What About Socialization?

“The quintessential homeschool question is, ‘What about socialization?'” Roe says. “Some people think that because we educate our children at home, we never let them out of the house.”

She says her son Lucas described the situation perfectly. “He said we never controlled the quantity of his interactions with others, but we did have the ability to control the quality.”

Hills says there are countless opportunities for homeschoolers to have quality interactions within the community. “If an organization is open to the community, it is open to homeschoolers,” she says. Her son Richard was involved in an elite swim club throughout high school, and her younger son, Victor, landed a gig singing in a barbershop group.

“Homeschoolers in my co-op worked at the zoo; they held jobs; they ministered to people,” she said. “They can look outside of the artificial world of just their own age group. They really knew how life worked. It made them more grateful, and it made them more humble.”

Her son Richard agrees. He says that while he occasionally felt out of the loop with teenage fads or slang, he benefitted greatly from the ability to act as and interact with adults.