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Homeschooling Today

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I have gotten a lot of comments about homeschooling on this blog, and I wanted to drop in and show you what our homeschooling looks like today.  This morning Sea Cadet embarked on a field trip to the zoo with a bunch of his buddies and a mom chaperone.  As we were leaving our apartment we noted a shipment of something in HUGE boxes.

As I am returning from dropping him off, those same boxes were there but empty.  I pulled over and asked the maintenance man “could we have some of those boxes?”  He knew where I was going….”when I was a kid, I could have done so much with these boxes,” and he told me to take how ever many we wanted.

I rushed back to the apartment, got the littles and we ran down to get boxes.  They picked out three HUGE boxes and we pushed them down the road to our apartment where they barely fit through the door.  I turned to the kids and said, this is your schoolwork today….build something, decorate it and enjoy!  They were thrilled and immediately sat down with pen and paper to plan.

Here they are in progress with two of their HUGE boxes….

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Once they are done we are going to discuss Hoovervilles and the Great Depression, I don’t think it’s a lesson they are likely to forget.

The only thing that would have made this better would be to be able to do it outside, but alas the weather is not cooperating, so as you can see, our entire living room is now Hooverville!

And just for the record, this school day cost us nothing…well, except the art supplies and packing tape they are using which we have had forever. So I chalk this up to a financial win and will be a great school lesson!

Oh, I’ve got to go, I’m being summoned…evidently, they are trying to figure out a light source for their cardboard building.


10 Comments

  • Reply Sue |

    What a wonderful learning experience – makes you realize how good we really do have it!!!!

  • Reply Jen From Boston |

    That’s awesome!! I love it! It combines lessons in history, creativity, resourcefulness, and empathy all in one!

    • Reply Walnut |

      I concur with Jen. I think the saddest part is that regular school standardized tests don’t cover any of those items, thus, there’s little time teachers can devote to teaching it.

  • Reply Joe |

    Sounds like an awesome lesson!
    For the record, my comments about homeschooling on this blog have been completely tailored around the time commitment and concomitant stress, not the schooling itself. I know there are many terrific ways to get a great education, and it ultimately comes down to the kid.
    I just personally can’t imagine having the time/energy to drive both my career and my kids’ education, and I’m not even a single parent!

  • Reply Anon |

    This looks like play time, not school. Are they smarter for having colored a box?

    • Reply Andrea |

      Colored a box? What about spacial planning, problem solving, measuring, etc. Those are KEY math skills. What about empathy and social studies? Even of there weren’t dozens of real life skills and school needed skills being practiced, it would still have been an excellent day. I am sure they are way ahead of their counterparts in public school and can afford to take a creative day.

      What too many people fail to realize is how much homeschoolers accomplish in a day. Take away time spent on passing out papers to 30 kids, disciplining the unruly ones, changing classes, etc. and you’ll see how many more quality hours a typical homeschool student has in a day and why they are able to do more in the same time.

    • Reply Walnut |

      The lesson was in history about the great depression. This activity is way of bring that history lesson to life. What would you prefer? They read a textbook and then do a worksheet? How on earth does that reinforce the lesson better?

      • Reply anon |

        The lesson is coming after finding a bunch of random boxes. This does read more than a little like Hope wanted her kids to get to play with a cool box fort. Was the Depression even in her lesson plans? Isn’t homeschooling supposed to follow some curriculum, especially for kids this young?

        • Reply Andrea |

          Well, since you asked – the state laws vary as to how strict a homeschool has to follow a curriculum. When we homeschooled, we used a mixture of pre-planned lessons and student-interest led lessons. We were able to easily delve into the planned curriculum with just four days a week.

          One day a week was for exploratory learning (look it up if you are unfamiliar with the concept). It was usually on Fridays, but if something caught his eye, it could be any day of the week. From his point of view, those were fun days where he got to pick what and how he “schooled.” From my point of view, those were the times he applied the skills and knowledge from all his cores into applications along with some much needed real life planning practice. And yes, if we lucked into super large boxes, all other plans for the day would have been on hold.

So, what do you think ?