Thank you so much for the encouragement. You're absolutely right that this can be a very lonely and isolating journey, but finding others has helped tremendously. And congratulations on A almost finishing his degree, … and on the trash can. There's hope for us in that!!

Thank you for the replies. Ds says he likes school, because he gets to play at PE and have birthday parties with cupcakes. The school's reading specialist knows him and helped his teacher get him into AR. The only books he's allowed to check out through AR are reading level 0.5-0.7 (I am a fish. I can swim…) and he's now convinced that he doesn't like fiction because of that. (This is despite reading Magic Treehouse independently and loving it.) We're going to try to meet with his teacher and principal again to see how we can salvage this year. Ds seems happy, but I have such a hard time with him spending 8-3 M-F for social skills only. He does know he's ahead of the other students and has gotten into trouble multiple times for "helping" them with their assignments.

Greetings all, I have been an anonymous stalker for almost two years now and thank you for all of the advice that has been passed around - it has helped me tremendously! My oldest (DS5) is in public kindergarten this year after going to a private/church K-4 last year. He learned a lot last year about how to behave in a classroom, follow rules, etc. This year, since August, he has learned about cylinders and cones. That's it (we hadn't covered that with MEP at the time). He is reading on about a 2nd grade level, knows a lot of his addition and subtraction, is learning German, piano (wants the trumpet, but he needs his permanent teeth in before I agree to that!), loves learning about dinosaurs, space, other countries, etc. I was concerned that he might have dyslexia, as it is prevalent in dh's family, so I taught him letters and writing at a very early age to possibly identify and get him any help needed as early as possible. He absolutely loved workbooks, school time, and learning everything else since then. However, he is an extremely intense child. Very, very strong willed. A joy to be around, but as some of you know, intensity and strong-willed children can be challenging when they are with you 24/7. Honestly, that is one of the primary reasons he is in public school this year. My dilemma comes in what to do next year. My gut tells me that he needs to be homeschooled. He has a late birthday and his 5 year old maturity prevents him from accelerating grades (mine and dh's decision). The private school was a little better last year, but it was a lot of money considering how little he learned academically. I attempted afterschooling both years, with varying degrees of success. By the time he gets home now, he wants to play or relax and is too tired to do more than one subject consistently each day. What would you all recommend? Have any of you successfully afterschooled an AL without causing problems with his other schoolwork/teacher? Or how do you know when to bite the bullet and homeschool? We are in a rural area so magnet or charter schools aren't an option. Thanks for the help!