Home Ed Questions: what about socialisation?

Last week, a reporter and cameraman from the BBC visited our house to do a feature about home education. It was great fun, a real adventure for the kids to be interviewed! The team spent 90 minutes at our house, but of course they had to condense that down to a couple of minutes for the feature, and sadly the kids' interviews didn't make the cut. (A transcript article of the feature is here)

I had put my hand up for doing this because the reporter had every intention to make this a positive piece on home education, and so it was; the premise was to try and answer why there had been such an uptick in home education in the past few years. They interviewed two mothers, probably strategically chosen: me as the one who always wanted to home educate, and the other mum as someone who felt she had to due to her son's needs. 

They interviewed me at length, and of course only a few seconds of that made it to the screen, but inevitably it was the part to do with social skills that they chose - what are my kids missing out on? 

And despite knowing they'd ask me that, because that's what everyone asks, I couldn't help but shoot from the hip when he asked if I wasn't worried about my kids missing out by not going to school and mixing with others there: I just quipped back that if anything, I'm worried about the school kids missing out on real life! And in this post I want to go into the topic of socialisation a bit more.

Perceptions

Here's a true story from a few months ago. We were in Sweden for a conference where I was working (I volunteer to do this on condition that Mr. and the kids get to come along for the experience) and at lunchtime, one deaf lady was sitting on her own - finishing her meal after her friends had left. N, then 8, noticed and went to sit and chat with her until she had finished lunch. The lady then came up to me and said how lovely and kind N was.

Not ten minutes later, I was in a conversation with another person telling them that my kids didn't go to school, and the same lady, without the slightest sense of irony, asked: "But how will they ever learn social skills?"

What to say to that?

In conversation

Socialisation - in what context?

I think the key question to ask, if we accept the idea that children need socialising (and of course, I do agree children need to learn how to function well in society), is: in what context? 

School is an entirely artificial fishbowl of relationships that is uniquely different from what happens in real life. At no point in real life does anyone have to spend their working hours with 30+ people who were all born within less than 12 months of each other, and be expected to get along with them all despite having no interests in common; the only similarity being their age. 

In real life and work, I have to socially get along with people of a variety of different backgrounds, ideas, abilities, and ages. In school, children have no opportunity to learn how to do that. My home educated children practice getting along with a variety of diverse people every day. They count among their friends people from toddler to pensioner, and their friendships are based on shared interests and personality rather than forced upon them by giving them a limited pool of 30 peers.

That's why I said I was worried, if anything, about what school children are missing out on. Quite apart from the age proximity - which can breed attitudes like anyone older than those in my class is scary, anyone younger is a baby - schools usually draw from their location, so the children all come from a similar neighbourhood and therefore, a similar socio-economic background. In fee paying schools it's even worse, a fishbowl of the wealthy with the occasional scholarship kid thrown in who is routinely made to feel they are less than. 

My kids have no concept of the things school kids tend to be hung up about. They don't care what brands they wear (or anyone else wears), and they usually can't even tell exactly how old another child is. What they think about is, do these clothes fit and feel good? Are these other kids kind and fun to be around? This is because they are not socialised in the artifice of school classes but in the real world.

So are they different?

Yes, my kids are different. I am routinely told by people - most recently a delivery driver who came to drop a package at our house just as we were leaving, so the kids were already outside and met him before I did - just how kind or polite or nice my kids are. This is because they see every person on their own merits, rather than categorising them in the way schoolchildren do: peer, authority (adult) or irrelevant. 

Sure, this doesn't happen on its own, it is very much our values and the way we as parents relate to people and who we mix with, that shapes how the children relate to people. What they see as normal. But that is exactly why I want to be in charge of shaping their outlook - rather than leaving that to the immaturity of their peers.

D(7) serving at the Cathedral's Christmas dinner for people who 
would otherwise be on their own for Christmas

N(9) sitting between two friends she made - pensioners - at the 
Cathedral Christmas lunch

Social doesn't just happen: Intentionality

At school, the "socialisation" is by default: every day they have to go there and get along somehow. For a home educator, social contacts happen all the time and naturally, but friendships for the kids do require intentionality on the parents' parts. Our kids attend various regular weekly groups, both for home ed kids (like our co-op, gymnastics and such) and for school kids (N is a footballer with a local team, D goes to St John's Ambulance Badgers) so they do see plenty of other children regularly, but to nourish and enable real friendships it is up to the parents to find time for meet-ups outside those groups. Informal walks, playground meets, or playdates are incredibly important but they don't happen unless we decide to make them happen.

This is often a case of diary juggling, where two or more families with multiple children between them try and find a time that everyone can make, and a place to go... and as home educators we don't all live in the same neighbourhood either so this usually involves travel across the city. Unless we make it happen, it doesn't happen.

Playdates with specific kids aside, thanks also to the rise of home education in the past few years, there are also many regular informal meet-ups like that where we can just show up when we have the time and meet people we know. 

And that is perhaps another lesson in living real life. Sure, most people go to work and have a set of relationships there, but many don't make real friends at work - friends and friendships need maintaining, need intentionality, because you don't just go to work/school every day to see them. So my kids are learning that, too.