Your kids have ONE shot at life. What are you doing to help them be successful?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ll go first. We spent $30k for my son to attend a private Kindergarten that helped him excel during the first Covid year.

We also bought a home at the top of our price range to ensure he is in the best public school district for elementary school.

Your turn! It doesn’t have to be education related.

As the kid of parents who spent huge sums of money to give us the best of a lot of things, I can assure you that pales compared to getting full acceptance, love and support from your parents.

[Anonymous]

I didn't read all of these posts but object to the premise that your kids have "one shot" at life. You have one physical life, but life is about invention and reinvention. My favorite people are those who are constantly learning, adjusting, and growing in life.

Life isn't private kindergarten or bust.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We only give them regular chicken nuggets instead of the dino-shaped ones. I don’t want my kids to end up at a state school.

If you gave dino ones, your kid would have a better chance of ending up with a PhD in a STEM field.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:🙄
I am doing my best to raise kids who are well balanced. OP you sound insufferable.

The OP is satire dude.

It's hard to see when it hits so close to home for many . . . .

[Anonymous]

I tell them constantly that I want three things from them:
- Be able to take care of yourself financially
- Do what makes you happy
- Be kind

There are caveats to each of the above things and it's up to them to figure out what their caveats are. Do you like expensive stuff? Then plan for a lucrative career that won't make you miserable. Are you easily frustrated, anxious? What can I do help you learn how to make number three easier, then? Because it's harder to be kind when you're stressed out. I have a cousin who moved to a remote country as a young 20-something and lived quite happily with only the things in her backpack for many years. She's now an adult with her own family and she lives a very unconventional lifestyle with very little. Her parents were always supportive of her finding her way, even though it was extremely contrary to what they had planned for her. I want my kids to feel the same kind of love and support to find their own means to become independent, self-sufficient, critical thinkers, whatever that might look like for them.

[Anonymous]

Your children have the ability to adapt to far more than you think. Do you really think that if something terrible happened, their lives would be ruined with no chance of moving forward?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll go first. We spent $30k for my son to attend a private Kindergarten that helped him excel during the first Covid year.

We also bought a home at the top of our price range to ensure he is in the best public school district for elementary school.

Your turn! It doesn’t have to be education related.

Wow! Excelling in kindergarten! Now that’s something to brag about.

When public schools were closed, he learned to read.

That could have been taught at home, with a tutor, during distance learning (you don't know that it wouldn't have), in first grade, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My oldest has special needs. We have stayed on in this country, visa after visa (and now green card) to give him the best chance at a professional launch. Our home country would not have offered him the services and accommodation he needed in school, and doesn't even have the medications he needs to take!!! It's been years of visa applications, lawyer fees, uncertainty surrounding whether we can stay or leave, stress and marital tension, so that our son has opportunities.

This, to me, this is a situation where a child truly only has one shot, and the parent has an ongoing fight to give it to them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Modeling a happy marriage. Both DH and I grew up with unhappily married parents (his never divorced, mine did several times without finding happier marriages along the way). A happy marriage is the best foundation for a happy life.

Eh, I don't agree with the bolded. Health insurance, having enough food, having a safe place to sleep, access to education - those are all more important and necessary in order to have a happy life. Your statement implies (probably unintentionally) that children raised by single parents can't grow up to have happy lives, and I'm sure you can agree that's not true.

You're confused. I'm saying that my children, AS SPOUSES, will have the best chance at a happy life if they are happily married.

Oh, so you're saying that they can't be happy if they separate, divorce or choose not to marry. That staying married, even if the other person does crazy or dishonest things over and over, that's the only way to be happy. Got it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Anyone else hearing Eminem music in their head when they saw the subject line?

Yep.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid has special needs so throwing as much time and money as possible on therapies…

This makes a lot more sense than 30k on a private preschool only to then go back to public.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I didn't read all of these posts but object to the premise that your kids have "one shot" at life. You have one physical life, but life is about invention and reinvention. My favorite people are those who are constantly learning, adjusting, and growing in life.

Life isn't private kindergarten or bust.

Yes this. I'm 39 and my whole is completely reinvented from my first go at it when I was 19. You can have any sort of life you want, and you can change what you want at any time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll go first. We spent $30k for my son to attend a private Kindergarten that helped him excel during the first Covid year.

We also bought a home at the top of our price range to ensure he is in the best public school district for elementary school.

Your turn! It doesn’t have to be education related.

Wow! Excelling in kindergarten! Now that’s something to brag about.

When public schools were closed, he learned to read.

40 years ago majority of kids started kindergarten knowing how to read. Parents weren’t lazy and prioritized family over money. You didn’t reinvent the wheel, you just parented.

Disagree, strongly.

My grandmother's era (70ish years ago), kindergarten didn't exist in a lot of places. When it did, it was focused on social skills and teaching what we consider preschool academics now. Kids learned to read in first grade (yes, my grandmother the hoarder has proof of her work and classmates'). My mother's era (50ish years ago), kindergarten was everywhere but not required, and it was still focused on social skills and preschool level academics... my grandmother was hired without a degree (school paid for her to take three community college classes) to teach Perception, the precursor to today's PE. My era (30ish years ago) had requirements for attending kindergarten in some areas, but it was still half day, and while some schools did three groupings for kids based on abilities coming in (mine did, and kids varied from not knowing the alphabet up to reading chapter books), others did not; that was also at the height of gifted and talented programs nationwide. Now? It's incredibly hard to find g&e programs, getting an IEP that actually works for the child is hard, teachers teach just to the middle, and kids are in full day kindergarten and expected to read if not before they start, at least by the time they get out.

Some kids are ready to read at 4. Others won't have it click until 7-8, no matter what is done. That's why Montessori allows children to work at their own pace. It's why Waldorf doesn't teach reading until all the children should be ready. It's why most research says not to focus on whether a child can read (and not to pressure them!) until 7-8.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ll go first. We spent $30k for my son to attend a private Kindergarten that helped him excel during the first Covid year.

We also bought a home at the top of our price range to ensure he is in the best public school district for elementary school.

Your turn! It doesn’t have to be education related.

I'm sorry to tell you, OP, but if you really want your kid to be successful you should have kept him in the private school from K-12.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ll go first. We spent $30k for my son to attend a private Kindergarten that helped him excel during the first Covid year.

We also bought a home at the top of our price range to ensure he is in the best public school district for elementary school.

Your turn! It doesn’t have to be education related.

Wow! Excelling in kindergarten! Now that’s something to brag about.

When public schools were closed, he learned to read.

...and then you sent him to public school for 1st where all those kids had been home the previous year? Do you even hear yourself? You are insufferable.