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Comment by stackghost | Hacker News Reader

I was a camp counselor in my late teens and early 20s, and we could always tell which kids were homeschooled. Always.

I couch youth sports, and same experience. It's getting better now that the kids are getting older (10-11). But when they were in 1st or 2nd grade, the home schooled kids were so far behind their teammates in social skills.

I only had one on my baseball team in the spring, while he was definitely not on the same level as the rest of the team socially, it could have just been that he is a shy kid by nature.

I've had the complete opposite experience, where adults often tell us they feel like our kids seem much older than their ages.

We lived in different countries where people speak a different language, during their earlier years, though, so maybe that also contributes to it.

It really comes down to the parents, like most things. If parents are heavily engaged, then the kids turn out more well rounded, regardless of where they go to school, public, private, or home.

I can also usually tell just based on the kids if their parents will be helpful or not. If I ask for a parent to help with setting up at the beginning of practice, or if an assistant coach can't make it and I need a hand, the way a kid acts is a pretty good indicator if their parent will get out of their chair on sidelines and come help.

There are outliers, but its a pretty good rule of thumb.

Could you expand on this please?

In a positive or negative way?

In a negative way. They weren't bad children, just undersocialized.

The benefits of school go beyond what the teachers teach.

But that problem can be solved.

It can be solved, yes. But it almost certainly won't be, in aggregate.

Counterpoint: I was also a camp counselor in my teens and 20s, and I even taught homeschool.

They were definitely easy to pick out, but I think in a good way. They were undersocialized with children, but felt way more at ease around adults. They understood more mature humor, spoke larger ideas in better sentences, and behaved perfectly.

And sure, they were a little "weird." As everyone ought to strive to be.

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