Post after post today contained pictures of homeschoolers doing their homeschooling thing. Children sitting at their desks with their math textbooks. Kids filling out worksheets. A family spread around a table, pencils in hand.
Conspicuously missing from these pictures of homeschool life is the one thing I remember from my own. Absent were the kinds of photos that pepper the Sonlight Catalog every year. I didn't see a single image reflecting the Sonlight ideal of how we learn together.
This omission reminded me of a proposed marketing theme from years back. The idea capitalized on the way Sonlight is such a radical shift from the norm. I couldn't find a mockup of the concept, so I tossed one together:
Welcome to Your New School
When I think of homeschooling, I picture myself near the couch. The sofa = school. Whether we were crammed onto it during an exciting story, or playing near it while my mom read about far off lands, or draped across it while lost in another world, the couch is the central image of my homeschooling experience.
There's something friendly, inviting, family-oriented, and literature-focused about my memory of the family room couch. And reading--together, alone, or out loud--is my image of homeschooling.
When you think of homeschooling, what image pops into your head?
~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Empty Nester
P.S. I couldn't find a picture of the "Welcome to Your New School" image, but I did find an old snapshot of myself. It seemed blog worthy to me:
Worksheets? This is Homeschool!
(said in my best Spartan voice)
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