how much to do w/a 7th grader

I am having a tough time with keeping our schedule to 4 hours, but I don’t really want it to go over that, so I am paring down my plans for my 7th grader.  He has a mild LD and a poor attitude towards school in the first place, so I really need to keep it managable for him, challenging but not overwhelming, with a good dose of fun in the mix.  He’d have a full-out revolt if I tried to have him do anything 6 days, especially math.  

Current Events – We use 2 things. God’s World News like Rachel mentions (each of my kids gets the magazine for their level) and http://www.studentnewsdaily.com for dd12. We use this idea from Charlotte Mason Help.

CURRENT EVENTS-“Forms V and VI are expected to keep up with the newspapers and know something about places and regions coming most into note in the current term. (Vol. 6, p. 230).” 
http://studentnewsdaily.com/ (read daily, oral narrate, read the bias article on Wed; on Friday, write short paragraph summary of the most important event of the week. We don’t answer the questions provided) from http://www.charlottemasonhelp.com/2009/07/year-7-booklist.html

Cursive – Keep the cursive practice as long as needed, of course. You have the right idea of a Commonplace Book. It’s what my kids transition to from copywork. 

Composition – If you’re doing an extra program and especially if writing is a struggle, then you may keep the number of written narrations lower. I have a goal that my dd12 writes daily. Written narration accomplishes this. We are not doing an additional program until January when we will use AG’s Beyond the Book Report. This will still be written narration, but a little more structured and only for a brief 10 weeks or so. 

Narration – We narrate most everything. Family history or natural science books – oral narration. Individual history, science, literature, Bible – oral or written narration. I try to read books ahead, but will cheat and skim or check sparks notes online if need be. But there comes a point when the child must own the work. 

Reading to Children––It is a delight to older people to read aloud to children, but this should be only an occasional treat and indulgence, allowed before bedtime, for example. We must remember the natural inertness of a child’s mind; give him the habit of being read to, and he will steadily shirk the labour of reading for himself; indeed, we all like to be spoon-fed with our intellectual meat, or we should read and think more for ourselves and be less eager to run after lectures. ~ Charlotte Mason, Home Education, vol. 1, p. 228

We read aloud at our house as a family at bedtime and other times and I plan to always continue. Also, I do read my younger kids’ school books, and while my dd12 may sit in with us for some readings during school time on occasion, she is quite capable of tackling the books on her own and indeed I think it’s the natural progression as Charlotte mentions.

Hope that helps,

Christie

As a general rule, Charlotte recommended reading aloud to years 1-3 and by year 4 turning over the books, for the most part, to the children. There are some things, like Plutarch for example, that you may want to always read aloud.

If using the SCM modules, you have a family spine of sorts to read aloud to everyone and then grads 4-6, 7-9, 10-12 have their own books in addition. I see no problem with having a family spine and doing some of the reading together, but I do believe, as did Charlotte, that the students should read their own books. I love the SCM modules because it keeps us all on the same topic, but moving at our own levels and pace. This coming year, we’re doing Module 1 and will do all of the family books as audiobooks, I will read the 1-3 books to dd6, ds9 will read the 4-6 books on his own, dd12 will read the 7-9 books plus some others on her own. If you’re blazing your own trail, you could do something similar, too. I would encourage you to consider stepping out of the way and letting the kids take the reigns, esp. by middle school. 

I feel that I’ve rocked your boat and I’m sorry.  Know that I share in love and from my 6 years experience and understanding of Charlotte and her methods. You certainly don’t have to do it this way. 

Blessings,

Christie

Hi Stephanie, I totally understand the challenge of handing over more work. I had my schedule pretty much planned for my 5th and 8th graders with me still reading family books but changed after reading Christies posts and remembering how AO does it. So essentiat how Charlotte did it. But of course she didn’t have little kids running around and laundry snd meals to interrupt the day:)

But I think more independence will be good for us. My youngest tends to remember more and narrate better, which I’m afraid will deflate my oldest. So, I’m handing family readings over to them this year and am actually looking forward to it! We’re more efficient when they work on tpheir own, no waiting around for all of us to be ready. And this frees up time for me where I plan to read/skim many of the books. I may look for online cliff notes if I can, but I’m not worried about reading everything.

But I don’t have youngers like you do. With real young ones I wouldn’t do a spine if I had to do it over again….not much was retained for us with so much info.

And I understand about the comparison trap and just don’t go there anymore. We know a family whose 7th grader was working 5–10 hours per day. And another who was 3ish hours per day. We’re happily in the middle where it’s just right for US:) Blessings, Gina