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LucyP
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| Posted: May 26 2012 at 12:28pm | IP Logged
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If the slackness and arguing over school work get you down, I think a rule of getting x work done before y time or no scouts etc is a good one. The 9 year old is definitely old enough for this, and I would say a 7 year old is too.
I cannot bear fussing and whining and foot dragging: the biggest lesson my kids need to learn is do their best cheerfully. It will stand them in good stead for life. And the snail pace accompanied by whining are so wearing on me as the mama and teacher.
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asplendidtime
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| Posted: May 28 2012 at 9:18am | IP Logged
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I hope my answer isn't too contrary. But as far as survival mode goes. I just have super simplified a lot. I had a baby July 2011, we hs'ed through the summer because I use materials which are not teaching/Mother intensive, they are more textbooky in approach but done more independantly. I have dumbed everything down for me. My children still do tons of reading in the afternoons, and they also do crafts and play outside in the late afternoon. But we stay home pretty much all of the time, dh takes our 15-passenger to work daily.
I still take time to read to my little ones, we do crafts occasionally, my dc do a lot more on their own than I organize, they also help with cooking/baking (we do make cookies at our house-no flames)   I make sure I am on top of little ones now by having them work alongside me/play too all morning, while older ones work. We listen to audio books as a family. But school work looks much different than I had thought it "should" when we started out eight years ago.
I even use a computer program to help me get my little ones reading. I don't have any guilt anymore over this, it's what I really need to do to "get it all done".
We have to eat, we have to eat affordably. That means we must cook, I make good use of my crockpot. We eat frozen pizza more than I care to think about, but we do, and we're surviving! 
We have a lot of laundry, we pitch in and work together, but this is a daily commitment. As well as sharing chores and keeping our home tidy, which it mostly is.
We commit to approx. 5 hours of formal learning time in the mornings, and when that's done the rest of the day is free. I worried this would stiffle their curiosity, make them hate learning, and somehow the sky would fall... But I found out that children are curious, they are interested, and they don't need me to be on top of everything they do. Learning can be their own, and in our home it more is than isn't now.
I am not saying you need to do as I do. I am not telling you to quit outside activities, I am not telling you to go against the grain of the normal homeschool advice. I am just saying that this is what has worked for us. It makes life simple, gives us a rhythm, and is something which seems to be working for us at this time. I do want to say that this was hard for me at first, I struggled to step out of the seasoned advice and do the opposite which was supposed to cause burnout and failure. But we found since we started these changes, (Spring 2010) that it wasn't so bad afterall.
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Rebecca~Mama to
Noah 17,
Katie 16,
Mary 14,
Tim 13,
Jonah 12,
Josh 10,
Zoe 9,
Will 7,
Peter 6,
Laura-Mae 4,
Emily-Joy 2,
Genevieve & Gabriella 1
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Capsela
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| Posted: May 29 2012 at 7:56am | IP Logged
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knowloveserve wrote:
Okay, so it looks like there are three main problems I'm boiling this down to:
1-So many choices are overwhelming me.
2-My family resists schoolwork all around. I hate the power struggles. It makes me want to give up and I believe I would if I didn't have a moral problem with my other options. The only thing they really "enjoy" is reading living books or being outdoors... which sounds fantastic but riddles me with guilt when I think of how underdeveloped they seem in the language arts/math areas.
3-I just need some gentle words of encouragement. Or a sharp rebuke to quit my sniveling and just buck up. Take your pick... feeling emotional and overwhelmed lately... |
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I could have written your entire post (only my baby was born in Oct 2010 and my other boys are 10, 7 and 4.5). My troubles started when my husband deployed to Afghanistan in 2010 and I had our 4th boy while he was gone. It was up to me to do it all and I could barely keep the kids fed much less do schooling.
This year was chaotic because we started late with a brand new curriculum that turned out to be way too much. About 3 months ago I started Latin Centered Curriculum and it has saved us all. It's simple, uses great books and the kids know what subjects will be done based on a particular day of the week. They only have 4 subjects daily and the lessons are short. I printed off a generic schedule and it is pinned to our school board so the kids know exactly what's going on each day.
This is not my ideal at all. Mine is much closer to yours. But the boys are thriving on this simple schedule and I am planning a morning basket for next year to get my CM fix in. The morning basket will consist of daily prayers and reading from The Law of God plus a lesson picked from the following: saints, icon study, picture study, poetry and American history. Short lessons that the boys will do together before doing their independent work.
Here are my 2cents for your 3 questions.
1) Stick with whatever works even if it is not your ideal. All the choices overwhelm me too. Most of this year I was paralyzed because I didn't know what to do after the new curriculum I picked flopped. LCC has been a lifesaver for us.
2) I have 4 boys and that sounds totally normal. School time was awful until I put the schedule up. Now that they know exactly what the expectations are there is a whole lot less whining. My 4th grader still drags his feet some but I just gently remind him that he is missing out on his free time and that usually gets him going. My 1st grader who was the whiniest before, now works mainly whine free.
3) I don't have much else to offer from what I have stated above, but take comfort in knowing that you are not alone. I truly could have written your post. I will be praying for you!
Kelly
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LLMom
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| Posted: May 30 2012 at 7:15pm | IP Logged
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asplendidtime wrote:
I hope my answer isn't too contrary. But as far as survival mode goes. I just have super simplified a lot. I had a baby July 2011, we hs'ed through the summer because I use materials which are not teaching/Mother intensive, they are more textbooky in approach but done more independantly. I have dumbed everything down for me. My children still do tons of reading in the afternoons, and they also do crafts and play outside in the late afternoon. But we stay home pretty much all of the time, dh takes our 15-passenger to work daily.
I still take time to read to my little ones, we do crafts occasionally, my dc do a lot more on their own than I organize, they also help with cooking/baking (we do make cookies at our house-no flames) I make sure I am on top of little ones now by having them work alongside me/play too all morning, while older ones work. We listen to audio books as a family. But school work looks much different than I had thought it "should" when we started out eight years ago.
I even use a computer program to help me get my little ones reading. I don't have any guilt anymore over this, it's what I really need to do to "get it all done".
We have to eat, we have to eat affordably. That means we must cook, I make good use of my crockpot. We eat frozen pizza more than I care to think about, but we do, and we're surviving!
We have a lot of laundry, we pitch in and work together, but this is a daily commitment. As well as sharing chores and keeping our home tidy, which it mostly is.
We commit to approx. 5 hours of formal learning time in the mornings, and when that's done the rest of the day is free. I worried this would stiffle their curiosity, make them hate learning, and somehow the sky would fall... But I found out that children are curious, they are interested, and they don't need me to be on top of everything they do. Learning can be their own, and in our home it more is than isn't now.
I am not saying you need to do as I do. I am not telling you to quit outside activities, I am not telling you to go against the grain of the normal homeschool advice. I am just saying that this is what has worked for us. It makes life simple, gives us a rhythm, and is something which seems to be working for us at this time. I do want to say that this was hard for me at first, I struggled to step out of the seasoned advice and do the opposite which was supposed to cause burnout and failure. But we found since we started these changes, (Spring 2010) that it wasn't so bad afterall.
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I have found this too. I wanted so bad for my children to love to learn, to want to do all this cool stuff, but in the end my children would rather get school done and do their own thing. So that is what we do now. The still love to read, draw, delve into their own interests, etc. and I put my efforts into things like baking, living the liturgical year, crafts, etc. for our fun stuff. Children can and will learn many different ways. JMHO.
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Lisa
For veteran & former homeschool moms
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4Real Forums : Living Learning
Topic: Ideals not matching Reality... etc
