Do you read to him at night as he falls asleep? If you do that would be when I would read SOTW or Science at bedtime and have a project set up and ready to go the next morning after breakfast and before playtime. It is more work for you the night before but it might be easier for him to see what he gets to do and become excited about it. As much as my DS loves to play outside he also loves hands on projects and often his projects become part of his play. My DS prefers it if everything is set up and ready for him to tackle. He is just now at a point where I can tell him we are going to do something and he is able to wait while I set it up. Before if it wasn't ready to go it was very hard for him to understand what was going to happen.

Anyone used Young Scientist Club? Something similair? I am looking at different science kits for DS age 8. I am not even bothering with a textbook based curriculum again. DS learns by doing and past attempts with a textbook ended in disaster. I want something hands on but I am struggling to find something that will work for our family. I am thinking of trying science kits such as Young Scientist Club or something since I can buy them on Amazon. I am reluctant because I have bought many different kits in the past but each time I run into the same problem. The kits all say “Everything you need, except common house hold itemsâ€. Inevitably “the common house hold items†are items that we do not have or do not have the right kind of. :glare: I have to make another trip to the store and spend more money on the "common house hold items" that I will never again use. Generally, by the time I buy the item(s) the kit is long gone or been opened and attempted and some vital piece is missing because someone thought it was trash or something. After 4 years of trying them every couple of months I have concluded that these types of kits just are not a good fit for our family and lifestyle.

I have heard really good things about Hope and a Future from many different people. I have never heard of Little Giant Steps.

:grouphug: Last week I freaked out because when I sought support from a local group I was once again told my son just needs to be a kid and I am overreacting. I have been hearing that same thing 6 years now. If I had listened to them DS would be on a wacked out diet to "cure" his health problems and I would believe that his pain is just because he is growing. He would also have major internal organ failure or dead. Of course, had I listened to his pediatrician was convinced that there was nothing wrong with him and that DS just needed to be with normal kids (I guess his old neighborhood friend's and homeschool friends are abnormal :lol:). You have done the best with what you had. You cannot act on what you do not know. Easier to say then to accept. One day, I will actually internalize that and be able to relax...

You know the sterotypical small town mentality about the football players? That is here. DS's father made the varisty football team as a freshman and rarely actually even bothered to show up for school. All they cared about that he wad good and made practice. DS doesn't play football (thankfully, he has no desire to) and doesn't have the health, but if I can pretend he is in school I can pretend he is healthy and wants to play and considering genetic factors, current size compared to kids his age and late birthday etc. I highly doubt they would give him too hard a time. They want the winning football team and will do whatever they can to get it. Heck, they have already tried scouting DS for the football development program (the kids play with the kids they will go to high school with from the time they are 3).

That is awesome! I didn't have the guts to be that direct with my teachers, I just refused to do anything. I am interested in what he says about research papers.

You all must have a longer lunch. The kids here get 24 minutes and that includes the time it takes to get to the lunch room, buy lunch, find a seat, eat and return the tray. I remember the teen who baby sat me in 4th grade talking about study hall but by the time I got to high school they had done away with study halls. Just for fun I checked the local high school website, they do not offer a study hall or period. There are no formal high school exit exams here. Heck, reading and being able to do math are not required in order to recieve a high school diploma.

What is the teacher going to do to him? Mark his grade down? Fail him? I would rather my child fail every class then spend every second doing school and neglecting real life. I would insist that his final grade not reflect any assignments not done in school. The school has 7-8 hours to teach what they need to if they cannot they are doing something wrong. They should not expect the child to take on their job at home. Where I live DS would be on the bus 2 hours a day, his age needs 10 -12 hours of sleep that leaves 2-4 hours to do EVERYTHING else. He is not a morning person and would need a good 45 minutes to an hour in order to wake up in the morning and get ready so that leaves just 1-3 hours in the evening to eat dinner, spend time as a family, take care of personal hygiene and actually be a contributing member of the household (ie very minor chores) and be a child and explore his own interests.

I am 100% against any type of homework. If my DS went to public or private school I would not allow him to bring home any homework and I would not allow him to suffer any consequences from not doing homework. My view stems from my experience. In 7th grade each teacher assigned 20-30 problems each night, the next day we passed the paper to the person behind us and graded the problem. Then we were assigned the next chapter and 20-30 problems and within 5 minutes the bell rang. That 5 minutes was sold to the parents as ample class time to complete the assignment and if we did not complete it it was our own fault and we were expected to finish it at home. I deeply resented having to take all my books home every single day, teach myself the concept and do the busy work on my own time. It was pretty much the same in each subject, every.single.day with the exception of one teacher and she gave one homework assignment per chapter. She was awesome and made everything hands on. I still remember some of the things we did in class. 7th grade sticks out in my memory because that is when I gave up. I begged and begged and begged for them to just give me the assignments and let me work at my own pace and not sit through class after class after class where I didn't learn anything and just wasted my time. I was told that people do not learn that way and that I had to do it their way. I stopped playing the game at that point. Homework did not reinforce what I was taught in school, homework was me teaching myself what the teacher did not teach in school that day AND doing busy work to show I that learned it. Why on earth did I spend 8 hours at school that day if I have to go home and teach myself the days lesson? I do not ever recall having daily homework that was any different. Yes, I took home projects to finish such as posters or large scale projects but those were very rare and added on top of the daily homework. FWIW: I attended one of the best public school districts in my state.

I give my son's grade as what his age is for most things, currently he is in 3rd grade, or would be if he was in school. But, he is large for his age so I tend to flex his grade as needed. Last year DS wanted to play basketball but they only had a league for K-1 and 3-5, nothing for 2nd graders so I enrolled him as a 3rd grader. When he was in kindergarten he took a preschool art class. It all depends on the situation and if it will be a good fit.

This.

:lurk5:

Throw in the complaints about hard hard it is to make ends meet but the entire family is outfitted in the latest and greatest new tec gadget and you have my experience. :tongue_smilie:

I find this topic fascinating. I have reccently started to research international standards in education because I do not like the idea of using US standards as the base for my expectations. Here the community colleges require students to take an entrance examination to determine if incoming students (primarily recent high school grads) are ready for college level course. If a student does not pass they are required to take remedial courses. Before we moved we lived in the district that was the best in the area and 47% of graduates had to take remedial classes at the community college because they were not ready for college level courses. I do not know what they are doing and I do not really care enough anymore to find out. I used to care but when I went to meetings to discuss education reform and ways to help the schools do better all the parents talked about was how wonderful the schools were doing. Everyone assumed that their child would never be one of the 47% having to take remedial classes because their child was not lazy and they made sure their child did their homework and studied.

Yes, my DS is heavily restricted by our budget. We have X amount of money and game systems are not a high priority. I have told DS he is welcome to play video games at his friends house. I am not against video games and do not want him to feel drawn towards something forbidden just because it is forbidden. He did play video games at a friend's house and decided he would rather play outside with his friend and expressed frustration when his friend just wanted to play their video games. I personally, do not blame him. If money was not an issue I would still refuse to buy any type of ipod, video game etc. My reason is from watching to older children in our homeschool group who are not restricted and from conversation's with DS. He is frustrated with his friend's who spend every spare second glued to their DS or laptop playing video games during free time at coop and open gym days. DS feels hurt that his friend's would rather spend their free time tuned in to a screen then talking and playing. He cannot even get them away from the game long enough to express his feelings of hurt. At tween nights (they meet at a coffee shop and the parents stay on site and chat) the tweens (8-12) all bring their laptops/DS and just sit next to each other playing games. They are a very quiet group and do not bother anyone else but that is because they are not actually interacting with each other. From talking to the parents they are playing mine craft, which they spend hours playing at home as well. I took DS once and he could not understand why they would get together and then ignore each other. I cannot say that I blame him, if I met a friend at a coffee shop and all they did was sit and play games on a laptop, I would feel very hurt. I am sad that my 8 year old had to deal with this and I do wish the parents would step up and make it a screen free time, but they won't, they do not see any problem with the set up. We have not been back.

We do not own a TV and do not have any type of handheld gaming system. I found found most toys to be a waste of money. The only real toy my son plays with is hero factory legos. He will build lego sets to display but he prefers hero factory for play. Instead of toys he rides his bike and using a varierty of sports equipment such as hockey net and stick, rollerbaldes, a basketball, soccer ball, tennis racket and tennis ball, frisbe and golf clubs and ball. He also plays with sticks, twine and a BB gun.

If you have the YMCA, its you best option. I receive financial aid, and it costs around ten bucks a family for a monthly membership, and all other classes/sports around ten dollars a piece. Of course you YMCA may very. Ten bucks is a cheap as it gets for our YMCA. I wouldn't know what I would do without the YMCA. I am so thankful for this organization. I am thrilled your YMCA has a great financial aid program. Our local YMCA is really lacking. The discounted rate for the lowest income for one adult and depedendents is $50/month. If you are low income then $50/month is out of reach. Other gym's regular rates are actually cheaper then the Y's discounted rate. The only reason I am even still looking at the Y is the allow 8 year olds to use cardio equipment and take classes along with their parents instead of parking the kids in front of a movie. I have been trying to advocate for over a year now for them to lower their rates to meet the needs of low income families but they are not listening. They claim so many people are wanting the discounted rate that they cannot discounted it to meet the need.

On top of it, despite livestock the fields are overrun to the point where the child must walk via the road. Said child has been hit by a car before for not watching for traffic. On top of that, the barn yard itself is VERY overrun with weeds. They had a horse die recently, suspected a snake bite. Yet this child goes out there, alone. Sometimes, she's made to take the 4 year old with her. Honestly, if it were me and I would find a near by farmer willing to brushhog the property. Some will even do it for free in exchange for the hay. It can be done without telling to parent and while the parent is at work. I would buy a push mower for the 11 year old and teach them how to use it so the child can maintain a mowed path to and from the barn. From what you describe it seems that you can't change the parent or rescue the child but there are little things you can do to help make things a bit easier or safer for the child.

From what you describe I think there is some mental health issues with the parent. I hold the view that children are capable of a lot more the society expects of them, my 8 year has what many would view as an unreasonable amount of responsibility, including: -Stacking firewood and bring firewood in daily, sometimes making 3-5 trips. -Folding and putting away laundry -Feed and care for turkey -Help take trash to the curb (our drive way is over 400ft long) -Mow the fenced yard -Helping with the hay -Weed-eat the front yard as needed -Help as needed with planting and harvesting of the garden -Feed his dog -Help clean and maintain the house (clothes to the laundry room, pick up trash) -Handwash the dishes (we do not have a dishwasher) I do not send him out to do these things while I sit inside eating bonbons and watching day time TV, I am almost always working with or near him. The only exception is bringing in firewood. He does that while I am fixing breakfast. We are just starting to build our homestead and with time I foresee adding more responsiblities. The goal is to grow and raise over 85% of our own food. Next year we hope to get chickens and he will be in charge of checking their water, feeding them and gathering the eggs when they start laying. As the fruit trees and berry bushes start to mature they will be added as a part of his responsibilities as well.

My DS has seen several specialists in learning disabilities. The first was a private neuropsychologist. I was unimpressed with everything she said. Nothing fit with what I knew of my son. When I called another neuropsychologist at the local children's hosipital and I was told I could hire a private tutor and that with time my son would be able to function but would have to learn to "live with it". That did not make sense to me. I still do not understand all the doom and gloom from neuropsychologists about the future of children. I finally called and set up an evalutation with a private learning disability specialist. This man got into the field when his daughter was young. He felt that she could do more even with an IQ of 65. He was right, he found several programs (neurofeedback, interactive metronome, fastforward, irlen lenses and so on) and was able to help her maximize her potential. She reads at the 4th grade level now. He tested DS and found an IQ difference of 39 points. Wow! That is a big difference and enough of a difference to make specialists pay attention to DS instead of writing him off as mentally impaired. The specialist found severe visual and auditory processing problems and the two combined made it pretty much impossible for DS to read beyond early 1st grade level. That fit with my experience in trying to teach DS to read and the experience of the OT and SLP my son saw when he was 3-5 years old who tried to teach him letters and letter sounds. He wrote out the test results as well as reccomendations and put them in order of importance to tackle. We started to tackle visual issues. I put DS in vision therapy (it was actually covered by insurance) and a few months later grandpa paid for irlen lenses. Within the first week DS of having the lenses DS could tell the letters apart, something he has struggled with for years. It is not cheap but I am sold on this man's methods and I plan to follow all his reccomendations. I am excited that we have a plan in place to help DS reach his full potential instead of just teaching him to learn to live with not being able to read. You know your child best. If something deep down inside you says that the "professionals" are wrong then trust that and seek alternatives. There are a lot of different therapies avaliable to help overcome learning disabilities.

Good topic! I have ADHD and cannot take medication to control it. I am always busy. I rarely sit and really the only time I am able to sit is when I have something to occupy me such as a computer. We do not own a TV, any video games or any other type of passive entertainment. I found that I am able to sit in front of a screen for hours and hours but not able to do anything else. For me, having passive entertainment means I can focus on it and only it. I am unable to balance it with the caring for my son and household. The solution was to minimize and everything went. I need the computer to maintain my schedule, homeschool records and to find cheap/free activities. I have a routine that I stick to. I log on, check e-mail, facebook, read comics, forums, e-mail, update school records and finacial spreadsheet and google topics I am researching. The only exception to the compute routine is when we are sick. My son has been sick for several days so I have had a lot of time online.

How many hours are you schooling during the 3 days? How much is teaching/learning new concepts and how much is busy work? We did one day a week in kindergarten, two in first and 0 in second due to some major life issues. I am putting the most emphisis on math this year. In August I gave DS an evalutation designed for the end of 3rd grade and he had mastered all the concepts. We are building fluency this fall and I plan to retest him in December or January in 4th grade. My son is not advanced and is not behind due to our doing so little formal education thus far (except in reading and that is because of severe visual and auditory processing disorder not lack of instruction).

I agree that you should ask questions! I was unsure about a group and instead of taking DS and getting him all excited about something new, I went to a mom's night out to talk with the other moms and get an idea of where everything stood. I knew within 5 minutes that it would not be a good fit.

My DS is going as a historical figure to be decided on, probably at 3pm Halloween day.

My parents pay for my son's gymnastics classes. He has done preschool, homeschool and recreational. The homeschool class was about having fun and that did not fit with my what my son wants. He wants something more intense that will really push him physically, I called around and found another gym that has regular classes for the same price as homeschool classes.