Forget Socialization - Let's Have Civilization

I have mentioned before on this blog that in answer to the "what about socialization" question, it's okay to admit that the truth is that we're not really interested in much of what is involved in said "socialization." In fact, I often feel like turning this around and asking (in all honesty) those with kids in any type of school, "Yes, what ABOUT socialization? How do you deal with that?" It seems like hard work. Oh, but do you mean, "How do you learn how to get along with other people in society?" That's a different question, and it seems like such a ridiculous one to ask of homeschoolers that I always want to play dumb and act like that's not what people are asking. We would have to go out of our way to avoid interacting with anyone, and anyone with a large-ish family knows you don't even have to leave the house to encounter learning how to live with different personalities.

Anyway, this still comes up from time to time, of course, and I always think about the irony of it when my kids are with their slew of friends. This happened a few weeks ago when Dave and I were taking our Bible quiz team to a quiz meet (I should really discuss the merits of Bible quizzing sometime, but that's for another day). We had our five children, three from another family, and two from yet another family. All told, we were in a 15 passenger van with a mix of boys and girls (mostly boys!) ranging from age 2 to age 13, and our round trip travel time was four hours.  We never heard of any unkindness or belittling,and certainly no bullying. There was no name-calling, no raised voices, and no fighting.We never once had to correct anyone or break up fights. Now, there were a couple of mild disagreements, but they worked them out among themselves. There were three or four electronic devices - a couple of Kindle Fires, and a couple of Nintendo DS devices. And they shared them. The older ones made suggestions about how to work out turns, and the younger ones deffered to them -and not because they were bullied into anything, but because the older ones were reasonable and fair. It was clear that they commanded respect, not fear. I heard later that the two oldest kids in the van didn't get a turn at all on the way down - and one of them owned one of the devices being played!

So I thought about the ridiculousness of the "socialization" question as I listened to all this going on, and really, I thought again about how what I was witnessing was a group of "unsocialized" kids being civilized, something that, to me, is worth way more that socialization. I don't have any interest in my kids learning how to survive the jungle law of an isolated group of 12 year-olds, or 10 year -olds, or so on. But I do want them to know how to earn respect, and how to give it. I want them to know how to be patient, kind, and diplomatic. I want them to be compassionate, and to look out for others.

Now, I know firsthand that some of those kids - the five who came from our house!- can behave in very uncivilized ways. The other kids are from families we know , and I'm pretty sure they have some of the same issues. I'm sure they battle unkindness, impatience, and selfishness daily in their family, as we do in ours. I'm sure that sometimes they are dismayed to hear their children at each other's throats, and I'm sure they have days of petty bickering - all day long. I'm sure they pray for their children, and with their children, and encourage purity of heart, and thus of behavior. If it's this hard when we have our children all day long, when we can identify and address the baser elements of their human nature throughout the day, how hard must it be for you all who have to undo "socialization?" I'm not being facetious or unkind, truly! I'm just saying that I know this must be difficult, and I humbly submit that "socialization" is not as much a problem issue for homeschoolers as it is for those in brick and mortar schools.

In any case, it is a relief and a joy to see the fruit of our labor, to see kids behaving in such a civilized way. That's what we're after. Socialization can be kept by those who want it - we don't!

"Good Housekeeping" Need Not Apply

I began going to La Leche League meetings when Aimee was about nine months old, and I remember one of the pressing questions I had was about sleep, and how to get any of it with an active, growing baby. One of the Leaders in the Group at that time gave me some helpful suggestions about bed and sleeping arrangments, adding that "your house might not look like something out of Good Housekeeping, but you'll get some sleep!"

I am not sure if she was right about the sleep thing (haha!), but about our home not looking like anything like Good Housekeeping, well, about that she was exactly right. I remember this Leader's comment occasionally when I walk into my bedroom now and see the king size bed - on the floor - and beside it, a double mattress that is supposed to be for the two (and sometimes three) kids who like to sleep with us but whose growing size makes things a little crowded. Usually a parent ends up there instead, sometimes with a child, sometimes not.  In fact, sleep happens (or doesn't happen) all over the house, and usually not in the intended areas for each person. So there are lots of blankets and pillows all over the bedrooms, and not very much is color coordinated. (Or if it is, like in our bedroom - sort of - a couple of bold, sweeping marks from permanent markers have kept us humble.)

And so it is in other areas of our house, where function is so much more important than form. Nothing in our house would be featured in any magazine - unless there's some kind of homeschooling, attachement parenting  magazine that caters to the very small percentage of people with whom we identify. I like some kind of order, and touches of beauty here and there, and I do think there is intrinsic value in those things. But still, we live here, learn here, work here, discover here, grow here, socialize here, argue and make up here...We have friends over, but we don't "entertain." We like to have a pleasant environment, but we don't want just to sit around and look at nice things. We definitely don't want to have things so nice that we have to fuss at little people all the time and make sure those people don't bother or break those things. We can have "things" later. Maybe. Right now we have lots of growing, active people, and lots of ideas floating around.
We have Bible flashcards and alphabet flashcards all over the dining room walls, along with a couple of Latin prayers, a list of English kings, and the table of elements. I printed out some verses (you know, mostly subtle things about loving each other and regarding each other's needs about your own) and tacked them on the walls upstairs by the bedrooms. Someone gave us a wine cabinet a few months ago, and it currently houses some art supplies. In the living room, my couch is waving its last white flag of surrender, and I've finally accepted the fact that I can't eke any more time out of it. It will be nice to have something without rips. But still, I find I don't even want anything too nice, because I know it will be subject to the not-so-gentle treatment of growing boys and a dog (the girls tend to be less hard on furniture).

So...I find that twelve years down the road of our family journey, we certainly don't have a "Good Housekeeping" sort of house. We do have lots of life, love, and learning, though, and all kinds of other things of eternal value, so I'll take that trade-off any day. Which is what I remind myself when I wood-glue another chair or find a new drawing on the wall...