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mommy4ever
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Joined: April 08 2011
Location: Canada
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| Posted: March 01 2013 at 10:36am | IP Logged
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we've been using CHC for the last 2 years, with a couple little tweaks. I liked it, it was safe, it covered all the bases. And I am fine with the content, but it has become drudgery. I am looking at stepping out of the prepackaged curricula. I love the CM concept, but it scares me!!!
I am not sure how to make it work, it's more hands on for mom, but I have 3 little people here, that need attention, too.
I can't wrap my head around it.
How do you all make it work?
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Mom to 4,
1 graduated June 2012
1 in Catholic school
2 homeschooled(one considering art school!)
ardently praying for a new addition to our family.
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SallyT
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| Posted: March 01 2013 at 2:08pm | IP Logged
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I don't know that it necessarily is more hands-on for mom than any other non-totally-self-teaching program. Granted, I don't do a pure CM thing here, just a kind of CM-influenced hybrid in which I do make use of some CHC materials. This year, in fact, we have been more heavily CHC than in years past, for a variety of reasons, using not only Language of God, which I've used and liked for a long time, but also handwriting and spelling. This has been useful in lots of ways, but for next year I'm planning to strip us back down to using only LOG in small daily doses, plus MCP math, which I use in conjunction with Life of Fred. Otherwise, our program will be copywork/dictation and reading with narration, covering all subjects. I do also use an online resource for foreign language. And we do, currently, one "basket" read-aloud daily, though I'm wanting to split that into two shorter times, pegged to both breakfast and lunch, for next year.
Depending on the age of the children, a literature-based/CM-ish education isn't really any more mom-intensive. One of my goals this year was to transition my rather transition-resistant children to a more independent mode of work, which was one reason why I was attracted to self-teaching workbook materials. My other goal has been to increase the amount of time they spend reading independently in literature covering various subject areas, shifting the burden of instruction from our basket read-aloud time, when we also do a lot of narrating and discussing, to the children and their own reading. This will be even more the case next year.
So for much of our 2-3-hour school day at the moment, the kids are occupied with their own work, and I'm available to help and do spot-teaching where needed (especially in math as new concepts come up), but I'm not right there engaged in their work. I don't have littles, but school time is actually when I do dishes, fold laundry, and do other light, quiet chores that can be put down easily if someone needs me. At basket time, we are all together; during other work times, we're engaged in parallel activities. I set timers for reading, so that there are parameters to the time they spend on each subject, and once we're settled into a steady routine, they can move from one thing to another without a lot of faffing around. Generally they like to do whatever written work they have to do first, then they take their stack of books for the day and settle down somewhere comfortable to read.
Right now most of our narration is of books we're reading together, out loud, but my aim is to increase narration of books read independently. I also want to incorporate a Book of Centuries for each child next year.
The most time-consuming part of all of this, honestly, is the planning: making booklists, deciding which books to give which child, deciding what we're going to read aloud vs. do as independent reading, and so on. I agonize for months over those logistical things! But once I finally do bite the bullet and make decisions, it all goes into motion pretty automatically and easily. Not everything I plan gets done, and I do tweak as we go, if a given book just isn't working out for a particular child, but the overall framework is easy to do, once I've established what it's going to be.
Again, I don't do a pure CM education here, and some things we just are bad at. We've never managed to do nature study consistently, or nature journals, but I do have a nature read-aloud scheduled for each week, and we enjoy that (and hopefully it's furnishing my kids' imaginations to observe and appreciate what they encounter when they are outdoors). Rather than a pure CM-style picture study, I do art history via Usborne Books -- this year we're using the Usborne Introduction to Art. It is more textbooky, but has the advantage of presenting a "lesson" per double-page spread, and the art is gorgeous. We do that once a week, and again, we enjoy it. Last year we read artists' biographies from a book on The Baldwin Project site, Knights of Art -- also a good experience! Things like crafts . . . well, let's just say that I'm glad we're in scouts! I am not crafty at all. So I'm glad to do some outsourcing.
I posted a link to my tentative/experimental/prototype schedule for next year on your 5th-grade thread, but it might be relevant here as well, as a way to visualize things. Really, the beauty of this approach is in its simplicity - there just aren't a whole lot of moving parts, and so much can be done by the student without a huge amount of direction/oversight from Mom, especially once said student is reading independently. Together time is a necessary and beautiful part of the day, but you're definitely not hand-holding all day long.
I hope this is helpful. I have always liked CHC's materials, though I've always preferred to use them as supplements to a literature-centered approach. Those who really do implement Miss Mason's philosophy more faithfully will, I'm sure, have many useful insights from that perspective!
Sally
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jawgee
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| Posted: March 01 2013 at 3:51pm | IP Logged
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Besides this site, which helped me immensely when I started homeschooling, I look to Simply Charlotte Mason for lots of expert info. Their "Free Curriculum Guide" has been an amazing resource to help me plan history.
Oh....is that you who just posted over there?! LOL....
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Monica
C (12/2001), N (11/2005), M (5/2008), J (8/2009) and three angels
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4Real Forums : Living Learning
Topic: Getting Started with CM?
