I have found that learning these skills is not that hard. I am a pretty good cook even though I didn’t start until my late 20s. Now, in my late 30s, I am learning about lawn maintenance and gardening.

However, I think learning these skills as a child would have given me more of a sense of mastery over my environment, and consequently, greater self-confidence and self-esteem.

So I come down on the issue as follows: Academics should always come first. These provide the critical thinking skills that everyone needs as a base. But I think children should be encouraged to develop competence in practical areas because that also provides a base to work off of.

However, my experience gives lies to the idea that I see promoted on certain sites that young women should stay home rather than pursuing higher education so that they can co concentrate on developing their housekeeping skills. These things are not that hard to figure out in your spare time as you go along.

I was homeshooled, and I grew up around many homeschooling families. I have had some unique observation opportunities, and one of them is precisely what you described…all academics and no life skills. What a shame to be home and not take advantage of it! Some of these kids, all grown up, are no better off than their public schooled peers. I feel sorry for them, to be honest, and have seen how frustrated they are and how much they struggle to learn that which is necessary to live (i.e. cooking, managing money, and cleaning).

So to add a voice of experience, PLEASE, please, homeschoolers, don’t neglect this. In fact, all of you parents, PLEASE don’t neglect this. Teach your children how to fish, don’t just give them their daily dose. They will thank you later.

Another thing to keep in mind is that these practical skills can be integrated WITH academics! The way I learned fractions (way before we covered it in school) was by baking with my mom. Especially when she’s say, “Okay, now we’re going to make 18 muffins instead of twelve, so how much flour do we need?” Money management is another great one for integrating with mathematics–even a simple trip to the grocery store. You can learn percentages by explaining to your kids how you tithe and asking that they tithe a certain percentage of their allowance or gifts; expand this by helping them to choose a percentage to put away in savings, as well.

If you have a kinesthetic learner, learn history with your hands: do woodworking when studying the Colonial Era (read aloud to your kids while they’re busy creating; it will sink in so much better!). Cook foods that were served in a specific time period or country. Learn other skills that may have been used at that time: candle-making, cross-stitch, etc. This works great with any historical fiction, too, and branches well into English/literature.

Science, of course, is BEST when hands-on. Help Daddy with some rewiring around the house, and call it a course in electrical engineering! Gardening is a course in botany. Caring for animals: biology! Talking to Grandpa about his diabetes’ treatment: health & nutrition.

The greatest gift my mother ever gave me was to find ways to integrate my academics into the real world. I think it’s the main reason I have never stopped learning and that much of my learning happened outside the classroom–but it was still academic!

~Bethany

My mother was a great cook, knew how to sew, kept a realtively clean home, and gardened. Somehow she bought the feminist lie that those things were unimportant and therefor never taught us, but instead she pushed academics. She sees her error now that her two oldest daughters are both staying home with their children and complaining that we don’t know how to do anything around the house We have asked her to teach us some things, but now she is busy working outside the home to pay for the 5th and last child to go to college (even though she has also stated that she plans on staying home after she is married, which may be soon.) I’m not saying college isn’t a great thing for her to accomplish, but at the cost of my mother going back to work now that she is sixty is outrageous to me. (Even my sister knows this, but mom and dad required all of us to go to college so we can “get ahead”, whatever that means.)

I guess this just goes to show that actions speak louder than words. My mother pushed academics, but poured her life into her home and children. Now her 3 daughters all want to do what she did, not what she pushed. I guess that is something we can all think about.

I also appreciate it from a new homeschoolers perspective – it seems counterintuitive to only do “school” when HOMEschool is so much more, and that’s really the point. Not to mention, academic subjects are enhanced by practical application – cooking teaches measurement, time, chemical reaction, thermal energy,etc. – I can’t wait to examine the physics of a pressure cooker. Additionally, finance, ratio, and on and on….things most kids in upper math classes don’t grasp on a practical level.

My own math skills were weak, barely passing College Algebra, and then I got a part time internship in a small home-based drapery workroom. Bear in mind, I had never sewn a stitch, and didn’t for 3 years after I left that position. But while I was there, I learned to figure easily in 16th’s of yards, centimeters and meters, the geometry of plane, scale, and the physics of load, I actually used pi and diameter and circumference, daily! About a year letter, I CLEP’d out of an additional two math subjects, which I substituted for elective credit. Never in my life, without that practical training, would I have EVER considered math as one of my electives. When I did sit down to sew, I knew backwards and forwards the formulas, and the mechanics came very easily, because I had a body of competence associated with it. In my life now, I am given a better price at the workroom I use for my clients, because I do part of their job for them. They don’t have to schedule a write up appointment for me, and it saves them time and money.

These everyday skills are the things that make a difference between a job and a career, and a living and a life. If I stumbled into being better academically and professionally on mere chance, I can only imagine what a dedicated homeschooling parent can scratch out of the minds of their own children. It’s an amazing thing to consider.

Thank you for reminding and encouraging all of us, once again. Bless you!