Misconceptions over home education and socialisation

[PeachAndorange]

Why is this the case? I’m sick of hearing it as it isn’t true ?
There are HE groups and also other activities at weekends and evenings that any children can go to
Play dates with friends
Family gatherings

All I’m hearing is that my child will be isolated and this was a negative choice .... it’s not and seems it’s just the general consensus that parents do this to isolate and it couldn’t be further from the truth

Dylan Seabridge had no contact with authority bodies from the age of thirteen months until his death. I'd call that hidden.

I did consider homeschooling as dd's physical needs were quite difficult to fit around a school day. These were the main reasons that kept me off:

I know dh and I are quite quirky in many ways- good ways, perhaps, but quite limited. Also couldn't help noticing that many of the local
HE parents were also quite like us. I thought it might be better for dc to experience some more "normal" families too. In retrospect, I think for ds being able to make friends from families who were less academic, less middle-class, less arty has been his salvation: he is none of those things and much as he loves us he would have thought of himself as a misfit.

In our area, quite a few of the HE activities and meet-ups
would require use of a car, and even if I had been able to drive, I was always quite strongly against unnecessary car use. It seemed to me that by keeping them in school I was able to access a hub of activities and different people without those journeys.

Dd was very clingy and very inclined to trust me in everything. Remembering how much I admired my own parents and how long it took me (even without HE) to learn to have my own opinions and question theirs, and how this has not always been helpful to me in life,
I wanted counter-weights in her life.

Dd herself wanted to go to school, even at times when life was most difficult.

Having said this, I am also convinced that my friend who HE'd her son made absolutely the right decision- for him. He was autistic, didn't cause any trouble at school, but simply did not socialise or learn anything, he was just passing through which is a dreadful waste of a young person's life. By a judicious mix of HE and social activities, she encouraged him to learn, she helped him to build a friendship circle, she gave him an interesting life.

I never listened to her when she told me to HE dd, but otoh I never doubted that she had made the right decision for her ds.

You are right Burney but concerns had been raised and not acted upon. It was well known that he existed. There were concerns about the parents.

That seems like splitting hairs to me. Whether or not he was in the system officially, he certainly wasn't in practical terms and it failed him terribly. I can see there's a place for HE in some cases, but I would absolutely be for a register and regular inspections.

I am on the verge of home educating and socialization is the only thing that worries me..However that's more because she struggles with socialization and groups and going out in general so I think it would be too easy for her to get used to being at home and therefore even less able to cope in those scenarios.

But not everyone who home educates is the same. A colleague was homeschooled and really resents her parents for it because they didn't really do much with her, and she wasn't taken or 'allowed' to go to groups. I do think it is different to having the freedom of school to choose your friends, but not necessarily worse, it depends on the circumstances and the quality of the home schooling imo.

It’s just tricky we seem to be having to answer more about socialisation than education

'cos education is really easy, finding how you get a kid to spend time socialising with anyone outside of the same privileged group of kids who get to go to home-ed groups or extra-curricular activities is much harder. So of course people are going to ask about the thing's which are difficult.

But how would a register help? There are children who are seen by teachers every day during term time and who are still abused.

When a home edicated child is abused the fact that they are home educated is nearly always used as a reason, but there are often many other factors as well. If a schooled child is abused (at home or at school) the schooling system is rarely blamed.

When DC were misbehaving I used to threaten to HE them. They certainly believed it would ruin their social lives.

I had an adult friend who was HE'd, she said it made her too shy. Her kids go to regular school. She has to work, anyway (single parent).

My 13 year old home Ed child socialises without me and attends groups without me. She has many many friends and they are all really close. They see each other most weekdays!

It’s just tricky we seem to be having to answer more about socialisation than education

Surely it's obvious why though?

I think people miss that many children end up being home educated because they have poor social skills & can not cope in school rather than it being home education causing those poor social skills because of lack of contact with others.

In my DDs ballet class, mid teens, there were 3 HE girls - she noted that they were very confident in interaction with the adults but completely at sea with the social dynamics and nuances of teenage girl life of the other girls, especially at more extended groupings like shows or workshops. It wasn’t as if all the others were from the same school - a variety of schools and backgrounds.

In my experience home edded kids have a fabulous social life (well, the NT ones). They are bright due to having well educated parents have a lot of time for extra curricular stuff as they cover academic stuff 1:1 or in small groups very quickly. However they tend to be precocious and over confident. They have strong opinions and are not used to being challenged, or people not agreeing with them. Their friends are usually similar demographic of degree educated SAHM and high earning dad. They do lots of activities but these can be dropped if they don't like them. It's not the same as the resilience you learn from school. I was very shy as a child and found school difficult but the social skills I learned have prepared me for adult life. The ability to mix with people with different views from your own is very valuable.

I do have a child with ASD and totally understand why so many SN kids are home schooled. Luckily despite the many difficulties we have faced with schools my daughter loves the social side of it and is thriving now we seem to have found the right place for her.

I know boisterous and rude school children, but I don't blame ttheir behaviour on the fact that they go to school. I know shy adults who went to school and I ( and they) don't blame school for that either. There are plenty of shy, clever, rude, well adjusted, capable (etc) people from both backgrounds.

I know little about the intricacies of Home Ed but I think socialisation is about more than having fun with peers. I think at school you learn things like:

• dealing regularly with people you don't like
• knowing when to share your opinion, and when not to
• how to spend large amounts of time with people who are very different to you
• that you are usually not the most important person in the room
• that sometimes daft seeming rules are needed to keep order and benefit the majority
• how to blend in (it's then your genuine choice if you choose to stand out)

That's good, isn't it Jellyfish? I'd much rather have a teenager who can socialise well with adults (education is preparation for adulthood after all) than teenagers who are preoccupied with nuances of teenage girl life ( I assume you mean things like boy/girl friends, going out, make up, social media, fashion and such like)

My personal view on HE is that although it does have huge benefits from some children, it poses huge issues in that A) you’re only ever being disciplined/told what to do by one person, so when you leave and go and get a job you might struggle to listen to someone else B) you’re only being exposed to one persons views C) you are lacking socialising. You’ll never ask a friend to lend a rubber, never create an after school club, never experience playground fun

Calamity good list, home ed children can do those things in a variety of settings.

Pentium your view of the lives of most home educating families is completely wrong. You can obviously educate your child in that way, but most home ed children certainly don't live like that!

Ginger, you note I said personal view, which I am entitled to and from my experience it is what I have seen.

But please, continue to shoot down any poster on here who doesn’t feel the same way you do.

The kids we know who are home schooled are definitely not socialised in the same way ( a 12 year old threw a toddler tantrum over some light, and I mean light, teasing) but that's kind of the point for the parents I think. They don't want their children to be like everyone else.

The kid on the street who's home schooled seems to sit outside on the step half the day looking bored, waiting for the school to kick out. He's deffo a bit different ( NOT SEN before anyone starts!) and finds it hard to gel with the other kids.

Some religious sects home educate precisely to avoid their children socialising with the outside world. Many people home educate because their child is nd and can't cope with a school setting - many of these children also need to socialise on their own terms and quite a few, not at all.

Whatever else it is, HE can easily be quite claustrophobic, with an intrusive amount of parental oversight and micro management. I've worked quote a lot with HE children over the past 5 years, running groups that are supposed to be "drop and go". A significant number of parents need crowbar- ing off their children (and these children are 10+) and getting them to actually go away for a few hours can be nigh on impossible. Smothering.

I'd much rather have a teenager who can socialise well with adults (education is preparation for adulthood after all

Not so sure about this one tbh. Teenagers, or younger children, who socialise with adults are not on the whole socialising as equals: they are socialising with older people who will make concessions and adapt to their youth. That's not going to happen in the workplace.

I was not HE'd but lived a life that was socially isolated with parents exclusively focused on serious interests like art and literature who did not encourage any frivolous interests, like fashion or popular culture.
Unfortunately I admired them so much that I decided their way was the only way and my peers were just silly and wrong. Even in a career as an academic I have found myself hampered by this narrow upbringing. A more varied and nuanced experience would have been a better preparation for adult life and the workplace. What socialising I got through school did actually help.

pentium ,

Where do you get the info from for your personal view?
H.ed children don't exist in a vacuum, they are involved with groups and in activities. Why do you think an adult in charge wouldn't discipline a child? They are exposed to many views from many people, and as for socialisation, well as I said they don't exist in a vacuum. I'm sure many play with friends, why shouldn't they? My dd used to meet her schooled friends when they'd finished, sometimes played at their house, sometimes the park, they'd go to cinema when dark and wet.

Personally, I don't think it's a bad thing for children to miss out on having to work with people they don't like. Why raise them to be happy with a life like this? Plus, when will they ever work with people who are exactly the same age as them, it's a false environment

As for them being in danger of abuse, well let's remember the poor mites who died who attended school and nothing done. One poor boy starved to death, ate sand and was clearly struggling.

H.ed children are no more open to abuse than schooled children and if it is school that is said to make a difference, why aren't schooled children's parents assessed during the holidays.