The Importance of Meeting Other Homeschooling Families

Being a homeschooler is not as strange as it was when I was a child.  When I was homeschooled 25 years ago people thought it was really strange to homeschool.  Now there are tons of homeschooling families and it really isn’t as strange as it was back then.  A lot of people are now bringing their kids home to give them a different kind of education than public school.  It is definitely becoming more “normal”.  I have a lot of great friends that don’t homeschool and they don’t judge me or think I am weird (although they do sometimes say I am a little crazy 🙂  I’m alright with that!  If my friends ask me about it I tell them, but other than that I don’t really talk to people about it.  Some of my friends kids are in private school, some in Montessori school, and most just in regular public school, which is fine by me.  I love them all.

Less than a year ago I really only knew a handful of other homeschooling families.  Growing up doing Homeschool we didn’t do a lot with Co-ops.  We did school with my aunts family and then as I got older we had a few other families join us.  As an adult, now homeschooling my own children, I didn’t ever think of joining a co-op or meeting other homeschoooling families. I really didn’t think I needed it.  And I thought my kids were totally fine.  They are very social children who, after school, play a lot with friends, have extra curricular things going on.  The thing is, they probably are just fine.  Socially, they do great, but something just kept nagging at to find other people that homeschool.  I decided to see how many people in The Family School Forum homeschooled in Southern Utah.  I found about five families, and planned on meeting them, but that never happened.

About a year ago I was at the park in my little town and another lady was there with her school age children.  I knew right away that she homeschooled, so I asked her.  She said she did, and told me about a St. George LDS Homeschoolers Group on Yahoo.  I thanked her for the info, but brushed it aside thinking I didn’t really care to set up a Yahoo account and that I didn’t really need other Homeschoolers.  I had met some really cool and some really odd homeschooling families and  my kids and I already have great friends I didn’t think we needed to try to meet other homeschoolers. They all do their own thing and I didn’t really care about meeting them and trying to get our kids to be friends.  Plus when it comes to meeting new people I totally become shy.  I know, you would never guess that!

After a couple of days of thinking about this St. George group I couldn’t get it out of my mind that I needed to join the group, so I joined the group.  People get on there and ask questions, invite us all to homeschool mom’s night and park day and other field trips.  I read all the things and thought about going, but never did for about 5 months.  After finally realizing that I was just nervous to get out and go meet new people I knew that it was exactly what I needed.  I first went to a swim day at the Rec Center. To be honest I was nervous that I would just sit there and not talk to anyone.  I was wrong!  I met the nicest people, they weren’t weird, they didn’t think I was weird, and we had so much to talk about.  I started going to the park day whenever I could.  My kids have met new friends, and I have met some great new friends and mentors.  Great people that I can talk to, and that I have so much in common with.  I decided to put together a field trip to the farm over Halloween time and had a great turn out and meet some other really great moms. Since that time I have been to park days days, mom’s nights, and field trips!

This last month I joined an actual Co-op, where we meet once a week and the kids get to take classes for a couple hours taught by other moms.  It has been so fun and my kids have really enjoyed getting to know other kids.

Not all of us homeschool the same way, some use the TJed method, some like me are LDS based, some Charlotte Mason and some a mix of a whole bunch of stuff!  For the most part no one cares what you do, they just think it is awesome you are homeschooling.  Everyone has so much to offer and each of us does what works for our family and encourages each other along!

After being involved in the group for the last few months I will tell you that even though I totally thought I didn’t need it, I did.  It has bee like a breath of fresh air meeting other families that homeschool, talking to other moms about concern, ideas or frustrations we are having, or just the joy of our days of homeschooling.  Stuff my other wonderful friends just didn’t really understand, that these ladies do.  They give ideas, feedback and encouragement.  It has been so wonderful.  So if you homeschool, but don’t know anyone else that homeschools.  Put together a group, you might not think you need it, but you do.  People will tell people about it and soon you will have lots of people involved! Having that connection with other moms doing the same thing as me has been the best thing for our family this year.  Too bad I didn’t do this 5 years ago when we started!  Oh well, better late than never!