But what about SOCIALIZATION? | The truth about homeschoolers and social skills 

I went to Public school and I’m a total introvert. I grew up having a ton of friends but the only friend I still have is my sister. She’s my absolute best friend. I’m homeschooling my two kiddos and our number one focus is family connection. 😊

My daughter went to school, didn't see any of the children outside of school. Not one student came over to play, all the parents were super awkward and apologetic toward eachother. When schools close down from covid, she gained so many friends in the neighborhood, it was wonderful. We've been homeschooling ever since. Homeschooling has far too many benefits to list honestly.

I'm a mother! And watching this video from Pakistan where homeschooling is still very rare, I really needed to hear these words from an experienced home schooler. Thank you so much for making this extremely useful video.

As a previous public school teacher I can't even begin to tell you how often I said or heard other teachers tell Elementary age students that they werent there to socialize. 😂 also when lunch or lines or classroom management runs long kids often miss out on their short recess and get very little time in play and interacting with others their own age. Some teachers do better. Most don't. Agree with the friends and coworkers in similar life stage not age. We love getting together with large families and childrens of different ages for our children to play with.

I can't agree more that kids don't need a lot of friends and how it's about quality over quantity, even as a mom of an only child. Also so much "yes!" on what you said about overcompensating and your closing statement. Oh, the irony of people talking so much about diversity while pushing for everyone else to be just like them.🙄 I wish people would be smart enough to actually research homeschooling before jumping into ridiculous assumptions and generalizations. If they don't want it for themselves, that's fine, but they should not just throw around baseless judgments parroted from other ignorant fools. 🙃 My daughter is one of the most consistently happy/friendly girls I know and handles frustrations/sadness well. She doesn't have crazy roller coaster emotions and is truly mature for her age, yet still has the innocence and wonder of a child. I know it's mostly because that's how God made her but I also believe being homeschooled and living with happily married parents and one set of grandparents has a lot to do with her being secure and content/peaceful.

LOVED this! I’m going to be homeschooling my kiddos and the socialization part has been my biggest concern really. I was actually talking about it with my husband today, so this was wonderful timing for me haha Also loved the ending about better to have a saved soul even if it means they’re a little “weird” (whatever that means nowadays looking around) point!

When my cousin found out that my daughter is homeschooled her initial question was "what about their social skills?". I tried my best to explain that my daughter will grow up just fine but she is not convinced. Sigh.. some people are really ignorant.

Great video and I couldn’t agree more! I homeschool my kids, oldest is 5 and she is extroverted while I am introverted. She wants to play with her neighborhood friends everyday; while I think a few times a week is more than enough. I try to keep her needs priority over mine but I sometimes feel very guilty saying no you can’t have this friend over because you saw her yesterday when I know if she were in traditional school she would see her friends everyday. I do think it’s so much more important for her to have healthy relationships with her siblings, so I prioritize that over friend time. I find it hard to let go of the guilt and feeling like I need to schedule in play dates and activities to overcompensate!

I am reading Gabor Mate's "Hold on to Your Kids". Its amazing so far! Speaks directly to the idea of friendship within the family unit

So before I even watch this… I started a new job recently and when my coworker found out I was homeschooled she said “I would have never known you were homeschooled! You don’t seem like it.”. I was wondering what did she think we act like? Should I be speaking elvish and wear a cape? Cry when I hear a bad word? In my experience there are weird people in the school system AND weird people who are homeschooled (I think that’s dependent on parenting and personalities). Most homeschoolers I know are very sociable and do just fine in the “real world”.

Couldn't have said it better myself. You are spot on momma. My issue is that a lot of kids aren't being raised the way I am raising my wn kiddos and end up teach my kids bad habits. For that reason, we tend to keep to ourselves 🤷🏼‍♀️ it does keep us a close knit little family which I did not have growing up. I love your video. Thank you for letting us join you and your homeschool ❤

Oh my goodness! Say it again, louder for the people in the back!! As aanother second gen homeschooler I agree with this video so much!!! I feel like I have this conversation with people every day!

I love this! My kids are currently too young but we plan on homeschooling and this issue has come up when talking with others. My son turns 3 tomorrow and he is great friends with the girl next door who is 11 years old. In the school holidays she is at our house for atleast an hour everyday and they both love it. She is a little gem and that is quite the age gap

Wonderful insights and ageless advice that crosses cultures and generations. Especially what was said at the 15 min and 22 min marks. We homeschool and can attest to what was said in this video to be true. I was looking for a video to share with a family friend about socializing while homeschooling and this hit all the major points. If I may add something, some of the geniuses in modern history were "homeschooled". Homeschooled is in inverted commas because some geniuses were schooled by a tutor hired by their uncle after their biological parents died. These findings were published in a study done back in the 1950s, and has major implications for homeschooling and peer "socialization" as we know it. The conclusions would be quite radical (in a good way) by today's standards.

I loved this message so much! The next time someone tries to talk to me about home school and socializing, I’m directing them to this video ❤

Wonderfully said!! I think I definitely did to much her kindergarten year, to many co/opa and to many activities so I was definitely burned out after this year and going to make a change.

I’m in your position: I was homeschooled from the age of ten, my husband only went to public school, planning to homeschool my own (too young currently). I couldn’t have said any of this better. You nailed this. I love it and am definitely sharing. Thank you. I do think some people make these comments because they don’t like that most homeschoolers do it for religious reasons. They know they can’t necessarily argue your beliefs but they can attack the supposed well being of your child as if they have genuine concern for your kid.

Love, love, love this!! So encouraging and reassuring! I so agree with the mixed age groups. So much magic can happen when you have a group of kids of varying ages playing together. The young ones may have the ideas but not know how to carry them out, where as, the older ones do have the skills to carry it out. Its beautiful to see the team work, learning and social skills that are being used when in situations like that.

Love this! Thank you!

PREACH!! 🙌🙌

I loved this video! It was very timely as this is our first year homeschooling and I went to public school so I am trying to navigate how to handle socialization. I especially loved the end of this video. It was very well done. Thank you!!

Love this! Thank you for touching on this topic and clearing this huge Myth within homeschooling ❤

Yes yes yes to all of this! Great video🥰

We are originally in dance for socialization bc my kids are so shy. And it’s been great and they love ballet. We also can’t do a co-op. Then we decided kids needed swim lessons and didn’t want to pause dance. Man it was exhausting swim has ended and I’m really grateful and we won’t be doing that again if we need more swim lessons then dance has no choice but to pause.

First gen homeschoolers (since Covid). It could simply be the personality of my kids - or perks of homeschool - I see my kids BETTER able to have conversations with other people, especially adults, than their peers. My kids are involved in sports, classes at our library, co-op, etc. so they most certainly are getting socialization!!

Wow thank you !!!!

Very encouraging video. I liked what you said about the quality of friends instead of the quantity. My son is an only child and we had concerns about homeschooling him because of the social aspect. After experiencing a few months of him being in public school, we are leaning more towards homeschooling him. My friend has 5 kids and homeschools them and is going to meet with me this week to give me some information. Thank you for your video!

I am currently homeschooling my 5 & 8 year old. I attended public school my entire academic life and didn’t know anyone who was homeschooled. I know A LOT of individuals who are socially awkward, anti-social and extremely introverted. None of them were homeschooled.

Agree, wholeheartedly! I have 4 kids I'm homeschooling, two of which are highschoolers who were public schooled for almost all of it. I can tell you - they're weird too😂 Also, my daughter (15) lets know how all her past friends from our old town are all into drugs and sex, so I think I'll stick with what we're doing.

Amen!!!!

Do you have videos with your mom on your yt? If so, do you have one about building a family culture in homeschooling and how she modeled that? Blessings xx

My daughter is 7 and we have been homeschooling since kindergarten. We do quite a bit of activities with other kids but my daughter hasn't ever made a 'best friend' per say. She'll have so much fun playing but won't even ask the kids their names 🫣do you think with your experience being homeschooled this is enough at this age?

I'm a first generation homeschooler in my family. This is the number one comment, "What about socialization?" I hear from all my friends and family when they learn we are homeschooling; and repeatedly hear from them 4 years later. My mother just last week said it to me; and she is even on board with me homeschooling. She with heartfelt concern on her face, "What about them being weirdos, like super weird?" It's really starting to get under my skin; and I'm now trying to figure out a better short and concise response. I think it is actually a thought stopping technique that as soon as the person says it; it stops them from critically thinking of the true pros and cons of homeschooling. And inhibits their thinking from considering all the many wonderful benefits of homeschooling as compared to mass schooling; which there are a plethora. (USA)

My children are social butterflies 😂😂😂😂 I admit I made that assumption about homeschooled children before though. My eldest child went to public school for the entire school career and she is by far my most socially awkward child (love you honey but its true) my second oldest is autistic and he went to public to grade 3 and has been honeschooled for 3 years and he was tormented at school and had terrible social skills and no confidence on himself and now hes a social butterfly still awkward but hes autistic so. My two youngest children strictly homeschooled extremely social, confident children.

I think public school has led to higher divorce rates. Let me explain. The public school mindset is that kids should only be with same age peers. For class time, for lunchtime, for recess. The same group all the time. Even up into high school a kid will often want to know whether a certain friend is in a new class with them. The class doesn't matter, the kid's interests or talents won't matter. It's they want friends in the class with them. It's like this culture where you have a bubble of people that are everything to you. They have to be with you all the time. It's quite restrictive because kids will sacrifice something they may be interested in or good at because the bubble public school started them with are not interested in it. I see it all the time with groups of public school kids where if one kid in the friend bubble starts an art class after school at a community center the bubble will start to push them out. That one individual interest or activity is weird to the collective group. And then they group up and expect spouses to be the same. Their other half, the same as them, with the same interests and activities and that they should only do things together. And the spouses do not get to grow as individuals within a relationship and often eventually split up so their individual needs can be met.

my son wants to be an introvert an do his own thing an i get so much grief on that from people. i have offered for him to do activities he just doesn't want to do it. my daughter only wants one friend out side the house an apparently people say it is not enough.

I think homeschoolers hear the comments and struggle with the comments!!! I know I’ve had discussions about this topic with family members who believe my kids will be weird but they want my kids in sex only schools and I know my kids would struggle with that!!! Ppl’s ignorance annoys me!!! When my kids where at school they had friends who where in different year groups!!! I remind my family that I’m outgoing and I party homeschooled as a kid!!! My kids love hanging out with kids of all ages!!! I have friends who are older than me and I know my 2 in classes are already preparing for that with their social hangouts as I hear awesome stuff!!! Homeschool doesn’t take as long as public school so there is more time to socialise!!! Our school system offers extra curricular activities to homeschoolers!!!

I am worried about having a only child then to homeschooling her.

my youngest is working with the Ministry of Education with speech and language and not im basically hunted by them because my kids dont want to socialise with the whole world.

Are any of your kids extroverts? I’m an introvert with majority extroverted kids. 😮

For some reason I don’t think I’m getting your weekly emails. I got the first one but that’s it 😅

I homeschool to not socialize...I real don't like being around people. I dont like it because of church, the more I learned about the lord and jesus the more depressed and miserable I became. I cant be near people for fear of god who for me is evil and dangerous..but thats me if it makes your heart happy go with it.