[Athey]

So all the boards on JM that I check religiously were lacking updates and I just browsed through the various boards and started looking around. I poked into the homeschooling board out of lazy curiosity and was reading. I found myself wanting to post in there and ask mention some things, but caught myself and didn't want to start a fuss in their domain and ruffle feathers unnessecarily. Not my intention at all, but I still want to type this out. lol...

Okay, so I was public schooled. My DH was in Private School till middle school, then public (thats where we met!).

So I've never done the home school thing myself. I however have known home schooled kids.

In 10th grade my good friend Ana invited a new addition to our weekly friday-night movie gathering (My now DH's parents had a very large big-screen tv and a huge entertainment setup so we watched movies every week in his basement).

Ana had recently joined a church group because a guy she had a huge crush on was in it (haha - great reasons for doing this). Anyways, in the church group she met a girl named Mia. Mia was homeschooled. Since Mia basically had NO friends except for a few others in her church group, Ana asked her to join us.

Her mom hated the idea. Her mom REALLY sheltered this kid, and anything outside of the church was basically evil incarnate. lol. But somehow she managed to get permission.

Mia was very very socially awkward.
She never got our jokes. She missed out on entire subtexts in movies and we had to explain things to her. She was niave, and didn't have much self-confidence.

I use her as an example because I really got to know Mia and spent a lot of time with her over the years. But I've met a few other home-schooled kids and they were all the same.

I've never met one that didn't feel really 'out of place' with non-homeschooled people.

One guy I knew who was homeschooled (and really very sheltered) I met in college. It was his first time away from his parents and in a real social schooling enviroment.

He was one of those people who, after years of not being exposed to anything, suddenly wanted to expose himself to everything and made a real mess of himself.

I mean, this guy was the whole traditional, went to church and hung out in a teen church group, etc. All that stuff. But the second he was a 2-hour drive from his mom, he started getting drunk every night with the most retarded guys. Never did his assignments, slept through or totally skipped almost all his classes, and flunked out and got put on 'academic probation' by his 2nd year.


I see these women on the homeschooling board saying that they don't see the benifits of public school. That it's just a popularity contest (and I do agree) with overcrowding and poor education standards, etc. etc.

But I think there is one benifit that they just don't see.

Public school teaches you how to interact with other human beings. It teaches you social skills and how to deal with real-world things that you just can't learn from your mom, a text book, and other homeschooled children from your church.


I know that these can't be the whole truth - that there are probably plenty of people who were homeschooled and came out fine... I've just never met one.

[Isabellamom]

I am a public school teacher (welll, I was until I became a temporary stay at home mom) and I have had a few wonderful chances to interact with homeschooled children and they were great experiences.

The first time was when I joined a natural living playgroup; many of the moms homeschooled and I was asked to teach a few lessons. Individually and in small groups they had been learning about mammals, so I hooked up with another public school teacher friend of mine and we took her class and the homeschooled children to the zoo followed by a "powwow" type discussion about mammals in my backyard. The kids all had a wonderful time, and I could tell no difference in the social skills of the homeschooled children and the ones from the public school.

I was so interested in homeschooling after this that I offered to teach another homeschooling group in the area about the history of the countries I had lived in (we did Panama nd Brazil). They were a joy to teach! They were all homeschooled in separate homes but met for group lessons, projects, etcetc. They had the most fascinating questions!

My husband coaches and ruins a youth soccer camp; of the 37 kids signed up this year, 7 are homeschooled. One mother was telling me about how community sports help her children to meet and interact with nonhomeschooling children. It was a great idea and it really worked! My husband even started asking me if I would think about homeschooling.


I'm sorry you have had a bad experience with homeschooled children, but mine have been wonderful. Of course, I have countless stories of wonderful public school experience as well. I'm considering sending our children to an alternative type school where lots of parental involvement in the learning process will let me teach them but also keep my job as a public school teacher, which I love!

My understanding is lots of properly (is that an oxymoron?) homeschooled kids are made to do lots of extracircular activities that involve other kids to learn social graces... I don't really think everyone sticks to any rules though!

There is a movement that is scary to me.. The more I learn about it, and I see the numbers growing... It's Dominionism.

Its most common form, Dominionism, represents one of the most extreme forms of Fundamentalist Christianity thought. Its followers, called Dominionists, are attempting to peacefully convert the laws of United States so that they match those of the Hebrew Scriptures. They intend to achieve this by using the freedom of religion in the US to train a generation of children in private Christian religious schools. Later, their graduates will be charged with the responsibility of creating a new Bible-based political, religious and social order. One of the first tasks of this order will be to eliminate religious choice and freedom. Their eventual goal is to achieve the "Kingdom of God" in which much of the world is converted to Christianity. They feel that the power of God's word will bring about this conversion. No armed force or insurrection will be needed; in fact, they believe that there will be little opposition to their plan. People will willingly accept it. All that needs to be done is to properly explain it to them.

All religious organizations, congregations etc. other than strictly Fundamentalist Christianity would be suppressed. Nonconforming Evangelical, main line and liberal Christian religious institutions would no longer be allowed to hold services, organize, proselytize, etc. Society would revert to the laws and punishments of the Hebrew Scriptures. Any person who advocated or practiced other religious beliefs outside of their home would be tried for idolatry and executed.

If the beliefs are not scary enough, the homeschooling beliefs through this is rising..

[Isabellamom]

My understanding is lots of properly (is that an oxymoron?) homeschooled kids are made to do lots of extracircular activities that involve other kids to learn social graces... I don't really think everyone sticks to any rules though!

There is a movement that is scary to me.. The more I learn about it, and I see the numbers growing... It's Dominionism.

Its most common form, Dominionism, represents one of the most extreme forms of Fundamentalist Christianity thought. Its followers, called Dominionists, are attempting to peacefully convert the laws of United States so that they match those of the Hebrew Scriptures. They intend to achieve this by using the freedom of religion in the US to train a generation of children in private Christian religious schools. Later, their graduates will be charged with the responsibility of creating a new Bible-based political, religious and social order. One of the first tasks of this order will be to eliminate religious choice and freedom. Their eventual goal is to achieve the "Kingdom of God" in which much of the world is converted to Christianity. They feel that the power of God's word will bring about this conversion. No armed force or insurrection will be needed; in fact, they believe that there will be little opposition to their plan. People will willingly accept it. All that needs to be done is to properly explain it to them.

All religious organizations, congregations etc. other than strictly Fundamentalist Christianity would be suppressed. Nonconforming Evangelical, main line and liberal Christian religious institutions would no longer be allowed to hold services, organize, proselytize, etc. Society would revert to the laws and punishments of the Hebrew Scriptures. Any person who advocated or practiced other religious beliefs outside of their home would be tried for idolatry and executed.

If the beliefs are not scary enough, the homeschooling beliefs through this is rising.. [/b]

WOW scarey...there was also that story a few days ago about Baptists in the south wanting to take all Baptists out of public schools.

I must say that none of my experiences have been with Christian homeschooling. Maybe the problem lies in only letting them interact with other "church" friends? (aiming this at the OP-since your experiences seem to be with religiously homeschooled children.)

Is there anyone here who homeschools for reasons of their religion? is it important for you to have them interact with children outside of your religion?

[WaterMama06]

Homeschooling I think is wonderful as I also think Public schools are great. If you homeschool though, I would have to say you must keep up on the social aspects of your children as if you don't, then I do believe they will have some social issues that could have been avoided.

I plan on having my daughter homeschooled until she reaches Highschool, and if she chooses to go into public school, that is fine by me. All the children I knew who were HS did just great transitioning into highschool SHE WILL have social interactions though in sports, ballet...w/e she wants to do.

[AbbyHannahsMom]

I think if Homeschooling is just as good as public school as long as the parent is getting the child involved in other programs that involve their child with children his or her own age.

[babyn2]

And I am a public school teacher!

[MirandasMommy]

I agree that as long as the homeschooled children are getting the social experience they need then it's great. I personally would never homeschool our children because I don't want them to miss out on all the fun stuff in school that I got to experience. I have a friend that was homeschooled his entire life and he (severely) lacks social skills.
Amanda

[oicyur]

Mia was very very socially awkward.
She never got our jokes. She missed out on entire subtexts in movies and we had to explain things to her. She was niave, and didn't have much self-confidence.

I use her as an example because I really got to know Mia and spent a lot of time with her over the years. But I've met a few other home-schooled kids and they were all the same.

I've never met one that didn't feel really 'out of place' with non-homeschooled people.[/b]

I ditto this! I have never met someone who was homeschooled who wasn't a bit (if not totally) socially akward! My best friend growing up was homeschooled and when she would hang out with me and the other kids she woukd just act wierd and had a hard time socially. It was the same case with a bunch of other kids in my area as well.

There may be kids out there who were homeschooled and aren't socially retarded, but I have yet to meet them.

I think if you can socialise your homeschooled kids enough then homeschooling does have it's place. Here is Australia there is a homeschool movement but it is very small and it is nearly impossible to socialise your children as much as I feel is necessary. I did homeschool my eldest for 1/2 of his first year of schooling because he just didn't cope (it was too noisy and scarey) and while academically he did wonderfully, socially he did miss out.

Both my boys are in our local public school and while there are a lot of things there that I don't like, I just cannot provide them with the socialisation that children need. They NEED to spend a lot of time with kids their own age, not just a few kids that I handpick, that way they learn conflict resolution and how to deal with a wide range of people.

[My_Serenity]

I've met several people who have been homeschooled and are completely 'normal' in the social area. (I've actually only met one who I thought was kind of out there). My husband was homeschooled as were his two brothers and I know a lot of his friends who were homeschooled. They did a lot of activities and even played sports with other homeschoolers. I think it kind of depends on how active their parents are in getting them involved in social activities.

As for the religous thing... well I'm Christian... but that's not why I'm homeschooling. For one... I'm not saying that all public school systems are bad... but in my area they are awful. As of right now we can't afford private schooling either. I also plan on doing a boat load of extra stuff with Xander when he's older. There's a wonderful homeschooling group here that meets every friday. They do extra classes for the kids in music, art, gym... etc. It's actually very much like a school setting.

[Miguelsmommy]

I've met socail inept and nieve public school kids too. I think everyone has and lables them loners. Miguel is almost too socail he will be homeschooled. one of the resions I choose to is I feel he should socailze more then school allows freely.