Are homeschooled kids weird?
Are homeschooled kids weird?
~ Written by Sarah Small
Admit it. Somewhere deep in your heart, you’ve wondered, especially if you’ve ever heard someone say, “I know a homeschooling family at my church. Those kids are weird!”
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Haven’t we all asked ourselves: Are homeschooled kids weird? Will my kids be weird?
Weird. Normal. We all have our own definitions. You might say, “I don’t want my kids to be ‘normal’ by today’s standards!” And you might also say, “I don’t want my kid to be labeled as a weirdo!”
But here’s the thing:
All kids are weird.
That’s normal. I mean, when I was a kid—in the privacy of my own home—I stuck black olives on all my fingers and ate them off, one by one. That’s weird, right? Of course I didn’t eat black olives at public school, but if I had, I would not have eaten them off my fingers one by one.
I would have known that was weird because some kid would have announced to the entire cafeteria: “THAT GIRL IS EATING OLIVES OFF HER FINGERS LIKE A WEIRDO!” Even those kids that had a secret desire to emulate me would have shriveled and mocked me. I would have been forever known as Olive Girl.
Here’s what’s different about homeschoolers. At my homeschooling co-op, if one kid were eating black olives off his fingers, I can guarantee that the rest of them would be doing it within seconds. Because weird is good. Weird is normal.
I eat black olives like a “normal” person now, although my husband would argue that no “normal” person even eats olives. But you know what? Without any coaching from me, I swear, my youngest son does this.
Because 99.9% of kids (totally made-up statistic) are innately weird, creative, silly, funny, uninhibited, and terribly clever—if they are allowed to be.
I remember distinctly a day when my firstborn son was in kindergarten in public school. He wanted to wear his kilt and sheepskin vest to school. “Sweetie, you can’t wear a kilt to school,” I told him. I hated to tell him why, but I had to.
“You can only wear your kilt at home. Kids don’t wear kilts to school.”
I squashed his weirdness. I had to, for his sake.
Fast forward several years, when this same kid was 13 and had been homeschooled since we pulled him out of public school after first grade. One day we found, stuffed in the back of a closet, a llama-hair poncho that my husband once brought back from South America.
My son was ecstatic! For months he wore that poncho everywhere, including our homeschooling co-op. He also wore John Lennon-type sunglasses and t-shirts with ties.
And yep, I’m sure the kids thought he was weird. But they didn’t care because they were weird, too.
My son has graduated college now. I asked him recently what some of the best aspects about homeschooling were. One of the things he said was this:
“I had the chance to be a quirky, weird, and creative kid without intense ridicule. I was then able to develop that all into socially acceptable quirkiness as a college student.”
“Socially acceptable quirkiness” usually translates to “outside-the-box” thinking. What is one of the top qualities that employers in most fields look for in employees? Innovation and creativity—outside-the-box thinkers.
Childhood weirdos.
Homeschooling allows kids to be weird when it’s okay to be weird.
As your kids get older, chances are they will learn to corral their quirks and develop into creative young adults who refuse to accept mediocrity and challenge the status quo.
I think we need more weirdos in our world.
So ‘fess up. Have you ever wondered it, too: Are homeschooled kids weird? Do you harbor a secret fear that people will think your kids are weird?
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yes. We are ‘weird’- my kids are very normal, but they have never heard a Bieber or One Direction song. The teens watch Horrible Histories and Dick Van Dyke show- They can lead the singing at a funeral. They ask to hold babies. They walk slowly in a museum because they are interested in the art/history. They do not bully. They are not perfect, but they have benefited from staying as a FAMILY most of the day
AWESOME 😀
Can I just say, I am a homeschool mom of four and teach at an enrichment school for HS kids one day a week. I have 15 1st-3rd graders in my class and none of them are really all that weird.
I think a part of the school environment has the tendency to amalgamate the population- in other words, being together creates a certain amount of same-ness. In public school, some of that is peer pressure and cultural influences and such. But the other part of it is that as a whole, they’re all smiling faces and you can’t really examine them for the individual differences.
That may be what happens when homeschool kids are at the library at 10am on a Tuesday. They’re not seen as part of a whole, but on their own, away from the crowd. If you were to take a few public school kids and deliver them to the same place, out of context, the librarians might also be able to pick out their weirdness just as easily.
All that said, my own kids are totally weird. Heh.
Ha Ha … Love this! It makes me want to encourage “weirdness” more!
My husband and his siblings were homeschooled. His siblings dislike all out of the box thinking and now they hate the idea of homeschooling. He, however, has always moved to the beat of his own drum and would never dream of squishing his kids into the public or private school box. I was public schooled, even in day care starting at 6 weeks and i too have always been a weirdo. I spent SO MUCH of my childhood trying to fit in, i just didnt!
This article is making me wonder if homeschoolers, at least some of them, are attracted to this way of life simply because it allows them to be odd without being attacked for it?
Ps, my husband lived in a scratchy wool poncho from mexico at 13 🙂
Man i love homeschooling. 🙂
I LOVE weird! I encourage weird! Ok, within reason. My son HAS to wear pants when we go out… but often he wears his spiderman costume to dinner. My daughter dresses in princess dresses and crowns to go to the store. And we wear our pajamas to “school” (our kitchen table) on a daily basis. I can’t imagine it any other way! I dread the day that my kids are too cool to be weird (hopefully that day never comes!).
Absolutely agree. Suppressing our passions, our identity, and our inner promptings to fit in deprives the world of the fullness each person can bring to it.
Sharing!
Myself and everybody in my family eat olives that way…. Then again, we’re a pretty weird bunch even though we’re all grown up and we love it that way. I was the only homeschooled one out of four kids so you can’t blame it on homeschooling lol.
There are definitely some weirdo homeschooling families. I am not talking about the kind the eat black olives off of their fingers. I am talking about the kind that think they are better than everyone else because they shelter their children from the real world. Their kids often grow up to be socially awkward. That is sad and real.
I am glad homeschooling works out well for your family. I love all children and love when they can grow to be great human beings in whatever setting their parents deem best for their education.
I agree with a previous commenter: I began to really like myself in college, which was when I finally embraced all my weirdness and was surrounded by other confident weirdos. 🙂 This is one of the things I love about homeschooling! (and we’re just confidently weird enough to try it!)
Totally proud to be a weird homeschooler. We know how be ourselves, and we also know how to allow others the same respect. I have some WEIRD friends, every shape, size, color, religion, school type whatever. They are all awesome people who God made special. And I love them ALL.
Usually when people make comments to me about the weirdness of homeschoolers, I respond with, “Are they weird because they are homeschooled or are they homeschooled because their parent felt they may be pre-dispositioned for being weird?”
When we go to the library, there is one librarian in particular who greets my children and then studies their reactions. My son doesn’t always reply “hello” if somebody he does not know well says hello to him. He is 6. He is still learning to say good morning back to me when we see each other around the house for the first time. 🙂 I asked her, “Did he greet you?” Because I was not paying attention to their exchange. This librarian sighs loudly and says, “No” with this look on her face like, “You are destroying his future by homeschooling him…” She has made other comments in the past about “school pictures” – that somehow we don’t get school pictures… because we homeschool… 🙂
My fear is that someone will somehow actually think my kid (and his parents) *aren’t* weird.
Being weird implies that there is a standard of what isn’t weird. All groups of people – workplace, church, school – have their own set of what is acceptable and whatever falls off this unspoken but rigid standard is deemed weird. I remember kids in school that were considered weird. I now wish I had gotten to know them better because after growing up I realized they were the interesting kids!! 🙂 With that in mind I’ve never encouraged my kids to “normalize” while we homeschooled. I might have explained what others do, but never with the implication that they should veer towards that way of being or doing. With my kids now 19 and 15 I love the individuals they have come to be!! And I love their friends!! They all are who God and Nature intended them to be without the peer pressure all through the years. As an example, on Halloween night they all gathered at one of their homes and at some point in the evening the 21 year old host pulled out an Elmo puppet and, doing the voice, had everyone in belly laughs!! One girl, rather than being a sexy anything, made herself a narwhal costume….classic!! I just am so impressed with their creativity and spirit!! So, whatever weird is, I think it’s great!!
I read this yesterday and loved it so much. Thanks for the freedom to be weird!
My kids are definitely weird – and I LOVE it! Part of why I homeschool is so that I get to experience as much of their weirdness as possible. It’s a wonderful gift and I won’t let anyone squash it 🙂
Oh I KNOW my kids are weird…and I know that their father and I are also and I embrace it! I was bullied when I was in middle school badly and I think if I would have been able to embrace my “outside of the box” thinking earlier on I would have been better off. 😀 WHY BE NORMAL? 😉
I’m pretty sure there is no way to make my kids normal! lol Although I am pretty sure the olive thing is normal; all my kids do it, all my nieces do it, and all of us did it as kids. Or maybe our family is extra weird! 🙂
I think this is such an interesting topic of conversation…especially since there are no children in public or private school who are “weird”. 🙂 Happy that my kids can be creatively themselves and grow and develop as individuals! Thanks for this article.
I think many home schoolers lack social skills. This has been our experience when socializing with other home schoolers. Weird I like..
See, I do want my kids to be weird! I want them to be who they are, without peer pressure and all that other junk. Thanks for the post, it was a great read. Blessings
I loved this post!! It should be mandatory reading for everyone 😉
I was a ‘weird/odd/quirky’ kid at school and learnt very early on (around age 7) that I had to act like everyone else or be beaten up for being different! We are a family who are very much outside the box and I love that my five year old daughter loves to go out in her big brother’s snow boots. She may not be able to walk properly in them but she’s smiling so much that I simply don’t care what people think 🙂
This article made me smile. I’m a homeschool graduate and (normal) people tell me I’m weird all the time. They’re usually surprised when I cheerfully agree. Hopefully someday I’ll have kids of my own to homeschool, and they’ll get to enjoy being weird too.
As both a former homeschooler, who married another homeschooler, and is now a homeschooling mama, love this. I am a bit “weird” with my out of the box thinking, but I’ve realized that everyone is weird in their own way. And it’s ok! In case people aren’t aware, the public school system churns out some real weirdos too. 😉 PS When I tell people I was homeschooled they always seem shocked… “but you seem so normal!” bahahahaha