My grandson is has Asperger Syndrome and this caused him to have many problems at school. The biggest problem was that his condition was not officially diagnosed by the local paediatrician – as it can be difficult to diagnose – and without that my daughter could not get the support that her son needed at school. The result was that he became highly stressed in school and eventually my daughter decided that the only solution was to home school him.

The stresses of mainstream school caused my grandson to to have very low confidence and low self-esteem and although my daughter was reluctant to start home schooling, now that she has done it, she would never go back because there have been many dramatic improvements in my grandson’s social and intellectual abilities. If you are considering home schooling for your child, then I recommend that you do it, provided that you are prepared to put in sufficient work to educate your child. It will involve extra expense and joining local groups, but it is probably much easier than you think.

If you home school your child, especially if they have communication difficulties or are shy, then in many ways it can certainly be beneficial, both emotionally and intellectually, and it is likely to help your child to develop self esteem.

One of the biggest criticism of home schooling is that the child will be unlikely to get proper socialisation. Children do need to learn how to socialise, yet the claim that they need to go to school to get it is not necessarily true. After all, if you thrust a shy child into a crowded school it can be quite overwhelming for them and they might even have social anxiety attacks. It could be very difficult for them to recover from that and it could be counter-productive. When a child is schooled at home, they are much more likely to feel ‘at home’, comfortable and confident. The social environment at home and with their friends will allow them to learn social skills at their own pace.

Learning to Socialise

What many parents don’t realise is that a classroom setting is not the only way that a child can learn socialisation. It is not the best way to learn social skills either. A shy child will definitely have difficulties while attempting to adjust to a classroom environment and they will also have difficulties when they attempt to fit-in or to get along sociably with their classmates. Shy children are usually quiet and often nervous or inept in groups and that makes it hard for them to make friends in school. That means they will probably end up feeling alone and lacking in confidence. On top of this, shy children are usually victims of bullying. Most bullies like to pick on anyone who stands out from the crowd and so shy children are obvious targets for them. Their shyness makes them different and that makes them stand out from their peers.

An Aspergic child will almost certainly be very shy, have above average intelligence and yet probably be unable to easily communicate their knowledge either verbally or in written work. Thus the teacher might accuse them of not paying attention or of ‘not wanting to learn’. These are just some of the issues that a shy child may experience in a classroom environment and very often this kind of stress simply makes their problems even worse. If the child is home-schooled, they can learn to socialize at their own pace, develop and raise their self-esteem and gain confidence. They are also much less likely to be victims of taunts and bullying from other children.

It is important to realise that it is extremely difficult to learn in a stressful environment. If a child gets anxious or stressed in the school environment, then they will be focussing on the cause of the stress rather than on their work. They will then lose concentration and be unable to retain the information taught in class. They won’t be able to participate in the lessons and they will not ask questions because they won’t want to be noticed. It is very likely that they will get left behind and then they will start to find ways to hide their lack of knowledge. This same lack of knowledge will produce lack of self-esteem because it will start to convince them that there must be ‘something wrong’ with them because everybody else seems to know it and they don’t.

In a big class, their teacher may not even notice them and so will be unlikely to give them sufficient attention. Worse, in a big class the teacher may not be able to give them sufficient attention even if they do notice that the child is falling behind.

Socialising In A Home-school Environment

It takes a lot of encouragement and positive reinforcement to help a shy child to overcome their shyness. They will not be able to overcome it if they regularly get stressed or anxious. You will need to provide the right environment for your child and that means being observant of how your child reacts. Yet it is usually true that a parent will know their child extremely well and much better than any teacher does. If your child is uncomfortable in large crowds and yet is very happy playing on their own or one-to-one, you can start by bringing in one friend to play with them and slowly increasing the number. However, you must watch the child for feedback about how well everything is working. As you do that, your child is likely to gradually build their confidence.

It is very worthwhile joining a local home schooling group. Many of the mothers in home school groups have taken their children out of school for similar reasons to you. This means that a high percentage of the children in the group are, or were, shy or have communication issues. While you might think that this is a bad thing, in my experience the reverse is true. The children see each other as peers and they all play together happily. Nobody bullies anyone else because nobody stands out and no child is picked on because they are all in the same situation. A home schooling group will often make educational trips for all the children to join in as well as having trips to a play park. This is an extremely good socialisation environment and likely to help them enormously.

You can also sign them up for group classes like music, art or crafts. They will probably make friends with the other children because they have similar interests and that will make them feel accepted. By joining home schooling and other groups your child will soon become self-confident and their self-esteem will grow significantly.

Filed under: Lifestyle • Self Esteem

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