Regarding the original question, it doesn't have to necessarily be religious in orientation. If we had our kids in public school, we'd ask that they not participate in Veteran's Day, and we're atheists. We're not pacifists, either. We just believe in honoring veterans in our own, personal way throughout the year, and we believe that "holidays" like Veteran's Day and Memorial Day are often conflated with other ideas that we do not agree with (hawkishness, whitewashing of military history, veneration of the state, etc.).

I think that as teachers we have to teach what we have a passion for. I would not teach as effectively otherwise, and I might even burn out. My "bias" even carries into core subjects like history -- I definitely focus more on the history of Western civilization than any other. I skip chapters from other cultures in SOTW without a second thought. That's not to say I don't teach any at all, but if I had to estimate a percent of the total time they're taught (including extra activities, supplemental reading, etc.), it'd probably be somewhere around 20% non-Western. I just think that with the huge swaths of history that could be taught, depth is better than breadth. It makes sense to me that we should mostly study how the current society we live in came to be by tracing its roots to ancient Greece, etc. When it comes to non-core subjects in general, my inclination is to put the things that are of secondary importance to me on the backburner and not address them until the logic stage (fifth grade). My thinking is that even with a bright child and excellent curriculum, the kid will forget a bunch of what is being taught in the early grades. So I focus on skills that will be built upon so they're less likely to be forgotten (foreign language, an instrument, etc.). Subjects like art history (or even just art -- at least, in terms of formal instruction) can wait.

PBS' Manor House website gives some suggestions. You don't have to follow their recipes to the letter to get the spirit of the dishes. They suggest Potato soup, artichoke and asparagus salad, kale, gingerbread cookies, and various sweet cream desserts.

What's your price range? Steam Mop - $63 I clean houses part time for extra income, and I looooove this thing. If she has lots of hard floor surfaces, it is a lifesaver -- so quick and easy, and it just uses water so no harsh chemicals are involved. The One Minute Manicure - $20 Crock Pot - $30 A great tool for making cooking easy. Single Cup Coffee Maker - $20 She can brew decaf tea or coffee if she's breastfeeding.

I would say no. I'd explain why and remind her of the other very nice (and expensive) gifts on her list that she has to look forward to. I'd also offer to help her plan to buy it herself using her allowance. "You get $10 per week for allowance, so you'd be able to buy it before Christmas!" Or whatever timeline given her allowance. That way she gets to make her own mistake, as it were.

I think George R. R. Martin still emphasizes honor and chivalry, but he makes it the exception rather than the rule. Ned Stark, Brienne of Tarth, Renly Baratheon, and Loras Tyrell are all very noble characters.

Classroom management. The idea is that it's easier for a teacher to control a group of 25 kids who are all the same age. Ironically, schools have also taken up the philosophy that it is inherently good to have a "mixed" class of kids of different abilities and education levels, so an ideal classroom would have kids with IQs ranging from 60 to 150, kids who are barely literate with kids reading several grades above their level, etc. Academic educators seem to believe that it will "pull everyone up" by some sort of osmosis. It's a veritable nightmare for the teachers.

I just wanted to say that I've known a few adult men who were never broken of the habit. I did my best to pretend not to notice when I was around them, but I was pretty shocked and uncomfortable being in the presence of a man who had his hand down his pants every five minutes or so. I don't think with any of these men that it was a pervy thing -- they were just used to being able to "readjust" whenever they wanted and did it as freely as another person might scratch their arm or rub their nose. I can't imagine how many women they've sent screaming for the hills. One guy I used to know was good looking, tall, and smart -- but if I had been single at the time there was no way I'd entertain the notion of dating a guy with that embarrassing habit. Just goes to show that there are some things parents absolutely have to put a stop to, or else the kid may end up sabotaging himself in ways he doesn't even realize.

We're atheists and we celebrate it. But we are extremely opposed to the idea of Santa Claus because we want to be honest with our children in all things. We also don't focus much on the gifts. We read Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol aloud every year, bake and craft, talk about the solstice, and try to encourage spontaneous acts of generosity. We also do "required" acts of kindness as a family like shoveling an elderly neighbor's driveway, helping clean/cook/babysit for a family with a new baby, etc.

I believe there are going to be seven books in the series, so there are two more books that will be published after A Dance with Dragons. You can keep up with the author's progress by following his blog (he says that he's only 100 pages into the sixth book right now), and you can see some of the production diary of HBO's next season here.

For Christmas, I'd really like to get our family a nice collection of the classics (both children and adult classics). I'm not talking gold leaf pages and leather covers, just something that looks nice with themed covers, ykim? My searches on Amazon have only yielded two options: 1. Puffin Children's Classics. The box set includes 16 books and is only $3.60 per book. Not bad, but is this really my only option? Plus, Oliver Twist is abridged (we generally don't buy abridged). 2. For adult classics, there's the Penguin hardcovers like this (there are more in the "Customers also bought..." line on that page). But they aren't sold as a group (unless I want to pay much more than their cost individually, go figure), it's about $14 per book, and the cover art might be a little too modern for me. Surely there must be more sets out there. Can anyone point me in the right direction?

I love Ginnifer Goodwin, and I'll keep watching for a few more episodes for her alone. I know the kid is supposed to be endearing, but I think he's just an annoying brat. I hate the "obnoxious kid knows it all (he really does!)" TV trope.

Be sure you order those books with the library discount! It's usually 40% - 60% off.

Exactly. The last thing any 16 year old needs is a parent intervening in their relationships on their behalf. (Of course, parents should intervene if there is anything illegal or sexually inappropriate going on. ASFAIK, this is not one of those situations.) Now is a great time for him to realize that not everyone is going to treat him with the utmost respect, and he needs to develop coping mechanisms to deal with that. My DH was homeschooled. During his first semester in college, during the course of conversation he told his mother about two professors who didn't seem to like him. Little did he know that his mother would look up the professors' phone numbers and call them to discuss her son with them. Did this improve the situation? Not in the least. Did my DH all but die of embarrassment? Absolutely. He also learned a very important lesson -- he could not trust his mother to the degree that he could share his feelings of insecurity or disappointment when it came to his college experience. I know your situation is not the same, but I think the principle may still apply. Your son has confided in you about how hard he's taking this. Sometimes the right thing for a parent to do is to do nothing. Just listen. Counsel him when he's open to it. It's not up to you to fix his relationships, so don't feel guilty!

You said he's working in a field that involves physical labor -- are you sure they aren't underpaying him? Minimum wage is around $7.25 in the SE and if he's working full time, after taxes that would probably be around $275 per week. That's a little over $1,000 per month. So even if his rent, utilities and various bills took up two-thirds of his pay, that'd be $725 and he'd have $275 left over. That should be almost $70 per week for food. Many jobs start paying at above minimum wage, so he might want to consider trying to find one that does (fast food jobs, waiting tables, etc.). It sounds like either his employer is not paying him minimum wage or he needs re-prioritize his bills (moving to a smaller place, downgrading his car, getting rid of cable TV, etc.). Or he's only working part time, in which case he should try to find one of the jobs I mentioned above for longer hours. I know that saying, "Something here is wrong!" isn't what you were looking for, but I don't want to make the mistake of fixating on the symptom instead of looking at the disease.

It sounds like RightStart Level C might be a good fit for your son, since it covers a lot of the basic math, telling time, multiplication, etc. It's a math program that's very hands-on, which is usually an advantage for kids who struggle with math. For language arts, I agree with a previous poster who recommended First Language Lessons (grammar) and Writing With Ease (writing and narration training). Those can be found here. What kind of science did you have in mind? Traditionally, earth science and astronomy are taught in conjunction with SOTW 2. One secular option is Elemental Science. Aside from having to get the supplemental books from the library or Amazon, everything is laid out for you -- worksheets, simple experiments, fun projects, etc.

I think Rosetta Stone has online interactive sessions with native speakers included in their TOTALe package.

SpongeBob leads to learning problems Television viewing decreases cognitive development in young children TV viewing at young ages produces negative academic effects later in life There's a lot of research that's been done, and the consensus is clear: TV is not "self-directed learning" or "educational" for young children. It is an entirely passive form of entertainment that has shown time and time again to produce negative effects on cognitive development. It's easy to say, "Eh, whatever works," or "I did it when I was a kid and I turned out okay!" but you should know that those permissive sentiments fly in the face of every major study about how television affects children's brains.

The best book I've seen so far is EVOLUTION: How We and All Living Things Came to Be. It's written for ages 9 and up, but you could read it aloud to a younger child and they would understand most of the big concepts. There are lots of illustrations and examples, which I love. I'm also a huge fan of this series by the BBC featuring Kenneth Branaugh as narrator: Before the Dinosaurs: Walking with Monsters Walking with Dinosaurs Walking with Prehistoric Beasts Walking with Cavemen It's a lot cheaper to buy the entire collection together. Last I checked, all of them are available on Netflix Instant Play, and some of them are on YouTube as well (here's part 1 of 9 of Walking with Monsters). They're also on Amazon Prime I think. Walking with Monsters is not listed in the correct order on Netflix, though, so watch Episode 3, 1 and then 2. The only caveat is that the series shows the creatures hunting and killing each other, and while there is no graphic violence, it does show implied violence (blood on teeth, etc.) so it may not be suitable for really young kids. The series does an excellent job of illustrating how more and more complexity can arise from simple organisms as they adapt to their changing environment.

I think Americans need to see more pictures of the dead. Maybe it'd make our wars overseas more "real" for them and would change the way we jump into foreign conflicts. I wish they'd also show pictures of Qaddafi's grandchildren that were killed in a targeted attack a few months ago. Most Americans don't seem to know that we helped murder a five month old and two two year olds. Those are only three children in a very long list, but maybe it'd help counteract the feeling of, "This war was so easy and just." In truth, many experts say that Qaddafi is being replaced by the Mujaheddin. Too many people I know look at this and other conflicts we entangle ourselves with like it's a Call of Duty game. :(

I always carry a gun in my purse, so no, I don't leave it in the car. If I'm going some place where I wouldn't want to carry my purse, I leave my purse at home and carry my wallet, keys and gun on my person (jacket pockets, etc.). Our car was broken into in our driveway and the GPS was stolen from the glove compartment (like a PP, we didn't have one of those plastic mounts to let them know we even had one, so that was odd). Someone broke my dad's car window just to steal his leather jacket. I don't think it's fraud, I think that car break-ins are just becoming more common now than they were ten years ago and people aren't used to having to deal with that.

Cool story, bro!

How about a cat? ;) No? Okay, how about the cat of the dog world, the Italian Greyhound? EDIT: The video recommends the dog for couples without kids -- but this is only because if you have a tiny greyhound puppy, you don't want a 2 year old throwing them across the room or sitting on them. But if your children are taught how to handle animals properly, this wouldn't be a problem (and this precaution would be the same for all small dogs).

Never. I am not exaggerating when I say that I believe public school is more harmful to kids than alcohol, marijuana or premarital sex. If my DC want to rebel, I hope they choose one of those things instead, because they're a hell of a lot more fun, and I would have more chance to combat some of the harmful results with those things than I could hope to do with the myriad effects of public school. Institutional schooling goes against everything we believe from a philosophical standpoint...I really don't have time to list all of the reasons it wouldn't be an option in our family.

Businesses that are used to hiring mostly illegal immigrants can pay their workers pretty well in part because they are saving money by not having to pay taxes, insurance, workman's comp, etc. that they would have to pay if it wasn't under the table. My FIL is a dentist, and he would LOVE to have a secretary as the front desk of his office, but he can't afford the associated taxes and expenses of having an employee. (So yes, he works as a dentist all by himself taking mostly Medicaid/Medicare patients.) Those businesses would have to a) pay less per hour and b) hire less workers if they weren't hiring illegally. Agriculture is mostly seasonal work with very few benefits. A lot of people just don't want to deal with that and aren't suffering enough financially to try it. I read recently that many (I want to say most but I can't remember the numbers) steadily unemployed people are simply holding out for a job that paid as well or nearly as well as their previous one...definitely not Great Depression era mentality there. At least in my area, there isn't a single fast food restaurant in town that pays minimum wage. Most of them pay around $12/hour. Agriculture jobs are much, much harder than being a cashier at a fast food chain. Besides, waiting tables even at a greasy spoon will earn you around $17/hour. There's no comparison. I don't think the reason illegal aliens are chiefly doing our agri work is because they have a saintly work ethic and Americans are lazy bums. I think it's in large part that agri business isn't willing to pay a competitive wage for how hard and dangerous the work is, and they can get away with paying immigrants less for more.