~Erica
A friend recently posted on Facebook that she was considering homeschooling her children. I quickly encouraged her to look into it and then the public school folks jumped in with the "Socialization" argument- they won't be socialized if they go to school at home. It's such a tired argument and my first thought is "Really, that's all you can come up with?"
When someone uses it to my face I usually counter with a joke, "We have to schedule time out of our social activities to get school done," while I'm thinking if I socialized my kids the way public school does I'd go to jail for child abuse. And how many of us heard from our teachers, "Miss, you are not here to socialize, you are here to learn."
When new homeschoolers ask how to meet other homeschoolers it makes me sad. It means that they are not reaching out to the community that is out there available to them. When we first started homeschooling I didn't wait for opportunities to come to us, I made our own. I found a couple of other like-minded moms and we started a field trip co-op so that we could do something fun with the kids each month. A few years later I got involved with another group of moms in a learning co-op using KONOS. The group disbanded after a couple of years because our older kids were getting involved in other things and it was time to move on.
Nowadays our family does very little "socializing" with other homeschoolers because our kids are so involved in activities that have nothing to do with school- Scouts, sports, church, etc. We do go to Homeschooling Swim Lessons because it works into our schedule. Isaac is involved in a chess club that is homeschoolers and the kids from the Christian school. All the kids' closest friends go to public school or the Christian school.
In our area there are lots of opportunities for homeschoolers to socialize with homeschoolers- soccer co-op, baseball co-op, swim lessons, Chess Club, and several new learning co-ops. It's easy to get involved but you have to leave your house and maybe your comfort zone
I hear ya! It is exhausting being taxi-mom to take kids to dance, piano, 4-h, soccer, church, volleyball, and what have you. Those are just our "Social" activities for this week. It's such a joke when I hear others talk about the lack of socialization in homeschool kids. Uggh. Grin and bear it I guess....we know the truth. :) This is my first year sending my kids to a local christian school 2 days a week....a learning experience in and of itself.
ReplyDeleteYou have inspired me! So far, I have only made one telephone contact with another homeschool family here. I was thrilled when she told me there is a big group of them in the area. Now I need to step out of my comfort zone and be a little more assertive! :) Miss you guys.
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