Home Schooling Questions

Today's Friday Meme at Heart of the Matter is all about those goofy questions people ask you about homeschooling and your even goofier responses. Well, for the most part our friends and family are all very supportive of what we do ... but there are always those rare times when some stranger will ask us "oh don't your kids have school today?" or my favorite is the questionable looks we get from other parents when we're at the park in the middle of the day on a 'school' day.

So I haven't really encountered too many funny questions but I do recall one funny discussion I had with an acquaintance ... ( who I'm sure had innocent and well meaning motives behind her questioning!)

She asked 'do they still have to learn math and English like the public school kids?' Well of course we do!

She also wanted to know if my children have to take tests and how do I know how well they're doing in their school work.
Seems like an innocent enough question - but for some reason it makes me laugh. After all, who knows my children better than I (besides God!) ?! Yes, we do (some) testing, yes, we track their progress ... but to me the biggest indicator of their 'success' is simply seeing their growth from day to day! Any classroom teacher can tell you how her students have changed and grown from September to May - and we are no different! We can see clear differences in their abilities and educational growth just like any 'normal' classroom teacher.

So that's all I've got for funny stories for the moment ... I'm sure as the years go by we'll encounter many more moments that make us laugh. I think it's simply out of curiosity about the unknown that people ask these things. And I think most of the time it's purely innocent and not meant to hurt the home school parent. Homeschooling is becoming a lot more 'acceptable' and widespread ... but there is still a lot people don't know about it.

Have a great weekend everyone ... and don't forget to page down and enter my 300th Post contest below!