The Podcast with
Suzanne & Amy
The secular homeschool podcast for people who think too much and the home of the world’s longest game of Library Chicken.
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Real talk about secular homeschooling and why it matters from the founders of SEA Homeschoolers and home.school.life.
In this episode we’re talking about decolonizing the secular homeschool curriculum — and why it’s a project that we expect to be working on for the rest of our lives.
What does it mean to be a secular homeschooler, and why does it matter? After a bad conference experience reminded us how loud the voices of conservative Christian homeschoolers can feel in the homeschool world, we wanted to talk about what being secular homeschoolers means to us and why we think it's so important.
After a couple of years hiatus, The Podcast with Suzanne and Amy is back! Our secular homeschool podcast is shifting gears to focus specifically on homeschooling middle and high school and on how, as homeschoolers, we can work together to decolonize the curriculum. In this episode, we let you know what you can expect in future episodes.
In this week's podcast, I'm talking about what is probably my all-time favorite homeschool tool, the one that we have turned to every single year and used for every single subject. It's not fancy, it's not expensive (in fact, it's free!), and it can grow and change with your homeschool. And in this podcast, I'll be walking you through how to use it in your homeschool (or at least some of the ways we use it in our homeschool!).
This episode is only available on Patreon.
In this episode, I’m chatting about the seasons of homeschooling, and why homeschooling is so much happier when you let yourself lean into the season that you’re in. With bonus Roman real estate scams!
This episode is only available on Patreon.
I'm chatting about academic stamina -- the ability to stick with and follow through on academic projects. For us, this wasn't an important part of homeschooling until I started planning for high school, which is when I realized that this kind of academic stamina is important for life AFTER homeschool. Here's how we worked to build it, plus some thoughts on what I'm doing differently the second time around. (Academy bonus: The Roman propaganda machine is hilarious!)
In this first episode, I'm chatting about how we never got good at doing nature journals, but they were a great part of our homeschool life in spite of that. With bonus Roman mobs!
The Podcast with Suzanne & Amy Archives, 2015-2020
In this episode of the Podcast with Suzanne and Amy, we're talking about what planning for the new homeschool year looks like for us (it's a lot more relaxed than you might think), how we're navigating a weird quarantine world full of changes and disappointments with our kids and ourselves, and some particularly good books we've been reading lately.
In this episode of the Podcast with Suzanne and Amy, we're talking about recognizing and navigating white privilege in our homeschool lives — plus how we handle end-of-the-year evaluations in our homeschools and some great books we've been reading lately.
In this episode of the Podcast with Suzanne and Amy, we're talking about the power of long-term planning in your homeschool (plus tips on how to actually, you know, long-term plan!), what it feels like to graduate a homeschooler (which Amy recently did, in case you missed her five million other posts about it!), and what we're reading and watching lately, both academically (a great history of a Japanese city) and not-so-much (now is the time for comfort television). It's been a little while, so this is a long one!
In this extra-long episode, we're talking about what we've learned over the course of our homeschool lives so far, our favorite gaming distraction, and a new generation of comfort books.
In this episode, we’re talking about the sudden preponderance of giant underwater monsters terrorizing young adult protagonists, the joys of the end of the term, and what we’re looking forward to reading over the upcoming holiday break.
In this episode, we're talking about starting a hybrid homeschool (it's all about the lists), time travel stories, and our current adventures in homeschooling, including dual enrollment and trying to get math credit for homeschool work at a public high school.
In this episode of the podcast, we're talking all about middle school: what it can be, what it often ends up being, what we regret, what we love, what we'd like to do differently, and why it can feel so darn hard. Plus: life on the back burner and fangirling over N.K. Jemisin.
In this episode, we're talking about the big homeschool questions on our minds these days, what's happening our very transitional homeschools, and the delightful Space Opera.
Suzanne caught a cold this weekend, so consider this a bonus episode of the podcast: Amy’s going it solo to talk about how we get our groove back after the holiday break.
In this long, long-awaited episode, we’re dusting off our headphones to talk about how the new homeschool year is going (busy! ACT tests! Not-White-Men History!), what’s keeping us busy, all the television Suzanne is generously watching for us, and the sci-fi novel Ancillary Justice. We’re back!
In this allergy medicine-fueled episode, we’re talking about how we teach (and don’t teach) language arts in our homeschool, from workbooks to deliberate avoidance, sharing our favorite podcasts that aren’t this one, and talking about that delightful comfort book, 84 Charing Cross Road.
In this episode, we’re trying to come to terms with a new normal and nervously peeking out of our political closets, talking about how we homeschool when all we want to do is hide under the covers and/or obsessively check the news (spoiler: sometimes we just don’t), and trying to get back on the book reading wagon with a comfort read classic. (Also: The scoop on the Lost Episode—a.k.a. Episode 10—which Amy promises she really will upload eventually.)
In this episode we’re talking about math, math, and more math, including our favorite homeschool math curriculum options, chatting about British television, British writers, and the historical plight of women married to Percy Shelley, trying to explain the awesomeness of Suzanne’s Bag of Justice, and the puzzling out the problem with Atticus Finch.
In this episode, we’re coming out of our pillow forts to talk about how to homeschool through challenging times, our favorite coping mechanisms (including the Library Chicken Book Bender exception), and some of the titles on our comfort reading lists.
In this episode, we’re talking about things we wish someone had told us before we started homeschooling, adventures in the Twitterverse, library chicken victories, starting a liberal arts high school, and Lab Girl by Hope Jahrens.
In this (slightly all-over-the-place) episode, we’re talking about how to figure grades for transcripts if you’re in a situation where something’s forcing you to figure grades for transcripts, superheroes who like saving the day, Veronica Mars in the afterlife, what’s happening in library chicken, and many, many books.
In this episode, we’re talking about how to handle it when a kid just plain doesn’t want to do something on your homeschool’s academic to-do list (and, for the billionth time, about how Amy stopped doing math for two years and the world did not explode around her homeschool), what we’re up to on the homefront, and Five Children on the Western Front, Kate Saunders’ tribute to the great E. Nesbit.
In this episode, we’re talking about the dreaded “S” word, socialization, and what it does and doesn’t mean and about how homeschoolers find friends and build social networks, which isn’t the same thing as being socialized, darn it. Also: Star Trek, All the Birds in the Sky, and more.
In this episode, we’re talking about how we gear up for a new homeschool year (school supplies and denial are involved), the done list versus the to-do list, nerdy movies, getting your AP class approved, Aaron Burr in history and in Gore Vidal’s Burr, and more.
Suzanne Rezelman and Amy Sharony tackle the big secular homeschool life questions in The Podcast with Suzanne and Amy. In this episode: How do a couple of nice, normal parents who genuinely loved their own school days end up becoming homeschool moms?
What do you do when you discover that a book you grew up loving isn’t the book you remembered? Luckily, there are so many great books now for middle and YA readers that you won’t have much trouble finding a replacement that you’re genuinely excited to share with your kids.