"What about socialization? How will they learn to get along with (work as a team with, take turns with) other kids if they don't go to school?"
These questions are often asked without a lot of forethought....as though no child ever played with others until they first set foot in a classroom. As though babies don't reach for each other from their shopping carts, or toddlers watch and imitate each other on the playground, or no child has a sibling, parents, pets, or other humans to interact with....
Maybe I'm confused, because I'm pretty sure humans were social creatures who learned how to band together for mutual benefit long before there were schools....
Here I present video evidence that children can and do get along with, work with, and even take turns with other children outside of school. They can even do it without much adult guidance...and they can do it naturally, the way humans are designed to do.
It's worth noting that most of these children had known each other a matter of hours when these photos were taken....and also to note what's missing. There was no pushing, shoving, crowding, trying to be first, monopolizing the food or goats or space....there was no cruelty whatsoever to the animals, and, when one of the littler children forgot themselves and started to chase one, a chorus in defense of the goat rose up from the others.
I've spent a lot of time with children in my life, but this was something new. No one was telling these children, who ranged in age from four to nearly ten, how to treat each other or the goats. No one was making them stand in a line, waiting, fingers pressed to lips. No adult tried to orchestrate turns at the feed pail...and yet all had turns, the bigs watched out for the littles, and all had fun. They moved in a natural, easy flow that is alien to an artificial environment like school. It was a rhythm that matched the small herd of nanny goats and kids, a social structure echoed by the animals...human and goat kids gamboling away, to play by themselves, or in shifting groups, or back to a parent again, for quick expressions of affection or lingering emotional nourishment.
It strikes me that the social awareness of unschooled children is very much a natural, intuitive thing. They have an inborn understanding of how to relate to others. In the same way the newborn looks deeply into her mother's eyes, nestles snufflingly into her breast to smell her and soak up her warmth, then learns to reach out, smile, laugh, and speak, these older children have developed more complex social skills. They were naturally kind and respectful of those around them, whether in shoes or barehoofed...
This was a good thing for me to have learned. The next time someone who sends their child to school asks me about socialization, I will remember. I may choose to answer, to share this bit of wisdom gleaned in the company of other unschoolers, while feeding friendly goats. I may ask them what they are doing for socialization that offsets what school is doing against it, if they are being rude, or if they happen to be a close friend who will understand that I don't, in their case, mean any offense, and know they value an honest and open exchange of opinion and experience. or I may say only, "So far, that hasn't been an issue, but if it becomes one, we'll consider our options." And I'll smile a secret smile, remembering children free in a barnyard, doing as they please, and yet considerate of each other.
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