March 14, 2008
Why get an education? - Part 2
A second part of what I think should be developed in an educated person is their ability to relate with other people.
When we home schooled our youngest during middle school, we constantly were asked, “how will he be socialized if he is home schooled?” The concept of socializing appears to be another reason people think children should be in school.
I find most people understand socializing to be that their child can relate with other children. That they learn to find their place in the social pecking order and learn to live with that position. This value of being socialized in earlier grades becomes a fearful and undesirable thing in secondary school. There, it is called 'peer pressure'! No parent of adolescents wants their child to be influenced by their peers. Why is that? Well, most adolescents are immature and irresponsible and not good role models.
I want children to learn how to relate with adults in the adult world. I want them to learn who they are and for them to be able to relate with confidence in who they are without the shame or pressure to conform to how others think they should be. High numbers of peers and low numbers of adults in a child’s life tends to lead to the latter.
All people tend to define themselves from their self-image. We tend to look to others to reflect to us who we are. I do not want children to primarily look to other children to define themselves; I know there will be some of that, but the more important issue is to get a true view of themselves from the adults in their world.