In the homeschooling post, a common theme (and common to most homeschooling discussions) is socialization. Kids need it, it's easier to get in a public school
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I dunno, the description doesn't really jive with my experience of socialization at school. If we're talking about grade school, we all mixed on the playground before school, for a half-hour at 10:30 recess, an hour at lunch, and after school. Our parents mixed, too, so that usually opened the door to out-of-school playdates. I didn't really sit quietly in a room for all of our lessons, either - sure, we had some solo work, but we also had break-out group activities, PE in the gym, swimming lessons, choir and orchestra, etc.
I guess most schools probably aren't like that, but I think this post is just one characterization of how socialization might occur at school and my experience wasn't quite that... grim. :/
For the record, I grew up in half a dozen different provinces in Canada, and we played outside year-round, too. The school where I teach has set a benchmark of -20C to stay indoors in the winter, or pouring sleet/rain, and other than that, the kids are outside.
I'm not sure I'd choose to socialize like that, but it pretty much (minus the age similarity) defines 99% of the jobs I've had in my life. (The one it doesn't is the time I was a nanny and didn't have any coworkers.) And it taught me things like some people are stupid, occasionally you are the stupid one, and sometimes the boss/teacher doesn't know everything and that's okay. Some people will bail you out while others will rat you out, learn the difference quickly.
My students learn to sit at the same table and get along even if they don't love each other. They learn to work together in groups. They learn to be part of a team, as a group, a table, a class, a grade, a school. My students do activities as a large group, play games, and do projects together. They also play with kids in other classes and grades at recess, before and after school, and go to band and other special activities with various kids in their grade.
Students in public school socialize all day...are they specifically playing games/having free time all day? No. But that doesn't mean they're not learning social skills.
When you have a whole-class discussion, how often do the students actually talk to each other, addressing each other's points in some substantial way (arguing against them, elaborating on them, etc) versus how much of it is students taking turns to talk to you?
Now, your classroom may be very different from most, but in my experience by the time kids reach 6th grade they have been so socialized to the latter that it is very difficult to convince them to do any of the former, even with curriculum designed specifically for that purpose and teachers with several years of training and experience teaching that way. It usually takes a full semester before they start opening up; by 8th grade they're doing much better but still fall into the old style if you let them, since they're usually doing that still in their other classes (I work with science classes).
In our classroom we have 4 teachers, so we do a LOT of small group work/projects with teacher facilitation. Many of our students have special needs and require more support with discussions, but honestly, I think they also do a good amount of working together with varying levels of support from us--once a day or every other day depending on the groupings, they work on a subject with peers with minimal adult support.
They do a lot of adding to each other's points, and we have some types of lessons where we specifically try to get them to respond to each other (math congress)...it was slow going at first, but they really started to understand how to respectfully ask questions, disagree, and compare people's presentations by the time we'd done it a few times. Does that mean they always default to that? No, of course not-but it's something they're working on in their social interactions too, and it's hard for them at this age to disagree respectfully, give constructive criticism, and back up their points with examples.
That's...really not my experience of a grade school classroom. My kids' classes are interacting and working with each other all day long, not just in a couple of 15 minute blocks. Plus they mix up the classes regularly for specials (music, art, gym, or computers) that they have every day. IDK, I think that's a really biased description.
What are you on about? This post isn't biased at all!
You can phrase anything to sound bad. Like if I said to you, how would you like to be unconscious and paralyzed and hallucinating for 8 hours? That sounds a lot worse than if I ask you if you want to go to sleep.
LOL Are you really paralyzed when you sleep? I though there was something called sleep paralysis that's supposed to be really terrifying - because it isn't normal.
/tangent
I never think about this stuff. If anything, my kids are OVER socialized, between school, scouts, sports, religious education and camps. Like someone below said, I WISH I had my kids' ease at socialization and had their social life.
Well, you're paralyzed during REM sleep, anyway. The current thought is that it's our body's way of stopping us from acting out our dreams.
Sleep paralysis can either happen as you're falling asleep or when you're waking up. What happens is that your body is starting to prepare for REM sleep (or is just coming out of it), but you're conscious as the paralysis sets in (or it's still there when you wake up). It actually happened to me once and it was pretty scary!
Yeah, I'd say that I was pretty well socialized as a kid, too. Kids are just naturally social creatures.
That definitely wasn't my experience with school. As someone else said above, we had many chances to socialize - at recess, at lunch, during group work, during art class, during PE.
I think that homeschooling, if done properly, can certainly socialize a child. People that I know who homeschool tend to go out on "field trips" all the time with other homeschoolers. One concern that I would have would be that while my child might have lots of playtime and interaction with other children, they might not learn how to work in groups, which is definitely something that is necessary in adult life. It's really important for kids to learn how to share responsibilities, divide up labour, and incorporate other people's ideas with their own.
I also think that being in a classroom situation prepares you for university, when you'll have to sit through two or even three hour long lectures. I mean, assuming your kid decides to go on to post-secondary.
Unschooling, on the other hand, I am totally against, but that's another story.
Sports, clubs, and general family life can all teach a child to work with others who have different opinions.
That's true!
I think that my main issue with unschooling is the child-led part of the philosophy. I get that kids are natural learners, and that they'll be able to focus on their interests and really learn about them in depth and explore all kinds of stuff, but I worry that it would teach kids that life (and what they end up doing in life) happens on their own terms. In the vast majority of jobs, you couldn't just pick what you wanted to focus on and do that, know what I mean?
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I guess most schools probably aren't like that, but I think this post is just one characterization of how socialization might occur at school and my experience wasn't quite that... grim. :/
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Students in public school socialize all day...are they specifically playing games/having free time all day? No. But that doesn't mean they're not learning social skills.
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Now, your classroom may be very different from most, but in my experience by the time kids reach 6th grade they have been so socialized to the latter that it is very difficult to convince them to do any of the former, even with curriculum designed specifically for that purpose and teachers with several years of training and experience teaching that way. It usually takes a full semester before they start opening up; by 8th grade they're doing much better but still fall into the old style if you let them, since they're usually doing that still in their other classes (I work with science classes).
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They do a lot of adding to each other's points, and we have some types of lessons where we specifically try to get them to respond to each other (math congress)...it was slow going at first, but they really started to understand how to respectfully ask questions, disagree, and compare people's presentations by the time we'd done it a few times. Does that mean they always default to that? No, of course not-but it's something they're working on in their social interactions too, and it's hard for them at this age to disagree respectfully, give constructive criticism, and back up their points with examples.
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(The comment has been removed)
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You can phrase anything to sound bad. Like if I said to you, how would you like to be unconscious and paralyzed and hallucinating for 8 hours? That sounds a lot worse than if I ask you if you want to go to sleep.
Reply
/tangent
I never think about this stuff. If anything, my kids are OVER socialized, between school, scouts, sports, religious education and camps. Like someone below said, I WISH I had my kids' ease at socialization and had their social life.
Reply
Sleep paralysis can either happen as you're falling asleep or when you're waking up. What happens is that your body is starting to prepare for REM sleep (or is just coming out of it), but you're conscious as the paralysis sets in (or it's still there when you wake up). It actually happened to me once and it was pretty scary!
Yeah, I'd say that I was pretty well socialized as a kid, too. Kids are just naturally social creatures.
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I think that homeschooling, if done properly, can certainly socialize a child. People that I know who homeschool tend to go out on "field trips" all the time with other homeschoolers. One concern that I would have would be that while my child might have lots of playtime and interaction with other children, they might not learn how to work in groups, which is definitely something that is necessary in adult life. It's really important for kids to learn how to share responsibilities, divide up labour, and incorporate other people's ideas with their own.
I also think that being in a classroom situation prepares you for university, when you'll have to sit through two or even three hour long lectures. I mean, assuming your kid decides to go on to post-secondary.
Unschooling, on the other hand, I am totally against, but that's another story.
Reply
(The comment has been removed)
That's true!
I think that my main issue with unschooling is the child-led part of the philosophy. I get that kids are natural learners, and that they'll be able to focus on their interests and really learn about them in depth and explore all kinds of stuff, but I worry that it would teach kids that life (and what they end up doing in life) happens on their own terms. In the vast majority of jobs, you couldn't just pick what you wanted to focus on and do that, know what I mean?
Reply
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