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New to homeschooling and to CM. Have 11 yo in 5th grade
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I want to start by telling you a little background. 5 years ago I would have told you that I would not be homeschooling,not in this lifetime,lol. However about a year ago I feel that God changed my mind and I have no idea why. I debated not sending him to PS at the beginning of this school year but in the end I sent him because I wasn’t sure I was ready.
My son has a lot of sickness every winter and this year has been no different. It starts in January and he is sick almost non stop until spring. He ends up missing a lot of school but has never had trouble staying on track with his school work until this year. Actually I can’t blame it all on sickness because he had a 44 in math last sememester. Fast forward to now…he was failing every subject but one and was very possibly going to have to repeat 5th grade again. I felt like the time was right and I went Tuesday and withdrew him from PS and signed up with my church umbrella school. We are only required to get in 9 more days of school but we must get his grades up in all courses except Language. I really feel like he is needing the deschooling process but we must do 9 more days and raise his grades so that is not a option yet.
This(CM) is a lot to learn and I will definately be ready come fall but for the next 9 days what do you suggest? Getting started on the CM ideas? Struggling through worksheets and papers? I have found his problems in math but he is so bored trying to just do worksheets. Any help? Please?????
Hi apsews. Peace to you. Peace. Peace.
Before anything else, do you mean that those nine days have to take place immediately, meaning the next nine regular school days, or can they be nine days within a certain time span?
Warmly,
Richele
I know in NY state, the “school year” runs from July 1st until June 30th. You have to meet a certain time requirement, but you can do it at your own pace/schedule in that time frame. So is it possible that you have until the end of the “school year” to get those 9 days in? And if that’s the case, maybe taking a bit of a break would be a good thing!
I defer to Laura and Richele, since I don’t live in an area where there are homeschooling requirements, but…
My thought would be that there is too much transitioning to CM methods to do in 9 days. I think I would:
a. Find out for sure what the requirements are and what your deadline for getting his grades up would be.
b. Begin working on the ‘disciplined studies’ in math,language arts, and whatever else he is really struggling to make a passing grade in by whatever means you can find so that he ‘passes’. In other words, work with him in his problem subjects daily (but in short lessons) so that he can pass whatever requirements he must pass before moving on.
c. Get over this hump, and then give him a real break from regimented school. During this time, begin learning all you can about the CM education through this website and the SCM materials, Ambleside Online, and books like “Educating the Wholehearted Child”, and “For the Children’s Sake”. You can begin to implement Nature Study, reading living books, and habit training (important CM concepts) even while your son is taking a break from official ‘school’.
Take a deep breath. Once he is over the technicalities of meeting these state imposed standards, you can begin his real education. It is an exciting adventure for both of you!
Looking over your post again – what does he have to do to get his grades up in the next 9 days? Pass a test? Get the concept? Who is grading his work to determin a ‘passing grade’ and how are they making that determination? Your teaching methods are going to depend on how those methods are tested, if you see what I mean?
Ok, I am in Alabama and they require homeschool to have a total of 145(no certain amount of hours) days and he only has 136(due to missing days for sickness). The umbrella school requires grades to be in by June 7th and they are turned into the board of education. I don’t have any rules of what work he does to get the passing grades(I do the grades myself) other than turn in an average grade for the semester. The coordinator of the umbrella school is a good friend of mine and she said she would do daily grades to bring up the averages.
The reason I was thinking of going ahead and do the CM is because I feel like he would do well with the short lessons,hands on,nature study,etc. We have to pass Math,Reading,Science,History. Thanks for all the advice so far and I appreciate all of you helping me figure out what to do!!!
I don’t have any advice except that HSLDA may be able to help you. I want to give you a warm welcome to homeschooling and to SCM.
With what your coordinator suggested here is what I would do:
Every day for the next month or however long something in each of those 4 areas and give your son a daily grade as she suggested so his overall grade rises as needed. BUT!!! Here are the sorts of things I would do for those daily subjects to be given a grade:
Math – Choose to work on areas he can already do, or to strengthen one weak area at a time, with a daily grade for participation/practice. So maybe you focus on addition facts, or measuring, or whatever for a week or two, then move on. Keep things where he can do the work and succeed, and keep the work TEAM WORK with you, not independent assignments.
Reading – Have him read daily for a period of time and give him a grade for completing his time. For example, set a timer for 15 minutes each day and when he’s read that long he’s done.
Science and History – To be honest here is where things can double up if you have him use his reading time for science or history related topics. Or you can read aloud something to him related to each daily and let him tell you what he understood/learned/liked about it. Grade for participation.
Good luck! As soon as possible I would drop things to decompress, but this was the least stressful plan I could think of to fit what it sounds like you need to do to finish out this year.
I agree with Tristan and lest you feel like it’s “cheating” for giving these types of grades, I want to encourage you not to underestimate the value of simply reading, narrating and observing in the learning process. Simply having him tell his favorite part of something read means a lot of cognitive processing has had to happen. That’s when true ownership of the material takes place. Plus it will encourage him and strengthen your relationship in the process. Find a great living book on a topic he’s interested in. The Winged Watchman by Hilda van Stockum, for example, which we discussed on a other thread, is a fabulous book set in Germany-occupied Holland during WWII. It is an on-the-edge-of-your-seat book that will give him such a clear picture of what life was like for those people. And there are thousands of others. The ladies here will be happy to make book suggestions for various topics. Go outside with him and observe something in nature during this beautiful time of year. Have his describe it to you or sketch it in a nature journal. Put up a hummingbird feeder and read a book about them, or just observe them and have him tell you what he noticed. Nature study every day can be valuable and easy grades for science.
Just some thoughts. Enjoy this time. Get him on your team and it can be a real blessing for both of you.
Ok, so since you are thinking that starting with CM now would be what is best, I’m going to say that is what would be best because you are his mother and you know what would be best for your child!
I’m not really sure where’d I’d go with math if I were in your shoes. Does he have all the basics down pat? Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication and Division. If not, I’d start there for now.
Reading is easy. Pick a book he’d be interested in, have him read a chapter a day, and then tell you what happened in each chapter. I wouldn’t worry about written narrations just yet, since he’s just getting started. I’m not sure what reading level he is at, but my 5th grader is loving Chuck Black’s Kingdom Series. Tons of adventure and biblical allegory.
For Science, I’d do nature study and a living book for now. The free curriculum guide has a list of living books in the science section. Pick one that would interest him and have him read and narrate. For nature study, we’ve been going out and writing down and recording the “firsts” of the season. So when we notice that the tree frogs are back, we record that. The first time we saw that the lilac bud, we recorded that. When the first daffodil started to peak out of the ground, we recorded that. That’s an easy way to start nature study for now.
I suppose for History, you could figure out where it is you would like to start. Are you planning on using the SCM guides or Truthquest or someother guide to help you navigate what to teach? If you are, both have samples. You could figure out which one you plan on using, and look in the sample pages to get started. That way you don’t need to wait on starting history while waiting for the materials to arrive.
Hope that helped!
Oh wow!!! Ya’ll are amazingly helpful!! I wouldn’t have thought to do the nature studies as his sole grade in science but I love it!
I did figure out what his problems are in math, he struggles with borrowing(regrouping they call it now)and mulitplication so I think we will work on just the subtracting because the multiplication stresses him out. We started Wednesday and the first day I kept things simple because I didn’t know what he needed work on and he made 100 and was so excited about it. On Thursday we focused on the subtraction and multiplication and didn’t make such good scores and he was unhappy and has had a “attitude” about it since that. I think I should keep things fairly easy to keep him excited. What do you all think? I think at some point kids do need to be challenged but for this circumstance I think “just getting through these two weeks” is most important.
One othere thing…I went to the library last week and they were having a book sale and I had read enough to know what I thought living books are supposed to be. I bought alot of books that I felt would be just that. For example,one is Wilbur and Orville Wright by August Stevenson. It is actually a story and not just facts. Am I on the right path? I thought we could do that for reading and history. Any thoughts will be appreciated!!!
aspews…I have no advise to add beyond what has already been given, but I had to giggle when you said “5 years ago I would have told you that I would not be homeschooling,not in this lifetime,lol.” because that was totally me too!! I was actually one of those parents who thought homeschoolers were “weird, unsocialized, and awkward”. Shame on me! Like you, God apparently had different plans for my life than what I had envisioned and he began to work on my heart and move me toward homeschooling. (It was as much a shock to me as everyone else when I first decided to quit my very well paying job and homeschool my son). Luckily, my husband is very supporative and onboard with this new path for our lives. He’ll admit that it’s a little scary being the sole income for the family, and we’ve made many sacrifices to go down to 1 income, but we are both so excited, and can’t imagine going back to the way things were.
I believe that book is from the Childhood of Famous Americans series. It is perfect for what you want to do. Just have him read for a short amount of time or read it aloud (but, as Tristan pointed out, it would count for his reading grade as well if he does the reading) and tell you about it. Easy. Done. And because it’s a narrative, he will remember it.
And I agree to keep the math light. There a lots of games you can play for math. Your goal at this particular moment is to get through these next few days, help him succeed, and give him a desire and fire to want to learn more. A CM education is rigorous in what they learn, but the process is delightful and real.
Welcome! You have been given great advice….
I’m just curiouc as to what type of improvement they could expect you to have made in 9 days, and what happens if he doesn’t improve his marks?
If they are saying you couldn’t homeschool because he “failed” after the PS teaching him for the more than 150 days, and you teaching him 9, that would be totally rediculas – it is their falure not yours…
If they are saying that he would fail the grade, but you can continue to homeschool – well the grade is just a number….
Just a few thoughts…
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