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Time for subjects in the 4th/5th grade


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I'm making my schedule for next year and thought I would take a survey here to see how we are doing. I think we might be running a bit long in some areas and a bit short in others. My son will be a young 5th grader or older 4th grader, we don't have to declare but I consider him somewhere in the middle.

 

So- how long do you spend on these subjects daily or weekly if you have a 4th or 5th grader? I know often people answer that they spend about an hour per grade level but I'm more curious to see how that time breaks down.

 

Writing (including research related to writing, organization and editing)

Spelling

Grammar

Literature

Language (Modern or Ancient)

Math

Science 

History

Extras- Art, Music, etc.

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My dd is in the same spot this year - young 5th or old 4th, by my state cut-off she is 4th. She is a motivated worker and a crazy fast reader.

 

Writing (including research related to writing, organization and editing): 30-45 min

Spelling: we have dropped this

Grammar: 15 min

Literature: 20-30 min (only counting assigned)

Language (Modern or Ancient): 20 min Latin, 20 min Spanish(sporadically - this is just for fun)

Math: 60 min

Science: 30 min

History: 20 min

Extras- Art, Music, etc.: piano practice 30 min, everything else is done on her own time

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4th grade:

 

Writing (including research related to writing, organization and editing) 30 min

Spelling- we don't do spelling

Grammar- 20 min

Literature- 1 hour

Language (Modern or Ancient) -45 min

Math - 45 min to 1 hour

Science - we don't do formal science

History - 1 hour spread over two days

Extras- Art, Music, etc.:

Geography, poetry: 15 min each, 1 day a week

Typing daily - 10 min.

Piano daily: 15 min.

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Writing (including research related to writing, organization and editing) -60 minutes daily

 

Spelling- 15 minutes (3-4x week)

 

Grammar- 15 minutes (4x week)

 

Literature- reading time is 2 hours daily and this includes literature, poetry, history and science but not all in the same day.

 

Language (Modern or Ancient) latin 30 min. daily

 

Math-60 min. daily

 

Science- see above

History-see above

 

Art- 30 min. 3x week

 

Music- 30 min. daily

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DS1 is 10. He has his issues and works at a slower pace in areas like reading and writing. Here is my very tentative plan for next year (grade 5 for us).

 

Writing  -- Copywork, Penmanship, Paragraphs, Journals -- 30-40 min per day

Spelling -- 20 min per day, 3-4x week

Grammar -- starting next year, planning 30 min, 3x week

Literature -- 60 min per day, every day, maybe more if you include bedtime and audiobooks

Language (Modern or Ancient) -- Spanish, no set amount of time as we use a very informal curriculum

Math -- 60 min per day, every day. He will do more if I let him.

Science -- 40-60 min per day, 4x week.

History -- Included in with Literature, no set amount of time. We read from SOTW 3x week and that's about it for history.

Extras - Art, Music, etc. -- He spends a lot of time practicing his guitar and playing the keyboard. Also spends a lot of time online watching and listening to music on YouTube. Formal lessons 2x week, kids worship band 1x week. TKD 1x week. Goes outside for "nature time" every once in awhile. Likes to build Lego stuff, spends about 1-2 hours per day messing about with Legos, K'nex or model kits. Will occasionally write terrible "Clone Wars" fan fictions and share them with the family. :)

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At that age, DD12 took an hour for Literature, an hour for Math (split into two 30-minute chunks) and about 15 minutes for each of her other subjects.  She spent about an hour a day on music practice and about 2 hours in physical activity (skiing, softball, walking the dogs).

 

By comparison, this year for 7th grade, she has doubled the music practice time and spends about 30 minutes each day on history and science.  Lit and Math are still about an hour each a day.

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I don't schedule anything daily at all. I know what I want to accomplish roughly by a particular point, and some days we might do nothing but a single subject because we get caught up in it. DD also gets bored doing the same thing so I am usually juggling multiple curricula per subject.

 

I really look at things more broadly in the sense of knowing I want to hit certain topics in each subject so I pull in all my different resources and flip amongst them.

 

It is much more fluid and organic and works really well for us.

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For 5th grade:

 

Math - an hour a day

Reading - 45 min. a day

Lit Discussion - 15 min a day

Grammar - 15 min. 3 x a week

Spelling - 15 min. 3-4 x a week

Handwriting - 10 min. 3 x a week

Writing - 30 min a day

Latin - 20-30 min every other day

Spanish - 20-30 min. every other day

History - 30 min. every other day

Science - 30 min. every other day

Geography - 20 min once a week

Logic - 15 min. twice a week

Art - 30 min a week

Music Theory - 15 min twice a week

Drum practice - 30 min a day

Drum lesson - 30 min a week

Voice practice - 20 min a day

Voice lesson - 30 min a week

Morning Basket - 30 min. a day

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With that subject load this would be our WEEKLY time allotment (don't work in daily schedules here, so a child might spend 3 hours on writing, and 2 hours on math one day, while another child might do an hour each of math, science, history, foreign language and language arts)


 


Writing - 4 h (all writing included, eg history reports, science 'papers', lit reviews and general creative/LA)


Spelling - 45 min - 1 h


Grammar - 45 min - 1 h


Literature - 2 h (if you are only including LA lit. I am placing history and science reading into history and science)


Foreign Language - 4 h


Math - 5 h


Science - 3 h


History - 3 h


Extras - 6 h


 

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My 5th grader averages around: 


 


Writing - 45 minutes/day


Vocab - 20 minutes, 2-3x/week 


Grammar - 10 minutes, 2-3x/week (we're just reviewing, we spent 20-30 minutes/day in the fall)


Literature - 1 hour/day


French - 20 minutes/day


Math - 1 hour/day


Science - 30 minutes/day


History - 30 minutes/day


Piano practice - 30 minutes/day


 

 

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I'm making my schedule for next year and thought I would take a survey here to see how we are doing. I think we might be running a bit long in some areas and a bit short in others. My son will be a young 5th grader or older 4th grader, we don't have to declare but I consider him somewhere in the middle.

 

So- how long do you spend on these subjects daily or weekly if you have a 4th or 5th grader? I know often people answer that they spend about an hour per grade level but I'm more curious to see how that time breaks down.

 

Writing (including research related to writing, organization and editing)

Spelling

Grammar

Literature

Language (Modern or Ancient)

Math

Science 

History

Extras- Art, Music, etc.

 

I have a 4th and 5th grader this year--so I'll attack this :)  Some of this is hard to break down--our LA program integrates creative writing, grammar, spelling and penmanship.  And literature--I'll try to think of individual reading as well as our read-alouds in MFW and our reading curriculum----

 

Writing--mostly just included in other subjects; specific assignment, 2 hours/month

Spelling--10 min/day

Grammar--20 min/day

Lit and Reading--45 min/day

Language (Spanish)--10 min, 3 or 4 days/week

Math--30 min/day

Science--20-30 min most days, at least 3 per week

History & Bible--30-45 min/day

Extras--Art, 15 min 2xweek; music apprec, 10 min 2xweek

 

Betsy

 

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I'm loving reading about everybody's schedules- my tentative plans are:

 

Math- 60 min- Fact/Fluency Practice- 15 min daily (this has been our current schedule but I'm considering cutting back to 45/15)

Latin- 15 min (just starting this year) daily

Writing 30-45 min daily

Spelling: 15 daily

Grammar: 5 min daily (practice)- 15 min 2x a week, until we finish Paragraph Town and then it will be Poetry

Vocab (CEI): 15 m- 2x a week

 

History/Lit/Science (read aloud) 1.5 hrs- 2 days a week- 1 hr- 2 days a week- still trying to decide how to divide this up- ds does at least 60 min reading per day on his own

Geo- Art- 30 min - 1 x a week each

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Mine are by week for a fourth grader:

 

Writing (including research related to writing, organization and editing) - 2 hours

Spelling none

Grammar - 2 hours

Literature - 2 hours plus another 2 of read-alouds

Language (Modern or Ancient) 7 hours (2 languages)

Math - 5 hours

Science - 3 hours

History - 2 hours

Extras- Art, Music, etc. - piano - 1 hour

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For my 4th grade girl:

 

Writing (including research related to writing, organization and editing) - 30 min daily

Spelling - 0 min required, but she spent much of the fall prepping for the spelling bee which ranged from 15 - 30 min per day (usually in the evening)

Grammar - 15- 20 min daily

Literature - 30 min formally with me daily & 1-4 hrs of additional free reading daily

Language (Modern or Ancient) - 20-30 min daily (French)

Math - 1 hr daily

Science - 20-30 min 2x per week

History - 30 min 2x per week

Extras- 30 min of Art 1x per week

   & she studies 2 instruments which means 2 private lessons each week and about 2 hrs of practicing each day

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My 5th grader is doing:

 

Galore Park English

Galore Park Science

Maths

Geography

Reading

SOTW 3

Australian History - spine plus field trips

Drama

Swimming/soccer

Readalouds

 

and this term we're adding in graphic design using Chip Kidd's Go.

 

It's been working out well.

 

Sadie, would you mind sharing more about what you're doing with Go? I have a graphic design background myself and I think my dd would enjoy this.

 

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