When I ran into an old friend at Socrates Cafe last year, I explained that I was at the coffee shop for Teen Wednesdays and pointed to the twenty or so high schoolers waiting for me to join them.
She exclaimed, "Oh my gosh Maureen, those are the most beautiful teens I've ever seen!" You should have seen the excitement in her face. She was really moved by this observation.
This got me thinking. Are homeschooled teens more beautiful that other teens? How can that be?
Over the months that have passed since running into my friend, I've been observing. My teens don't have the angst that I see in some of their peers who go to real school (my children like to say that they go to fake school). They also have an innocence about them, a sweet innocence. Most of all, I love the way that they look you in the eye and speak to you with respect. Yes, speak to an adult as an equal and not someone to be loathed.
Is this the result of homeschooling? Does this make them more beautiful? Umm, something to ponder.
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2 comments:
Yes. Homeschooling keeps teens "normal" and unaffected. They pick up a lot of ideas about what looks "cool" and uncool, and how to look totally, like, bored about life in school.
They also feel the need to conform to the standard of makeup, hair, chains, black clothes, etc., too with school.
I find homeschooled teens just more natural, themselves. Comfortable in their own skin. High self esteem, without the high self esteem course fakeness.
I have spent a lot of time with non-homeschooled girls (my oldest daughter is 12) and I see a large difference in how these girls "look" as compared to a group of homeschooled girls. My 12 year old and her hsing friends still have an innocent, open, wholesome look that isn't as common with her non-homeschooling friends. I enter a room and I can see the difference on their faces and in their body language. On those occasions when we see a wholesome look in a non-hsing crowd, we make a bee line to that girl b/c we know her family (whether they homeschool or not) has similar values as we do and the girl will be friendly. (And, we have yet to be wrong. We also discovered that that girl will have a close relationship to her parents.) The non-homeschooling girls who have retained this innocent look are usually girls who don't run with the popular crowd in their school setting, but are generally well-liked and comfortable in their skin.
My point is that I think that innocence and openness is easily recognizable and is more common among the homeschoolers I have seen and known than among the non-homeschoolers I have seen and known, but overall the girls' faces reflect their families' lifestyles and values. Also, the "hardness" that many non-hsers have starts as young as 7 and 8. It is so, so, so sad to see those once-sweet faces become closed, haughty and suspicious.
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