I almost never see kids in the 6-12 age range playing unsupervised around here. I'm pretty sure there were just as many crazies in the 90s as there are now. That said, I do live in a different country now than I did then, but from what I've read kids in the US were usually given quite a lot of freedoms like that in the 50s and 60s or w/e. As to why people let their kids play outside unsupervised, I imagine that it depends on the parents - some might just find it to be the easiest thing to do (although seriously, have they not heard of videogames?), but others (including me) believe that you need to gradually increase kids' independence to prep them for adulthood... you can't just supervise a kid full time until they turn 18 and expect them to know how to act like an adult.

My youngest is the same age as yours then (born mid-November, currently 4yo). Our district's cutoff is Dec 1st, so he would be old enough for K next year. If your son wants to do academics, he's definitely old enough to gradually introduce him to some of it. I'd just try to keep lessons short and playful. This year I've got my 4yo in homeschool swim&gym at the Y (their youngest group is 3-4yo, because a lot of the older homeschool kids have younger siblings), which is also wonderful socialization time, as the kids play when the older siblings are doing their swim&gym. I also have him in taekwondo (he's been doing that for almost a year now). But anyhow, since this is the 1st grade planning thread: My plans for next year: continue homeschool swim&gym (just not sure if he's going to be in the 3-4 or in the 5-6 age group, because they're doing the cut-offs differently than the school district, but his best friend is going to be in the 5-6 group next year, so who knows - depends on how he's doing at the end of this year, I suppose). I'm also planning on signing him up for homeschool science at the science museum (for which the youngest group is K-2). Other than that, just continuing what I've been doing... gradually making things harder. He's currently reading Frog and Toad, so we'll keep reading books like that and then gradually harder ones. I have no clue how people predict what their kids will be doing a full year later. I'm hoping for maybe Magic Tree House type books by the end of next school year, but I don't know... that may be a pipe dream or may be reached by winter break or whenever. Same thing with math... I want to see him solidify his addition, subtraction and skip counting skills, get better at understanding place value and start to add/subtract 2-digit numbers. I'd also like him to memorize his times tables by the end of next school year - his older brother had them memorized before he was 6, but I can't plan that that far ahead - he may or may not be ready at some point within the next year. Writing is the R that I am the most clueless about. I'd like him to write, yes. Just not sure how wise it is to push a kid this age. He likes to write though - I'm thinking maybe doing copywork (he currently traces words and writes the occasional thing on his own, asking me for spelling), and trying to get him to memorize the spelling of some common words *other* than his own name (he knows how to write his first and last name). I'd probably call 2015-2016 1st grade for my son (since I don't feel that the above describes K), but we don't have to report for this coming school year yet for him - we'd first have to report him for the 2016-2017 school year when he'd be in 1st grade according to the school district.

That does sound like something to be proud of. I had no clue you were talking about Holt. I think I read some of his writings several years ago, but, I don't recall. I read the The Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother a few years ago because people would refer to Tiger Moms and I wanted to read the source, and she's not the kind of mom I'd want to be (she doesn't use the word winners, iirc, but...). I mostly meant that I'm not sure to what degree unschooling would work for my oldest, and I'm not sure to what degree he needs someone to tell him to learn x, y, and z skills and to make him do it. Unschooling appealed to me because as a kid I learned almost nothing in school because I'd already learned a lot by reading library books just because I wanted to. But for a special needs kid, it gets complicated. Everybody is a great parent (with an excellent parenting philosophy) until they have kids, no? One thing I'm trying to tell myself that there are many ways to have a kid turn out alright, and that there probably isn't a perfect way to parent a kid - that there just are different upsides and downsides to various parenting choices (okay, there are obviously ways to parent wrong, like beating your kid into the hospital, but you probably get what I mean).

True, and homeschooling probably does increase that feeling of responsibility. But I meant in general as well. When I was a kid (back in the halcyon 90s), my parents and my friends' parents let us run around outside at 6+yo, going from one playground to the next, with none of the parents knowing where we were at, just expecting us to be home for dinner. If something bad had happened (never did), people would probably have thought that was really unfortunate. Whereas now I get the impression that people would think you're a horribly neglectful parent and if something happened to your kid it was your own fault, even though bad stuff sometimes just happens.

@Serenade: I think today people feel that if you parent "just right" nothing bad will happen to your child, and that if something goes wrong with a kid the parent just didn't do enough. I think for my parents' generation parenting was a lot more relaxed (they're older than you, don't worry).

My 2nd grader is in a national school of excellence (whatever that means), and in 1st grade they added up to 20. Maybe they also did things like 50+10=60... don't quite remember. But no carrying and borrowing, and no multi-digit numbers (when you say multi I think think 3+). They won't start multiplication until 3rd grade (he knows how to multiply, but that's because of the apps I had him play with in K - not because of anything he learned in public school). When I went to school (in NL) we didn't do any addition/subtraction until 1st grade, but then halfway through 2nd grade they started multiplication and expected us to know the times tables by the end of 2nd grade (I don't remember if carrying and borrowing was at the end of 1st or at the start of 2nd grade). ETA: I also didn't have any homework until 7th grade, with the exception of doing a presentation once a year or so starting in 4th grade. My son got homework in public school preK, I think once a week, and daily starting in K. Schools vary a lot though - we moved in the middle of his K year, and in the school he was in in TX K was pretty relaxed - whereas the school he's in here in NY, when the teacher tested him in January when he started told me they were already writing in sentences, so my kid was behind. Then they quickly started piling on more evals and therapies and stuff. In TX he'd had an IEP for autism, some speech therapy (I think maybe an hour a week?), and a 1-1 aide for 1 hour a day, which turned out more like a shared aide 3 hours a day because 2 other kids (in his class of 14 kids) also had an aide one hour a day. My son this year has 2 hours of speech therapy, 1 hour of OT, 1 hour of PT, and a full time 1-1 aide, and the short bus. He's also in a class of 25 kids. Academically he's average to well-above average. Conclusion: you really can't make blanket statements about schools as they just vary so much. Here more parents wait a year for their kid to start K as well, to give them "an advantage". In rural Texas I'd never heard of anyone doing that unless the kid was exceptionally slow.

In The Netherlands they eat licorice to help with sore throat (and just as candy as well). It's pretty harmless, although since it's candy it's not good for your teeth. Also, if I remember correctly it can increase your blood pressure if you eat a pound of it a day. Not that I'd recommend eating a pound of it a day. Just mentioning that because some pregnant people get high blood pressure during their pregnancy, so if you have that this may not be the best choice for sore throats during pregnancy (my blood pressure stayed on the low side while pregnant though, but then and again, my latest blood pressure measurement (not pregnant) was like 98/60).

I meant it more like trying to cram skills down kids' throats, rather than trying to prep them to win competitions. I don't really care about competitions. I just want my kids to be able to support themselves and their dependents when they're grown-ups, and I suspect it will get harder to obtain a middle class standard of living in the coming decades. It's a little odd to me that what's (often) seen as good parenting for special needs kids (intensive ABA 40+ hours per week) is (often) seen as bad parenting for regular kids (Tiger Mom). I'm aware that not everyone sees it that way (nor that you were saying that)... it's just my impression of what the average parent thinks.

Can't answer the specific questions, as my oldest is in 2nd grade, but I'm definitely interested in reading all the answers! One of the things that happened with us was that before my oldest was born both my spouse and I were planning on unschooling him (though not entirely sure to what degree - came across Sandra Dodd and figured that wasn't our cup of tea, but anyhow - something unschool-ish or child-led). Then, oldest son was born. He was 'different' pretty much from the start. Had him evaluated by early childhood intervention when he was 14.5 months. He was 3.5 months behind in speech/communication, which was half a month too little to qualify for services at that time (he was far enough behind in social-emotional development to qualify, but they didn't know what to do about that for a kid that young). We had him evaluated again at 2.5yo, at which point he was almost a year and a half behind in speech, and did qualify for services. So, he got speech therapy, which didn't make any difference (speech therapist said I'd been doing all the right things, so she was basically just doing more of the same). Then, when he was almost 3yo, services would be transferred to the school district. I was burnt out by that point (and pregnant along with all the nausea and exhaustion that brings), plus doing the same thing over and over expecting different results is questionable as well (although not entirely crazy since kids brains do mature). It was a tough decision but I decided to put him in public school, where he started just after turning 3yo. Ironically, he started making progress in the month before school, which was right after we'd bought a TV (and had the subtitles on all the time). He's continued making progress since then (but has 4 hours of therapy a week in school, along with a full time 1-1 aide). Currently trying to find a balance between child-led vs me playing Tiger Mom (and planning on homeschooling both kids next year - youngest is still at home with me, planning on pulling oldest out of school).

I'm from The Netherlands, so traditionally, mayo. But that's often not available here in NY, so ketchup. Other things I've done include apple sauce, peanut sauce, mayo mixed with ketchup, mayo mixed with applesauce, mayo and ketchup mixed with applesauce. Applesauce can go with almost anything! Chili with applesauce, bami goreng with applesauce, pasta (either alfredo or with some sort of tomato sauce) with applesauce.. :) ETA: I thought home fries were more like steak fries. W/e. Tator tots could be with any of the above, except maybe peanut sauce.

How much conceptual understanding is there really in 1st grade math? Is there any adult out there (with a normal IQ and not having severe dyscalculia) who doesn't grasp the concepts in addition and subtraction under 20 (which is, iirc, as far as 1st grade math went - my son is in 2nd grade now)? I don't want to derail this thread, but I suspect that for the early elementary grades, it would be best if the teachers would *like* math and feel competent in doing math... something too many teachers in the US supposedly don't, and throwing curriculum changes every few years at them isn't going to make them like math more nor make them better at it.

Haven't read any replies yet, but my son's math workbook has pages in them to be torn out and sent home along with the homework (usually one page at the start of each new unit) with instructions for the parents, explaining all the new-fangled math stuff. Pretty quickly I decided to just read the Spanish side of the instructions, so that if something sounds stupid to me I get to wonder first if it's just me misunderstanding Spanish (at which point I do look at the English side, to conclude that it's just the stupid math, but at least I didn't waste my time, because I did get to practice my Spanish). Of course my philosophy is also that if a kid is too young to do his/her homework on their own, they're too young to have homework, but that's another story.

I also voted 'other'. I use apps for that on my phone. For curriculum, my 7.5yo is in school, so they do what they do, and my 4yo hasn't really got a curriculum yet. I just started LoF Apples with him, did one lesson, and then he got ill, but planning on continuing it (maybe do chapter 2 today, even though he's still coughing). Before that, I'd been doing some random workbooks from the dollar store, played dominoes (making him add the 2 sides whenever he put down a tile), playing with cm cubes while writing down equations (2 cubes + 3 cubes = 5 cubes), reading some books (mathstart etc) featuring adding and subtraction, etc. I had to ban his big brother from trying to teach him math half a year ago... my youngest was just beginning to add and subtract, and my oldest decided it was time to start teaching his then 3.75yo brother negative numbers (that worked, at least as far as things like 1-3=-2 are concerned), and then multiplication (which didn't work), frustrating both of them to tears and arguments etc (I tried to teach the oldest appropriate things to teach first, but I couldn't, so I had to ban it outright to preserve everyone's sanity). So, the now 4.25yo still doesn't know multiplication, and I think the 7.5yo still doesn't get why his little brother is so dense (7.5yo has an ASD).

Just think of all the years of accumulated wisdom you've got over me! :) I just put it in there to provide the context of when/where I'd learned of the concept of YE (I don't recall exactly when, but I think it was during elementary school). I can't wait for the kids to be a little older and a little more independent.

I was born in 1984 in The Netherlands, and grew up there. I obviously hadn't heard the term YEC when I was a kid (for one, they speak Dutch there), but I'd come across the concept, mostly in the context of "various religious people take various parts of scripture literally or figuratively". From what I remember, not many people even debated evolution though. My one memory of someone who didn't believe in evolution was a classmate I had in college (majoring in biomedical science & engineering) who was a Jehova's Witness and didn't believe in that. Definitely no debates as to whether to teach evolution in schools or not. I went to christian schools (in the Dutch version of the bible belt) and evolution was taught. There were some fundamentalists (mostly in that bible belt, but still quite a small percentage of the people living there) and they had their own schools, but I don't know many of the details as they really did not socialize much with people not belonging to their church.

I'm not a fan of zombies either. However, I think the silliness of a zombie pandemic might be easier for (most) kids than something more realistic like a more lethal flu (like the Spanish flu of iirc 1917) or ebola or something.

Come to think of it, I don't know if you son knows any kids in the public school he would attend (from the playground or sports or w/e), but if he goes to public school at some point because of your cancer, he'd be starting public school during a very stressful time in his life, so it'd be really nice if he knew at least *someone* at the school, whether it's a friendly kid in his class or the teacher, or even just the school psych. Going to school for the first time and being around complete strangers with no-one you know is stressful for any kid, but for a kid who has to because of a parent being terminally ill or dead it would probably be even harder (of course, hoping it doesn't get to that). So, I think it'd be good if your son could get to know some adults or kids at the school somehow.

Could you try contacting the local elementary school and ask them for guidance? With a bit of luck you might be able to talk to a 4th or 5th grade teacher who can show you what they do every day, what books they use, and maybe even assess your son a little. Not like the IEP kind of assessments, but my 2nd grade son's teacher regularly assesses what reading level kids are, etc, and when he switched schools in the middle of K his new K teacher had some little assessments for the 3Rs for new students. Teachers in other grades might have the same thing for kids coming from other schools as well. Schools can just vary so much, district by district, or even within a district there are variations. Wishing you lots of luck.

Has anyone used Zombie Based Geography? I found this thread from last summer in which ZBG is mentioned, but at that point nobody had used it yet. http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/519505-geography-poll/ http://www.zombiebased.com/

That's one of the reasons why I started the vocab notebook for my son. I want him to develop dictionary fluency and the habit of looking words you don't know up. Still working on the fluency (he's taking a long time to find words), but once he gets better at that my plan is to start pushing him harder to find words he doesn't know while he reads on his own. Baby steps. The 365+ words a year are a bonus, since they're just a drop in the bucket (IIRC a well-educated person should know about 100,000 words, which at 365 words/year would take only 274 years to learn).

I don't for DS4 (homeschooled) and I don't for DS7 (currently in public school) either, although the school probably does (don't know). I did start having him keep a vocabulary notebook a week ago where he's supposed to find a word in one of the books he's read that day, write it down, look it up in the children's dictionary, and copy the definition. So far he hasn't found any words he didn't know though, so I've gone through the things he reads until I find a word I think he probably doesn't know, and then quiz him on it. Then, if he can't answer me, that's the word for the day. A couple of days ago he even got a bonus word because the definition of 'rascals' (his word for the day) had the word 'mischievous' in it, which also needed to be looked up. Maybe some day I'd do an SAT vocab book. We'll see. ETA: my main reason for not bothering with a curriculum is that I think you learn the most vocab just by reading a LOT. I do also have a prefixes/suffixes workbook, which would presumably help with vocab as well (I got it to help with sounding out words since DS7 is a sight word reader).

Thanks for the info!

Thanks. I hadn't ever heard about Athena's before (I think). My son definitely does not meet the 6th grade level reading requirement for their econ class, but someday he will. Philosophy would indeed be another subject that schools typically don't cover much in elementary (or, many schools, not much in middle or high school either). AOPS has been on my to-buy list for a while, but my son probably isn't ready yet for their easiest book, and AOPS statistics would probably be a few years off for him. I'm not entirely sure what level my son is at for math - he had his times tables memorized by the end of K, could divide as well, could use a coordinate plane, negative numbers (incl. adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing them), do simple fractions and decimals, and then a few more things in 1st grade, but this year we haven't had time to do any math other than the busywork the school sends home. So I'm not sure where he'd be after I homeschool math with him for a couple of months, other than well ahead. I also know some kids plateau, so really not a clue.

Thanks. I like the mathstart books (some more than others), but they're too simple for homeschooling my son in 3rd grade next year. Contemplating Zaccaro's "Scammed by Statistics", although it's grade 6+ (but, kid's awesome at math). Can't find a "look inside" anywhere though.

Thanks. A unit study might be the way to go. Sort of hoping someone out here knows of a list of useful books kind of like what I linked to in my previous post for economics? My 7.5yo was asking me about bell curves etc day before yesterday. Maybe I can adapt something for older kids for him, since he's good at math. I just think statistics and economics are subjects that get way too little attention in most K-12 eduction while being very important for creating well-educated citizens/voters. Not that that means they have to be covered in 3rd grade. Curious whether anyone teaches other odd subjects (not that econ, psych, and stat are odd... but they are for elementary grades).