Time to place an order
Earlier in the year silly me stated that I had EVERYTHING we needed for homeschooling this coming year. Pat laughed. Literally he laughed heartily and smiled that all-knowing smile; yea, right, you’ll find something.
I went through my materials, my plans for the coming year and I really couldn’t think of anything we needed.
But wait! Grammar really did need to be changed from Rod & Staff to something else. It had become too technical with little direct application IMHO, so I started searching for an alternative. Should I switch ScienceKid to Rules of the Game or Editor in Chief? Soon I had an order to Rainbow Resource of $150, and by the time it arrived I had another $150 in my wish cart. How did that happen? Once again the order went in, materials came in house, and I wondered how that had happened. Didn’t I have everything?
Today I heard about another writing program in an email; read on-line reviews; and before I knew it there’s another $150 in my Rainbow Resource wish list. I haven’t transferred the items to my cart and pushed the purchase button since I want some time to think about this order. I always do do this. Sometimes a few items leave the wish list, and sometimes a few more items are added in. This order contains a writing program by Jensen, extra practice Singapore-math workbooks for MilitaryKid, and a Grow-a-Frog kit for me. There are still dissection kits to be purchased for the coming year too…….I can hear Pat laughing and giving me that ‘yea-right’ smile, you have everything purchased for the coming year.
Never. No, there’s always something more that i could add in 
So, how do folks homeschool on a few hundered $ a year for each child? Is it just a claim or a reality? I know I can’t do it on that. Just trying to cover the basics; at least the basics in my book; grammar, writing, handwriting, spelling, Latin, math, science, history, art, music–piano lessons alone can easily be $1000/year, Logic, reading books, and then there are field trips….. costs way-more than a few hundred $$ a year. I guess I too should admit that ScienceKid did 4 different math programs this year, two writing programs, and MilitaryKid is not far behind on the number of different programs he has used in several different subjects. Science consists of weekly hands-on experiments that use lots of supplies, which adds more cost to our homeschool expense. Thankfully I have the luxury of purchasing items on my wish list, and having more than one grammar or math program in-house. Then there’s the expense of the kids doing Science Olympiad,…..
I think I’ll go place that order with Rainbow Resource…..
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April 29th, 2006 @ 12:14 am
I’ve never considered field trips part of the homeschool budget. I guess when people say they do it for a few hundred dollars they really aren’t accounting for everything. Also I don’t count ballet and other extracurriculars as part of homeschooling. The kids would be doing that anyway if they were in public school. And the other thing that I do which is sort of cheating is take $15 from “groceries” and run down to my local homeschool supply store and pick up a new workbook every now and then.
I have yet to buy anything for science but I have a catalogue from www.homesciencetools. that sells supplies cheaper than I’ve seen it anywhere else.
April 29th, 2006 @ 8:45 pm
You’re probably right in that things that I include in my figure others do not.
I love homesciencetools.com and order from them quite often. LOL!! Right now I must have a couple hundred dollars of science stuff that I want to buy from them. We’ll be doing Biology next year and so I’m oscillating on whether or not to buy dissecting kits and other lab kits. HS’ing cost much less when the kids were little.
April 29th, 2006 @ 9:57 pm
I give up on trying to homeschool in a frugal manner. I’m now trying to implement a $100 a month budget! We’ll see how that goes.
Thursday we went to the zoo. It cost $56 to fill our car with gas, drive 120 miles to the zoo. We bought our entrance fees, had a snack, then spent $10 at the petting zoo. Then we went out to a yummy dinner at the Olive Garden.
Total cost for the day: $156. That was a school day, but I’m not counting it in my budget. lol
April 30th, 2006 @ 5:24 pm
Well, we spent less than $200 for the whole year, but I don’t count things that we would do anyway, or boosk we buy “just because’ that they also happen to learn from.
Nobody is in any lessons or classes this year either. We’re also far into the relaxed/unschooling end of things and have done away with most workbooks. We read a LOT of books from the library and second hand, whether or not they are considered “school” books.
(although I did get some for Emam recently, big 300+ page ones for THREE bucks apiece. :O)