TWO GENERATIONS OF HOME SCHOOLING

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The Calvert School textbooks we used at home were also more advanced and interesting than were the regular school's materials. In fact, I love V.M. Hillyer's A Child's History of the World (which Calvert students are still using today) so much that I've even reread the book as an adult, just for fun. (By contrast, how many grown-ups even remember the books they used in public school?)

And Mother's housekeeping duties never suffered as a result of her teaching me ... since she had me help out with all the dusting, ironing, and washday chores. Even so, l had plenty of extra hours for healthful outside play, relaxing, drawing, planning houses (I still love to design adobe homes for do-it-yourselfers), and for experiencing those hours of solitude during which we learn to "grow our souls".

My "teacher" parent also provided me with extracurricular activities. She drove me 17 miles to Santa Fe, twice each week, so I could take dancing lessons ... and paid for the instruction by playing the piano for the class. She even formed (and ran) a Girl Scout troop, and my participation in that group gave me some of my happiest childhood memories.

Of course, my mother could not have done all she did for me if I hadn't also had a wonderful father. Without his cooperation, she would never have been able to teach me at home. Together, my parents gave me a solid educational grounding. And their instruction paid off: I entered college at 15, graduated four years later with the highest honors, and have subsequently earned four additional degrees.

TEACHING MY CHILDREN TO READ

One of my graduate diplomas was a master's degree in education from Harvard. I went after that certificate not to learn how to teach (and, to tell the truth, the required coursework in no way trained me to instruct) but, instead, to merely gain official credentials ... so I would have the legal right to do for my own youngsters what my mother had done for me.

I then taught my first four children (two girls and two boys) at home until the eldest was eight years old. At that time my marriage ended in divorce. I had to work outside the home to make a living, and could no longer spend the day with my youngsters. Thus, while four of my offspring were taught to read at home, the youngest son and daughter learned that basic skill in public school.

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