It's 17 feels like 6. At 1am it's supposed to be 19 feels like -3. F.

If only that wouldn't require setting the thermostat to like 80.

IIRC there is a way to be able to just do whatever exercises you want. But it's been a while - the kids and I have been on Khan for about 5 years, iirc. ETA: to be clear, a few months ago I did most of the exercises they'd added in the last couple of years - it's not like the last time I looked at Khan was 5 years ago.

Hm, I guess if I moved the driver's seat back before getting out, it might be marginally easier to climb over the stick and parking break. Not sure.

The most annoying thing about having to park on one side of the street some days of the week, and the other side the other days, is that because it's a one way street and there's nowhere for the snow to go, you have to climb over a mountain of snow* and then squeeze yourself into the driver's side door half the days. Or climb over the stick shift and parking break, which in a compact car is just about as much fun (DW did that the other day - I haven't yet (well, I have, but not this year, and not because of snow)). *Yes, technically it's possible to shovel that away, but since there aren't parking spots, and certainly not assigned parking spots, you probably wouldn't be able to park in the same spot again, and you probably wouldn't be lined up with the part where you shoveled the snow away even if you got more or less the same spot again, so, what's the point (these mountains of snow are already over 3 feet high).

I want a garage, and a heated driveway and sidewalk (so they don't have to be shoveled). Is that so much to ask for?

Wait, you're in NY and use a cover school from another state? What state? How does that work?

Um, you have to file a bunch of paperwork, so, not thinking about it is not an option. Also, just because the reqs happen to line up with what you'd do anyway, doesn't mean that they line up with what everyone would do. As a parent, you do not just get to choose what you want to teach - the state has rules, and quite a lot of them. Just because those rules happen to line up with what most colleges want to see anyway, doesn't mean they're not rules, and doesn't mean they're not a PITA for some people. (and it'd be one thing if they were graduation requirements - but they're not... you have to do those things or you won't be allowed to homeschool your kid, in other words, you're not the one in charge of what gets taught in your own homeschool) To be clear, I'm not even saying they're bad requirements... just that you can't just do whatever you want. Some PPs mentioned the parent being able to decide what is taught as the criterion for whether you're a homeschooler - well, I can't just choose what to teach. I have *limited* choice. I can't just say "no math" or w/e.

I'd subtract more points for missing units on, say, a physics test than I would on a math test. Either way, I'd make the kid correct the mistake, and give a reminder about the importance of units (if there are a lot of missing units the lecture can get kind of long... I once read that NASA had one of their missions go wrong because someone didn't write units and the person reading it thought it was inches while the person who didn't write the unit meant cm (or the other way around, or something), and it basically cost millions of dollars. It's been a while, and I'm not 100% sure if that story was true, but I don't care - it could've been, and it drives the point home). Also, I don't give out grades for upper elementary (other than on my quarterly reports, but those are really generic and only intended to keep NY happy).

It'd eventually dissipate into the room whether you leave the door open or closed... but if you can have heat now, why wait?

Well, I haven't watched Khan's videos, just the exercises (I've done all the pre-alg ones to "mastery"), and I'd say it's not as rigorous as AOPS (not that we've gotten far yet in AOPS). Not real sure how to compare it to LOF - just completely different. I don't have experience with the other pre-alg programs. ETA: I don't think there are too few practice problems in Khan. Then and again, I'm mostly fine with LOF too, and people tend to criticize that one for too few practice problems, so, ymmv. If there's one thing my kids struggle with, I just find some more problems online, or make up some more problems, or, uh, have them do Khan (Khan is not our primary program - I just occasionally have the kids do Khan for variety or when I need a break, so my assessment of the number of problems is based on when I went and did all of it - it seems like they have a decent number of problems, but since they randomize them you do sometimes get the same problem almost back-to-back, and, if you're new to a topic, only doing Khan to mastery might mean you haven't mastered it - you probably do need to do more problems than they make you do, but that's not the same as there not being enough problems).

Right, I didn't mean that as a criticism - of course you can turn down the heat some. I was just saying that I don't care all that much about the numbers other people post. I don't remember the details of the thread, but iirc the thing was that they weren't destitute. Some people do think they're in a contest to show who's the most Spartan. Anyhow, making the kids put on a sweater and socks when cold is perfectly reasonable.

I should probably just send him to go run outside any time he complains of feeling cold. Not that running is always an option, depending on how well people have cleared their sidewalks - I shoveled a foot of snow on iirc Monday.

Yeah, no. That would involve opening the back door, letting in cold air, to go to the basement. Twice (so, opening the door 4x). (there's still another door between our back door and outside, but it's quite cold and very drafty in the hallway to the basement, so, it's still a waste of energy - it's not like we keep the thermostat set at 50, plus, it'd make *me* cold to go to the basement twice to warm socks. they'll get warm just fine on his feet (really, they're not cold - it's not like I'm asking him to put on 50 degree socks - if he wants, he could hold them in front of the heater before putting them on, but it's the principle - he doesn't want to believe that it works, because he's not complaining about cold feet, so why would socks help?... well, because they do, even if it's another body part that's cold))

Whinging makes me cringe. Why the extra 'g'? (like someone else mentioned, it's probably British or something, but it still makes me cringe). That said, at least I knew what it meant. I bought lights for the xmas tree last night, and an obscene amount lot of groceries.

Broccoli, when told to put on socks, just whines that that'd make him even colder. It's quite annoying.

I read it just now, but I agree with people that one number in one person's house is not the same as the same number in another person's house. Also, I remember some thread one or two years ago about some family who didn't turn on their heater until it was really quite cold out, and who'd make the kids run outside to warm up because it was so cold inside, so, I take the people who post really low numbers with a grain of salt. It's not a contest of who can be the most Spartan, kwim?

I didn't have a real estimate, other than "pretty low risk", and "the risk probably depends on whether you use electrical lights or candles". But, anyhow, thanks for letting us know that the xmas tree should be in the bathroom, bedroom, or basement, from February-November, got it. Maybe I'll put real candles on it, like my grandparents did, so I don't have to worry about electrical fires. (to be clear, I assume the risk is substantially higher for candles, though the one difference is that I wouldn't leave candles on when not in the room, whereas I have left electrical xmas tree lights on overnight, and it'd probably be safer to have something catch on fire while I'm there than while I'm asleep (which, of course, could be solved by not leaving either kind on when not in the room)) ETA: our tree is fake.

One would imagine that there's a WikiHow about that. Yep, there is: https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Your-Bed ETA: I don't get the 2 checkings accounts thing... how would that be beneficial? (I get that it's not, I'm just unclear why anyone would think it is)

Waiting. :toetap05:

Legislation would be one option that might be more effective than education. Not that I'm a PhD. But, say, if we create a situation with universal health care, very low cost college, etc, and then ban pay day loans, most credit cards, etc, seriously limit car loans and mortgages, etc, you could reduce consumer debt. Or, if you wanted to reduce govt debt, you could raise taxes (including closing all sorts of loopholes), slash spending, and pay that off. Really, the govt has a lot of tools it can potentially use to reduce consumer and/or govt debt. Now, whether any/all of the above are desirable is another debate, which is not for this forum (there is a rule against discussing politics). To be clear, I'm not taking a political position with this post (i.e. I'm not saying what the govt should do). I'm just saying that legislation is a tool that can be used, just like education (and, you can legislate about education too, including requiring everybody to take algebra 2, statistics, microeconomics, macroeconomics, accounting, and personal finance in order to graduate high school, just to give an example).

I thought that buying stock meant buying part of a company. Which yes, companies become publicly traded in order to get more money, but once they're on the stock market (and plenty already are), we could technically all buy as much stock as we want, which would increase stock prices (unless supply were to increase), which of course would be a bubble if the companies aren't actually worth more (and if we all buy stock instead of spending money, they wouldn't be worth more, as they'd be selling fewer widgets because people are buying stock instead of widgets). So, even if we're all happy to buy into that bubble, the companies would decide to lay off workers because they don't need as many people to make widgets and they like to make as big a profit as possible, so keeping people on payroll who aren't needed is something they don't do, and at some point the unemployed people are going to have to sell their stock in order to survive, and, people being people, the other people will likely panic as stock prices start to drop, and then you've engineered a crash and quite probably a depression. Right?

Right. But suppose there is some imaginary state where the law says that as a homeschooler you have to use these books, give these tests, use these rubrics, for these amounts of time on these days of the week, then would you still be a homeschooler? Legally speaking, yes. But the parent would not have any of the freedoms that some people in this thread mentioned as the things that distinguish homeschoolers from public/private schoolers using an online program.

Exactly: Required courses. For purposes of this subdivision, a unit means 6,480 minutes of instruction per school year. Instruction in the following subjects shall be required: For grades one through six: arithmetic, reading, spelling, writing, the English language, geography, United States history, science, health education, music, visual arts, physical education, bilingual education and/or English as a second language where the need is indicated. For grades seven and eight: English (two units); history and geography (two units); science (two units); mathematics (two units); physical education (on a regular basis); health education (on a regular basis); art (one-half unit); music (one-half unit); practical arts (on a regular basis); and library skills (on a regular basis). The units required herein are cumulative requirements for both grades seven and eight. The following courses shall be taught at least once during the first eight grades: United States history, New York State history, and the Constitutions of the United States and New York State. For grades 9 through 12: English (four units); social studies (four units), which includes one unit of American history, one-half unit in participation in government, and one- half unit of economics; mathematics (two units); science (two units); art and/or music (one unit); health education (one-half unit); physical education (two units); and three units of electives. The units required herein are cumulative requirements for grades 9 through 12. Now, whether I could graduate a kid without any mathematics, for example, maybe. Like, if the kid does 12960 min of math in high school, and gets Fs in all of it, maybe I *can* graduate the kid as a homeschooler... I'm not sure. But I certainly can't choose to just not do any math in high school. Of course, private schools have regulations about what they have to teach too, and they're still private schools as well.

You've obviously never seen a thread about cupcakes. Or grocery carts. There are guys on this forum - not many, but there are some, and most of them are well-liked by most people here. I'm still not sure what you think will happen if we all took your advice and started saving oodles of money, pronto. And if you'd been female, I'd happily have used the word womansplaining, which is not a word, but I've used it before. Netiquette rule number something-or-other: read some posts first to get a 'feel' for the norms of the group before posting stuff yourself (this btw, works irl as well).