((Hugs)) to all you moms. My sister (palest white you can get, we both are) married a half-Korean guy who looks, oddly, Hispanic. Her son, especially, takes after his dad in Oriental looks. I'm sure they've gotten comments here and there. But any time they are in a Mexican restaurant, the staff always assumes her husband is fluent in Spanish. LOL. Fortunately he did minor in it. Even my dh and I, who are both pale with dark brown hair, get comments on our kids ... our son looks like me but our daughter has red hair. I get asked all the time "Where'd she get that hair?" which irks me to no end because it sounds like they think there's a different father lurking around or something! (As it happens, dh's mom had red hair at one point, and dh was redheaded and then blond before turning brown-haired. I was a blond kid too till about 6 or so ... go figure.) Funny thing ... though my sis and I both look VERY much like my mother and her side of the family ... we were adopted when she remarried after a nasty divorce. And my sis, a toddler at the time, looked JUST like our dad. It was hilarious, and he was proud as any dad could be. (Our bio dad has since re-entered the picture, and it's kind of eerie to see how much we resemble that side of the family too, since we're so used to being carbon copies of our mom.) Families and genetics are just funny things. You'd think more grown-ups would get this. Sigh.

Take a couple weeks' break, then ditch everything but the bare essentials and one fun thing. Even my therapist would tell you that. I've just saved you $$. :D You can't teach them everything in a year, and you can't ruin them in a year, either. (Maybe the PS could, but not you as a loving mother.) So go ahead and give everyone (yourself included!) time to recover. It was trauma. You need rest and healing. And make sure that the esssentials really are essentials, and not just guilt trips you put on yourself. :)

I'd be a bad PS mom too... I'd want to be involved all the time, but I would NOT want other strange people in my kids' classrooms. :) Then again, I hear too many horror stories about strangers. They really do have confidentiality laws to follow. Even as a student teacher, I wasn't allowed to photo or video my teaching without written consent from *every* student's parents. Needless to say, with the return rate on signed papers, I never did finish that video requirement ... had to do it in another class. Sigh. Maybe this school just wants to make sure no one is randomly targeting students ... what with cell phone cameras and all, it can be tricky protecting privacy. That said, I know our neighborhood school does (used to? not sure) a community day in the fall, where they basically have a mini carnival, and everyone is welcome to attend. It might be a way to meet some of the teachers, maybe volunteer for some events or something, and then they'd know you and you could observe. Or volunteer to tutor. That's sure one way to see what's being taught in the classroom!

Cool ... a small set! They're doing a Toy Story theme, so that's what they are from.

We had to read it in high school. I started out hating it, but by the end I couldn't put it down. I hate stories where folks act like idiots, but at least Ms. Austen made them all put things right in the end ... so it was good. I haven't really gotten into her other books though. But I would say, give the rest of it a chance ... it really drew me in, and it's not my cup of tea at all.

I let my kids dictate at that age if they need it. Or write some and I write others. Or I write and they copy, if I want them to have the handwriting practice. Mine do ETC 1 & 2 in preschool, so definitely it's ahead of their motor skills. It's only in 2nd grade now that my son's writing has really caught up to where he's at (we're in a Beyond the Code book at the moment, as we alternate them with ETC after book 3).

My mathy kid loves Horizons so far. He's in Horizons 3. We do skip a lot of the repetition (not altogether, but fewer in each problem set, for example). The spiral approach keeps his interest more, and so far so good.

No personal stories, but a similar discussion came up on another gifted forum. There were folks there who did it both ways ... redshirted for maturity issues, and then went for acceleration and grade skipping. It sounded weird at first, but then I figured, as a homeschooler, that's what I do with my kid in the areas he needs it ... so why not? I do think it makes it hard for a classroom teacher to teach to such a wide range of abilities. Not that teachers can't do it, but that today's overall lack of discipline and the stupid strict adherence to a curriculum (rarely chosen by the teacher) makes it VERY hard for them. So, though I'm not in favor of age segregation, I do think that redshirting makes it rough overall for the class. I'm sure it helps some kids, but it doesn't much help the group. A pity we can't just do away with ages, and work with ability grouping ... but even then the ranges are wild ... kids who can read high school materials at 5 but sure can't do similar level written work ... wiggly kids ... and so on... Sigh.

The Adventures of Riley is a series Scholastic just started carrying in their book clubs. I think they're reprints, but they seem to be good. Mixes cartoon art with photography, as Riley travels around the world, learning about animals in different regions. There are six or so out now.

We dictated for the early levels of ETC, if that helps. (For my son ... my daughter is writing them with much less difficulty.) The Leapfrog videos are annoyingly useful, and most libraries probably have those. www.starfall.com is free games, with printable worksheets.

Not sure if this will help, but while browsing bookstore magazines out of boredom, I found one called Wargames Illustrated, or something like that. My husband is into D&D style games, so I picked one up to read later, to see if it might be something he could use for our school down the road. It looks like it took real battles, and showed how to play them out as tabletop war games. Might make a fun hobby? I haven't read the magazine yet, so can't speak to reading level or appropriateness, but it looked really cool.

Your first act should be to check the laws in your state. In many places kindergarten isn't even compulsory. (It isn't in my state.) That can give you lots of room to experiment without worrying about records and all that. Everybody has their own favorites. We use Explode the Code for phonics, and I didn't even worry about handwriting outside of that for kindergarten. You can start with the ABC primers for an easy start, if you want the handwriting practice, or start with book 1 if you want to start with short vowel words. The Leapfrog videos are also pretty popular with the kids. www.starfall.com has fun free phonics and reading games. We like Horizons for math, mostly because it is spiral, which means there's a lot of variety on each page and it keeps my kids' interest. If the writing turns out to be too much, let them dictate, or skip over parts they already know. (That's actually good advice for any program. Tweak to fit your children's needs.) Other than that, for kindergarten, we use (and still use) Five in a Row, because they are picture book unit studies ... lots of fun and gentle learning. Good for when you're teaching more than one child, too! You buy the manual/guide, and either buy books on your own or check them out from your library, depending on your preferences. They cover all sorts of good stuff like Madeline, and Mike Mulligan, and Ping, and so on. Science, geography, and all the other subjects get discussed based around each book. You'll probably get lots of other answers, but that's what worked for us, anyway. Have fun! Kindergarten is a blast.

I must be an oddball, I didn't think much of the first book. But my sis and her daughter loved the series, so I was persuaded to read the 2nd, and liked it better. Haven't read the third yet, but am planning to.

Oh why did I read that link? Anyway, ((hugs)) and hope you feel better soon!

You can just create an Excel spreadsheet too ... take a stack of books an evening, and enter them as you watch TV or something. (I will say, I started this back when my collection was in the hundreds, with an index card catalog and spreadsheet as backup, and now I've got thousands. If I ever get them all into Librarything or whatever, I need a scanner!)

I would've assumed it was a pay-your-own kind of event, if that helps. :) Informal restaurant get-togethers always strike me as that way. I've occasionally assumed that only to find the host covers everything, but that's just more a pleasant surprise. I think you were fine. And even if someone got it wrong ... they were only charged for their portion ... not stuff they didn't eat, or an overhead charge, or anything like that.

And you never know what you might find in yard sales or thrift stores ... I got my Felicity doll at a yard sale, and a Bitty Baby outfit at a thrift store (I spotted it on another doll). Bitty Baby for my daughter was an ebay purchase. I got AG dolls for my nieces via ebay too. Of course the retired ones get pricey, but sometimes you can find a cheap one that just needs a little TLC ... maybe factor in a visit to the AG doll hospital? You shoulda seen the Christmas when my son broke down into tears because he didn't get what he REALLY wanted for Christmas. I was baffled, as he'd pretty much received the few things he'd mentioned wanting. Turns out what he REALLY wanted was a Stargate Webkinz Christmas movie starring himself and his friends. Um, I think even Santa would have had a little trouble with that one... LOL. Fortunately he got over it.

Carrot tops... you can get a leafy carrot, cut off the head, and plant it or let it root in a jar of water. I set mine in a terra cotta plant dish, and it looked really cute ... the carrot matched the dish so it looked like some weird plant growing straight up out of the middle. LOL. Potatoes that have sprouted on your counter. Those can be set in a glass of water for buds and roots to start, and plant it later, or go ahead and plant as is. You might even get some baby potatoes out of it ... I've had luck two out of three tries this past year, and I'm a real brown thumb. For those, you wait till the plant dies a natural death (perfect for me!) and then you can dig up the potatoes. (Or wait for them to mature a bit.) I think the squirrels beat me to my second try, but I got the last ones ... they're on my counter right now ... a handful of little ones. Very cute. Beans, well soaked. Can be grown in a baggie with a wet paper towel if you want to watch the roots and sprouts. Birdseed, if you don't want to eat it. Get the kind that's not coated to keep it from sprouting (although I don't put much stock in the coating, since we get quite a harvest of birdseed under our bird feeder ... the birds enjoy it...).

She can also save up for a modern AG doll styled liked Kirsten, and hunt Ebay for the outfits. Or, if she sews, find some of the sewing patterns for 18" dolls. I know with my son (age 8), if I think he's expecting something that I know isn't going to be so, I have to give him plenty of warning. He just gets his heart so set on things sometimes, and it's just not always possible. He's not usually a drama type, just an intense type, though. I can see this being an issue when my daughter gets older. Sigh.

Is she a tummy sleeper or a back sleeper? I know, all the current recommendations are for back sleeping, but some babies just won't sleep unless they're on their tummies. Both of mine were that way. We finally gave in and let 'em sleep on their tummies, since we never could swaddle them properly. I think in my oldest it might have been a minor reflux issue, that was made better by sleeping on his tummy.

Yeah, well, it got worse from there. LOL. If she was still the principal at that school, that would be reason enough for homeschooling ... I'd be afraid she remembered me! :) We're zoned for that school. I ended up being switched to a third grade class at a different school, which was much better, and the teacher there let me have all the leeway I wanted to teach ... way cool ... but still limited by the curriculum and time I had available.

Sometimes you work so hard on being strong through the hard times that you push away the emotions (grief, anger, whatever) that you would normally be feeling. Then you think you've dealt with it. Then, whammo! it hits you later, when you're not expecting it. So says my counselor, who's also walking me through some things. As to the how ... when I figure it out, I'll let you know. I'm *supposed* to be letting myself cry more now, instead of hold it in. And then make notes about what sets me off, so we can discuss it, and work through it.

Just to put in a word for the teachers ... many of them don't have a choice about how to teach the material. Especially the non-tenured ones. I did my student teaching partly in a 5th grade class. I was told to begin a unit (by the lead teacher), so I did, and it happened to be a day the principal chose to observe my class. When I began the unit, I realized the kids were missing some basic facts, so I backed up to teach them (it was a social studies concept, not math, though). That principal absolutely hit the roof that I was NOT teaching what was written down in the teacher's lesson plan book. And here I thought my job was to teach the kids something... (Funny thing was, it was an optional program the lead teacher had chosen to use ... not even part of the curriculum ... but since I deviated from a lesson plan [that I didn't even choose], I was at fault. Even though the kids NEEDED the material I was covering.)

Gosh, when you look at it like that, it has been quite a decade ... I hadn't thought about how it encased most of my adult life so far... Here's to a better one upcoming!

My son had tantrums around 3-5 or so, that caused us to take him in for an evaluation. (The tantrums, coupled with his brightness, obsession with numbers, and a few other quirks had us [okay, me] worried about autism or some other disorder.) It had gotten to the point where I could hardly take him shopping without a screaming meltdown. The one session with the psychologist seemed to be enough for her to tell us he wasn't autistic, just bright and quirky, and that we could ramp up the discipline with no worries. It was reassuring, till he threw a rip-roaring tantrum as we left the clinic parking lot. LOL. Anyway, he's 8 now and much better behaved. With him, it's a gifted kid temperament and sensitivities, mostly, coupled with inconistent discipline. (Like other posters said, we glide through calm phases where everyone gets his own way because there's nothing to clash over, so the clashes catch us by surprise.) The poor kid has inherited my temperament, as well. (I have anxiety, panic, and depression difficulties. I've gotten double use out of my therapy as I can learn strategies to help the both of us!) Transitions are a big thing ... plenty of warning always goes over better than no warning. We are both big on planning ahead. We practice coping strategies when we get overwhelmed. And so on. We've been lucky, in that homeschooling gives us time to work on these strategies. And we've got a Cub Scout pack full of equally quirky boys, which helps all us parents to work with our kids in a pressure-free setting. No need to be embarrassed by a meltdown when other parents are dealing with similar issues! Which makes it easier to handle, and makes our responses better, which in turn helps the child's behavior. Younger sister has a much easier temperament, which is great ... though dh said he notices she's sneakier about things, probably because we worry over her less. She does get away with stuff ... we have to watch her ... but then she just turned 5 and there does seem to be something about that age ... Another term to google is "overexcitabilities" if that helps.