I guess it's hard to answer or even perhaps discuss. Because it seems like the public school system varies a lot in what they offer (even without talking about academics). On top of that is everyone's personal preference on what they even need, for example my parents sent me to public school. They never looked into childcare, because my school was walking distance to my house and my parents just told me to go home after school (shh.. don't tell CPS). During non-school days occasionally it was stay at home by myself or go to my parents work. Then furthermore there is the question of extracurriculars are you a family that would extracurricular whether you homeschool or not. Or whether public school will put pressure or present opportunities for your kids to have extracurriculars (which might cost extra even at a public school but perhaps not as much as if you had to make those activities happen outside of the public school system). Also technically, my kids do go to a public school. It's a homeschool charter school, so they give me monetary and curriculum support. They have a library of curriculum I can choose from to use for free, including consumables.

My kids are in the blanket for building stage of life and the top sheets are great for that.

I actually decided that for DS7 back in November (?). We've really liked it, I know it's not quite enough if you just hand the book over to the child and say do it, but it seems effective (for DS7 who is a decent speller) if we work through it together. He doesn't need me to work through it with him but I'm there to remind him to use the activities to really study the rule/words rather than just get it done. I started having DS7 just do independent reading (with narration, copy work, and conversations) instead of All About Reading. We'll look up words in the dictionary or talk about words he doesn't know. I let him chose the books and I steer him towards on-level or below, so it might be 5 words from an entire book that we have to look up or discuss. He has really been enjoying it and I've gotten him to produce more writing this way. Also unbeknownst to me I've been essentially following WWE. Originally I decided not to use it because it seemed like too much writing for DS7 but somehow we caught up to it. DD5 just loves writing so I've actually been doing narration, copy work and conversations with the All About Reading short stories she reads. She requested more writing be incorporated into her All About Reading so that's what we are doing. In another 2 weeks or so she'll be in AAR2. In a different note, it's pretty clear DD5 needs glasses. This is what makes me happy I'm homeschooling because the indication that she needed glasses is she was a pill. I know school teachers can also catch this stuff, but I wonder how long it goes on before people find out. I could see if she was in traditional school for a while she would just be getting in trouble. The only reason I figure vision is the problem is because I have only 2 students and so I watch her closely for school work and knows what crutches she needs to complete work (which has been me re-writing something in large font for her) .

I don't know I didn't look at the details.

In California you can make a $35,000 cash deposit with the DMV to claim self insurance for the car insurance.

I admit it's not a good sounding text. I've also been guilty of sending texts like that. Usually it's because my mind is on business mode, whether it's because it's the 3+ official business text of the day and my mind has a hard time switching back to personal talk mode.

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I don't think it sounds like they want a "very personal assistant," but for me there are red flags that they want a slave that they pay. I know people from my culture of origin who would post an ad like that because they want workers who are at their beck and call. They don't think there is anything wrong with being at work for 10-12 hours a day 6-7 days a week. It's normal in some countries to have 6 day work weeks as the norm.

I don't think you can ever just make someone more positive. They have to want that for themselves. The being able to be positive no matter how dire and out of your control a situation is comes with a lot of maturity (some adults lack this amount of maturity too). I don't know if it helps, but the way I approach these types of conversation is to be honest about the reality, what parts they really do have control over and if they really don't. Election is kind of a good example because for me the presidential election pretty much my vote doesn't count. It gets counted but my state is an all or nothing state and is not a swing state. I still vote and my general vote counts because there are a lot of other things on the ballot aside from the presidency. The elections for people who are going to run my town is something I can sway or the measures for my local area. These are important too. I have lots of thoughts about this and often I have to hold it back and let people think "I can't change anything."

I agree with @HomeAgain and @desertflower. If you do want a more conceptual math I would pick Singapore math, but be sure to get the teacher/home educator's guide. There are extra activities in there in case your child needs it to review and get to mastery. To make math more engaging you could supplement with the Beast Academy Comics(?) or Life of Fred. Those present the math with a bit more fun, but I don't think either one would provide enough scaffolding and practice for your son.

Also no one really knows that there is "no head injury". Head injuries are one of those things that can happen and no one knows that it happened. It's not like breaking your leg where it's very obvious when it happens.

I feel really bad for everyone who have trouble sleeping. How do I sleep? Basically when my head jlhits the pillow. What I need to do to have a good night's sleep? Get rid of my kids.

YES! I was horrified when my daughter was 3 and putting stickers willy-nilly on things. I was don't you want to save that special sticker!!!

Have you thought of looking into a research/internship/summer camp experience at a college or university? You'll have to look for what's available near you, or not near you, but within your budget. I did a summer program in my teens where I did research alongside an astrophysics professor. Super engaging. Unless you test out of physics in college, the first class you take in physics will be the fundamentals (just faster, material/questions will be harder, with someone who has a PhD in physics). FWIW I went to public school where a biology teacher taught my physics class (teacher was sometimes stumped by what we were suppose to be learning and plenty of gaps), I still passed the Intro to Physics for STEM majors course in college.

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I come from a family background where aunts, uncles, the whole extended family gets to say what they want to the kids without parental filter or consent. I can't even begin to imagine it happening and being a healthy relationship all around. I mean in my childhood sure sometimes it was fine and benign (never actually helpful), and no singular incident was that offensive, but there sure were some relatives that kept each singular thing difficult to say offensive but the culmination of their statements and advice was undermining my parents. Based on this post and past posts, I think SIL is definitely undermining you in some way. Hopefully you and your husband are on the same page about his academic goals and that translates into your son not really listening to your SIL.

I'm frustrated because I can't find where I originally found this. But somewhere I had read that to begin narration with a child to simply have a conversation with them about something they did or something they are interested in. (I did with my son when he was a preschooler but hopefully it can work for your 9 year old.) I didn't start narration with books or things I read to him. I started by asking him about his interest and having a conversation about it with him. I even found these conversations were more productive when I didn't know anything about the topic and he was the expert. This established the habit and established that narration isn't a test with right or wrong answers but it's just communicating what you know.

DS let me know math was boring. Basically when his focus starts to waver and he starts to fight a subject it means the material is either too easy or too hard. To figure that out (if it isn't obvious) I just say OK do this/these problems for me as quick as you can and if they are correct we can skip the rest. I pick the harder problems for this exercise. If he complains about that then I pick then problems he was doing and I say let's do this problem together. I do it with him to see where the confusion might be, then that's the end of math for the day; I regroup and figure out how I can teach or scaffold it starting tomorrow's lesson. HWT starts with doodling for a few pages. I would say for us this was the handwriting without meltdowns. You can start in Kick Start Kindergarten even. If meltdowns are happening with this you may want to invest in the teacher's guide. It has more things in there to make handwriting even more scaffolded and gentle.

Just yesterday I got strawberries for $4.99 for 2 lbs. When "in season" their produce can be a fantastic price. Also dairy if you drink that much.

I think some people don't need Costco. We are a Costco loving family right now because we will finish their perishable bulk goods. (I go every week). There was a time before kids though the Costco membership was not a must have. If this is you then maybe just see if you have friends with a membership who will get the good deals for you.

Yes, yes I do. How many people really want cheeky underwear. I mean at some point I feel you might as well just go commando at least then you won't have to keep adjusting the stupid underwear.

My kids get smelly stickers at one of their classes. Sometimes I think the parents are more excited about them than the kids are. I was much more into the smelly markers than the smelly stickers though. I will always expect a black marker to smell like licorice.

I've put in a more detailed what we are using for DS7 in the second grade thread. As with this year we are continuing to work on writing output, I'm counting all the writing in this umbrella (seriously including doodling). I just reviewed WWE and realized we are actually on pace with SWB's recommendations, so pretty proud of us. Without even meaning to, we really used WWE as a guide but use our own copy work and reading to do it. I wish I could have an open and go option here (and I tried this year), but the reality is I need the selections to be super high interest or else it drags down the rest of our day. DD5 is really struggling with being the younger sister of DS7. She kind of beats herself up about not being good at stuff because she keeps comparing herself to her 1.5 year older brother and thinking she isn't good. This year I started her on a lot of curriculum that I had used with DS7, but as the year went on I switched some curriculum so it'd be harder for her to compare. So, this year I'd like to find some activities she can call her own and build up her frustration tolerance.

I've been looking at the MCT Poodle books for a few months thinking "Oh they are so expensive". Then I went to use some Starbucks gift cards I got for Christmas. I was shocked that $5 did not get me a regular size drink (sure it wasn't the just a coffee but still...). If I substituted coffee drinks for dollars in terms of curriculum it seems super cheap.

The people aren't wrong and it would be really hard to convince her to homeschool because homeschool would be cheaper than public school (public school is subsidized from the government). It is the point of public school to provide free and affordable education to the public. Our school district offers free lunch for everyone, water is available on tap at school but you could bring personal water bottle from home if you are concerned about tap water. If you are low income and qualify after school care can be subsidized to free. I think the convincing should be on how she can afford homeschooling not that it would be cheaper.