What Does This Mean, Really?

Our son Sam, just returned from two years in Brazil. He was under the gun to earn some money and get registered at USU to begin his college experience. He took the advanced placement math test and did well. With prayer and persistent effort, he made it all happen and aeronautical engineering, here we come.

He attended his first math class. As the teacher began explaining things on the board, what should have been pretty easy, seemed more complicated than he expected. After class, he read the book though, it was was crystal clear to him. He thought about it and after a while realized that in all the years he had studied math, he had never had a teacher. Using Saxon Math, he had taught himself math from grade school, all the way through high school. Imagine that, taught himself. Learning this subject from a teacher was for him, the exception, not the rule.

So is this good or bad? He will certainly encounter college classes where he will need to learn from a teacher. But how cool is it that he has habits of self direction that allow him to be an independent learner? In a subject like math?

As we consider the benefits, goals and hopes for a home schooling life, what balance of self taught and teacher taught do you want to see in your child?