It's no secret that most kids today are scared to death of math and calculus. But they're actually quite easy...as long as you don't let modern school teachers "teach" you any of that "new math" nonsense. If you want to kick it old school, there's no better way than to teach yourself calculus with Thompson's Calculus for the Practical Man.

This book was catapulted to world renown when Nobel laureate, Richard Feynman, recounted using it to teach himself calculus when he was 13. Feynman credited his success in calculus to having taught himself and to some of the unorthodox methods presented in this book. Sometimes, when others couldn't even approach a problem, a method he had learned here made the problem almost trivial.

If you are at all interested in Calculus, don't let your first experience be in a classroom setting. You owe it to yourself to teach it to yourself. This book was "old" when Feynman read it, so it's a bona fide classic today. Rest assured, there is no new math here.

(One word of warning: Calculus is a perishable skill. I passed the AP Calculus BC exam with a 5 and then taught myself multivariate calculus while at the Air Force Academy. Within a year of leaving the Academy, I had already forgotten many of the more advanced techniques, simply from not using them. I do remember the basics, but I would have to put in some serious study to replicate that 5 now.)

Another reason not to send your child to school.

The primary purpose of school is conformity. Children who do not conform are labeled slow, dumb, troublemakers. One of the major themes of indoctrination is that of selfless cooperation, volunteerism, altruism. They are taught that profits are selfish, crass, even immoral. Students displaying entrepreneurial bent are especially singled out for conformity training and medication. In reality, most of the good in the world is not the work of selfless volunteers, but the work of profit seeking entrepreneurs. These heroes seek out humanity's unmet needs and find innovative ways to meet them, improving the lives of billions of people, thus fulfilling the words of Jesus, "If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all." – Mark 9:35

In this video, Cameron Herold tells his story and gives tips for encouraging your child's inner entrepreneur.

My favorite tip:

Don't give your child an allowance or even pay him to do chores. That simply teaches him to be dependent. Instead, allow him to find things that need to be done and come to you with them and negotiate a fee for their completion. This teaches him to be observant, proactive, and incentivizes performance.

An Introduction to Austrian Economics

by Hans-Hermann Hoppe and Jörg Guido Hülsmann

Mises and the Austrian School by Jörg Guido Hülsmann

Here's a little video for all the husbands and fathers out there who have daughters who want them to tie "pretty bows" for their dresses.