daughter really likes music, so I'm sure that will play, you know, a part. But no, I wouldn't push college unless that was something that they really wanted. If they can create a business on their own that I think would be the way to go.
And anything you learn in college, you can really learn unless you need that degree, you can learn it on the fly. Like you said, you just took an AI course and I'm thinking, wow, I should do that. So anything we can, you know, pay $39 and learn it or just go on YouTube and learn it. Yes. So yeah. Or go to the library. Yeah. Like people did back in the day to get a book out on it. Right. Yes. But yeah, we don't unless you really need that degree to be the doctor or whatever.
And I would even say, do you need a degree to be a doctor? Because maybe if you want to be more of the holistic route, maybe the medical system isn't the way that you want to go, but you, you know, have a different path that you take for that too. So like we were talking about before, I think things are really changing. Then once my kids get up to that college age, I think it'll look a lot different as, oh my gosh, that that was a great answer.
You're really talking about creating a lifestyle of learning for your kids that is family inclusive, like your kids don't go to school and learn their subjects. You're learning and growing together to create a lifestyle that is healthy and wholesome, I love that.
Is there anything in particular that you're really focusing on? No. You know, I think right now I'm just trying to get like a routine of our life together because was it you that had said to me the other day when you were on my podcast, how like routines are very important for kids, right? Yeah. And I got thinking about that and I sat down with my son and I said, we need a routine. So we started writing down the things that we have. Okay, well, we always have a playgroup on Tuesday.
We always have soccer at a friend's house on Wednesday. And when can we fit in our schoolwork around that? And, you know, when can I work on the podcast? So I've been getting up earlier in the morning other than my daughter, so hard times are easy to get up early or so, but yeah, really getting that routine down. So I think that's step one and it doesn't have to be solid edified right away either. Does this routine work okay. It works for two weeks. But no it doesn't. So then you can changes.
But even as even going down to the nitty gritty of like we were talking about sourdough bread on my podcast. Okay, well, I know I got on my routine Thursdays, I make the dough and then Fridays is when I cook the bread, and then and Thursdays is when I make a list of the dinners that we're going to make next week. And does this always work out for me every week? No, because you got to stick to you can have a routine, but if you don't stick to it, it doesn't mean anything.
Yeah, but this is you know, ideally this is when my life works the best. Is Thursdays okay. What dinners are we going to eat next week? What ingredients do I need for them? Yeah, let's make the grocery list. Okay, I put all that, and then I pick up the groceries on Friday. I know not everybody likes to do grocery pick up a for me with two little kids. It's like. And you know, it's a great learning experience to go to the grocery store and you talk about how much everything is.
I get it, you know, with my son, that would be wonderful. My daughter is the kind that you just cheesy. The screaming in the car. You set her down and she's running down all the aisles just knocking everything off the shelves. So, you know, I pick up hey, seasons, everything is seasonal. You know, your daughter will be older and a little bit and probably going into the grocery store will be worth it. But right now it's not.
So that's fine. It's worth it to get like the rotten vegetables that they pick out for you. If I don't have to do the shopping, you really talk with your with your son. And I love that so much. Like just when you are on the trampoline. Why are we coming down? You talk to him about the routine. I love that because you're giving him ownership and agency that he actually has a voice in your home that is better than any curriculum right there.
You're teaching a critical thinking collaboration, creativity, communication skills, and you're listening to him. What does he want to do with a routine? What is important to him? I love that you're including your kids in the decision making process, because you're teaching him that he's not just a cog in the wheel. He's an important human being, not a doing being, but a human being. That your family system relies on and needs. And that is so beautiful.
And yeah, and that's not to say that I don't get annoyed or yell or, you know, like, we're not perfect parents. But you know what? It's important that when I do get those stressed out moments where I'm like, oh my God, give me five minutes, you know that. I go back later and say, listen, yeah, I overreacted there. I'm sorry. And, you know, so that's been an important part of the homeschool too. And not feeling like I need to be perfect.
And there are days where I'm like, oh my gosh, this TV has been on for like six hours. Not to say that they're sitting in front of it the whole time, but like, I didn't take the initiative to say, okay, now we're going to turn it off and sit down and do a craft. And then there's other days where it's never on at all, or there's some days that I'm like, we haven't even opened up a book today. I haven't read to them.
And it's like, that's okay, because I look at my child and I'm like, I don't think they ever read to me, but here I am. I made it. So yeah, not it's so important that parents don't feel like, oh, I have to be perfect from the get go or ever. It's like you're growing. And so I try to tell my kid that to like, hey, we don't have it all figured out. I was going to ask you, what books would you recommend?
You've mentioned a couple, but you have a book behind you, so tell us about that book really quickly. I'm so much better than this, than I am now. I feel like we got to record my podcast. So this is also what we did this year.
Colin, my son and I wrote Let's Talk Emergencies, and it's a book about how to teach your kids what to do in emergency situations, because as I was last year, going over, you know, different math skills or reading skills, I remember one touching on what's your mom's phone number and thinking, well, this is a really important thing to teach him. And then it never really asked it again. And I'm thinking, well, he's not going to remember all those digits like 1 or 2 times of asking him.
So then I was starting to think about other things that they might need to know. My brother in law was a retired police officer, so I asked him, like, what do kids need to know? And what do they not usually know that they should be? So they never know their parents first and last name. So like when oh my goodness, you're right. It's just mom. Yes. It's it's always just mom or dad.
And especially in families where like mom has remarried or dad has remarried and everyone's got a different last name now, it's it's really important to talk to our kids about what our real names are so that if they're lost, they can find you. And the most important thing that I have found, that I haven't seen this talked about anywhere, is how to teach your kid to call 911 from a locked cell phone, because most people don't have landline phones anymore.
Or if an emergency happens, you are out somewhere and phones lock after a couple minutes usually. So how can they break into that and call 911? Which is it is possible. And you know, there's one way on Apple, one way on Android. So the book really gets into that. And, you know, along with stranger danger, internet safety, what to do in a fire. Yeah. Staying, you know, away from water, whether it's outside or in the tub.
Always have an adult with you and, so, yeah, just things like that, that I was like, these are probably the most important things we could teach our five year old. Like, why does he need to know how to read right now if he doesn't even know how to call 911? There's an activity book two that you can get. They're both right on Amazon.
I mean, I don't have any fancy like, yeah, I wasn't going to stock up in my house and have them all over the place because my kid would buy dryer draw on all of them. But yeah. So there's also let's talk emergencies the activity book and they're both on Amazon. What are some books that you would recommend for parents who are considering homeschooling or just starting out and like, why isn't it going as well as I thought it would?
I mean, I think we all, when we start a big project like homeschooling as a project, we have these ideals in mind of what it's going to look like, or we know somebody who's doing it and it just feels like our life should look like that, and then our life doesn't look like that. So yes, I mentioned before John Taylor. Oh, that was a big eye opening.
He was a New York teacher of the year and that year that he won that award, he left teaching and pretty much just went out writing books and talking after that. On how there's so much corruption in the school system and just a better way to learn. Yeah. So his books like, dumbing Us Down was, was very, very important to my like, really taking a step back and looking at the big picture. And he has weapons of mass instruction.
Then I also mentioned Free to Learn, which was just a beautiful book about a different way to learn, like why are we doing this school thing? But for other book recommendations, I really recommend my, Katie Barry has been on my podcast a couple times and on my curriculum series, so she's on Instagram as Katie Berry Book RECs, and she just this woman must have read every book in the world, I swear. So it's an I'll. I'll put a link to her. Okay. On her Instagram too.
Katie Berry would be very my Katie Berry book recs and she just has that every time I talk to her. She has so much knowledge about books and it's and it's for the moms and the dads too. But you know, like to really make this like a fun experience so. Well, that'll that'll be I mean, I love John Taylor, but I've actually given out dumbing us down as gifts to people. And, so you're singing my song there, and I'm excited to go.
Go, find Carrie, Katie Berry. I'm always looking for good book recommendations, so I've. We're thrilled to get those out to people who are listening to anything else. You would love people to know who are considering homeschooling. I just think that, you know, when I first started, one of the fears of mine was, are my kids going to resent me if they don't have the traditional experiences like prom?
And, you know, homecoming or dating, you know, where are they going to meet kids of the opposite sex and and, you know, have dates? That was like one of my biggest fears. And I think that that is a lot of people's especially, like, if the mom wants to homeschool, that's like the dads fear for their kid, or are they going to miss out on all the stuff? Those are real. But you, when you kind of get into it, first of all, like you mentioned before, you don't have to homeschool for life.
You can homeschool for a season if you say, this is the way the world is today. My kid is in like third grade. We can take this year and just learn at home and see how that goes, and then decide from there. And I think what you're going to find, too, is when you are educating your kids at home, you have so much more time to have other experiences together that when you step back and look at your life like, how important was my prom?
To how important is like getting to eat breakfast with my kids every day from like the eggs that we get from our chickens in the backyard, like, you know what I mean? So there's yeah, there's a different perspective that goes along with it.
And then you also have to think about like there's kids that just like live in other countries where they don't have proms or they don't have like these school buildings where everybody just goes to and learns one grade, you know, everybody at seven years old is in second grade. And yes, but that only exists here. And that's all, you know. So that seems normal. But it's not. And and it's not like it's always been this way in our country either.
It's the way the education system looks today is just in the last 100 years. And when you really get into the history behind that and, the people like John Dewey and Horace Mann that brought that, that, yeah, that education over from Prussia to the States, there was a reason behind that. You know, they wanted worker bees. They wanted people smart enough to do the job and not too smart to ask questions or outsmart the business owners.
So I think that when you understand and all of this stuff, prom and homecoming just don't even matter. And anything they do in the school system, you can replicate for your kids with a homeschool group, with just friends. Yeah, all that stuff can be done anywhere. You don't need the government's permission to do that at home. Cheryl. It has been delightful to get to know you and to talk with you. You guys, you got to go check out her podcast, The Homeschool How-To podcast.
If you're interested in homeschooling and different methodologies and why people are choosing to homeschool, or if you have a friend or family member who doesn't agree with your choice to homeschool, it's a great resource. Cheryl, thanks for joining me today. Lisa, thank you for having me. Okay, you guys, it's not that hard to homeschool. We know you can do it. We'll see you next time.