| Author | |
Kristie 4
Forum All-Star
Joined: June 20 2006
Location: Canada
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 1508
|
| Posted: May 08 2009 at 5:11pm | IP Logged
|
 |
|
I have been intrigued reading all the forum posts about Kolbe, even emailed them regarding a number of questions.
But....we have been so relaxed around here. My oldest (whom I am thinking of Kolbe for for 9th) reads ravenously but we have done no lit. analysis, and just mostly narrations and the such for writing. We have done no textbook science....
I would love the paper topics, the organisation (I am serioiusly organizationally challenged)...BUT when I look at the plans all together I say WHEW!
I know you can't tell me if it is possible  but I wondered if any of you have gone with them after a more relaxed earlier foundation.
Also, I am having a hard time flipping from screen to screen to try and see what this would look like in a weekly workload- can anyone give me a bit of a picture as to an average week for a ninth grader with Kolbe?
Thanks,
Kristie
__________________
Kristie in Canada
Mom to 3 boys and one spunky princess!!
A Walk in the Woods
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
mariB
Forum All-Star
Joined: Dec 20 2006
Location: Vermont
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 3815
|
| Posted: May 15 2009 at 5:23am | IP Logged
|
|
|
Kristie, we use Kolbe with our high schoolers...but in a very relaxed manner. We currently have a 9th and 11th grader with Kolbe.
I'm not good with lesson plans and I do have some opinions about their tests... so I have ended up having the kids show their work by writing papers, etc. Our 9th grader is using Kolbe's theology and english/comp. course. along with Apologia Biology, TT Algebra II, online Latin( not from Kolbe), World Lit.(our own),and geography (our own plan).
If you would like to know more...I could p.m. you. I know there are a few Kolbe users here who could probably give better advice than me...but we are sticking with Kolbe mostly for record keeping and for a few of their classes...and because they respect the role in parents educating their children at home. I plan to keep using them for high school.
Blessings,
__________________
marib-Mother to 22ds,21ds,18ds,15dd,11dd and wife to an amazing man for 23 years
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
Cay Gibson
Forum All-Star
Joined: July 16 2005
Location: Louisiana
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 5193
|
| Posted: May 15 2009 at 8:23am | IP Logged
|
|
|
Kristie 4 wrote:
I wondered if any of you have gone with them after a more relaxed earlier foundation.
|
|
|
Kristie,
I hesitate discouraging you. AFterall, only YOU can make this decision and you might want to try it out for a year and see how it goes. You won't have lost the year and trying it out on your 9th grader might be a good plan for you.
That being said, my experience was this...
We used Kolbe our very first year of hsing. My oldest was 4th grade. It was very classical. He was very out-doorsy and unschooling worked best for him.
We have a very relaxed approach and my organizational skills are very relaxed, otherwise I would stress too easily and become a hard-to-live-with-Momma.
I was cleaning out school supplies and books the past two days and came across some old Kolbe items from our first year. Looking it over, I know we cannot use them in our home. It doesn't "fit" us.
I'm not saying it doesn't "fit" other families.
My best friend used it w/ her son from 4th grade up to graduation. It worked well for them. This fall he'll be starting his senior year in the seminary and has done very well.
__________________
Cay Gibson
"There are 49 states, then there is Louisiana." ~ Chef Emeril
wife to Mark '86
mom to 5
Cajun Cottage Under the Oaks
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
Red Cardigan
Forum Pro
Joined: June 16 2007
Location: N/A
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 470
|
| Posted: May 15 2009 at 3:02pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
I'm beginning the procrastinator's panic stage of planning my oldest daughter's first year of high school, which means I really haven't looked at much of anything yet.  I've been interested in some of Kolbe's program, too, though, so I'll be interested to read responses.
Since we're in Texas I'm not too worried about record keeping or official transcripts, etc., so even if we used some Kolbe I'd still probably be pretty eclectic overall. Has anyone used some of their program, or even most of it, in an eclectic approach? Is there one particular course of study (e.g. literature, history, etc.) from Kolbe that you'd buy or consider buying even if you didn't use their whole program?
__________________
http://www.redcardigan.blogspot.com
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
RamFam
Forum Pro
Joined: Feb 21 2008
Location: Virginia
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 425
|
| Posted: May 15 2009 at 9:54pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
Cay Gibson wrote:
| My best friend used it w/ her son from 4th grade up to graduation. It worked well for them. This fall he'll be starting his senior year in the seminary and has done very well. |
|
|
I know it is off topic, but I couldn't pass that up. I love to hear about home educated kids who end up doing fantastic things!
__________________
Leah
RamFaminNOVA
Tom ^i^, Kyle (my Marine), Adeline '00, Wyatt '05, Isaac '07 Philip '08,Michael '10, and John Xavier Feb '13
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
Martha
Forum All-Star
Joined: Aug 25 2005
Location: N/A
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 2291
|
| Posted: May 16 2009 at 11:49am | IP Logged
|
|
|
I posted on the seton vs kolbe thread about my own journey...
science is the toughest thing for us right now and I posted why over there.
I don't think it's a good or bad thing. It just is.
and I'm a bit glad to have to deal with it now, because the truth is that college is very textbooky, so he does need to learn to adjust his learning at least some to accomodate that fact if he wants to attend college successfully at some point.
if you have specific questions, I'd be glad to answer as best I can.
my one big issue with kolbe is that, compared to seton, they have very little homeschool experience on staff. that's not to say someone has to be a homeschooler to give helpful information, just saying that when I'm describing a problem in my homeschool, it helps ME to know the person I'm talking to has been in the trenches themselves. 
__________________
Martha
mama to 7 boys & 4 girls
Yes, they're all ours!
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
ALmom
Forum All-Star
Joined: May 18 2005
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 3299
|
| Posted: May 19 2009 at 10:41pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
Yes, you can do it even if the background up to this point is very relaxed. Just remember that you are the teacher/principal of your school. I like to sound out things with them - ie I can easily talk to the curriculum designer and ask about the purpose and goals they had. I may or may not see that as essential for my children at the time, but it does help me to be less knee jerky and more prudent in what I do or do not do. Like Martha said, I do have to keep in mind that most of the folks I talk to have never homeschooled themselves - and working on 21 years of homeschooling, I've been doing it longer than most. Do not take the plans and be a slave to them or you will drive yourself nutty. If you do everything listed on the plans, you would be doing a paper a week in every subject except math and science (science usually has at least one paper in it plus lab reports if it is a lab science). You have to choose. They are providing more guidance now in terms of how many papers to do which is still optimistic.
I find that I am glad to be able to call someone who is trained in science to explain something I'm just not getting very quickly. I sign up for Enhanced Evaluation Services for my highschoolers even though I don't use any of their record keeping. I send them some of their assigned papers and some of mine - they grade either case which is my favorite part because I am still free to taylor things to my children. I ease them in to test taking strategies and how to use a textbook - notice the difference in print style, there is a reason for that. Use that to help you outline. We do a test of two from them in various subjects as non-graded the first few times or occassionally as a short cut to know what needs more discussion or as a how do you read a test question. My science folks honestly need to be told, in any field other than math and science -if a question is asked, you really have to read into the question. My scientists are inclined to give very brief, one sentence answers that answer the literal question without any extrapolation. I have had to teach them to readjust their thinking once they see that the subject is literature or history or theology.
The coursework in every subject is demanding and thorought but not all of it is absolutely essential for every child. Pick and choose what is best suited and needed by your family - especially if you do not need any transcripts from them.
I tend to use what I want from whomever - science from Kolbe/ a co-op, reading/literature from Kolbe/Seton depending on the child and the age of the person, history and literature as a jumping off point for my own extrapolation (I use some of their things and some of my own - so I dropped something on their plans in order to add in The Ballad of the White Horse. I write some of my own plans, use the vocabulary only if it is needed by the particular child and in the way the child needs it (my current highschooler just listens to the pronunciation of the words  , she reads too widely to need to do a lot of vocabulary testing - but I've noticed over the years some odd pronunciations). If they are strong writers, then we use the composition book as a reference. We don't do the oral presentation every year, but spend some time doing at least some oral recitation. I think the plans are a reminder to me of the richness that I can provide as they are ready and/need it but I still discern what is most important in any given year considering the entire picture of the child, the child's goals, our family circumstances and areas of strength and weakness and interest.
If they have a lot of the history sequence and background already under their belt, then the history plan is superb. If they need a bit more of that background, then provide a little more traditional study of history in sequence while digging very deeply into one or two of the primary sources alongside the sequential type stuff. Their notes are really good at giving a lot of background now. Sometimes all the primarly reading can be overwhelming for the student and you pick and choose to train in the thought process and the how to do this.
We have had our best years since using Kolbe with our highschoolers - but I have found that I do have to rewrite the plans for my own children. Their plans are overwhelming - with so many options . I wish they'd put them on-line so I could cut and paste but since they don't, I simply have a notebook of plans - rewrite the specific assignments and paper topics I want them to do and then refer them back to the plans by page number when I want them to read the background notes or summary of important information. My children have appreciated this. Plus they like to see the assignments for the day all lined up together and not have to keep flipping between subjects. I tend to give them a week of plans at a time so they can still adjust if they want to - just they cannot decipher having a weekly summary, then day by day and both honors and regular track plus all my modifications to sort out without me rewriting.
Hope this helps.
Janet
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
Kristie 4
Forum All-Star
Joined: June 20 2006
Location: Canada
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 1508
|
| Posted: May 20 2009 at 10:00am | IP Logged
|
|
|
This all helps tremendously. I am slightly ashamed to say that I have been losing some sleep over this- I have the one side of me loving the rabbit trailing relaxed style we have going on, but as I add more kids into the mix I find that I am getting less effective at that, and I really want something coherent for the highschool years.
I am pretty sure we will try 9th grade next year (how's that for committed ). I will definitely rewrite the plans in a way that you reccomended Janet, as I could see my son getting lost in the shuffle of all those different plans. I also need something visually appealing and simple looking ( it is all about the visual layout for me!) so I will need to do that. But I think it will be freeing to have something to tweak instead of the heaps of ideas clamoring around in my poor head.
Thank you for your thoughtful replies to such a question!
__________________
Kristie in Canada
Mom to 3 boys and one spunky princess!!
A Walk in the Woods
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
At_His_Feet
Forum Pro
Joined: April 28 2007
Location: Australia
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 304
|
| Posted: June 29 2010 at 5:30am | IP Logged
|
|
|
Just wondered what you ended up deciding, Kristie? 
__________________
Tricia
Mum to 3 boys 17, 15, and 10.
Do whatever He tells you
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
ALmom
Forum All-Star
Joined: May 18 2005
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 3299
|
| Posted: June 29 2010 at 10:29am | IP Logged
|
|
|
One of the things that just occured to me in rereading this post - is Cay's response. I also found Kolbe very restricting when I tried to use them in grade school. Some things have changed a lot since then - better plans and support in high school, etc. but I still could not use Kolbe for my elementary and early middle schoolers. We never could do that (just too hands-on, non-textbooky and delayed writing so Kolbe in elementary was never a good fit for us). However, somehow it was just perfect in high school for my oldest 3 - doing it my own way, of course. I'm not sure about my next 3.
I would also say that with the EES, the key is to really communicate with them about what you want. I was very specific about personalities, learning styles, my assessment of where they were in writing and what I expected from Kolbe. I wrote extra on the EES request form - and honestly, they did exactly what I asked them to do, and it was different things for different children. My writing challenged child improved so much and we broke assignments down for him at the beginning. The feedback and the accountability and the ability for them to give prompt feedback really made a lot of difference.
I also do not consider myself stuck with only Kolbe for high school. We have done Declaration Statesmanship this year for history. We have done single courses with Seton from time to time. If we don't want to do Latin, we don't. I decide which things we read and write about, which tests we take, etc. I do whichever math I think we need to do. I'm sure I'd have to put up with a few things if I wanted their transcript (or at least the Magna version) but they are very respectful of us as primary educators. I've just learned to use what I need from whatever source, in whatever way works for our family.
Kristie, I hope you had a good year, whatever you did ultimately decide.
Janet
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
Kristie 4
Forum All-Star
Joined: June 20 2006
Location: Canada
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 1508
|
| Posted: July 01 2010 at 7:25pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
Well..... besides the fact that once again we ended the year (read that as Feb. on!) flying by the seat of my pants, I will give you what we did for the other part!
Basically, I really only used the Kolbe plans, and then only the history, to see what they were reading (which books) and how they paced them. I did the same thing with the MODG 10th Ancient History plans- as a springboard for booklists, some paper topics, and pacing.
What we really did was our usual fallback- lots of reading, some narration, and a few more polished essays using a guide I found online with one of the great books programs (sort of walked my son through how to write a narrative essay on the Iliad, a compare/contrast on The Orestrian Trilogy, and a supportive paper on the Odyssey (sorry, can't think to spell today- just way too muggy on this Canada day!).
Oh, and I wrote him more of a schedule like one that Linda Fay uses on the Ambleside list, but it didn't last all year- we found the more structured Science took alot of our time this year and we needed to shave it off in other places.
__________________
Kristie in Canada
Mom to 3 boys and one spunky princess!!
A Walk in the Woods
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
12stars
Forum Pro
Joined: April 25 2008
Location: California
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 372
|
| Posted: July 01 2010 at 7:40pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
We are going to use Kolbe as well in 9th grade and everything mentioned here is very helpful. I felt more freedom with Kolbe than what we were originally going to do.
If you you don't follow their syllubus, can you explain to me how you change things around.
Back in 05 with my sisters they were not very pleased with my trying to change too much. I think since then they have changed their perspective.
That is one of the reasons why we are fully enrolling.
My daughter has a really hard time with math and we were able to do Saxon Algebra 1/2, and no science this year.
I am stuck on electives, not sure what we are going to do yet.
__________________
Claudia in Southern California
Wife to George,
Mom to DD 14, DD 10, DD 7, DS 4, DS 2, 1 in heaven, and now due 5/11.
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
ALmom
Forum All-Star
Joined: May 18 2005
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 3299
|
| Posted: July 01 2010 at 8:26pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
Claudia:
Actually, I think they have become a bit more restrictive again if you want the K designation, at least. I am a lot more able to flex the way I want becaue I don't get a transcript from them and don't do quarterly reporting with them.
You may want to talk to them about changes you want to make. For mine, I am doing an on-line Biology instead of their plans. I am doing a different Geometry than the one they use (I have the old text that Seton uses and it is much better organized in my opinion - though it doesn't cover non-Euclidean Geometry which I really don't care about for high school).
I have substituted freely in history and I skip any works that I don't think appropriate for my children. I will substitute a Catholic author I want them to tackle.
I have divided the Scripture course into 2 years. I think it a bit rushing and not very conducive to meditation to rush through the entire OT and NT in one school year, doing lots of papers and tests. I obviously then pare down something else - usually it is a quick review of something we have already done thoroughly prior to Kolbe high school. I know they require Latin for those graduating from them. I've had 2 children who really did not want this - and since I don't have the expertise to help them and there wasn't a lot of local help, we let them do a modern foreign language instead. Not all of mine did 3 years.
Basically we have taylored things to the child in question and what is going on in our total family.
I love the EES service, but the program is just not a good fit for my 8th so I will probably be doing something else with him for high school.
The lesson plans and support from Kolbe is a lot better now than when I did it with my oldest a long time ago.
Janet
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
12stars
Forum Pro
Joined: April 25 2008
Location: California
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 372
|
| Posted: July 01 2010 at 9:37pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
I did talk to them over the week and we had a homeschool conference I was able to ask these questions. I really don't want to deter too much from their laid out plans, but if I must I must and I need to know that they will be alright with it, we are still in the process. We are not interested in the Summa Diploma at all. More of the Magna, I do want a transcript and all the added bells and whistles.
For the longest time I mulled over this prospect. We were going to go with Seton initially, but after the conference and talking to them ( they were very nice by the way) I knew long term they might not be the best fit for us, it got too expensive too quickly. The changes I wanted to make were also going to be too expensive for us.
My daughter has struggled with math and little bit of science so we need to catch her up in 9th grade and by the time she is in 10th she will be where she needs to be without it affecting her credits.
They said that that would be allowed, and also Spanish for 2 years, the only thing was that they don't have a syllabus, course plans, or tests for the program we chose, which is Rosetta Stone. That applies to any elective or switch from their core. They will get the credit so long as I turn in the samples they need.
I really had wanted to make up our dream curriculum, truth be told I am too afraid I will mess things up.
__________________
Claudia in Southern California
Wife to George,
Mom to DD 14, DD 10, DD 7, DS 4, DS 2, 1 in heaven, and now due 5/11.
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
imcatholic
Forum Newbie
Joined: Nov 20 2007
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 48
|
| Posted: July 02 2010 at 12:44pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
It might be a big jump - but if you use it more as a guide it might work.
__________________
Beth
http://novoasark.blogspot.com
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
Teachin'Mine2
Forum Pro
Joined: Jan 22 2010
Location: N/A
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 242
|
| Posted: July 02 2010 at 1:03pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
May I ask what Kolbe charges for high school with a transcript? I'm surprised to hear it's less than Seton.
We used Seton, full curriculum, for the first time this year, 8th grade. It was a big adjustment at the beginning as we had been doing our own eclectic thing for the years before that. It made my job much easier, and it gave my daughter the structure she loves, but it did mean that we (she) spent a lot more time at home and on school work. We were used to spending much less time and having more field trips, days out, etc.. But she's learned a lot this past year, and we'll be continuing for high school. I'm just hoping it's not too much more for 9th than it was for 8th.
__________________
mom of one 13yo dd
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
|
|
Forum Locked) 
4Real Forums : High School Years and Beyond
Topic: Could we do Kolbe?
