Yesterday, DS11 and I stopped at an antique/yard sale. He was kinda bored with the furniture (gorgeous but pricey), but seemed to enjoy looking at the knicknacks. A lot of 70s/80s stuff, mostly.
Anyway, recently he's been "into" World War history stuff. He just finished the DK Eyewitness book on WWI and is now into WWII, so he's been asking me stuff about Hitler. I'm LOVING this because this is entirely self-initiated, auto-didactic, self-motivated learning he's doing. Which is, you know, how homeschooling is SUPPOSED to work, but which he rarely ever actually does. I even wrote a blog post about it lol: http://motherbynature.ca/2009/09/yes...posed-to-work/
Anyway, so I happened to notice a book cover that featured an image of Hitler. It's called "Hitler's Games", and it's about the 1936 Olympics. I showed it to DS and he was mildly interested. After we'd looked at everything else, though, he wanted to go back and look at it again, and we stood there for a moment chatting about it, as he was realizing that he did want to get it and read it.
The guy running the sale smiled at us, and said "now why would you be interested in a book like that?" Not in a smarmy way, just a kind of surprised-but-impressed question. DS shrugged, embarassed, and I said he was really interested in WWII history lately. So the guy said that he'd learn a lot from that book.
Then he asked DS what grade he was in in school. DS answered that he was homeschooled. The guy immediately grins and nods, and says "ah, homeschooled! I should have known. You LOOK homeschooled. Real smart, too!"
We walked away smiling, then when we back in the car, DS asked me "What does he mean that I LOOK homeschooled???" I honestly didn't know and we had a good laugh about it. We know it was meant as a compliment, but what on earth does it mean?
If there's any kind of 'stereotypical' homeschooler appearance, it would be the neatly-put-together 50's-redux quiverfull family, combed hair with preppy or modest clothes. They're calm and speak like grownups, very serious and studious.
That is NOT my son. lol... we were just on our way home from gymnastics training, so he was in his singlet and spandex pants with his spiky hair. He's 180 degrees away from "calm", talks a mile a minute, is emotionally and socially immature for his age, is totally into the "fad" stuff like bakugan and Guitar Hero... in other words, much more of a "normal" boy than I'd have liked.
Anyway, recently he's been "into" World War history stuff. He just finished the DK Eyewitness book on WWI and is now into WWII, so he's been asking me stuff about Hitler. I'm LOVING this because this is entirely self-initiated, auto-didactic, self-motivated learning he's doing. Which is, you know, how homeschooling is SUPPOSED to work, but which he rarely ever actually does. I even wrote a blog post about it lol: http://motherbynature.ca/2009/09/yes...posed-to-work/
Anyway, so I happened to notice a book cover that featured an image of Hitler. It's called "Hitler's Games", and it's about the 1936 Olympics. I showed it to DS and he was mildly interested. After we'd looked at everything else, though, he wanted to go back and look at it again, and we stood there for a moment chatting about it, as he was realizing that he did want to get it and read it.
The guy running the sale smiled at us, and said "now why would you be interested in a book like that?" Not in a smarmy way, just a kind of surprised-but-impressed question. DS shrugged, embarassed, and I said he was really interested in WWII history lately. So the guy said that he'd learn a lot from that book.
Then he asked DS what grade he was in in school. DS answered that he was homeschooled. The guy immediately grins and nods, and says "ah, homeschooled! I should have known. You LOOK homeschooled. Real smart, too!"
We walked away smiling, then when we back in the car, DS asked me "What does he mean that I LOOK homeschooled???" I honestly didn't know and we had a good laugh about it. We know it was meant as a compliment, but what on earth does it mean?
If there's any kind of 'stereotypical' homeschooler appearance, it would be the neatly-put-together 50's-redux quiverfull family, combed hair with preppy or modest clothes. They're calm and speak like grownups, very serious and studious.
That is NOT my son. lol... we were just on our way home from gymnastics training, so he was in his singlet and spandex pants with his spiky hair. He's 180 degrees away from "calm", talks a mile a minute, is emotionally and socially immature for his age, is totally into the "fad" stuff like bakugan and Guitar Hero... in other words, much more of a "normal" boy than I'd have liked.