Daddycademy

“If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning.”

– Mark Twain

Welcome to Fun Friday!

That’s what we call our Fridays if the kids get their schoolwork done the rest of the week, they get to take off Fridays and have some fun.

I usually call it Finance Fridays.

So I wasn’t able to write earlier this week but I figured this would be a good moment to share something fun.

I think it’s important for fathers to teach their kids. While Ani does a great job curating curriculum and teaching the kids for homeschool, there are lessons I want to teach our kids off curriculum. I came up with what I call Daddycademy. The idea of dads teaching their kids isn’t new, and there are handles online with similar titles.

What is Daddycademy?

But I wanted to create my own with a focus on five categories – Faith & Theology, History & Civics, Business & Money, Trades & Skills, and Games. I’ve been rotating each week since October and have created a base that works. The kids actually look forward to it.

I knew it couldn’t be a stale lesson, but something active and fun. Ever the youth minister, I took a familiar but simple format and made use of it. Baseline, you can make any youth block with this and build from it, I usually fit this in an hour or so. But sometimes it’s longer.

Here’s an example from our first Trades & Skills lesson.

Trades and Skills

• Introduction – Goofily, I’ll build off of the last lessons, and always draw back to things we’ve covered. I’m Professor Dad by the way :}

• Music video – Crowder – Grave Robber : I have a YouTube playlist with a ton of music, but it’s usually Christian music. I’ve started showing them different genres like orchestral, jazz, blues, rock, etc. Music is important

• Game – Red Light Green Light : I started building a list of kid games that we rotate and add to

• Psalm reading and opening prayer – Izzy : I like giving the kids the opportunity to lead prayer, this is an important skill

• Trades and skills : I’ll draft out different lessons and give them exposure to different parts of each topic. Simple, but I get to work with them.

  • Introduction

  • How trades built our house (tour the house and show pipes and wires)

  • Electricity from outside cables to inside

  • Scientific method -> engineering -> trades and building

  • Basement – how we get water, gas, electricity.

  • Work bench tour, how to use tools next time

• Closing prayer – Luke 10 – Wyatt

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Simple, but effective. It’s important to have fun with it and not make it forced, otherwise the kids won’t be in. Remember, “Fun Dad + “Man, I love you, kids.” So why pick these topics? There is a lot out there to explore, but I think these are vital lessons I want my kids to know outside of the classroom.

Faith & Theology – We are the first catechists. There is no other subject or topic more important to teach them. A relationship with God is S-tier fathering. They should know not only how to pray but they should know the WHO. When a father leads in prayer, the kids have an 80%+ chance of retaining it themselves. If it’s just mom, that’s around 20%. We have an important role to play with this.

History & Civics – Politics aside, our children need to know the country they live in and the unique place in history we belong. I think this perspective comes with responsibility and humility for what we have. It can easily disappear if we’re not careful. Plus, how often do you think of the Roman Empire? I know, me too. It’s just cool.

Business & Money – I want our kids to have a head start on this. How to count, handle, earn, save, and invest is a lifelong skill. We even have the game “Allowance”, it’s kind of like Monopoly. Business and entrepreneurship were sparked in me early by my dad. It’s a mindset. But we’ve had some great lessons on this. As the saying goes, if you give a kid a fish, they’ll be back for another. Teach them how to fish, they’ll never go hungry again.

Trades & Skills – Not only should we know how to use tools and fix things, but our kids should know that the trades are an option, perhaps a better option career-wise. That’s where growth and money is being made these days as stagnation and automation hits corporate. As we advance, I want to get some guests to teach in this space and go check out work sites.

Games – Lastly, Professor Dad isn’t all business. Sport and games are not only fun, but they teach teamwork, competition, how to play to win vs fun + graciously win and lose, strategy, physicality, and more. A secret weapon here – video games. I have a future Climb about what video games taught me. The game Civilization taught me more as a kid about economics and history than my classes ever did.

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So anyways. This is our project. I’m building a library of lessons to someday share. How are you teaching your kids?

If you ever want to join on a Monday morning, bring your little and I’ll get you a coffee! Let me know.

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Adam Jarosz is the founder of Righteous Co. and author of “Iron Ore: Journal of a Man” – a company built on faith, formation, and adventure. With over twenty years of experience in ministry and business, Adam leads retreats, coaches men to be the leaders they were called to be, and writes from the trenches of entrepreneurship.

He’s a husband, father of four, and believer in Christ and His Church, the power of grit and grace, and good bourbon. Follow along for insights that challenge, encourage, and call you higher with his newsletter, sign up to get it right in your email box here: The Climb.