Where's the School in Homeschool?

As I was browsing homeschool blogs this evening, a thought occurred to me. I share about our home life, but I don't say much about our schooling. You might begin to wonder if we really ARE homeschoolers. Yep, bona fide, card-carrying members of both Home School Legal Defense Association and our local umbrella school. Sometimes we even do schoolwork. Ha. Just kidding about that last. We do schoolwork every day! We do religion every day, we do math every day, and well, you get the picture...

We might do it a little differently, though. Certainly we do some things differently than I did twenty years ago. Because we live in an apartment, if the boys occasionally want to use their spending money to walk to the pop machine, I figure the exercise balances out the calories. And the treat (as well as the caffeine) boosts everyone's mood and production level. Ironically, I heard that soda pop has been banned in Baltimore County Public Schools, a decision I would undoubtedly have applauded a very short time ago. (And some of you may be shaking your heads at me.)

We do math a little differently, too. Robert (16) works on his own math, then looks up to see what Peter and I need help with. Math is not my strong suit and I tend to get through seventh grade math before struggling. (Peter is in eighth.) I always thought I'd learn upper level math right along with my kids, but there was always something else...babies and toddlers, and so on. Just when I thought I'd be able to learn math along with the youngest, I decided to work on learning Braille with him instead.

And of course, that's another thing we do differently. Almost every day Peter reads in three different "modes", as I call it. He listens to books on tape, reads to me in Braille, and reads to himself a few pages of a book under the video magnifier.

This isn't a picture of our whole schoolday, but just some snippets to let you know that yes, Virginia, there really is a homeschool here.