It's amazing how much my oldest didn't get it until she started having to pay some (not even all) of her own bills. Suddenly she has much more perspective.

I think your dd has too much work. You have her working on at least ten different things (maybe more). To me, that's overburdening. The first thing I would do is remove piano from the "school day." Lots of kids take music lessons, and it's an extracurricular, not a school subject. Next, I would remove the morning basket. Ninety minutes is way too long, and SOTW1 is not challenging enough for a sixth grader. She's very possibly bored with it. I would find something she could spend 30-40 minutes on for history that is grade-appropriate. I also wouldn't try to teach kids of varying ages like yours a language together. By necessity, you're going to work at the pace of the youngest/slowest child. That would be boring for the oldest. I would go with one foreign language. If she wants to lean French, let her focus on French. You can save Latin for high school. I would also select one resource for French. I know that I often feel overwhelmed when I try to use multiple resources for one subject. If you drop the morning basket, you can just focus on one French resource and save time. I agree that WWS is not something she should be working on independently. You can spend some time going over the lesson with her, and then she can work on the assignment, and then you can go over it with her again, making suggestions on how to edit and improve. Were it me, this is what the student's daily schedule would look like: 7:30-8:30 Math 8:30-9:15 History 9:15-9:30 Break 9:30-10:00 French 10:00-11:00 Writing 11:00-11:15 Break 11:15-12:00 Science (with siblings) 12:00-12:30 Speech/Drama ETA: I see she's still doing spelling and grammar, so those could be done from 12:30-1:00. I would end here. That's 4 1/2 [5 including grammar/spelling] hours of work, which I think is perfectly adequate for a 6th grader. Piano practice, handwriting, and subject-specific reading would be things that would need to be accomplished outside of school time (honestly, I would tell a 6th grader, unless it was a child who for some specific reason needed handwriting instruction, that handwriting is a hobby that she can work on on her own for fun). And I wouldn't worry about having your child do weekly writing about the subject readings. Yeah, it's a great idea in theory, but in practice, we can't do everything, and WWS is pretty heavy-duty writing. Also ETA: I know that different things work for different people, but I've never felt the need to have a middle-schooler working 6-8 hours a day (my kids are now in middle and high school). For us and our priorities (not just academic but also hobbies/interests and family time), that would have been too much.

Well, that particular assignment is directly related to the book the students are reading. Matt (the main character) has several mentors, who may or may not be positive role models for him, and to me, the assignment was meant to get students thinking about how they are influenced by the people around them, not for them to just give a cute and pat report about someone who helped them. How Matt is influenced and how that influence helps him develop his identity is a central theme in the book.

That means she is ready for Algebra 1, not that she has mastered Algebra 1 material.

We don't do fair; we do appropriate. Each child gets what is appropriate to their needs and (some of) their desires.

Absolutely I would say something. As a taxpayer and concerned citizen, I would call up and tell the principal, "I just wanted to let you know that the flag corps coach is not representing your school well. I've been working near where they practice for several weeks, and he's always negative with he girls. The number of girls on the team is dwindling. You should probably look into this." Public school employees work for the public. The public has a right to comment on their job performance.

My dd is really enjoying The Hero's Journey. It has variety and incorporates creativity and art. I think the instruction is solid.

There is a free, online history textbook here. My dd read it last year and enjoyed it.

My dd wasn't thrilled with that one, either, and tried to get out of it. I just told her, "When you go to college, you will have to complete the assignments you are given whether you like them or not. Start practicing now." :sneaky2:

We enjoyed Lightning Literature.

My brothers are plumbers. They own their own company, and they are extremely wealthy (one has no degree and one has a degree in English). The reason that I mention this is because they frequently hire people with no experience and train them. As long as they are reliable and hardworking, they do very well with my brothers' company. In fact, my oldest brother started the company after having worked for another plumber who trained him and then gave him his blessing to start his own company. It may be something for your husband to look into. I will give you my personal opinion, which may or may not please you. I give it with sincerity. You are married to a man who has only a high school diploma. He is stuck in a low-wage job with a fairly large family to support. It's impractical for him to try to obtain a degree right now. You are, according to your posts, overwhelmed and depressed. You both worry about money. In my opinion, putting the kids in school/daycare and getting a job might be a positive step. It would help out financially, give you some breathing space from your kids, and take some pressure off your dh. It is more likely that you will get ahead financially with both of you working than with trying to come up with some career change for you husband. If you can save enough money to move to a more desirable neighborhood, a lot of the things that cause you stress will be alleviated. Putting your kids in school needn't be forever. You could take them out again once things are more financially stable. I know it's a big step. I agonized over putting my oldest in school. It turned out the be the best decision for us. Best wishes.

If he still enjoys life, don't put him down just because you are moving. Keep him close to you, reassure him, and work to make his new routine (at the new place) as close to his old routine as you can. Have your family plan on spending extra time with him while he adjusts to the new place.

If you want him writing about literature, then I suggest Lightning Literature. I know some people say it's too light, but it does have the student writing about their reading. It sounds like you have pretty much covered all the writing skills your son needs, and now it's just about application. If you keep rehashing the same instruction, he's bound to get bored (sounds like he already is). You can also have him write across the curriculum. Assign him one paper each semester in each of literature, history, and science (and any electives he may be taking, like philosophy or psychology). Or have him take a technical writing class for a different approach to writing.

There's a free online history text here. My dd14 enjoyed reading it.

I would NEVER put a student in the position of inadvertently identifying with Hitler.

Two DE semesters of a subject is 2 years of high school credit. If's he's going to take four semesters of DE social studies, I'd call that good and not worry about it anymore.

You could purchase The Reader's Odyssey and let your dd pick some books she is interested in to use with it.

I have had success in the past substituting books by just correlating the topics. Have the student read the topics in the syllabus in your book of choice. If your book doesn't have information on a specific topic, there are tons of free resources. I think it's crass to refer to Zinn as "unhinged." There are less polemic ways to get your point across.

So what's wrong with summers in the park being the time and place for PokemonGo? Because your kids don't want to do it, no one should? They're infringing on your idea of how people should utilize parks? Reading further into this thread, it seems that you have decided that PokemonGo is worthless because some people have done stupid things while playing it. Well, people do stupid things all the time. It's not like people started being stupid because of PokemonGo. I think you sound very judgmental about this.

I think that you're overreacting, personally. You're punishing your kids by not taking them to parks because other people might be playing PokemonGo? That seems extreme. FWIW, my kids have been doing the things that you say you want your kids to do: enjoying parks, getting exercise, socializing with their friends, etc., while playing PokemonGo. It's actually a social game. Besides, it's not all they do. Believe it or not, the vast majority of their time is spent not playing PokemonGo.

Almost every day. It's disgusting.

It certainly appeals to my art-loving child. She told me her favorite part of it is the main lesson book art projects.

You can't predict that with a test. The SAT and ACT have historically had low reliability and validity for their purported aims.

Me too! If he's taken two WTMA classes, I would expect him to be on grade level, at least.

I know, right?? The illustration in the textbook is all neat and clear, and then you look through the microscope and it's just this weird fuzzy blobby stuff that looks like weird fuzzy blobby stuff. Using microscopes in school actually taught me not to enjoy using a microscope. When I was in 8th grade, we had to do science experiments. I decided to see whether the pH of a host medium affected how much bacteria grew in it. To make a long story short, when I looked at the stuff through the microscope, I saw absolutely nothing. I talked to my teacher about it, and she was completely unhelpful. She basically said that if I didn't have results to present, I'd flunk the project. So I did what any grade-conscious student would do: I faked the results. That's exactly the kind of stuff I try to avoid in teaching my kids science. If we spend a lot of time on something just to spend time on it but we get little or nothing from it, to me that's time wasted. If we can look at neatly labeled images online and my kids learn, or we can look at fuzzy blurry blobs through a microscope and my kids are scratching their heads, I'll go with the online pictures every time.