What is your yearly budget for education materials

[RenaissanceMum]

...I didn't have a budget per se, but now he is in private school and does private lessons for both violin and piano, and I can't seem to stop buying him educational materials... This year excluding tuition I've spent roughly $3,000 thus far. But I'm going to buy a laminater and make it all last as long as possible! I definitely want to set one for next year though. 

[Nikita]

I'm embarrassed to say I've spent many thousands. Luckily, being Australian, the government have started paying people (mothers) to have kids (no kidding. with my first child I got nothing. second child and 3rd child , about 800.  4th child, $4000, fifth child $5000. They pay you $200 to immunise them to 18 months, and pay family payment each fortnight to upkeep them. So as I feel we are very blessed to have these, I spend these monies on educational things. As for clothing, I mostly buy 2ndhand, and buy many educational toys 2ndhand in 2ndhand shops and ebay, but do have to fork out full price for things like latest educational dvds, gonesjenius etc. My older kids go to private school too. I hope to have more children, and foster or perhaps do family daycare if that falls through, and plan to look after my grandkids as much as I can when I have grandkids, so It hink of it as a great investment that will be used for a long long time to come, and thus great value.
My younger kids will be homeschooled, and I intend to fork out the money now, and have as much resources as I can while their brains are soaking it up, then coasting along on those resources for a lot of years and spending a LOT less.
We also have an education tax refund here and thankfully, as I have kids in school, some of the educational things like computers, stationary, some dvds etc can be applied to them and half the expense claimed back. If you have school age children, look into that.
I aim to have my daughter enter Prep (K5) at 4 years old, but at home, so if I register her perhaps I may qualify for tax refund for her a year earlier too, rather than having to wait until she is "school age".

[mom2bee]

I just wanted to chime in and show something I tallied up today. Keep in mind that I do not yet have children of my own, nor am I in a relationship. I foresee kids being 1.5-5 years off for me, I have plenty of time to prepare, but I've been looking around, reading up and evaluating things and have made a list and pretty much broken it into 3 sections, each section beings approx. 3 years of my childs life.

All amounts are given in USD as of now, 2010. All prices are those for the item, NEW from the publisher with shipping when applicable and rounded to the nearest ten. (147.89 ~150). I will probably buy lots of things used when the time comes to begin doing this, but I want to fully explore my options early. I have fretted over and considered programs like MonkiSee MonkiDo and TweedleWink but haven't added them to the list because, in the end decided I wasn't as impressed by those products over their competitors. If I happen to be "big ballin'" or else "rolling in dough" when the time comes, great, I may try them, but other than that, no.

For 0-36 months (0-3 years)
0420 -- LR+LM Combo Pack with Chinese Ext.
0170 -- Wink To Learn Chinese Combo pack
0135 -- Before Five in a Row manual plus literature pack.
0300 -- Deluxe Your Baby Can Read/Deluxe Tu Bebe puede Leer (Eng and Spn versions)
0100 -- Jones Genuises Math Matrix
0150 -- Baby Signing Time complete collection
0500 -- General Expenses
0300 -- Books*
_____________
2075 -- Total

* (I plan to use the library for most of our book needs, and if I must buy I'll check resell shops but I'll allow a general budget of roughly $100 a year for those first years.)

For 37- 72 months (4-6 years)

0050 -- Verbal Math Lesson (4 books)
0400 -- Jones Genuises Math 3, 4, 5
0300 -- Math On The Level complete Series
0125 -- Algebra: Hands On Equations
0600 -- Five in a Row Vols 1-4 + Lit Packs
0600 -- General Expenses**
0450 -- Books and Games**
0600 -- Mandarin language upkeep
0450 -- Science materials
___________________________
3525 -- Total

**I still plan to buy primarily used books and games from resell shops and discount bins, but with a toddler I expect to use a good bit more glue, paper, etc for their learning charts, games, projects etc.

73- 108 Months (7-9 years)
0430 -- Jones Genuises Math 6-8
0300 -- Books + General Supplies.
0500 -- Science Materials
1500 -- Mandarin Language Upkeep
_____________________________
2730 - Total

_____________________________
8330 Grand Total (Assuming my math isn't horribly off....its almost 1am)
_____________________________
 
As you can see, its important to me that my child have a strong math foundation. Please note that many of the products from the second stage can continue to be used beyond their original term. Also many of these things, such YBCR (TBPL), LR/LM, WinkToLearn, B4FIAR + FIAR, the General Books, Verbal Math, as well as Math on the Level are non-consumable. They can be reused for other siblings and cousins etc. So they are less of an expense and more of an investment. One that I'm very much willing to endeavor to make.

I didn't include the cost of the materials for things like Social Studies, History, Geography, Art, Literature etc in separate columns because it is darn near impossible for me to sit and reasonably calculate the cost of things. However, I expect to get several of those subjects for free or cheap via internet, library, co-op resources etc.

Also, many of those things are available for free in books and websites so I don't calculate them as warranting an expense all of their own. I plan to nurture science and technology separately as much as possible in my children as Tech is a big passion for me and I want to share it with them and also its obvious that tech and science are going to be even more important in the world by the time I have kids.

A few notes: I intend to EC my children (Infant Potty Train.) and practice a few forms of attachment parenting in such that I hope to breast feed, wear my baby in a baby sling/carrier and just love and enjoy my baby with as little interference from the commercial world as possible. I have not calculated the cost of the equipment to do those things yet because, well, I'm a bit lazy okay?

Via the internet, I was able to find the ONE type of Private school I'd be willing to send my child to and pay the steep tuition for and at 12-18 grand a YEAR, I know that homeschooling, even with "expensive" curricullum, I'm getting a terrific bargain so I dont feel bad about spending 10k on the first 9 years of my childs life.

[Maquenzie]

If you have supportive friends and family, you can register for lots of those things when the time comes which could really help!

I can't attest to what "early education" budget we will settle on. Right now I'm just testing the waters and using a $50/month educational budget and personal spending money.

For my DD1 though, we've had a $50/month "consumable" Montessori budget (we use glass cups, pitchers, etc. And also buy seasonal a new practical life type materials). Since Elizabeth started school, these things have become less formal and we are more likely to spend the money on new puzzles or child sized cooking utensils. Her yearly tuition is $6k and violin lessons and rental are almost $2k a year. So, for 1 child, our budget is $8.5k per year.

[Wolfwind]

Wow, I'd better start saving!  At the moment it doesn't cost much, because I'm making simplified versions of things myself.  I'm sure my yoga mat doesn't work as well as an actual infant crawling track, but it was affordable!  I do want to buy Little Reader, because the time I'll save in not making flashcards of hundreds of words and even more encyclopedic knowledge files I can dowload from the site is worth the money.  But the visual stimulation and math cards I made myself.  I'm severely limiting screentime, so no DVDs. 

When she was born our take-home pay increased by $200 a month (instead of a bigger tax rebate), so that got budgeted for her.  We're not spending it all, and I was going to reassign that money.  But maybe I'll save it for her college and start spending it when she hits three or so; it looks like at that age classes and activities cost a lot more.

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