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if you've afterschooled a K'er


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How did it go? Were you able to do actual AFTER-schooling or was your child too tired? I'm afraid I'll buy curriculum and then find that my DD is too tired from school to want to do anything else, and I don't see doing much extra schoolwork on the weekends. She'll be going to a private school for half a day (7:45 to 12:30). K there doesn't involve much play. Well I guess some sit-quietly-and-play stuff like puzzles and coloring, but not independent or even somewhat directed play.

 

FWIW I'm thinking about getting FIAR for her and doing some Miquon math as well (2-3 days a week for the math).

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I used Five in a Row with both of my girls for K (one homeschooled and one afterschooled), and we love it. It's gentle learning but covers a variety of topics, and the stories are great. It's easy to adapt to suit your preferences and needs, and you can add activities or go-along books if your child wants to explore a topic at a deeper level. My DD is in first grade now, and we're going to row Owl Moon and do an owl pellet and some related activities this weekend. For afterschooling, I don't read the book five days in a row or do all the activities, but I didn't always when we homeschooled either.

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Sorry for all of the hyperlinks, but I have full explanations with pictures about each thing. Plus it's a chance for shamelss blog promotion. :tongue_smilie:

 

When my son was in Alternate Day Kindergarten last year, we Afterschooled him on the off days. I kept track of his Guided Reading Level and kept stretching it upwards. For math, he did his school district's second grade math curriciulum, Hoghton Mifflin's Math Expressions. (That's the same publishing house as Saxon.) He also did Right Start Level C and Life of Fred Fractions.

 

This sounds like a lot, but really it was just about five hours a week, usually when he was home all day Monday, Wednesday, and most Fridays. My dirty secret is bribery. I let him watch 30 minutes of "Wild Krats" on TV for every 2 pages of math he does, or for every 30 pages of reading from a book of my choosing. He still has LOTS of time to play in the backyard, be bored, and be a kid.

 

I have to mention that I didn't find about about All About Spelling until recently. Otherwise, I would have done that too. Also, I hadn't read The Well Trained Mind until a few months ago. That would have given me a lot of good ideas, so I didn't have to reinvent the wheel!

 

Good luck!

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My son attended all day kindy with aftercare. Reading & Hooked on Phonics were already routine for us so we just did that in the evenings. We did Singapore math a couple times a week when we could. My son wasn't too tired and didn't resist but he was also used to going to full time Pre K prior to that.

 

I think picking programs that are quick and to the point are key in after schooling.

 

Good luck!

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We are beforeschooling (with some afterschooling and every other time schooling) our kindergartener. She goes to school full day and we still believe we can do a good job of the 3Rs (full curriculum) plus life/interests (geography, science experiments, etc).

 

My mom beforeschooled me as I went to afternoon kindergarten. I definitely think she'd do similarly had I gone to morning kindergarten.

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If she's only going half days it would be very feasible to do. If it were all day, well that would be tough. My daughter went to all day preschool last year and it was touch and go. I had to slip the learning in when I could it was sometimes later in the evening for maybe 30 minutes, or it had to be on the weekends. But then I just let it happen when the time seemed right.

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We are beforeschooling (with some afterschooling and every other time schooling) our kindergartener. She goes to school full day and we still believe we can do a good job of the 3Rs (full curriculum) plus life/interests (geography, science experiments, etc).

 

My mom beforeschooled me as I went to afternoon kindergarten. I definitely think she'd do similarly had I gone to morning kindergarten.

 

 

My memory is a bit fuzzy so I apologize, (and I did just check your blog to make sure), but... are you the mom who had recently taken in two little ones with special needs and were supplementing their education at home to boot? Wow! Hats off to you! :grouphug:

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are you the mom who had recently taken in two little ones with special needs

 

We have 5 littles currently (3 came in April, 2 in June). The older three have significant issues developmentally, emotionally, etc. The younger two just have slight delays we hope will be remediated with just a few months of therapies and us working hard between therapy sessions. The older three will all be in school full time and we definitely will be supplementing their educations on top of doing all their therapies (and therapy homework). We also do things with the younger two (phonics-based Doman-style reading, Sparkabilities, beginning phonics--lest you think I'm crazy on that last one, our last 18month old foster child learned almost every letter sound in the short time we had him).

 

We try to keep everything fun and VERY short time wise (keep them begging for more!). Because of having so many so close in age and such, it is easier to have things broken up. We started practicing our schedule this week, doing some before-schooling in our morning routine. It went pretty well :)

Edited by 2J5M9K
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Thanks Jen....

 

We kinda cheated and just printed out the Starfall and Progressive Phonics ones for now.

 

When my daughter was little, I used polaroid pictures on construction paper and made her books. They were just simple things like "Kimberly's friend is Jacob" and "Jacob and Kimberly race cars" and "Kimberly rides her bike with Jacob."

 

The kids liked your Doggie book though :) I think that would be a great idea for my four year old. He loves Dinosaurs and I think I could really help him have some fun with it, especially using his toys. Maybe the play therapist will let me take a picture of some of her dinosaurs also. He knows all his letter sounds but we're not doing so well making it to words yet. I keep remember that kids learn in spurts.

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We did and energy levels were fine. I think it's important to follow the lead of the child and decide if you want to focus on promoting their strengths or remediating weaknesses- or a combo of both. Try not to use too many different curriculums, the goal is to supplement not have school "twice" at home....which could be a bit much for any child. Good luck, Aly.

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We are afterschooling our K'er now. He goes to school from 9:15am to 3:45pm and the bus drops him off at 4pm. There are days when he is more tired and we just do a bit of writing and our usual evening reading. Other days, we fit in things like math, logic, and AAS. On the weekends, we usually spend 2 - 3 hours doing learning activities in math, spelling, science, geography. We don't do them for a straight 2-3 hours, just fit it in throughout the day.

 

Hopefully, next year we can switch him to a school that runs 7:45am to 2:15pm! But, getting into schools in this school district (wake county in NC) is one big ball of craziness.

 

We've been afterschooling since DS1 was in 3-year half-day preschool and so the routine has been set and he really doesn't feel like he is getting schooled twice during the day. We keep it fun and engaging.

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