RECENTLYI received this article the other day and thought that I would share it. It really assured me on some things:
Q: DO YOU THINK HOME SCHOOLING MIGHT NEGATIVELY IMPACT THE SOCIALIZATION PROCESS?
A: This is the question homeschooling parents hear most often from curious (or critical) friends and relatives. What if teaching at home somehow isolates the kids and turns them into oddballs? For you and all those parents who see this issue as the great danger of home education, I would respectfully disagree.
To remove a child from the classroom is not necessarily to confine him to the house. And once beyond the schoolyard, the options are practically unlimited. Home-school support groups are surfacing in community after community across the country. Some are highly organized and offer field trips, teach co-ops, tutoring services, social activities, and vairous other assistances and resources. There are home-schooling athletic leagues and orchestras. Even if you're operating completely on your own, there are outings to museums and parks, visits to farms, factories, hospitals and seats of local government. There are friends to be invied over and relatives to visit. The list is limitless.
The great advantage to home schooling, in fact, is the protection it provides to vulnerable children from the wrong kind of socialization. When children interact in large groups, the strongest and most aggressive kids quickly intimidate the weak. I am absolutely conviced that bad things happen to immature and "different" boys and girls when they are thrown into the highly competitive world of other children. When this occurs in nursery school or kindergarten, they learn to fear their peers. Research shows that if these tender children can be kept at home for a few years and shielded from the impact of social pressure, they tend to be more confident, more independent and often emerge as leaders three or four years later!
**boy, does this man know my family, or what?!!?
Peace & Happiness,
Dana
xoxo