Thomas and Nanci Kuykendall

>From: megates@...
Another of my children spent many a "moms and kids"
>gathering sitting on my lap and not interacting with anyone.

I have one like that. He does well in more intimate settings or out in
public (saying "Hi" to people in stores, etc) but he gets overwhelmed in
"Moms ans Tots" situations where there are just too many kids and adults
together. He cries for 20 minutes when we arrive, and spends the rest of
the time hiding from the other children. He would play inside when they
were in the yard, upstairs when they were down, etc. We stopped going
alltogether. It was too much for me, as I am mostly introverted as well,
and I would end up exhausted. My other, older son seemed to really enjoy
the other kids, as he is quite extroverted and gregarious and hyperactive.
But he would get TOO wound up from the amount of people as well, and would
end up having a melt-down every time.

Nanci K.

[email protected]

It can be hard to find the balance. My extrovert also melts down after a
lot of time with other kids, yet will continue to beg to play with
others.
Mary Ellen

> My other, older son seemed to really
> enjoy
> the other kids, as he is quite extroverted and gregarious and
> hyperactive.
> But he would get TOO wound up from the amount of people as well, and
> would
> end up having a melt-down every time.
>
> Nanci K.

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>>> They argue that homeschooled children are very precious while young,
but they often turn into odd maladapted adults who struggle in their
relationships.>>>

I'd like to hear these people prove that the schools turn out
well-adapted adults. High divorce rates, dysfunctional families, lots of
depressed people, etc. Unless you live in an isolated, rural area, it is
likely that your unschooled child will end up becoming involved in
activities as she grows and will have plenty of opportunity to interact
with others. Besides, children learn how to "relate" to others within
the family first.

I'm with Dawn. I wish I could say no to more of the numerous
opportunities my children have to spend with others. Monday was a school
holiday so they played with neighborhood schooled friends. Tuesday, dd
was invited to a neighbor's house, then both dd spent the evening with
friends while I attended the babysitting co-op meeting. Today,
homeschooled friends came to play from 11 to 3, then we went roller
skating for two hours. Tomorrow we have girl scouts (a homeschool
troop). Friday they will come with me to a LLL meeting, where there will
be other children. This week is a little busier than usual, but fairly
typical.
Mary Ellen
Gain weight... Stay Active... Get Smarter...
New Year's Resolutions are EASY for Babies!
<Hi and Lois>

Candy

How true!! My daughter is 4, but we have always known we were going to hs. When it would come up in conversation, I would get the usual blow off statement "Oh, I couldn't hs MY children, they are too social for that." My daughter is I think, the most social person I know. Not only do we hs, but she is also an only child. She has many friends, she is involved with theater groups, gymnastics, and she has a whole lot of fun doing beauty pageants. With the pageants, she gets to do charity work, have parties, ect. Courtney nearly always has something going, and is about the busiest 4 year old I know. I think many people say comments like that because they have misconceptions about home schooling. Same goes with pageantry. They don't see the whole picture, I think they get hung up on one aspect, and don't find out any more.
I completely agree that hs children are, from what I have seen, at least as much, if not more social than ps children.
Candy Oliver
----- Original Message -----
From: donabak
To: [email protected]
Sent: Saturday, January 12, 2002 7:36 PM
Subject: [Unschooling-dotcom] Re: Ex-Husbands Who Used to Support Homeschooling


I appreciated your comments on socialization, Bridget. Something that
I have been doing since starting with unschooling in November is to
log the number of hours that my kids socialize. Amazingly, I see the
time going up, compared to when they were in school.

A parent of a ps student told me flat out that I was exaggerating
because "all the time in school the kids are socializing" I wonder if
this parent spends much time in the classroom and sees what happens
when children try to socialize in class ... they get ridiculed or
worse, put in the hallway. I will grant that they do get to freely
socialize on the playground for about 1 1/2 hour during the day.

Because I feel less stressed with the kids being at home and because
they don't have homework at night, I allow their friends to come over
almost every night. They socialize between 3 and 5 hours a day during
the week and as many as 12 hours per day on the weekends, not
including the nights they have sleepovers. How much more social do
they need to be???

I have also been fed the argument that my kids won't be able to
identify with their ps buddies as they won't have the same
experiences and won't have any reason to maintain their relationships
(eg. school dances, field trips etc.) To this I respond, that I have
kept in contact with a grand total of 1 (one) friend from my
junior/senior high school years out of the 600 people I graduated
with. The school environment did not help me foster life-long
friendships.

My kids didn't play with kids from their ps school anyway. I sent
them to a school outside of our designated district, so for the most
part, their friends are our neighbours, not their classmates.
Comments?

Dona




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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[email protected]

In a message dated 4/21/02 8:12:22 AM Central Daylight Time,
[email protected] writes:

<< I think that with all that is happen in our public schools today, it
is time we reclaim the "S" word for ourselves. When someone questions
you about socialization, don't be defensive about it. In fact mount
an offense, >>

I love doing that. One of my favorite questions for parents of toddlers was
"Is she/he a social person?"
Inevitably the answer would be yes.....then I could say "OH, but how did
he/she gain social skills without being in school?"
It usually causes people to do the round mouthed "OH" like a lightbulb came
on for the first time!!!
Ren