2025/Ms. Seara L.-

For many military children and children of parents who work in highly mobile positions, the word “home” can have a loaded meaning and stir intense feelings. These children often follow their parents on various assignments around the globe, often always being “the new kid” in a new place.

Yet, our children are incredibly resilient and unique. They manage to build a sense of home in unfamiliar places and create a sense of what is normal around them. Despite their circumstances that require moving every few years, my students are normal teenagers who are funny, perceptive, intelligent, while still imperfect just like other teenagers one would find in the continental U.S. or elsewhere in the world.

As a former third culture kid who also moved to different nations as an adolescent, I can empathize with my students’ different feelings and reactions to the word “home” and what it means.

I asked my students at Osan Middle High School to write a few words about what “home” was to them. Here are the responses I received from students in my English 11 class.