I still believe that the personality of the family is part of the equation. There are some people that are more social than others. Is it really fair to expect everyone to maintain the ’social butterfly’ level of existence?

On top of that, consider for a moment the intensely over-scheduled nature of families (at least in the US) nowadays. We go and go and go like crazy, wearing ourselves out in the process. Is it truly valid to criticize others for not making the same choices?

I think that there may some wisdom in being cautious about making judgments in these cases.

When I first began to homeschool I believed that it was the “right” choice for all families. My apologies to anyone I spoke with about the issue at that time in my life!

Since then I’ve grown up a great deal and have come to realize that there is no one right schooling choice for all families. Different needs and situations have a huge impact on what will work in each household.

There are even families I know that I believe should not homeschool; public school was a much better choice for them. I know other children who would hate staying home all day. They prefer the school setting. I say more power to them. My boys have stated repeatedly that they want to be at home. Should they change their minds, I will let them go reluctantly.

That said, I disagree strongly that socialization is reduced for children who have school at home. Consider for a moment: how much time in public school do children actually spend socializing? 7 hours per day? I hope not! They should be spending the majority of their time on lessons and assignments. If someone considers an entire school day as social time, then I would humbly suggest they re-evaluate what their children are doing all day.

Let’s say for argument’s sake that a child socializes at school between classes, on recess, at lunch, and going to and from school. In my opinion, 2 hours a day is a good estimate of how much time a child might spend on those activities.

My boys and I sat down one day this summer and counted how many children they spend time with socializing for 4 hours or more per week. For fun, we added the limitation that the children on the list had to be within two years of their age. It took about 3 minutes to come up with 30 different children that they see. That was before they joined the football team, playing 2 hours a day with 15 other boys for the past 3 months.

Granted, 4 hours per week is much less than 2 hours per day. I agree that my boys spend less time with other children than our neighbors do for example. We do have a very good balance of home and public life, and I for one am pleased with how the boys are developing. In addition, they’re much less exposed to negative examples of behavior so that’s a plus.

This still brings me back to where we started: it’s an individual choice and parents are to be respected for doing their best in their own individual situations.