No problem. ;)

Unless she is an *extremely* close friend of yours - one of those friends with whom an outburst or two of brutal honesty and unsolicited criticism in such words are to be expected, swallowed, and forgiven as a part of the package - a conversation like that would be a complete deal breaker for me. I would sleep on it, just in case that my perception is messing up with me a little right now while I am still emotional. But wow, I doubt that after having slept on it I would reason much differently. Also, I would send her the CD, with no strings attached to it, in an attempt to close that chapter in your life with a last grace on your part - and then I would MOVE ON, to other people, who are going to appreciate you for who you are and who are not going to allow themselves these types of conversations. You deserve better. :grouphug:

Same here. I have no idea what to think about it. I do not assess my kids' creative writing and I do not consider it "school". :)

Sleeping. Darned insomnia. :glare:

I disagree with a four year old doing math (or anything "formal", really, in an institutionalized schooling setting). Withholding recess from kids, especially this young, is insane and ineffective.

Against. :) I am against general education degrees as well, except for elementary school teachers who may not need to specialize the areas they study. For middle school onwards, I believe children need to be taught by a subject matter expert who had an additional set of education-related subjects, but NOT by a vague "education" major. So, I do not see why create a separate course of studies to home educate - honestly, it seems to me like all of those pseudo-degrees of today... I would not support it. I do not think homeschooling parents should be required to undergo a course of studies to be able to home educate, but I DO support educational equivalence exams for homeschooled children for major subjects. That way, parents do not have to deal with jumping through the unnecessary hoops, but it is still proven that children are learning something at home, if there is a national curriculum to abide by.

Wow, I had no idea this would be so widespread! :) Really enjoying reading these responses. It seems like many people have had this experience, I thought it would be something rather rare. I was completely, 100% ambidextrous until the age of about 8-9 (meaning that I could do literally everything with either hand), and then I somehow naturally started "specializing", switching some activities to my right and some to my left hand, and over the course of a few years, my right side has prevailed - as a teen I was already a rightie. But as a child, and I remember it very vividly, there was no difference at all for me. I could write and draw with either hand, I remember playing tennis as a child both as a lefty and as a righty, etc. But with time I sort of settled on my right hand. My older children are both righties, for the little one we are yet to see as now she is too small to make any definite judgments. Funny, I cannot think of anyone truly ambidextrous in my extended family either - a couple of lefties, mostly righties, but I was an anomaly as a child.

Some colleges want to see specifically a *modern*, spoken foreign language. The best thing would be to inquire directly with the colleges you are potentially interested in. I would be a "better safe than sorry" person here - meaning that, sure, I would welcome and encourage my child's desire to learn ancient Greek as much as they want, but I would make sure they had at least several years of a modern foreign language, for general education and just in case for these formalities.

Being that the thread got ressurected, here is a small update. I completely and utterly failed at my self-ed project. :lol: But, in my defense, I had some stress in personal life (moving, kids, bla bla... - excuses basically LOL). However, my DAUGHTER took on that economics interest REALLY seriously. :confused:

I am sorry I asked. :grouphug:

How does it function with your ds13? Does he use both hands alternatively for all functions or he "specializes" within them most of the time (e.g. drawing with right, writing with left?)? Sorry to be asking so much questions, just interested about this. :) Your sister was ambidextrous, as in, she no longer is? (This is a phenomenon I am *really* interested in, if so, because it seems as though a certain number of people start ambidextrous and then one side prevails in their later childhood - I am that case.)

Just curious.

:lol: (Swellmomma - where is your kittie gone? :tongue_smilie:)

You are not being mean and you are not being unreasonable, but I want to stand up for those of us who are more flexible with rules in general. It may seem rude, disorganized and unprofessional to most Americans, but really, many people (and entire cultures) function the way to interpret rules not as fixed absolutes, but as general guidelines, especially for something not very formal. I would honestly not see a big deal for those few days of difference. I would have an issue with consistent not showing up for events, but a few days of flexibility about payment would be totally fine with me. I am like that with most things. I am okay with (reasonable) tardiness, I am okay with "10 page essays" which are 8 or 12 pages long (because the length in my view is a general guideline, not something fixed in stone), I am okay with about a week of flexibility for payment after the official deadline, etc. Just a different view of it - I think these are small stuff which should remain small stuff and not be a cause of frictions.

Kristin, I do not think there is a "right" or "wrong" answer to these questions. Different things work for different people in different types of relationships. Yes, whenever you give your professional expertise to somebody for free, it essentially means paying for it yourself, because there is more than just time involved. That is why it is a gift. :) Again, it is perfectly reasonable and okay for you to decide not to wish to deal with such gifts with friends and to do business as usual with them. As for drawing the lines, I tend to include only people whom I consider de facto family already (long term childhood friends, next generation of long term family friends, and an oddball or two with whom I got really close a bit later in life). The favors and gifts extend beyond professional expertise. For example, my daughter is currently living with a family with whom our family has a history of mutual help over several generations - we pay *nothing* for room and board for her, and they would be *offended* if we tried. Likewise, one of the family appartments has been occupied for several years by another friend's daughter who uses it as a college student and only deals with utilities, no rent is charged at all. I have done professional translations in the past for 0 € for friends, paying out of my own pocket additional formal and legal stuff that had to be done (stamped by whom and where it had to be confirmed, etc.), without any mention of that. Likewise, I have eaten in restaurants in which no bills were ever given to me, I have attended theatre and opera by picking up right before the show tickets that had been discreetly put aside for me without having payed for them, etc. From little favors like that to major life favors - that is what friends are for, IMO. But, I totally understand and respect why somebody would wish to separate business from friendship and charge their friends accordingly.

No education can possibly be "complete", so sure, there were gaps left and huge areas of human knowledge and experience unaddressed, and perhaps many useful mental connections overlooked, BUT, on the whole, I got a very good education. I have been studying classical languages since middle school (and intensely in the last five years of my education, in lycee), reading literary masterpieces in two modern foreign languages, had a chronological study of history and art history, a basic science education (mostly concentrated around three - I think? - years of physics in high school, with the rest of natural sciences mostly integrated), integrated math (which did not go as in depth as it "should" have because we were a classical, not a scientific school, but it still covered basic notions of calculus, in spite of very few hours weekly allotted for it), and a very, very good education in literature. My school was strictly academic on the high school level. There was no finishing ANY stage of education without a comprehensive exam of some kind, and no graduation without a graduation thesis defended in front of the commission and all that jazz. With my friends from school I often went to theatre, opera, etc. Although we were teens like all other teens and often cut school, caused problems, and went out, we were still growing into a "cultured" bunch. My parents still thought my education was severely lacking. :tongue_smilie:

Agents are animated beings (people or animals).

A profoundly gifted kid and Latina Christiana?! :001_huh: Get her Wheelock's (better option) or Latin for the New Millennium (worse option, but still good, high school-ish), or Henle (which I have no personal experience with, but which seems to be in between these two).

This may not be for everyone, but I refuse to deal with money with (close) friends. Money has a tremendous potential of ruining even the best of relationships and I have seen bitterness about money too many times to wish to experience it myself. So, I prefer my close friendships to be as money-less as possible. I do not want money to be an issue on the table. Ever. In other words, money is not. discussed., and all my (close) friends might need from me (in terms of favors, professional expertise, etc.) they can accept as a gift only without obligations. Likewise, I get the same treatment. With time those favors tend to mostly even out anyway. For us it works, YMMV. I am not suggesting this is "the" way of handling money and friends, just bringing it up as an option. So, in my reality, I would simply never be in a situation like yours because there would be no money involved and I would be pleased with the absence of money as a factor. With less than close friends, i.e. essentially acquaintances, business as usual, without changing your prices three times. You set the price and inform them about the modalities of payment, the rest is up on them. But with close friends, I am not going to touch money with a ten foot pole - either it will be a gift, or you will get it elsewhere.

I agree. As annoying as it is, it is not your DD's fault and there is something teenagerish about your reaction. This has been my experience too with nearly all families I know, *especially* if the youngest child is a boy.

Logging hours is pointless, IMO. The credit should be awarded upon the completion of the course, no matter how long it takes - even in schools I attended it functions this way, nobody could care less how much time you dedicate to the subject on your own, it is concrete results that matter. I would be totally okay with awarding a credit for the minimal hours if you have to log them, as long as the student finished the course - I would NOT "punish" an efficient student by making them spend more time on the course, so yes, going with the bare minimum (but not below) would be totally fine in my book IF it satisfies your content coverage / results criteria. (Likewise, I would NOT reward dawdling and inefficiency by allowing a student to stop with a course at a point the number of hours has been surpassed, because "they did enough".)

I have read what was available online, which I believe was pretty much the integral text of To Train Up a Child (the one with infant switching and all). I would not have considered buying it under any conditions as I do not wish to own a copy or to financially support it, but what I read did appear to be an entire book, pretty much. It is because I *have* read it why I believe it is a lot less potent stuff than many people make it to be. Of course, now you might say - and I will agree with it - that "potent" depends on the person who reads it and their state at the time they read it, so while many people could read it and forget about it, many others would get influenced... but frankly, you can say the same thing about *anything*. And at some point, when it boils down, you can either treat people as though they are responsible for their acts or as though they are not and as though they are too weak to resist such stuff on the market of ideas. I choose the former, taking the attitude that ultimately, it is about the person who acts, not about an abstract idea they act on. They choose to adhere to that idea and implement it. Of course, there is an element of personal responsibility in promoting certain ideas in print under your full name, and an element of legal responsibility if those ideas cross certain lines, but at the end of the day, it is still about people who do it. I hold that nothing and nobody can make you a child abuser unless YOU allow it (assuming we are talking about mature and reasonably healthy adults), even if they were to openly promote beating a child to death (which the Pearls, IIRC, with all the disgust they do promote, still do not). So, no, I really do not see how that book could make anyone do anything, although it could certainly be a trigger... but for somebody who already has inside of them, or brought about by their circumstances, an inclination to punitive and violent relationships with children, power plays with children, and all the other stuff I abhor about this philosophy. First you have to accept the idea of the whole breaking the child's will, whipping, etc., to even get to the point of practicing it. And one book alone is hardly going to do it. My own mentality is so far away from that one that I could read this book and remain entirely intact by anything I read there. Now, sure, people are different and I come from a different culture and all, but really, it is a *choice* to implement in practice what you read about. I just get slightly disturbed when I read otherwise or when I see, even by implication, the principal fault being placed upon a philosophy rather than adults who chose to embrace it as their own (not speaking of this thread, but more generally).

Yes.

As always in these discussions, I am quite alarmed that a book gets blamed for things. :confused: So fine, it is a book (most of which I have by the way read, out of sheer curiosity), which contains many ideas which many people would find to be dangerous, wrong, or plain evil ideas. But ultimately, it is not about what a book says. It is about what people DO with what a book says. That is where the responsibility lies. NOTHING and NOBODY can make you treat your child in the proposed fashion without your consent if you are a mature and reasonably sane and healthy adult (and if you lack that maturity, perhaps you should not presume to "raise" other people in the first place?). So, while I share many people's disgust about the Pearls' overall child-rearing philosophy (blind obedience has never been the highest virtue I wish for my children - I do not consider it a virtue at all, to be honest, it creeps the hell out of me because much evil has happened in the world when the good people were "duly fulfilling orders" - nor has switching infants been my preferred way of bonding with them), I still disagree with the statements such as "children have died as a result of those teachings". No, they have not died because of it - they have died as a result of concrete actions by concrete people, not as a result of some vague philosophies out there in the air on the market of ideas. I agree with this (and I have never hit my kids). I have known people whose parents were polite, self-controlled, progressive, cultured people, who would never hit a child - but who, behind the curtains, did what were in many aspects awful mind games or emotional manipulation of their children (typically recognized as such only in retrospect). I often thought how most of my other friends, who suffered a swat or two in their early and a slap or two in their late childhood / youth, actually grew up in a way healthier home atmosphere even if it on the outside appeared more violent. So, I definitely agree with you here - things are not always what they seem. Still, it was miles away from anything the Pearls would advocate.

I would push it. But that is me, in my mind, Latin is exactly like math - you do not simply "give up" math halfway through school, other than in exceptional circumstances and exceptional schooling arrangements, because it is viewed like a part of the standard educational package. If Latin is non-negotiable for you, you must take that attitude. If it is not non-negotiable for you, then you have nothing to worry about anyway and let them do what they want.