At the “teen mom school” I went to for my last two years of high school, they taught us how to balance a checkbook, make a budget, organize our bills, and other important life skills. Even back then I remember wondering if kids in the regular high school were so fortunate to get this information so young. Everyone needs this guidance when they take their first steps toward independence, even if they don’t hit the ground running like a teen parent.
This is in part why I wrote about how to prep your teens for adulthood. The fact that it’s the most popular post on the site shows me that I’m not the only one who prioritizes how to help my young adult children take their first steps of independence – with as little bumps in the road as possible.
As homeschool parents it can feel like a lot of pressure to have to teach our kids academics AND life skills.
Who wold have thought kids could learn some of the most core life skills through online classes?
I’ve heard of Mr D. many times. A friend of mine has a daughter who uses a math class with him, and I’ve heard other homeschoolers rave about the classes offered by him.
So when I came across the opportunity to review the Life Skills class by the well-renowned Mr. D of Mr. D Math, and of course I jumped on the chance.
The following is a review Mr. D’s online homeschool class, life skills. I was allowed to attend classes for free, was compensated for my time, and as always, all opinions are my own.
Even after hearing so much praise about him, I was pleasantly surprised to see just what a gem he is when I joined a live class recently. He is upbeat, energetic, and engaging.
The class I joined used Zoom, an easy to use video conferencing tool, and some of the students chose to keep their webcams on. At the start of the class, most of them had flat expressions and your stereotypical teenager demeanor. Within 10 minutes he had them warming up with smiles and laughter.
Life skills online class
Okay, so Mr D is awesome, but what is the life skills class about?
The course starts with arguably the most important skill: goal setting. Then the course drills down into very practical tools like:
- Time management
- Financial literacy
- How the stock market works
- Check writing, credit cards, and having a bank account
- Stock market strategies
- Financing a car or project
- Learning styles and career assessments
- Career virtual field trip
- Specialized knowledge and having a burning desire
- Resume writing
- Researching a company or university
- College campus virtual field trip
- Managing life like a business
Through each of these topics, the students are engaged and given relevant homework, like making their own personal goals and reporting back on their progress, or taking part on a stock market game to see who can get the most profit from buying and selling stocks using the real stock market, but pseudo money.
I thought my parents did a pretty good job getting me ready for life with financial literacy, but this is a whole new level with kids understanding how credit cards work, and how you can get stuck in the credit card debt trap, and real functional tools to make sure you don’t.
When high school is over
There are so many things we can teach our kids to help them be ready for independent life outside of our home, and it’s hard to know what to teach them. In my two posts about skills to teach your teens, I focused a lot on household things like how to wash dishes by hand, cook a meal, or meal plan.
What Mr. D teaches are the things that could really get someone in trouble if they didn’t have a decent understanding of it right away. People can throw away money on the stock market like it’s the casino, or use credit cards not knowing the impact of compounding interest, or have no skill at writing a resume and lose out on job opportunities.
These skills are core.
Sign up for online middle and high school classes
If you’d like to learn more, you can check out the entire line up of Mr D’s online homeschool classes ranging anything from life skills to the entire line up of middle school and high school math.
Or find out more about Mr D. and his company on Mr D Math website.
Mr D. online
You can also find Mr D. on social media via Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram.
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