Welcome to the Wild and Free podcast, episode 63. I'm Ainsley Arment, and this week, Cindy Rollins talks about the meaning of motherhood.

You are providing them with something unbelievably wonderful. You can smile. It's okay. I know you feel burdened down.

I know that you feel like it's all on you.

But if you will smile, your family will be drawn to you and love you, and it won't really

matter what curriculum you pick out.

Plus, we released our new book Handcrafts this month.

We'll tell you what's inside.

So grab a cup of coffee and join us on the front porch. Let's get started.

Here lies the childhood pastime of play.

Oh, we don't mind play so long as it comes after the work and doesn't hinder our child's academic progress.

We're okay with play as long as it doesn't affect their test scores.

Yes, play is just fine as long as our children's education comes first. What have we done to childhood?

Just as the frog in the pot doesn't feel the temperature slowly rising,

families have been slow to sense the increasing pressures heaped upon their kids in education.

We press into their childhoods in the same way we increase our time on the

treadmill or apply more rigorous standards in the workplace. Before we know it, our children are left

without a childhood. David Sobel wrote, We want our children to splash in mud puddles,

but we also want them to score well in those first grade entrance evaluations.

And deep down, we want our children to go to good colleges, and therefore, it's never too early

to get them on the right path. It doesn't seem to matter that research shows that social and

emotional readiness in the child produces better academic achievement in the future.

In fact, a study conducted by the

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