Just a small rant today. 

‘Cause it’s my site and I feel like it..

For those of you who don’t know - we’re homeschooling our two children.  No, I’m not going to go into the reasons why - just suffice it to say we’re doing it “because we can”.

Today’s topic is the “socialization issue”.  No, make that the “The Socialization Issue”.  The bane of homeschoolers everywhere.

The conversation usually goes like this:

“Any how many kids do you have??

“Two kids - a boy and a girl”.

“Oh..nice.  What grades are they in?”

“Well, in a public school probably 2nd and 3rd, but since we homeschool the whole notion of grade levels gets a bit fuzzy...”

(At this point in the conversation, if you watch close, you can sometimes physically see the question forming.  There’s a delay as the person does some quick mental processing...then out it comes...)

“Oh...homeschoolers...aren’t you worried about...you know...them missing out on the whole social aspect of school...learning how to get along with and playing with kids their own age”?

Or, as someone commented in a related discussion online, being homeschoolers “we’re taking the risk of raising socially awkward kids”.

Uh, yea.  Thanks for the update.

This topic has been talked about ad nauseam in home schooling circles.  I’m sure if I fired up Google I could gather a nice half dozen links about it.  Or I could tell you about the church services, piano lessons, science classes or gym classes my kids attend on weekly basis where they interact with others. 

No - what gave me a chuckle today was thinking back to my own public school upbringing, and playing that against these great “social skills” that school is supposed to be so good at imparting to it’s students.

20 years after graduating, I still run into classmates who don’t seem to see me when we bump into each other.  I still see classmates that were picked on for what...dressing differently, speaking differently, smelling differently, learning differently.  I saw a female classmate recently, still walking with her shoulders stooped over because she got tall early on, and she was not comfortable literally “standing out in a crowd”.  I see classmates working menial jobs because that’s all the other kids or the school system told them they were capable of.

What strikes me is how most of these people, 20 years after graduating, still have pretty much the same personality as they had in grade school.  Exceptions? Sure.  But few.

Watching my own kids, I’m convinced this is more genetic than anything.  One of my kids has always been gregarious, willing and anxious to interact and talk with anyone in the room, while the other has always been more introspective and quiet. 

So what to do?  Smile, nod, make some comments about how we work to make sure they have a variety of social settings included in their lives, and walk away with a small smile. 

School - yea, that’s the place to learn great social skills.  Not.