How to connect with 'wholesome' families

[RosemarySutcliffe]

Please no tiresome comments of offended outrage. I was hoping for ideas on how to meet home educated families in the hope that my children (ages 13,11, 7 & 4) could make friends with children more like themselves. Children who are familiar with classic literature (nesbit, ransome, tolkien, lewis etc), who are imaginative, interested in culture (shakespeare, poetry, enthusiastic, outdoorsy, well-mannered and have a sense of good sportsmanship, traditional childhood fun, how to be a friend and so on.
It feels like a needle in a haystack. We don't do gaming, my children don't have ipads or phones, they have only been exposed to edifying, wholesome films. They don't have behaviour problems or mental health problems. They are just decent, normal, imperfect, regular children. They don't know who Taylor Swift is, they've never played minecraft. How to meet like-minded people? It feels as if home educated children these days are often far more homogeneous than children who attend school. I don't mean any judgement of offence, it just can feel a little lonely as a family when you are raising them outside of the prevailing culture. We would love to have friends to invite for afternoon tea and poetry, dinner parties, bonfires, book clubs, put on plays with, swallows and amazon style adventures.. you get the idea.

I really feel for you, OP. You've clearly tried so hard to create a safe and idyllic environment for your children... but it's an attempt at controlling their experiences of the world, and that is futile.

It reminds me of a quote about 'radical acceptance' from Tara Brach:

"Radical Acceptance doesn't mean we condone or approve of everything that happens. It means we acknowledge reality as it is, without getting caught up in judgment or blame."

Credit to you for being open to criticism and suggestions, but it's hubris to think that unfettered dinner table conversation between you and your husband, along with their carefully curated exposure to hobby groups etc, constitutes not being sheltered.

@RosemarySutcliffe

well, if it’s proving difficult for them to meet like minded friends within the Home Ed community, why not send them to school and see if they can meet like minded friends there?

Thank you, good suggestions and I value hearing other peoples experiences.

OP, is there a reason why you have to be based so rurally? Because as others have would find much more of what you’re looking for in a university town. I hear what you’re trying to do and I uploaded it to a certain extent but denying anything that’s happened since the 1960s it’s not the way to go about it and credit to you that you’re listening to people here.

My kids learned about TikTok from their friends. I showed them what it was. Told them why I wasn’t comfortable with them having it. Are they exposed to it on their friend’s devices? Almost certainly. But knowing about something doesn’t mean sullying their innocence.

The person up thread who talked about sex education as an analogy is right. We have talked about consent and bodily autonomy since they were tiny. They have both had age appropriate sex education. As DS1 is older we have had a few conversations about pornography. Because he will encounter it and I need him to be prepared to deal with it.

Can you work out why they are sheltered from popular culture? If you imagine that Vivaldi was considered ‘popular culture’ in his day then do they watch current movies (have they for instance seen Encanto or Inside Out and Inside Out2, or the Paddington films), why not let them listen to some contemporary music (one of mine can belt out a few TS songs, one of mine rolls his eyes), watch some of the excellent TV that is available for young people or even read some more current fiction.

Even the BBC Proms includes more contemporary music. And not all contemporary music is just ‘pop’.

There is so much good fiction for young people- books that will one day become classics. My kids have read the classics and I took them to watch a Shakespeare play for a younger audience last week, but there are so many contemporary authors that they love.

Why learn Latin and Greek- why not say Mandarin or Farsi or Hindi? All old and ancient languages as well with a rich cultural heritage. And the internet might be a great place to start with that.

I think a lot of PPs have said that their kids are gaming and exposed to social media and have healthy childhoods. Mine don’t have social media, don’t game, yet go to mainstream school, have many hobbies and fully fit in. I wouldn’t say we are remotely ‘counter culture’ but as academic left wing parents we are bringing up our kids with the values we see fit. But also preparing them for the world at the same time.

These are very useful suggestions to me, thank you.

If there is such a small pool of home educated teens in your area the surely you need to send your teen to school. There they will be able to form their own friendships with like minded people.

You’re stearing them in one direction and they may well get to mid teens and go off the rails with the shear boredom of such a twee ‘ wholesome’ life, just fyi.
Can’t you just let them be?

@RosemarySutcliffe I feel very sorry for your children. They really won’t thank you for this in the future. They will resent you.

What you have described does not constitute “a very few counter-cultural lifestyle choices with regards to their childhood”.

You’ve gone way further than that, OP.

I have nannied for kids like that and they tend to be posh! Running barefoot in the family’s ancestral estate house kind of posh.

Otherwise, church? A more traditional, high Anglican kind of church? The kind where the kids are called Philip but go by Pip.

I just feel surely it's beneficial to have a later introduction to it, why do they need endless years familiarising themselves with it in preparation for the world of work.

There is a reason why the younger generation is so much better with technology and that’s because they’ve grown up around it.

The world revolves around technology and everything is online now.
I know it’s not the same but I used to work in prisons and they would struggle so much even if they’d only served a couple of years, because the technology is constantly developing.

They do not need to stare at a screen for 8 hours a day.
But an hour or 2 a week won’t harm them.

You actually sound like a really good parent who is simply trying their best to give her kids a good life, which we’re all trying to do.

Even starting a thread and your responses show how much you live your kid.

If any of us posted about our kids, others would have an opinion and say we should be doing more/less XYZ.

But I do think you are isolating them a bit too much and you just need to find a bit more balance and let them be a bit more normal.

What was yours and DH’s childhood like?

Definitely helps if you live in a Russell Group university town! There will be plenty of families like this.

We are 35 mins from a university town that has a great deal going on and I am now realising it is probably a wise investment of time if we spend more time going over that way, I do want my older children to be able to form their own friendships - not just those carefully curated by me. I think further exposure to school children their own age hopefully will be the right way in to a natural progression into the world. I like driving and am happy to ferry them about. I am feeling quite inspired by some of the suggestions on here of some gentle changes I can make and some new things to explore and introduce to our life. My children do a lot of water-sports and are very outdoorsy, I see there are plenty of parents commenting here that their children have phone and games consoles amongst many other interests and achievements but my worry that I struggle to get past is that it won't work out that way for all of my children and that they will become one of those who get obsessed, addicted or exposed to harmful content.

OP I know you’ve had some harsh replies but FWIW I kind of agree with you. I have an ASD child and have thought about homeschooling them but my issue is exactly what you describe. 95%+ of homeschool ND kids seem to fit the description you gave, “unschooling” - which I disagree with several aspects of - often “low demand” which again I’m yet to be convinced is beneficial to the child, kids who are glued to devices. I don’t believe that children necessarily have to do traditional academics but I do believe they need to engage with the world - not just an online world - and learn to manage to cope with some of the demands of that world. Mainly because if they can do this then there are so many wonderful opportunities for them. I’m by no means anti-tech but it is depressing to think how many kids in these situations are allowed to spend the majority of their time at home in their rooms on devices. People argue that these kids needs screens “to regulate them” which just makes no sense - I agree they need chill out time and ND kids may need more time than others to decompress after being in a social or busy situation but I’m yet to see any robust evidence than giving a kid who struggles with dopamine regulation unlimited access to a device that is literally designed to be highly addictive is going to help anyone. I also don’t see how we could have ended up at a place whereby a significant portion of the population (which is what ND people now make up, myself included) literally NEED something that was only invented in the last 20 years and preventing them from having it is going to cause them irreparable damage which is effectively what some parents argue.

anyway I digress - I agree with pp that you’re most likely to find your tribe either with religious home ed families who follow Charlotte mason etc OR with fairly traditional families in middle class areas whose kids probably go to school.

Also while I agree it’s important to expose your kids to lots of different views and ways of life, don’t let people shame you into allowing your kids to vape and join tiktok. People love to call others snobs on mumsnet but I think most of us could do with taking a leaf out of your book rather than the other way around.

Thank you for your words. I value all the varying feedback and opinions. I appreciate busy parents taking the time to read and comment. Our childhoods were just average 80s/90s semi-rural, mainstream schooling upbringing. Entirely unremarkable really, mostly happy and stable.

You control so much of their lives, why do you think they would become addicted etc whilst you still parent?

@RosemarySutcliffe you don't mention what age your DC are but in my (non homeschooling) experience what you are describing was easier at primary school age, more tricky at secondary school age. By the time they reach 11 they need to be learning broader life skills to prepare them for what comes next (work, higher education etc). On the whole though, it is less about the education and more about the values base you teach your children, and supporting them to take measured risks and assess situations for what they are. My success will be when I know my DC can handle what life throws at them - through their own resilience rather than wrapping them up in "how I would like life to be". Some of the interests you describe are perfectly achievable in a more urban area, more challenging in more rural areas where sheer population density means you have to work harder to find the opportunities. My DCs enjoy classical music poetry literature. But they also enjoy gaming (electronic and board games), sport, cinema, socialising. They tend to self regulate from the more unpleasant aspects of all of these. And it is great. I am so proud of them for feeling confident enough to be able to say to others, "no I am sorry but that is not for me". That is such a powerful skill to learn and one I was much older before I felt able to do.

My kids do all the things in your OP AND they manage to go to school! Aren’t we super wholesome (god that word gives me the dry boak)

Cadets? My children love it, they learn a wide range of skills as well as firearm use.

I’m glad that you’re thinking all this, personally I think it’s time to get your children into a school in this university town. I’d say your children are much more likely to become obsessed with various online temptations if they’re completely denied them.

I had a friend who had a childhood a bit like the one you’re trying to give your children – growing up in a remote hamlet, lots of gathering acorns, no television, baking their own bread, reading Milton to each other around the fire, the difference was she did attend my private girls school in the nearest town. She stayed pretty true to her family values, despite mixing with us more uncivilised types - we teased her a bit but it was very affectionate and she knew her mind. The way she went off the rails was becoming completely promiscuous in her teens but that could have happened anyway. She’s ended up pretty alternative but happy I think.

I sometimes say bloody hell if I step on a lego.

😱😱😱

I would suggest getting involved in local music groups which then lead to friendships, summer camps etc. as a child I was into books, music and although I did watch TV (some of those who I played with didn’t have TVs) I didn’t like video games etc. My orchestra and bands were brilliant and I remember spending weeks in the summer at day camps with sports and music.

I understand what you are saying in so far as it seems to become harder to find sufficient fellow kids that are happy, unencumbered, and resilient.

But there are plenty still around! My kids meet them in school, then see them in Scouts, in judo, in dance... You would struggle as a family that's not plugged into the community to find my kids or their friends though. They are not in the internet writing or responding to adds to meet up.

I do think you are trying to find a subset of three rather narrow pools: families looking to widen their social circles, families that share your educational values, and families that are happy+resilient+living life.

I don't think your values are wrong. But they do make it rather hard to find the families looking to widen their social circles, and families that are happy+resilient might also (like many) be out off that you are implying a causal link between lack of popular cultural knowledge and a superior kind of education.

Sorry, not much help. I would suggest you try and see if there's any way you can mentally widen some of your categories. Maybe if you don't equate your educational choices with "happy & healthy", you would find more families that are the latter that want to hang out, despite not sharing all your values.