According to a study of Canadian Home-Educated Adults, socialization of homeschoolers is a non-issue. This is a follow-up of a study done in 1994 that only had positive things to say about homeschooling. 15 years later they re-surveyed as many of these same people as possible and it showed that adult homeschoolers were pretty content with their lives. In short, the study revealed the following: *Out of 226 the respondents to the second survey, only three people had not completed nor were working on their eduction. These three people were gainfully employed. *Homeschooled adults were more likely than the general … Continue reading →

I observed the following twitter conversation today (I am paraphrasing as I remember it): Comment 1: (From adult male) I coach a bunch of homeschooled students. They are a very distinctive bunch. Comment 2: (same person) It’s interesting that the girls have the same distinctive speech pattern as the boys. Comment 3: (From teenage girl) I’ve only met one homeschooled person whose personality did not scream HOMESCHOOL but his parents ran a COOP so it was like a school. Needless to say, I was perturbed. To the first person, I wanted to scream “What? Do you mean proper English?!!!” That … Continue reading →

I will start by saying if you know me and my son personally, don’t let him know I wrote this. He has a killer evil eye. Anyway, I just finished reading a slew of comments on the blog of someone who was asking questions about homeschooling. Most of the comments said something to the effect of homeschoolers are socially awkward, blah, blah, blah. The truth is that many homeschoolers are socially awkward, including my son. Many homeschoolers are also not socially awkward. My son was born … different. He has always been a serious person, and while mischievous as a … Continue reading →

This morning as I drove my kids to their homeschool program my son said, “My friend … said homeschool kids are unsocialized”. Considering the fact that the person in question is also homeschooled, I had to wonder why he would say such a thing. It was akin to my mother’s old habit of telling “yo-mama” jokes… to her own kids. I used to always stop her and say, “You know you’re talking about yourself right”. Of course, that is what made her jokes really funny. Somehow having a homeschooled child inform a bunch of other homeschooled children that they are … Continue reading →

One of the more common questions posed to homeschoolers asks if it is not wise for students to be exposed to numerous teachers over the years. This question is asked because some have the impression that the only person that teaches homeschooler of their questions. Of course homeschooling parents know that they are not the font of all knowledge and supply a wide array to teachers for their children. For this reason, the answer to this question is yes, children should be exposed to different teachers, and most homeschooling kids are. As I wrote Teachers That Influenced My Homeschooling Journey … Continue reading →

While I don’t necessarily agree with everything Dr. Laura Schlesinger says, or rather how she says it, I was delighted this morning to receive a link to her blog this morning and a post she made on homeschooling. Dr. Laura’s blog post was entitled, Home-Schooling Does Not Hamper Socialization. Now this is not a huge revelation, I have mentioned it many, many times. The fact that Dr. Laura took the time to put it in her blog, in a way gives homeschooling a bit more credibility, or it at least gives homeschooling families a reason to do little I-told-you-so dance. … Continue reading →

I have been observing as my homeschooled kids enter and exit the middle school years, that the socialization that public school advocates say our kids so sorely need actually cannot be avoided. Outside of keeping our kids under a rock, if they spend any time at all in the real world, they will butt heads with the clicks, the bullies, and the manipulators. This phenomenon is intensified when parents pull their kids out of public school to homeschool in the upper grades. When you take a kid that has already been socialized, and often in a negative way, and throw … Continue reading →

Yesterday I addressed the assumption that homeschoolers may turn out to be poor citizens. Realizing that this accusation is just another way to make homeschooling appear inferior, just like the socialization issue, it is still important for homeschoolers to work to invalidate such statements. Helping your homeschooled children become good citizens is actually quite simple. The most important thing you can do is model good citizenship. Here are some steps you can take. Teach students history of their country, state, and locality. Also, teach them history according to their heritage. This of course can happen in the course of homeschooling. … Continue reading →

There seems to be a lot of attention paid to Muslim and Islamic homeschooling in the news. Very little of it is favorable. It is labeled as a form of indoctrination of children, and of sexism toward Muslim girls. I have also noticed that other homeschoolers are criticizing these Muslim homeschoolers. It is not my goal to debate whether Muslim homeschoolers should or should not be able to teach their children according to their own beliefs or customs. We all know that Muslim culture greatly differs from American Culture and that strictly practicing Muslims who choose to homeschool do it … Continue reading →