Hi! I'm Dave Reed

Teacher, Maker, and FMCA Certified Health Coach

Your kids are amazing! My kids are amazing! And every one of them has the potential for genius inside of them. I have a passion for learning and I want everyone to develop that passion. Unfortunately, many are left with a distaste and distrust for learning due to our education system. Learning is not a one size fits all approach and many children will never succeed in the traditional environment. I didn't and carried that weight for a long time. Luckily, I found a passion for learning on my own, but many aren't so fortunate. I have been many things in my life. I have been a chef, middle school math educator, handyman, and entrepreneur. I love making things and working with my hands and I believe a lot of the kids who don't succeed in school can find their passion in the same way. I know when I was in school, a career working with your hands was discouraged. I was always told I was smart, but I hated sitting still in class all day. In addition to everything else, I am a functional medicine health coach with a passion for quality food, health, and community building.

What is your Element?

What is your Element? I’ve been rereading the book The Element by Ken Robinson. To be fair, I haven’t read it, but rather listened to it. However, listening to it gave me so much inspiration that I bought the hardcopy and now I’m going through it and underlining everything I find important and inspirational. There’s a lot to underline, highlight, dogear, and flag! There were two major things that struck me in my reading. We have no idea of what the future holds as far as opportunity,...

4 months ago • 4 min read

It's down to the wire this week, but the wait will be worth it!

This week was a huge win in the world of unschooling for me! For starters, I should share that my wife and I are both educated. I have a degree in education and she is a doctor. And we are encouraging our children to become entrepreneurs over going to college. Well, we are actually encouraging them to make sure they know they want to go to school, that what they want to study will be worthwhile, and that they don't go into debt to do it. In addition, we are encouraging them to learn skills...

6 months ago • 4 min read

Oops. I guess it's M.A.K.E.R. Tuesday

Yesterday was a big win for me as an unschooling father. I've raised two daughters who are highly intelligent and taught themselves many things. In fact, my almost 17 year old daughter is excelling in high school after having never been to school until 2021. To be honest I'm not sure how I feel about her being good at school, but she's proud of herself and enjoys being one of the brightest in her class. But my boys haven't shown a lot of drive and that's had me worried. Until yesterday. My 14...

7 months ago • 3 min read

This thing last week was amazing!

Unschool I truly believe this. I came across this Tweet yesterday, and yes I will still call it a Tweet because what else am I supposed to call it? I guess a post, but it just doesn't have the same connotation. OK, getting off topic. What do you want for your child? When you envision their future, what do you envision? We can all see the strengths in our children, but ultimately they have to find their path to make themselves happy. The current education system isn't truly about doing that no...

7 months ago • 3 min read

It's time to come clean

I'm struggling. I don't have it all figured out. All my sons want to do is play video games and watch YouTube all day every day. A lot of conventional wisdom says I need to be angry, crack down, and take it all away until they do what they're told. I've tried that, and let's just say it didn't end well. My relationship with my oldest daughter is... strained. I grew up getting yelled at and was on the receiving end of the wooden spoon quite a bit. I never doubted that my parents loved me, but...

7 months ago • 5 min read

This conversation was enlightening

Yesterday I was at church and having a discussion with someone who was serving with me. We were talking about my son playing clarinet in the local high school band. One of the benefits of homeschooling in Arizona is that homeschooled students are able to join the local school sports teams and band. As I was speaking with another volunteer, I was lamenting that when I was in school, we could actually start playing an instrument in 4th grade, and even our elementary school had a marching band....

7 months ago • 5 min read

This is why I do it

This week I've been participating in a Facebook Group for parents of homeschooled teens and tweens. It's been both good and bad at times. I see a lot of people who treat the education of their kids at home as just school at home. The same punishment/reward system that is used in school. I mau have mentioned this before, but we are entirely student led when it comes to educating our children. I want them to want and see the value of learning what they need to learn. My daughters both did and...

7 months ago • 5 min read

Big news this week!

This past week I did something. I was thinking about my days as a middle school math teacher and how I always loved giving kids problems for the day or week. That's why I love math. The problem solving. That's my favorite thing about my job as a handyman. Often I'll get clients who need a unique solution to a problem, or have something broken they can't figure out and call me. One of my favorite calls recently was from someone whose recliner wasn't staying reclined. It was a leather recliner...

8 months ago • 4 min read

Did you think I forgot you!

My week has been a little crazy, but here we are! I've been obsessed this last week with learning about new places to find .stl files to print. For years I used Thingiverse and was entirely happy with that. I was able to find jjust about anything I wanted that I hadn't designed myself there. I had used My Mini Factory and found it to be ok, but it wasn't my favorite. This week I learned about Yeggi and I am absolutely in love. Forget Thingiverse, Printables, Cults3D, My Mini Factory. Why?...

8 months ago • 3 min read

[FIRST NAME GOES HERE], was your week as amazing as mine?

This last week has been an amazing week of learning and inspiration. I've been diving deep into the world of making and 3D printing and I've gone down some rabbit holes. It all started with lamps. Well, technically it started with a free treadmill. It was bulk trash week and my neighbor had a treadmill she had left out for bulk trash pickup. I walked past it a few times, thinking about rescuing it and on about the fifth time I finally did. And unfortunately for my wife, ever since then my...

8 months ago • 6 min read

Your kids are amazing! My kids are amazing! And every one of them has the potential for genius inside of them. I have a passion for learning and I want everyone to develop that passion. Unfortunately, many are left with a distaste and distrust for learning due to our education system. Learning is not a one size fits all approach and many children will never succeed in the traditional environment. I didn't and carried that weight for a long time. Luckily, I found a passion for learning on my own, but many aren't so fortunate. I have been many things in my life. I have been a chef, middle school math educator, handyman, and entrepreneur. I love making things and working with my hands and I believe a lot of the kids who don't succeed in school can find their passion in the same way. I know when I was in school, a career working with your hands was discouraged. I was always told I was smart, but I hated sitting still in class all day. In addition to everything else, I am a functional medicine health coach with a passion for quality food, health, and community building.