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If you have a child that is particularly advanced/talented in a subject, how do you decide how much time to allocate to that field so they can develop their potential. Do you try to keep the subjects in balance so they're not neglecting other areas? Do you allow them to really go for it & squeeze everything else into whatever time is left? Or do you try to give each subject equal weighting?

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Dd does the minimum of English and history each day to count as a credit (45-60 min on average---she's a very quick reader too). She does not yet study a foreign language. That will start next year when she's officially a high school student.

 

The rest of the day is consumed by maths and sciences (the physics I am teaching this year and the geology and astronomy she studies on her own).

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My kids have "skewed" balance. ;) fwiw, I don't decide how much time they allocate to their passions except to put on the brakes when it starts to crowd out other parts of their life that they need to have (time with friends, exercise, etc). I expect them to maintain all subjects that represent a balanced education, but all of their electives and spare time can be turned toward their passions.

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We do much the same-a set amount of other stuff, and lots of free time for exploration. This year, a good part of the set amount of core curriculum stuff has been done in the car on the way to do the fieldwork for science, since she's had a chance to participate in research in her desired field. It's a skewed polygon, but it's working well for her.

 

 

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We are finding our way through this, as well. I must say - it serves as a fantastic motivator for getting through the less-favored subjects (such as math, in our case). We sort of adapt a "do what you like least, first" style. For example, my son does not care for math. He is really, really good at it... but doesn't like it. Yesterday he finished all of his subjects/assignments by 10:45a (!!!) so he could have the entire rest of the day to work on his programming (I think he is designing a computer game, but it's hard to keep track of his projects). So I let him?

 

One thing I am having a hard time with is all this SCREEN TIME! I was one of those moms that didn't want their child in front of a tv/computer too much. No video games. And boom - I produce a child who is in love with programming and video editing. Oy! So he spends hours and hours every day in front of a computer.

 

Luckily, for now, he does still love to go play outside with other kids. Until that becomes an issue, I guess I'll keep encouraging it.

 

Anyway, that is how we prioritize... get your work done, then the rest of the time you can spend on your projects.

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If you have a child that is particularly advanced/talented in a subject, how do you decide how much time to allocate to that field so they can develop their potential. Do you try to keep the subjects in balance so they're not neglecting other areas? Do you allow them to really go for it & squeeze everything else into whatever time is left? Or do you try to give each subject equal weighting?

 

Do you try to keep the subjects in balance so they're not neglecting other areas?

 

Yes, try being the keyword here lol.

 

Do you allow them to really go for it & squeeze everything else into whatever time is left?

 

That seems to happen from time to time too. I try to keep subjects in balance over the long term, but in large pockets of time here and there, I allow him to go for it too. I am lucky in that kiddo will not fight it if I suggest refocusing on neglected subjects once in a while.

 

Or do you try to give each subject equal weighting?

 

I have come to realize that this really will not work for us, no matter how much I try to fight it we always fall into a pattern of neglecting structured history and writing lessons. We do however, get a good amount of history and writing done in an informal way through free reading, documentaries, and blogging. I know we will eventually make it to at least 4 history and 4 english credits at some point but I believe his math credits will easily be double that by the time he is ready to apply for college.

 

how do you decide how much time to allocate to that field so they can develop their potential.

 

I am constantly doubting/ rethinking my decisions. I really don't know the answer. One week I might decide to throw all caution to the wind and allow free rein then the next week I start to panic a little that we didn't do anything for foreign language or grammar lol. I am fortunate in that I have a child who loves to read about as much as he loves math and he covers a lot of "ground" that way. What seems like a gap one week is covered and sometimes even mastered in less than a day through reading and discussion and usually, further research. The only really major gap he has at the moment is writing skills and I figure that I have at least 2-3 years to wait for the maturity to kick in before we work on mastering writing skills. I try to make sure that some amount of science is done regularly. I am not comfortable at this stage leaving science to just reading. He did that for elementary and that was fine and very beneficial too to keep interest high but he has covered so much ground that way that I think he needs some consistent problem solving in science to keep moving higher.

 

Hope it's not more info than you needed! :p

 

ETA: I do however prioritize the chosen field (math) because he has consistently maintained that he would like to do more in this field than any other field. Fortunately, we have always prioritized math to some extent so we already have a good math routine going here and every year I already know that easily 12-15 of whatever weekly hours he spends on formal lessons will be spent on math.

 

ETA2: Hmmm...now that I've said it I realize we are not exactly achieving long term balance after all. Striking that part off lol.

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I try not prioritize any one subject for DD12.  She needs to spend time on each subject every day and also fit in time for instrument practice.   For math, geography and composition, we have set goals on what needs to get done each week so we finish in time to take our long Christmas break.

 

DD12 is currently spending the most time on writing because composition is her weakest subject.  She is spending the least amount of time right now on math because she has hit a couple of "easy" chapters in her text (complex numbers, exponents and logs) and so she is zipping thru easy assignment in about 15 minutes.  She is filling up the rest of her school day reading literature (Tom Sawyer), geography, and science stuff (outer space).

 

 

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I have really struggled this year with this question with my oldest.  He is *not* a generalist, but I firmly believe that he should not specialize until at least 11th grade.  However, it is hard, really hard to not let him do what he loves. 

 

As you know from my math posts, I did let him specialize this year for 7 months.  But boy was I worried.  Worried that he would not keep his promise to go back to a balanced schedule.  Worried that he would lose major ground in his writing which I had worked so hard at when he was in 6th grade.  I just worried all the time.  During those 7 months (plus the 1 month of the exam, so really 8 months) he wrote 1 paragraph and that was it. *No* other writing what so ever, not even a list!  I kept asking myself, how could this be a good thing?  But in the past month we have started back with double writing - 1 hour independent and 1 hour with me; and shockingly, he has done great.  I don't think he actually fell behind.  He just seemed to mature, and the math-proof writing he did seems to have informed his more english/history/science writing.  He has basically been studying logic and organization, and it appears to be transferable to other types of writing. I will tell you that I am *very* relieved.

 

But now, we are back to balance.  Like others, he squeezes in his favorite subject by 1) taking it as an elective and 2) taking summer school math classes. But, in contrast to others here, he does *not* like to do math in his free time.

 

He also does 'history lite' with DAD and read alouds, documentaries, and discussions.  He has *no* output for history. None. But here in NZ, he does not need any history credits to enter university.  This laid-back approach is working, though, and he knows enough to effectively enter an adult conversation.  But he does not spend *his* time to actually study history. 

 

Another thing I have done is to count music as a subject when many others consider it an extracurricular.  This means that he does not need another course to fill up his schedule. 

 

Finally, I only make him do a standard class in Mandarin, which because he is quick, means that he can finish the work in 30 minutes per day.  So a full class, but not a class that takes an hour per day.

 

So what this yields is:

Math: 2 hours per day

English: 1 hour (not counting reading)

Science: 1 hour

Music: 30 minutes per day + 3 hours of classes on weekend

Mandarin: 30 minutes + 1 hour class on Thursday night

History with dad: 4 hours per week as DH sees fit

So I count this as 6 classes.

 

Summer school: signed up for intermediate number theory

 

I am glad that he focused this year because it got him up to the next level.  He learned so much in 4 hours per day because he was just in that mindset all day long , so it built very quickly. However, I don't plan to do it again.  I might eat my words, but that is my plan.

 

Ruth in NZ

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If you have a child that is particularly advanced/talented in a subject, how do you decide how much time to allocate to that field so they can develop their potential.

We allocate as much time as my child wants to put into her advanced area. For my dd, it is music. She spends 2-4 hours a day practicing, does two 1.5 hour lessons in classical music a week, one 2 hour orchestra rehearsal, and has a fiddle lesson 1 hour every other week. In between there are gigs and performances, weekend Irish music sessions for hours, listening to classical pieces and Irish music, and part of her schoolwork is music history and theory. Right now she is also working on a project with her Irish music and putting time into researching its history.

 

I say as much time as she wants because the amount of practice she feels is necessary to accomplish her goals each week will depend on how much material she has to cover and her interest level in that material- if she is learning a piece she really loves, she will practice longer every day or in the beginning of an orchestra "semester" she will have a pile of new material to learn so will practice longer the first couple weeks to get it all in her head.

 

Do you try to keep the subjects in balance so they're not neglecting other areas? Do you allow them to really go for it & squeeze everything else into whatever time is left? Or do you try to give each subject equal weighting?

I wouldn't say we have balance...we could never put that much time into other subject areas. I do make sure she does her regular school subjects regularly and intermingle it with her music so she is practicing throughout the day. We don't neglect any areas...she is doing math, language arts, science, history, Latin, and this year started learning French.  She does school 4 days a week and alternates history and science so they are twice a week each. Luckily she learns quickly so she covers a lot of material and remembers it. Sometimes I feel like we could use another couple hours in a day and sometimes we have to fit in school work on the weekends if a week is particularly busy. We also school a bit longer into the summer and start a little earlier than the public school. We do a lot of schooling in the car and fit in reading here and there....it takes efficient use of our time.

 

I have older kids in school so I know dd is covering much more in a "school year" than they are and she is working ahead of age level in every subject so I don't feel as if we are neglecting anything. Could she learn more in other subjects or take on other interests/subjects if she didn't spend so much time with her music? Yes. Does she wish she spent more time on anything else? No.

 

 

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I have been mulling this over with my young child (A. is 8).  dmmetler's little one is the same age and has an intense passion as well as a great deal of talent.  A., however, turns out to be incredibly gifted in math and prob. music but is not passionate about either.  He adores building stuff, though, and playing outside. 

 

It is important to me that he come out strong in history and robust in general philosophy/religion because I believe that, as a very very bright but otherwise neurotypical fellow, he ought to be trained as an excellent citizen -- that he ought to understand issues of policy and be informed enough to take intelligent stands and argue his position with conviction and clarity.  He really doesn't care about or like history, though, and he's still young so we're exploring our avenues.  At the moment I am using Ambleside Online's supplementary history suggestions but not their spines (much too violent for A.) and considering designing a History of Flight/Aerospace for 4th grade.  In fifth grade my hope is to move him onto a more standard history preparation but very possibly our middle school history will have a History of Science spine. 

 

Writing is also important to me, and it is being much harder than the history for various reasons.  We are currently paused in our writing program(s) to remediate handwriting and focus on keyboarding skills.  The trouble with teaching writing is that it is teacher-intensive on my part and his math and music are too -- it all begins to take too much of my own time and the preschooler gets neglected/cranky ;). 

 

In math and piano DH and I have the goal of keeping A. learning and engaged until he is old enough -- and mature enough -- to decide how much he cares about these things.  He seems to have a very unusual aptitude and we want to support that.  His other subjects are functionally on a rotation schedule at the moment -- each week, and each day, I balance whatever seems most-neglected.  He has gotten very very little science instruction this year because his science understanding is robust and engaged and his free time activities are science-y (DH is a neuroscientist and I know a good deal of science so the informal instruction on this is excellent at our house -- not the case for history!!!)

 

The final thing we are looking at is well-being.  Since we added piano A. has just been so so happy.  Now piano is not the only thing done to keep this child centered and well; but it seems to have added something.  He doesn't esp. like it and would do fewer lessons if I let him (when we did fewer lessons he would collapse in a bored, annoying heap on the bench during lessons!!) but he is just a well little human with what we're doing now.  And that's the most important to us. 

 

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So interesting to read how all of you are approaching this! 

 

We're in the UK, so don't have the requirement for a transcript, which means we can adjust the distribution of each child's study time to suit their needs. The flip side is that A levels are much more time consuming, so for each subject we work on at A level we'd need to give up 2 at IGCSE.

 

Adding an extra thing into our mix - DD1 has just finished vision therapy which tripled her reading speed, so I'm thinking about easing up in some areas to give her extra reading time now that she's so much more efficient. The hard part is deciding which areas we could cut back on without losing the skills & understanding she's gained so far.  

 

Ruth, thanks for reminding me about history documentaries! We seem to have gone heavily into science related stuff & history is being neglected - must get DH on board with watching history.

 

 

Hmm, yesterday we went to a Doctor Who based science day. Perhaps, if they paid close enough attention, they could build a tardis so we can fit in extra subjects?!

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  • 4 weeks later...

The one child I'm thinking of spends most of her day with reading and music, spending hours reading and practicing in fits and spurts throughout the day.  I require about 45 minutes of work in her math curriculum every day.  I squeeze in Latin and history most days.  This year language arts (writing/grammar/spelling) and science have been slipping a lot and we probably only do them formally about once a week.  I guess I've decided that I'm not going to force anything.  Forcing takes all the fun out for the child and for me...  heh.  

 

But like anything else, education happens in waves.  Interest and motivation in various topics comes and goes. Every child is different and is destined for a different future (especially if they have sincere passion for anything -- it's not as common as one might think).  

 

My main priority right now is to keep the joy in the education and to remind myself, sometimes multiple times each day, to really enjoy what we ARE doing without beating ourselves over the head about the long list of things we "should" be doing.  That's not easy for me.

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