How to Raise Entrepreneurs in your Homeschool with the Hess UnAcademy Method.

The Hess UnAcademy Homeschool Method

There are many MANY great ways to homeschool your children.

You might pick one method, settle in, and stick with that for the course of your homeschooling career.

You might pick one method, decide you hate it, and bounce around until you find a method that works for you.

Some people pull in bits and pieces from a variety of different homeschooling methods and create their own homeschooling style.

This is what we do.

How to Raise Entrepreneurs in your Homeschool

The Hess UnAcademy homeschooling method is what we’ve chosen to call our way of life.

And that’s exactly what it is – a way of life.

We dabble in a couple of different methods.

Some days we identify with relaxed and eclectic homeschoolers.

Other days you would swear we are roadschoolers.

From an outsider’s perspective, we even seem to have a lot in common with unschoolers.

If I had to put a traditional label on our homeschooling method, I would label us as Lifeschoolers.

Why?

Because we incorporate learning into our everyday life!

What Does This Look Like?

I say that we identify as lifeschoolers rather than relaxed/eclectic schoolers because we incorporate life into our everyday learning. 

But honestly, a lot of homeschoolers pull education into their everyday life.  And that’s great! 

But where we stand out is instead of pulling education into our everyday life (i.e. bringing outside projects or books and such and learning from them regularly) we do the opposite. 

We take our regular life and see what we can learn from it.

Why Do We Follow An Unconventional Homeschooling Method?

In order to graduate from Hess UnAcademy, our kids are expected to open and run a successful business of their own.

What Does A Successful Business Look Like?

A successful business means EITHER: you can live off of the income from your business and fully support your current lifestyle (in this case, a family of 1)

So as a teen, their expenses will include their own car, clothes, insurance, phone, fun money, college (if desired) and whatever rent we decide to assign them as they get older. 

OR they can sell the business for enough money to go and do investments as an income stream instead

(ALSO – they make enough to have a combination of business revenue and investment income) 

Obviously, as a family of 1, their expenses are going to be really low. And the lower their expenses, the easier it will be to accomplish that.

This will give them a great jumping off point to grow their income through their current business or investments to support them as they increase their lifestyle.

It will also give them the knowledge and experience to be successful when they are out and on their own.

There are SO MANY options for an entrepreneurial-minded homeschooler! If you’re unsure of where to start, here is a great article that walks you through just a few of the many many entrepreneur examples a homeschooler can consider.

(Note – if any of our kids decide they don’t want to do this, they are more than welcome to go get their GED and go out and get a job and we will fully support them in that path as well. Nothing wrong there as far as we’re concerned – but that diploma comes with building a successful business)

How To Know What To Teach In Our Homeschool

Knowing that their end goal is to start a business, our kids (and us!) now have an idea of what we need to be learning as a family to help them on this goal.

I have one son who loves screens. He as ALWAYS loved screen time. (actually, his younger brother has the same love of screens – I wonder if he’ll follow this same path?)

So this son (he’s 10) has decided that because he loves screens so much, he wants to go into coding.

He also loves inventing and problem-solving, so he has already drawn up plans for a bunch of different coding projects and applications he wants to develop and sell.

Now that he is strong in his reading and basic math, he is likely going to spend the rest of his at-home study learning how to code and working on these projects.

His goal is to have successfully sold a number of applications by the time he turns 14.

Our other kids have not decided what they want to settle on yet, and that’s okay! They are still young and are still exploring their options.

And honestly? We fully expect most of our kids to try out a few business ideas that don’t succeed before they settle on an idea that really works for them.

Exploring Entrepreneurial Options Through Lifeschooling

We want to make sure our kids get to experience as many different things as possible.

Traveling, reading, caring for animals, serving their community, problem-solving, being bored, building, gardening, the list goes on and on!

The more experiences our kids have, the greater their likelihood of finding something they truly love.

There are things to be learned in absolutely everything we do if only we are willing to notice and point out these lessons!

How To Raise Entrepreneurs Through Road Schooling

When I say we dabble in roadschooling, I don’t mean we live on the road and travel the country 100% of the time.

We have a permanent address. We are at home more nights than we are not. But a majority of our schooling happens not at the house – hence the ‘dabbling in roadschooling!

But as a part of our learning experience, we try and go on AT LEAST one field trip a week – if not more!

Our Homeschool Field Trips

Now when I say field trip, I don’t mean exclusively museums and national parks and fire stations (although those are great!)  I mean we go places as a family and explore together – and then we discuss what we learned from that field trip.

For example – today we went and volunteered with the local wildlife services to catch wild geese to be tagged and relocated. 

Related Post – Homeschool Service Project – Wild Goose Chase

This was a super fun experience for the kids that was also a great way to serve the community.  But at the end of this, we encouraged the kids to ask the men in charge some questions (that we had discussed and prepared the night before) so they could learn more about the program. 

We also discussed with the kids what they learned and observed through their experience.  We asked them leading questions that helped them naturally come to conclusions that would help them see why relocating these birds was important.

Another example – last month we went and explored Oldtown Scottsdale.

Related Post – Explore Oldtown Scottsdale – A Homeschool Field Trip

This is not something most homeschooling families would consider to be a ‘field trip’ but we do! 

We spent the day exploring that historical part of town. 

We saw some cool shops and learned about the local Native American cultures who are from that area. 

We learned about the guy who founded Scottsdale. 

We found a giant art sculpture while we were exploring and we had the opportunity to learn about the guy that made that sculpture and why he made it (the message he was trying to portray) which led to another discussion on what was going on in the world during that time period. 

We also got to learn about public transit and how people who live close to downtown travel and get to work and go shopping.  All this from one day of family fun. 

When you consider how often we go on trips like this (and many many more!) you can see why we say we dabble in Roadschooling!

The Hess UnAcademy Method

The Hess UnAcademy method is not complicated at all – and at the same time very complex.

We know there is a lesson to learn inside of everything we do.

Which means we are always learning naturally. There is no extra work needed. We are always learning, no matter what we do. We just can’t help it!

But this also means we need to be aware and observant of the lessons we are learning – for what good is a lesson if we let it pass by without our notice?

How to Raise Entrepreneurs in your Homeschool