Socialization &
Home-schooling
One of the many disputable matters within our culture is choosing
how our children will be educated.
When considering their education, there seems to be many
appropriate options. Yet,
the challenge of applying Deuteronomy 6:4-9 is puzzling at times.
Obviously, home-schooling is one of the many options we have in
our attempt to practice what God wants for the family.
And within the subject of home-schooling, socialization is
inevitably a hot topic. Many
feel its home-schooling’s weakest point.
The concern is that the home-schooled child may not be equipped
to function well in society. Does
the nature of home-schooling inherently isolate children from their
peers and develop in them a narrow perspective?
That’s a good question.
This discussion brings with it an edge though, there shouldn’t be
because we all care about these things. When
talking about socialization, I find it difficult to know where to start
or leave off because it’s part of a much larger picture than our
children’s education.
Hopefully, I can slide into the train of thought and then end without
being too abrupt.
Technically, socialization means “to make someone fit for
companionship with others”.
This is pretty straight forward.
But there’s still a few questions left unanswered.
For example: what values drive our children’s training? Values always define culture,
and lead the way for training. This training then equips the child to
function within the given culture, making them fit companions for others
within that culture.
Consider for a moment children growing up in the racial wars of a large
urban center. Here we find a
gang culture, one that takes a new member and initiates them with
beatings. Why? Because it helps
the member survive the violence they will encounter.
Survival is valuable in their culture.
Is the training helpful?
Well, I suppose it is.
But what if one of these young people desire to change to another
culture? Can they
make the transition?
Probably, but their old socialization will be of little help to them in
this new system. More often
than not, their old socialization becomes an obstacle.
It becomes very difficult for the young person to adjust to the
nuances of a new value system.
Shifting back to public education we find that the public school system also has an approach to socialization. They embark on a training program that aligns with the values of the State. Without going into a long rabbit trail about these values, let’s just say they lie in two areas: First is the need for national and state educational standards that produce vocationally specialized individuals for the work place. This is necessary for our nation to compete globally and remain economically healthy. The second follows the first in that these individuals must be trained to survive the rigors of this economic framework and thrive. These values determine the training of our children. Now, not everyone buys into this agenda. And because of that, an ‘us-and-them’ mentality is created. That’s probably why socialization is a loaded topic. Values are emotional.
“We are preparing them for life.”
The State will say about the training of our children, and that’s true.
They are preparing them for a certain kind of life.
The problem is that the State assumes a common value system among
us, one
that doesn’t exist. There is no
universally held value system and it’s presumptuous to think so.
Public school
socialization follows the State’s values.
Once under the State’s care, the children are passed from one
class to another without any stable, long term mentor. The teachers and
administrators, though well-meaning, don’t have the ability or time
to be primary care-givers for the children simply because of the sheer
numbers involved. Teachers
are taxed to the limit trying to manage group dynamics, instead of being
able to nurture each individual.
The effect toward their teachers are often disrespect & distain at best, rebellion &
violence at worst. Teachers
become frustrated, hoping simply to survive and touch a few individuals
in the process. Few, if any, are
satisfied with the status quo.
Yet, it remains a career with great potential impact.
Supervision looms as another concern. There’s just not enough
workers to go around.
So, the children tend to raise each other, defining values and
instituting policy. Their
lives become a milieu of tension, competition and exploitation.
Most kids are sentenced to twelve or more years of being raised
by their peers where the socialization revolves around impulsiveness and
instinct. These create an
atmosphere of status, in-groups and instant gratification.
This form of
socialization tends to compete with the academic training they being
given and breeds superficiality.
Consider personal discipline.
What happens when you allow a child to develop their own habits
and routine? The
outcome is seldom successful.
Failure is always someone else’s fault.
They hide in the mass, trying to slide by.
They lie to buy time.
And even when a child is confronted, the teachers don’t have the time to
help them change. Eventually
their habits follow them into the work place and the nation wonders why
it can’t compete in the global economy.
Consider also what happens when one’s culture is limited to a
specific age-group? They
develop their own language and idioms that are created to keep others
out and reward the privileged.
They disdain and distrust those outside the group and become
blind to others. Once out of
school they gravitate to those who act like their peers, young or old.
With little sense of history or the future, they live in a cocoon
of peers traveling through the moment, together.
As the State seeks to train specialized individuals for the task
of economic health, it seems to subvert its own mission by creating
citizens who can’t inter-act outside their own world.
So, which is more important: economic viability or relational
health? Focusing on
one is very different than focusing on the other.
For some parents, the priority is
not to have global economic health, but to raise their children
according to their own values. And
I think we can all see that children who are relationally healthy have a
better chance of impacting the global community in a positive way.
Within alternative training, like home-schooling, children can be
made vocationally viable, well educated and globally sensitive, but
usually as a second priority.
This creates tension with the State, not because the State
doesn’t allow exceptions to the rule, but that the rule can’t be
home-schooling. It’s too
unmanageable, too many variables for the maintaining of their economic
agenda.
Personally, I would prefer that the children acquire the tools to interact with people of various ages, rather than
frozen in a graded system of peers. I
would prefer to help them fall in love with learning, taking advantage
of those ‘windows of opportunity’ where the light goes on, when they
have real questions. I would see it as my job to develop a lifestyle
where I’m available during those ‘windows’, realizing you can’t schedule
them and call them ‘quality time’. I
would prefer to teach children at the pace they can absorb, processing
questions as they arise rather than forcing them into a
one-size-fits-all program. I would prefer to enter a lifestyle of
business with them, exposing the children to the benefits, purpose and
joy of work. There we can
expose children to the real-world of employment, helping them to be
comfortable around adults in the work force.
This is infinitely better than simulations and role play.
Personally, I would prefer that
siblings become friends, rather than demeaning each other and running
off to their peers, ultimately scattering the family to the winds.
Even though the public
school system is committed to broadening perspective, the dynamics we’ve
been talking about actually make the children narrow and isolated.
The odd thing is that those who advocate public school argue that
home-schooling produces narrow and isolated children.
That’s odd. But, I
don’t think this narrow and isolated effect is really the fault of the
public school system. The problem seems to be located where you have
economically-driven values as a priority.
When your primary goal is financial you have narrowness and
isolation. In our culture
with its dual-income generating marriages, we find the same thing at
work. It’s not deliberate
it’s just a consequence of economic choice.
Spouses seldom see each other
beyond evenings and weekends, and then it’s in the context of competing
with entertainment and the pursuit of peace.
They spend most of their waking hours around people other than
their family.
“Didn’t we get married and have children so that we could live
life together?” They muse. “How
did we get like this? We can make
money and spend it. But there
just seems to be something wrong." Many
live in a continuous state of dissatisfaction, making sure that the
cycle continues in their children.
How do the children fare in all this?
Not very well.
They tend to lack sympathy because of an over-developed focus on
self. They’re bankrupt of
empathy because they're trying to survive in an exploitive environment.
Sure, there are exceptions to the rule, children who are able
to cope and flourish within the public school system.
Children who connect with a teacher and in the process find a
bond. But that’s the
exception, not the rule. So,
parents struggle searching for an answer and sigh.
All the while the State stands by impatiently waiting for its
economic agenda to be fulfilled.
The State needs workers, parents want their children.
“Can’t we have both?”… That’s
a question true to form.
The problem isn’t
having numerous educational alternatives.
The problem is priority. One will trump the other.
In our culture we do need state
and national standards of education to meet our economic
responsibilities, there is no getting around that.
Yet, most leaders can’t even
define ‘national economic health’.
Meanwhile, the children must be nurtured and loved. They need
mentors, who in a one-on-one context can be self-sacrificial.
Only parents are willing or able to do this.
Only parents will pay the price that this choice demands.
Of course, we haven’t talked about the parents who aren’t able to
do this or parents who would use this as a cover for laziness. These are
topics for another discussion all together.
But, in the end I think you can see how socialization is part of
a very long train of thought.
And it’s here where I think I’ll stop.
Socialization is important, on
that we all agree. But when it
comes to narrowness and isolation, we need to realize these can happen
in any system. Today, we still maintain some personal freedoms in our country.
We still have the ability to choose and act on our own value
system.
These choices will define our personal culture and produce an
approach to socialization. In the training of children, parents will
always have to struggle with priorities. It’s not a new or easy thing.
Something is always lost in the choice.
May we only lose money and not the relationship within our
families.