Raising Free Thinkers: Why We Ditch Textbooks and Follow Questions

At our house, curiosity is the curriculum. Instead of cracking open a textbook and following a rigid lesson plan, we lean into questions. Real, random, hilarious, thought-provoking questions. Like the one my daughter asked just last week: "Why don’t mice fart?"

Now, a textbook might’ve had a chapter on mammals or digestion tucked somewhere in the index, but it wouldn’t have sparked the belly laughs, the scientific theories, or the rabbit hole (pun intended) of learning we dove into that day.

This is the magic of interest-led learning.

We don’t just study science, we chase it. One question turns into a documentary binge. A silly question becomes a search term or my son saying, “hey mom, ask Jarvis!” Jarvis is our assistant AI bot - lol. A conversation over lunch turns into a mini research project. Before we know it, we’re reading about rodent anatomy, watching National Geographic videos, and trying to determine whether small mammals have the digestive force to produce audible gas. (Spoiler: they technically can... they’re just a lot quieter about it.)

We call this "rabbit trail education" - where one idea leads to another, and learning feels more like following a mystery than completing an assignment. Our home is full of opportunity to possess books, watch documentaries, do random experiments, and dig into Google searches that start with “do animals…” or “can you really…”

I’ve seen how this way of learning teaches my kids not just to memorize, but to think. To question. To wonder. And that wonder is something I never want to snuff out with too many worksheets, textbooks, or checkboxes.

Of course, we have some structure. We cover the essentials of reading, writing, and arithmetic. But the real richness comes from the things that don’t fit neatly into a box. Like the time we ended up learning about flatulence in reptiles. Or how a single question turned into a two-day study on the difference between burps and farts (thanks again, digestive system).

So if you’re wondering whether it’s okay to close the workbook and open YouTube for a nature doc... or let your kids follow a weird question about animals - I’m here to say yes. That’s where the gold is. Some of our best homeschool days start with the words: “Hey mom, how…?”

And honestly, I wouldn’t have it any other way.