39. Pat Farenga and johnholtgws.com

01/02/24 • 57 min

In today’s episode, we get to spend time with Pat Farenga from Boston, Massachusetts. Pat grew up in New York and eventually ended up in Boston for postsecondary studies. After completing his Master's degree, and with the challenge of finding available work in the early 1980s, Pat ended up working at a bookstore in Boston. Unbeknown to Pat, this bookstore was below the office of John Holt, one the most influential figures for the modern unschooling and homeschooling movements. When John Holt died in 1985, Pat became the publisher of the well-known homeschooling newsletter, Growing without Schooling (GWS), and president of Holt Associates. More recently, Pat has finished preparing all 143 issues of GWS and has made these available online. Mr. Farenga is an unschooling father of 3 daughters, an accomplished pianist and saxophonist, and he is a prolific writer, best known as the author of The Beginner's Guide to Homeschooling (1998) and Teach Your Own: The John Holt Book of Homeschooling (2003). During our conversation, we discussed many of the unfortunate problems with the conventional school system and how it is designed to stifle curiosity and the love of learning. We also talk about how homeschooling and unschooling allow families to escape the arbitrary benchmarks that plague schools and their students. This episode is of interest to all who are seeking an alternative to conventional schools, and we are given access to many resources to help us improve education and lifestyle.

Connect with Pat Farenga
https://www.johnholtgws.com/
https://www.youtube.com/c/Johnholtgws
Books
Deschooling Society
Instead of Education
Teach Your Own
How Children Fail
How Children Learn
In Search of Excellence

Resources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothering_(magazine)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svWynGm

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Resources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothering_(magazine)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svWynGm

This Golden Hour
Free eBook Course
thisgoldenhour.org

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38. Chris Ronan and Geocaching

In today’s episode, we get to spend time with Chris Ronan from Seattle, Washington. Chris is not a homeschool parent or connected to homeschool really at all, except that he works for a company that facilitates an outdoor experience that many homeschool families enjoy: Geocaching. Chris is the senior public relations manager of Geocaching, and he also spends a lot of time training Geocaching volunteers. Over a decade ago, Chris and his wife became interested in Geocaching on a trip to visit his sister. They fell in love with it and Chris found himself, like Charlie Bucket who was fortunate to visit Wonka's chocolate factory, eventually working for Geocaching. The company started in the year 2000 after a man from Oregon hid a container and challenged people online to find it. Four months later, Geocaching was official, and today there are more than 3.3 million geocaches in more than 190 countries throughout the world. Homeschool families tend to love time in nature and going on field trips, and Geocaching provides an ideal activity for both. In this conversation, listeners will learn more about Geocaching, and they might feel more inclined to give Geocaching a try.

Connect with Chris Ronan
https://www.geocaching.com/play

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41. Nephi Zufelt and Wealth Mentality Families

In today’s episode, we get to spend time with Nephi Zufelt from Pocatello, Idaho. Nephi is a homeschooling father of five, mechanical engineer, business owner, leader in his local church congregation, and author of Katie Bell and the Wishing Well: A Story of Finding True Wealth, and The Big Startup Guidebook for Kids. Nephi and his wife had talked about homeschooling often when their kids were younger, but it wasn't until he left his job to start his own business and moved from Tennessee to Colorado that they finally decided to try homeschooling. At first, the Zufelt's just did what they thought was done in the schools. But over time and after studying the principles of homeschooling and learning, they began to see the great benefits and advancement of the homeschooling option. Nephi's wife had taught all of her children to read before they were five and so they already had that foundation when they started learning at home. Nephi and I talked a lot about how archaic and ill-equipped the public school system is to give students individualized attention. Unfortunately, most parents are still caught up in the old-school paradigm of focusing on their kids getting good grades and getting into college, when this is not sufficient for the world and future they are entering. Our children need to be curious and creative, know how to solve problems, love learning, know how to learn, and understand the principles of learning if they are to be successful in the rapidly changing and competitive world. The schools simply don't do this stuff! Nephi gave us so many excellent insights into topics like parent engagement, the role of the homeschool dad, principles versus skill sets, and knowing the difference between teaching your children grit and giving them the space to pursue their interests. Finally, we talked about Nephi's expertise in teaching children about wealth mentality. He helps us understand what real wealth actually is, things like good health, freedom of time, and strong relationships, instead of a myopic focus on materials and accumulation. Nephi reminds us that it takes great failures to create wealth.

Connect with Nephi
www.wealthmentalityfamilies.com

Nephi’s Books
Katie Bell and the Wishing Well: A Story of Finding True Wealth
The Big Startup Guide for Kids: A Principle-Based Approach to Entrepreneurship

This Golden Hour
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This Golden Hour - 39. Pat Farenga and johnholtgws.com

Transcript

Pat Farenga00:00:00.000

I just came up with a headline from my latest blog post, which is unlocking learning opportunities. Free education from schooling, education is a big lifelong project. It's not just this little meritocratic, job you do till you graduate from college or high school, and then you go out in the world and that's the end of your education. And that's crazy. This whole idea that, what we do up until we're 21 is going to serve us for the rest of our l