Our schoolroom takes a leap into the 21st century!

Not long ago I showed you pictures of our newly organized schoolroom.  This wasn't always our schoolroom, but it has become that and I love having it near our living room and kitchen.  I also love that it is a multi-function room.  We can still eat at the table when we want to and I keep all my stationary things in the secretary (not shown in this picture).  If you saw my last set of schoolroom pictures, you may notice something different in this one.

The focus of our homeschool is still books, books, books. 

But, I've added a computer lab to our schoolroom.

Some of you may wonder why?  Others of you may wonder, what took you so long?  Let me try to address those questions starting with the latter.  I firmly believe that the foundation of education should be books.  Knowledge is contained in books and passed on through books.  It's no coincidence that God chose to reveal Himself to us in a book, rather than some multi-media format.  The generations of Americans that made our country great were educated through reading and largely through self-study.  I want to continue with that tradition.

So, why add computers into the mix now?  Several reasons:

1.  Monk (11) and Twinkle Toes (9) are learning to type with Mavis Beacon and they've both switched to Teaching Textbooks math this year which utilizes a computer.

2  Measle (7) has not been the math whiz her older siblings were.  She struggles a bit more to get math and this leads to frustration on my part (how do you help someone get something that's so obvious?!).  She needs extra practice and I've purchased several math programs to supplement her Saxon assignments.  We started using Quartermile Math last year and have added Rainbow Rock this year. 

3.  Monk (11) is interested in learning some computer graphics- like Blender.

4.  I'm selfish with my computer.

So there it is, my full confession.  I also recently purchased a Greek grammar that comes with a pronunciation and practice CD.  I may be the only one interested in that, but I've made it available to them.  Also, we're going to study Rosetta Stone's Mandarin Chinese starting in June and continuing throughout next year.  We might as well get ready to enter the 21st century now.

How about you?  Do you utilize computers in your homeschool?  To what degree?  Why or why not?