For those who have h/s-ed for awhile/have older kids

[Guest]

If you have older kids or have been homeschooling for awhile, where would you say your kids have made their best friends? I'm trying to decide between a few different avenues - co-ops/Bible studies/park days - where have your children made their closest friends?

[cathmom]

I would say that anything where they get to meet different children and see who they click with would be good. The key, though, is that you must follow up and get together with them outside of the activity.

[Guest]

I would say that anything where they get to meet different children and see who they click with would be good. The key, though, is that you must follow up and get together with them outside of the activity.

 

And that's part of my concern. Everything is so far away from our house! :thumbdown:

[cathmom]

And that's part of my concern. Everything is so far away from our house! :thumbdown:

 

I have that problem too. It's hard. I'm about to join a different HS group that has weekly park days so that my younger dc can make friends. They literally have no friends that live in our state!

[Unicorn.]

My kids have all met their best friends in scouts, and swim team. Mostly scouts though.

[MamaT]

When they were younger, it was church. Now that they are more involved in their individual activities (3-5 days/week), it is at gym, dance, baseball, etc.

[angela in ohio]

Someplace where they will regularly see the same children each week. It takes time to build freindships, so this helps.

[Margo out of lurking]

1. Homeschool sports/clubs (soccer, chess, etc.).

2. Church.

3. The neighborhood, when we've lived in a neighborhood.

 

I always thought co-op would be the best place, but that's never happened. I guess they're too busy doing school work!:lol:

[Plucky]

Scouts, church, sports, and we met one new family at the homeschool skating day. My 16ds and their son have been best friends now for 8 years.

[Guest]

Okay, well it sounds like my son won't miss meeting the kids destined to be his best friends if we don't join just the right thing right now. :D Sports makes sense, although I'm thinking it would probably be more of a lego club or something, since ds is on the "non-sportsy" side....I'll have to look into scouts when he gets that age, too.

 

Thank you for your replies!

[Ellie]

Primarily, through our support group (not a co-op...a support group). One dd has a friend she met in church, but otherwise, it was the support group (or at least, other homeschoolers, if not from our own support group).

[Plucky]

Okay, well it sounds like my son won't miss meeting the kids destined to be his best friends if we don't join just the right thing right now. :D Sports makes sense, although I'm thinking it would probably be more of a lego club or something, since ds is on the "non-sportsy" side....I'll have to look into scouts when he gets that age, too.

 

Thank you for your replies!

 

No, I don't think that is true. My 13dd was very shy for years and she just broke out of her shell in the last year. Her friends are all at church for the most part and she now has a best friend, but it has taken a very long time. It really depends on the kids.

[Alenee]

We began with people at moms groups when they were toddlers but as they grew, we met people at church doing the same things, then co-ops, sports, even end-of-year testing. I'm a very social person and so are the kids so we haven't ever really lacked friends but as time goes by, we all sort of spread out and do different things. We don't do anything regularly that is specifically just social. Most of what we do is wrapped around some school or sport activity. I wondered for a while, when we weren't doing a lot, whether or not my kids were sad but when I asked my oldest dd why she never asks to see her friends, she felt that she saw them enough. That was a cool moment. I had worried that they were lonely but they felt content.

[Remudamom]

My kids are their own best friends. The oldest is a tad left out because he's older, but the younger four are all only 18 months apart and have gone from being their own playgroup to best friends.

[coffeegal]

If you have older kids or have been homeschooling for awhile, where would you say your kids have made their best friends? I'm trying to decide between a few different avenues - co-ops/Bible studies/park days - where have your children made their closest friends?

 

Park Days. A group was started about 8 years ago, and went through fits and starts at the beginning. It's currently run as an inclusive group, meets regardless of the weather, and is huge with an age range of newborn - teen.

[love2read]

At various places, but the most enduring friendships have all been through avenues that drew people with a similar belief system to our own. However, they consistently do group activities (bowling, summer picnics) with casual friends with similar values, but not necessarily similar belief systems. Hope that helps.

[Denise in Florida]

My oldest met friends at youth group and community college (dual enrolled for Junior and Senior year of high school)

 

Youngest has made friends in 4H, teen court and other homeschooling kids we met back when we did a co-op.

[katemary63]

4H, then co-op, then church

 

My kids have so much in common with their 4H friends and then co-op friends. The church friends who attend ps are not as easy to integrate with but it's not a problem either, just not as comfortable because there are huge differences based on our farm and homeschool life.

[katemary63]

My kids are their own best friends. The oldest is a tad left out because he's older, but the younger four are all only 18 months apart and have gone from being their own playgroup to best friends.

 

What a blessing for you! My son does not get along well with his sisters, one 15 mos. older and one 4 years younger. Their adults now and I thought it would change and it is a bit, but they still bicker so much it breaks a mother's heart. The girls all get along great! I really wish he had had a brother, but, I guess God knows best.

[lisamarie]

The friends that my kids have are through church. But for the most part, they are the kids of the friends that DH and I grew up with. My DS has 1 friend that is not from our church, but DH and I went to school with his dad and then DS and the boy were in kindergarten together at PS. Now they both homeschool so we try to get the boys together at least 1-2 times a month outside of sports (they play soccer together and are just finishing up a 6 week YMCA class).

 

 

What a blessing for you! My son does not get along well with his sisters, one 15 mos. older and one 4 years younger. I really wish he had had a brother, but, I guess God knows best.

 

:iagree: My DS told me the other day that he wished he had a brother instead of 2 sisters. I told him that he had the family God gave him and that it was for a reason. I do wish he had a brother, but the only way he'll be getting a brother is through adoption which my DH is not in favor of. The silver lining is that my girls are very rough and tumble and up for adventures, so while they are "just girls," they are more tomboyish and will climb trees, play with bugs and worms, and go exploring in the woods with him. If the girls were more girly, it would be a lot harder for him.

[Kari C in SC]

This is my 12th year of homeschooling. I took my oldest out of school when he was in 5th grade. At that point, he already had two best friends(twin brothers) he met at school that also spent weekends with their grandma that just happened to live in our neighborhood. But... he still needed friends that were homeschooled to hang out with during the week. It took a few years to click with that, but in the end we found a wonderful co-op and his friendships grew like crazy. He met another true best friend there along with a few other very close friends. When he passed away in May, we took him back to Florida. The love from his friends was amazing. I thank God every single day that we found that co-op and those people.

 

Now we live in SC and we don't have a co-op. We do have a great homeschool group that we have found a lot of great families through park days, field trips, etc. I found a few very close families and invited them to our home for a mini- co-op of sorts. My 12 year old daughter is also very close with her cousin of the same age that homeschools. My 6 year old has several blooming friendships with boys from the homeschool group.

 

Friendship is VERY important to me. I grew up with a best friend I met at 2 and another at 12. I am 38 now and I still have very close bonds with them. So... I am in the process of starting a co-op for next year. I want to be very sure my kids have every opportunity to form lasting and fun friendships. They are only kids once and nothing promises them a tomorrow - so I focus on happiness for them today.

[sparrow]

Scouts, soccer, and 4-H.

[QueenCat]

Mostly from the various homeschool groups we've been involved with.

[ereks mom]

When they were younger, it was church. Now that they are more involved in their individual activities (3-5 days/week), it is at gym, dance, baseball, etc.

 

 

Same here. I think it is very important to find activities where your dc can participate as part of a group. They begin to develop relationships with others in the group, and they learn the give-and-take that comes with interacting with other people outside the family.

[mktkcb]

Definitely our hs group. They have lots of activities for all ages. That and church, but mostly hs group/coop. Our group has a weekly PE coop in elementary, sports program starting in jr. high, and an academic coop in hs. All of which are fabulous.

[dhudson]

Church!

[stephanier.1765]

I started homeschooling 8 years ago. One of my children found his best friends through homeschool PE at the Y and my other found his best friend playing baseball through a local baseball association. I guess you never know where a new friend will pop up.

[FO4UR]

My kids are their own best friends.

 

This is us.

 

We moved a year and a couple months ago for a job that didn't work out.:glare: We are looking to move again sometime in the near future (hopefully) so we are feeling like nomads here. My dc make fast friends wherever they go, but have very few real friends here.

 

They play together all day long so I don't worry much. They get plenty of "conflict resolution" and cooperative play.;)

[Denisemomof4]

Your son is young. I normally wouldn't place importance on friends at this age. But because he's an only child, this age is important IMO, because I've just seen SO many kids who have had friends since an early age.

 

My boys didn't have luck at homeshool groups OR sports. My girls have had friends at both. With my boys, I'd meet a mom with kids with similar age and invite them over. Usually a friendship would begin. With my girls, I just let them make their own friends and go from there. Homeschool co-op and activities.

[RamonaQ]

1-Neighborhood

2-Church

3-Scouts

4-Music lessons-- preforming with a student, and then developing a friendship

[Tina]

And that's part of my concern. Everything is so far away from our house! :thumbdown:

 

That's a big part of why my kids have done so many overnights. You pick them up the next day. :)

 

My kids best friends have come from the hs co-op group which we have participated in forever. We did Scouts, attend Sunday School/church, the kids did community sports, but their best friends came from the homeschool community we met at co-op.

[yellowperch]

In our neighborhood. Sports (swim, soccer, basketball). I have a group of friends with similarly aged children. We go to the beach together all summer and the children are really close to those children. We have one family of homeschoolers we are close with (we love them!!!) and the rest of the kids are in school.

 

What really makes a difference is when kids show up in different settings over time. Two families that became our beach buddies were pool friends we saw at chess club a few times and so the friendships deepened. Likewise when a child from a soccer team ends up living a few blocks over and has the same piano teacher there is a better chance for real friendship to take hold.

[Annie G]

After 18 years of homeschooling, the 'friend' issue has certainly evolved for us.

When the kids were young, they found friends through our homeschool group and its various events like park days.

 

When the kids reached middle school, it wasn't enough to just have homeschooling in common- they needed friends who shared similar interests. They joined Christian Youth Theater and found them. Now that they're old enough to drive, they have CYT friends from all over the Chicago area.

 

Surprisingly, youth groups in middle and high school were not good places for my kids to find real friends. It just never really worked out that deep, lasting friendships were formed there. I was surprised when that happened over and over to each of our kids as they went through youth groups.