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amyable
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| Posted: March 23 2007 at 9:51am | IP Logged
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bring your children's attention back to task, say, for the 10 and younger set, in a half an hour, for example, while doing a math page?
Is 15-20 times a little excessive, or right about on target?  
OK, I'm winking and laughing, but I'm seriously wondering. It *would* have been a nice 10-15 minute lesson, IF they had not needed to be told to get to work every 45 seconds (it was just a Math-U-See page for both, immaturish 9yo and mature 7yo)
Do your kids need this much redirection? Do you give it or just let them suffer the consequences of not completing work in a timely manner? How do you redirect? Words, gestures (polite ones ), other?
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Theresa
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| Posted: March 23 2007 at 9:57am | IP Logged
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I am very blessed that my older two do not need much redirection. They are now 11 and 13 but even when they were younger they would often just sit and do their work without any encouragement or redirection from me. Now that they are older they just get up and start on their own.
My 8 year old however needs more redirection and I am working hard at not letting my frustration over it show (not always easy when I've had two disciplined workers before him).
I've heard others say they move the subjects that take longer to the morning or write before a break or outside time so that the kids are a bit more motivated to finish their work so have their free time.
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Tina P.
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| Posted: March 23 2007 at 10:17am | IP Logged
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Math pages. Ugh!  OK, I'm better now.  At least you do Math-U-See. Is half an hour a little of a stretch, do you think, for a 9yo and 7yo? Does one page really take that long? Or do you have them do more than one?
The one subject I can really say that I am *not* happy about in any year that I homeschool is math. We are right now implementing a new method to use during basic operations, which means that, yet again, I have pushed my eldest son back in math. I'm hoping that by teaching him this new method, he will be able to work more independently at his level within a few months. {I don't see the prayerful emoticon I was looking for. You'll just have to imagine it}. 
Anyway, perhaps they just need a little nudge backward? A little refresher? Probably not *so* far backward as I went, but just enough to get them back on track? When my kids are confident that they know what the math they're doing is about, they tend to look FORWARD to it and do it with GUSTO.
I might have just muddled your thoughts further, though I meant to help. Hope I have helped in some small way.
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amyable
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| Posted: March 23 2007 at 11:57am | IP Logged
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Tina P. wrote:
| Math pages. Ugh! OK, I'm better now. At least you do Math-U-See. Is half an hour a little of a stretch, do you think, for a 9yo and 7yo? Does one page really take that long? Or do you have them do more than one? |
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I *think* for both of them it was one, relatively easy page. It only took 1/2 hour because they weren't DOING the work, lol! If it was only this one time, or just in math, I would look to specific math reasons. But really, it's all the time, especially with my oldest. Today was particularly bad, but I am usually redirecting them many, many times.
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Becky Parker
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| Posted: March 23 2007 at 12:18pm | IP Logged
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I am constantly redirecting my 8 yo dd. She really does not like Math at all. She will doodle all over her page so it is not even legible. She will sit forever, not worrying about consequences. She just doesn't want to do it. One thing I have done, which I admit is a crutch, but is somewhat motivating for her, is teach her to use an abacus. She has become quite adept at adding with it and I think she enjoys hearing it "click, click,click" as she slides the beads back and forth with her pencil. She even sat with me the other day as I used it to add up my wish-list of homeschool books for next year, then figure out how many I had to delete so we could actually afford it! It was kind of fun for me too, and when I used a regular calculator to check it, I was a little surprised that the answer was right!!
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KC in TX
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I have to do this with my son. He has other issues which exacerbate this, but what I do is use a timer. I tell him that he has 20 minutes to do his MUS (2 pages). If he doesn't he does not get to go play for his break. I've never had to yank that privilege...yet.
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Angel
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It depends. Up until this year, I definitely had to redirect their attention every 45 seconds or so, especially if they were both trying to do math at the dining room table while the little ones were also doing their thing. Then my oldest turned 10, and a lot of things just seemed to come together for him. So now instead of goofing off with his sister every 45 seconds, he yells at whoever is distracting him.
Actually, I'm being a little unfair. Both my 10 yo and 7 yo *are* concentrating a lot better this year, but -- we break math up into 2 sessions. The first session, which is at the dining room table with me, usually only lasts 20 minutes, and I do let them stop when they feel like they've had enough, as long as they've actually been working. Then at quiet time when they're separated and the babies are sleeping, they do whatever is left that they can do independently. This works pretty well, although my ds is still having a number of meltdowns a week over having to do math at all. (That, however, is a completely different issue.)
We do have trouble when they're both supposed to be doing the same thing, though. This doesn't happen in math, because they're at different levels, but I am CONSTANTLY redirecting them when it comes to spelling, which I do with them as a "class". It drives me up a wall. The only way I can think to stop this is to almost always work with them separately. Then they can't egg each other on.
--Angela
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amyable
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| Posted: March 23 2007 at 4:33pm | IP Logged
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Angel wrote:
| but I am CONSTANTLY redirecting them when it comes to spelling, which I do with them as a "class". |
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So, are you saying this is what I have to look forward to when I move my 7yo into AVKO in a few months and teach them together?
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Angel
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| Posted: March 23 2007 at 6:30pm | IP Logged
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amyable wrote:
So, are you saying this is what I have to look forward to when I move my 7yo into AVKO in a few months and teach them together?
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Sorry, Amy! I really do like AVKO, in spite of the constant redirection. At least even if we only get through half a list (sometimes it's just not worth it to push past 15 minutes), I'm still seeing some results!
Come to think of it, I guess that is how I cope with attentional difficulties as a whole. I tend to stick with Charlotte Mason's short lessons. If they're just getting *too* distracted, I don't think it's productive to keep going because it's likely that they won't retain much of it anyway. I'd rather do 10 minutes of (mostly) sustained attention than 30 minutes (or more) of consistently deteriorating attention. Often this has meant in math that I don't assign all the problems, or I shorten what's meant to be covered.
--Angela
Three Plus Two
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Erin
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Amy
With my dc it is really a matter of personality and liking for a subject. Maths is liked by most of my dc, so for my 9 and 7 year old they could often do it on their own but on a MOnday the talk and noise!! Now if it was my ds12 who doesn't like maths...do you think it is rather ridiculous to have to sit with a 12 year old and say 'now let's do this sum, 5x6 =... come on you know it, let's say our 5x.' He sighs and says 'I don't like maths can I not do any today'. Now we can go through this often Like every day. The thing is he can do it if he puts his mind to it. Oh and I've tried the short lessons, they're always short.
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4Real Forums : Living Learning
Topic: How many times do you have to
