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Can we talk about challenging work vs. busy work?


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Venturing over here to the Accelerated Learner Board for the first time... :unsure:

 

One of the main reasons we left ps is because we wanted to provide a more rigorous education for our children. But I find that, in reality, I struggle with knowing the difference between more challenging work, and just *more* work. The only area where I've had much success in this is literature. This year dd9 is reading and discussing late middle/early high school-level novels -- and she's thriving.

 

I want to do similar things in other areas, but I'm afraid my version of challenge more often than not just looks like extra busy work. Even though she is bright, I still feel like she needs the a solid foundation in things like math, grammar, and spelling, so I'm hesitant to jump ahead, and I think I just end up piling on.

 

If you have a child who is ahead in one or more subject areas (any subject areas), I'd love to talk about how you provide a challenge that's really a challenge, and not just extra work.

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I think about every.single.task I assign my student and ask: what exactly is this task supposed to accomplish?

 

If I can not identify a clear educational goal for the task, it is very likely busy work and unnecessary.

If I were unable to discern the educational goal of an assignment, I would not possess the necessary expertise to facilitate the study of the subject and would need to either outsource or stick to scripted curriculum, including all the busy work it contains.

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In math, I think of busy work as routine problems that are just for practice to help someone learn an algorithm. For example, someone who's just learning long division probably does need to do a bunch of problems that look like 'divide 432 by 7. divide 243 by 5' etc. I think of challenging work as problems that are designed to make them stop and think, not necessarily covering recent work. 

 

Frequently with the school, a kid who gets done quickly with math will simply get another page of routine problems. This is not fun and not helpful. 

 

Moving on to the next level -- e.g. doing more than one lesson per day -- can be a useful stopgap, but finding a program or supplement designed to make them think on a deeper level is superior in my opinion. 

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With my DD I use my own curriculum for a number of subjects because I hate to spend money on something that will bore my DD or that will just be busy work. With spelling I have taught spelling rules and explained why words are spelt certain ways. We have worked on prefixes and suffixes and doubling consonants and I do cycle round and repeat as necessary, but I know what my child can and can't yet spell. What does she need a spelling test or list for - its not like she is competing against anyone. She just needs to learn what will be new for her with the minimum amount of repetition to remember it.

 

We do use Singapore as routine work that is sometimes just busy work - I feel like I am checking that bases are covered. LOF is more challenging and she does olympiads as well and we play with other Math and logic activities that require more thought. 

 

My 7 year old was reading The World Around the Corner during her younger sister's gymnastics today. One of the mother's saw what she was reading and asked me if it wasn't too thick a book for a 7 year old to read - I told her my child learnt to read young and besides checking that the content was appropriate to her age, I left her to it. I wasn't forcing her to read - she wanted to. The book was not challenging for her - it was just enjoyable - so neither busy work nor challenging.

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I agree with asking "what is the educational goal of this task?"  At the same time, I think it is important to remember that there are a number of goals to be met and not confuse practice with busy work.  Sometimes, practice is boring.  Some practice challenges endurance, concentration, focus, or other necessary academic skills.  Even professional athletes who are highly advanced practice the basics over and over.  

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For math, the best way is to choose a more challenging program like Beast Academy/Art of Problem Solving, Elements of Mathematics/eIMACS, MEP, Singapore using the Intensive Practice and Challenging Word Problems books, etc. It is better IMHO for the child to do 10 really hard word problems than 50 easy-peasy straightforward equations.

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I agree with asking "what is the educational goal of this task?"  At the same time, I think it is important to remember that there are a number of goals to be met and not confuse practice with busy work.  Sometimes, practice is boring.  Some practice challenges endurance, concentration, focus, or other necessary academic skills.  Even professional athletes who are highly advanced practice the basics over and over.  

I agree completely. The educational goal of a task could be simply to make multiplying fractions, solving quadratic equations, playing a scale, or conjugating foreign verbs automatic, so that the student can apply the skill without having to think.

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I believe a math book by Zacarro is supposed to be supplemental as a challenge. I also plan to use books by the critical thinking company to help challenge my kids.

 

You could also join organizations called Odyssey of the Mind or Destination Imagination. They are supposed to help kids think outside the box.

 

Hth

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Remember, too, that sometimes children enjoy busy work as it were, as a break. We strike the balance with topical work being challenging and appropriate and intersperse that with the fun work the kids love - puzzles, mind elders, crosswords, even coloring page. They burn out otherwise, doing back to back difficult work in every subject without breaks. Thus, I pkan the school day with the busy work or practice being the breaks.

 

Sometimes the only purpose of work is because the kiddo needs some fun and I need to assist with another student. That's not a sin ;). Not even for extremely bright children. In our case, we discovered nothing kills their love of school more quickly than just doing rigor in the basic subjects without anything fun, diversionary, or review. The well placed drill sheet or maze book has been much appreciated by the children as a 'reward' or break from their tougher work.

 

I would not consider anything busy work that is a FUN activity to the child.

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Venturing over here to the Accelerated Learner Board for the first time... :unsure:

 

One of the main reasons we left ps is because we wanted to provide a more rigorous education for our children. But I find that, in reality, I struggle with knowing the difference between more challenging work, and just *more* work. The only area where I've had much success in this is literature. This year dd9 is reading and discussing late middle/early high school-level novels -- and she's thriving.

 

I want to do similar things in other areas, but I'm afraid my version of challenge more often than not just looks like extra busy work. Even though she is bright, I still feel like she needs the a solid foundation in things like math, grammar, and spelling, so I'm hesitant to jump ahead, and I think I just end up piling on.

 

If you have a child who is ahead in one or more subject areas (any subject areas), I'd love to talk about how you provide a challenge that's really a challenge, and not just extra work.

 

 

It's tough, yeah.

 

On any day my kid has the following reactions to the schooling for the day:

1) Nothing. Sighs deeply. Inspects the inside of his eyelids. = something he finds tediously dull.

2) Snicker. Does it in a moment. Then giggles. = something he finds easy.

3) Whine. Weep. Declares "I don't know this!" and "This is too hard!" and "I've never done this before!" and "You never taught me this!" (none of which is true, btw) = something he finds challenging.

 

The mysterious #4, something he has to think about but feels comfortable learning without melting into #3, is rare.  :lol:

 

I also feel drawn to sticking to the "solid foundation" but sometimes "jumping ahead" is okay. Grammar isn't going anywhere. Have you ever seen a complicated sentence diagram without a noun? Of course not. Likewise, spelling harder words uses the same rules as spelling easier words. Stuff AAS2 covers with easy words is covered in Glencoe Spelling Power Grade 12 with hard words. The rule is still the same. And for math, Adding and subtracting millions, or fractions, or in long division, is the same as single digit subtraction. Obviously, you need to make sure the student knows the basic parts of something more complicated, but the basic parts are still practiced over and over.

 

Sometimes I "try out" a jump. Pull something more advanced off the shelf and see how it goes over. If it doesn't work, you can put it back on the shelf till later. If they run with it, and still get the basic stuff in it right, just keep going.

 

Most of the time, though, I feel like we are spinning in place. And yes, it is tempting to pile things on to finally get their skills to match what their brains are capable of. Resist! Condense, pre-test, jump, anything. They'll catch up. I think. I hope.

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Well, on second thought, we are doing a lot of these kinds of things already, so maybe we are not as bad off as I feared. FTR, dd isn't profoundly gifted, but she is bright and I am sure she would have tested into the gifted program had she stayed in ps (for whatever that's worth). She did test at least 2-3 grade levels ahead in every category when she took the WJ-III a few months ago -- higher in some areas. I realize relying on standardized tests can be iffy, but it's required by our state, and it did at least give me some kind of baseline as to what we're working with.

 

I do try to be very intentional about every assignment I choose, although I am still learning and feeling things out as we go along, so I am sometimes not confident in my reasoning.

 

For math, we are using a combination of moving faster and going deeper. We use CLE as our spine, but she currently completes two lessons a day, and we only work the review sections once a week. We do talk about *why* she's doing what she's doing as she learns each new skill. We took a stab at BA as a supplement last year, but to say dd didn't take to it would be an understatement. I don't believe she'd ever encountered anything like it before. This year we've been working with Borac's Practice Word Problems, which she seems to enjoy (she likes word problems). We break from CLE every few weeks and spend a week in Borac. I am thinking of shifting to Saxon next year as we enter middle school, but I haven't decided yet. I'm just never sure how much is enough.

 

For spelling, we are in Spelling Workout E (grade 5) and should finish F (grade 6) by the end of the year. I kind of forgot that she's working ahead in that area!

 

I already mentioned literature. She's finishing The Legend of Sleepy Hollow/Rip Van Winkle now (which was harder than I remembered) and doing amazingly well. I was actually shocked at the nuances she picked up in the text. I am giving her a break after this to do some Native American legends (she loves mythology).

 

Content areas tend to be more on grade-level. I'm going for exposure to a range of history/science topics at this level, knowing we will revisit them later in more depth. I encourage delight-directed learning here. Sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn't.

 

ETA: We also added Latin this year, at her request, and she's doing well with it. But we are taking it slow because I'm having to learn it alongside her!

 

I agree completely. The educational goal of a task could be simply to make multiplying fractions, solving quadratic equations, playing a scale, or conjugating foreign verbs automatic, so that the student can apply the skill without having to think.

 

Thank you for this -- it's exactly what I meant when I mentioned needing to lay a strong foundation, but I wasn't able to articulate it well, even to myself. This makes me feel much better about continuing to push things like math facts, even though she *can* work at a higher level.

 

It's tough, yeah.

 

On any day my kid has the following reactions to the schooling for the day:

1) Nothing. Sighs deeply. Inspects the inside of his eyelids. = something he finds tediously dull.

2) Snicker. Does it in a moment. Then giggles. = something he finds easy.

3) Whine. Weep. Declares "I don't know this!" and "This is too hard!" and "I've never done this before!" and "You never taught me this!" (none of which is true, btw) = something he finds challenging.

 

The mysterious #4, something he has to think about but feels comfortable learning without melting into #3, is rare.  :lol:

 

I also feel drawn to sticking to the "solid foundation" but sometimes "jumping ahead" is okay. Grammar isn't going anywhere. Have you ever seen a complicated sentence diagram without a noun? Of course not. Likewise, spelling harder words uses the same rules as spelling easier words. Stuff AAS2 covers with easy words is covered in Glencoe Spelling Power Grade 12 with hard words. The rule is still the same. And for math, Adding and subtracting millions, or fractions, or in long division, is the same as single digit subtraction. Obviously, you need to make sure the student knows the basic parts of something more complicated, but the basic parts are still practiced over and over.

 

Sometimes I "try out" a jump. Pull something more advanced off the shelf and see how it goes over. If it doesn't work, you can put it back on the shelf till later. If they run with it, and still get the basic stuff in it right, just keep going.

 

Most of the time, though, I feel like we are spinning in place. And yes, it is tempting to pile things on to finally get their skills to match what their brains are capable of. Resist! Condense, pre-test, jump, anything. They'll catch up. I think. I hope.

 

Fortunately, my dd has never been much for drama, so I don't have to deal with a lot of whining/tantrums/etc. Unfortunately, she tends towards the passive-aggressive -- i.e., if she doesn't want to do something, she complies, but she does intentionally poor or sloppy work. Which is just as annoying in its own way. She can also be a "coaster;" she won't work any harder than necessary, so I feel extra pressure to make sure she's challenged, because she's not apt to challenge herself (one of our major reasons for leaving ps).

 

I think trying out a jump is definitely working for us with our lit experiment. I love your example of spelling. Like I said above, I think we actually stumbled on something similar without trying!

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For quite some time we have just used much more challenging resources but traveled at a very slow pace.  Most every thing we use is high school level.  It was a way to produce depth and minimize the busy work.  Even books that are not super challenging high school curriculum provide a strong foundation for my late elementary son.  I compose study guides for most subjects composed of the busywork problems.  So if the Latin book has 10 sentences to translate, I steal about four of them to put in a study guide before the test.  It eliminates just having him translate for the purpose of translating and keeping him busy.  The work is then directly related to something.  The review questions in AoPS I do the same thing with.  Instead of a stack of problems, they are split up to seem more applicable.

 

For things that just plain require practice, we keep the practice at about 15 minutes for the subject.  Normally it is even lower.  Spelling, Grammar (in earlier years), language conjugations and flash cards, timeline work for history, those sorts of things are all done as filler work in between when my son needs a brain break. We will have a large discussion and writing session, then he will do Spanish flash cards or fiddle with his history timeline cards.  Spelling is a transition in our day between snuggling up and having morning time and getting down into math.  Between math and chemistry he might watch an episode of Salsa! or Learning Latin with Virgil.  It is cool down time.  I don't think I would exactly call it busy work, since none of the work is really superfluous or just for the sake of doing it.  He likes them and finds the stuff either silly or competes with himself to see how many he can get right.  It isn't challenging, but I think it might be what Arctic Mama was talking about above.  It is engaging and not mind melting.  He gets something, but not heaps of depth.

 

My son hates repetition, so if it is busy work he will let me know right away.  For those items, if I see the value in what he is asked to do I try to shift it so that he can see the value as well (like study guides) or I remove it completely.  If he can read to me a translation of Captain Underpants in Spanish, I am not going to have him translate 15 sentences the book has about transportation.

 

It gets easier to figure out when the kid knows a bit more about how they like to learn.  I can really have pedagogy discussions with my son now since we have been homeschooling for a while.  He can look at how he learns and tell me what it is that he likes and what he doesn't like.  We can work together.  When we first started really getting the whole accelerated thing going, he was too inexperienced to really know what he wanted or to be able to communicate it.  Just talk with your daughter often and really listen to what she says.  You can more than likely begin to decipher how she likes to learn so the busy work stops being busy work.

 

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Fortunately, my dd has never been much for drama, so I don't have to deal with a lot of whining/tantrums/etc. Unfortunately, she tends towards the passive-aggressive -- i.e., if she doesn't want to do something, she complies, but she does intentionally poor or sloppy work. Which is just as annoying in its own way. She can also be a "coaster;" she won't work any harder than necessary, so I feel extra pressure to make sure she's challenged, because she's not apt to challenge herself (one of our major reasons for leaving ps).

 

I think trying out a jump is definitely working for us with our lit experiment. I love your example of spelling. Like I said above, I think we actually stumbled on something similar without trying!

 

 

Ah, yes, the passive-aggressive "grr, I'll fudge through this just because you're making me." That's #1 1/2 for my kid.

 

I ran into that problem with DWN recently. He likes drawing, and his handwriting is still atrocious, so I was still slotting that in once a week. But he started being more horrible with it than usual. Turns out he didn't see the point of it ("What? I know exactly what words that chicken scratch says!") and found it boring. So I told him that he could change all the nouns into different nouns when he wrote the sentences, and bingo, that was fun. And he was actually good at it.

 

My kid is probably just bright and not gifted as well. So while he can move forward faster, he still needs some practice. But not too much. But enough. It's tough to keep tabs on. All the time. Everyday.  :willy_nilly:  lol.

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On any day my kid has the following reactions to the schooling for the day:

1) Nothing. Sighs deeply. Inspects the inside of his eyelids. = something he finds tediously dull.

2) Snicker. Does it in a moment. Then giggles. = something he finds easy.

3) Whine. Weep. Declares "I don't know this!" and "This is too hard!" and "I've never done this before!" and "You never taught me this!" (none of which is true, btw) = something he finds challenging.

 

The mysterious #4, something he has to think about but feels comfortable learning without melting into #3, is rare.

 

 

Oh goodness!  Are you in My house ;)   You finally explained my ds. :lol:

 

To the OP, I am having the same problem as you and I am listening intently to the replies.

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Good timing on this thread! My husband wants more busywork to slow our son down. I've learned to hang on to our sons coat tails. We are having a great year but dad is worried that this speed isn't sustainable and wants more review/busywork. This all started when I noticed we will be doing preAlg in 4th grade. I think dad is worried about keeping him close to his friends to minimize conflict.

 

If I give more than one easy busywork day then the next real work day my son complains. We are loving Beast so I'm not changing.

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Good timing on this thread! My husband wants more busywork to slow our son down. I've learned to hang on to our sons coat tails. We are having a great year but dad is worried that this speed isn't sustainable and wants more review/busywork. This all started when I noticed we will be doing preAlg in 4th grade. I think dad is worried about keeping him close to his friends to minimize conflict.

 

If I give more than one easy busywork day then the next real work day my son complains. We are loving Beast so I'm not changing.

 

I have also found that dd does better work when she is being challenged consistently. If she expects to be required to think and make an effort, she does (usually). If she thinks she can get away with doing a halfway job, she will -- every time. I wish she was a bit more internally motivated, but we are working on that.

 

Someone upthread mentioned using easier work for "brain break" times in between heavier subjects, which might work better than whole days that are easy.

 

I would have a hard time intentionally slowing a student down. Why will it cause conflict with his friends if he's ahead of them academically? That doesn't make sense to me (and honestly wouldn't be a good reason to me, even if it did). The pace may or may not be sustainable, but when he runs into something that gives him trouble, you just slow down and spends some extra time on it, right? Just my $.02. :coolgleamA:

 

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I would have a hard time intentionally slowing a student down.

 

 

I do intentionally slow my kids down, but by going "deeper" rather than piling on more easy work. I see no advantage to having my kids be radically accelerated via using a super-easy program. It's not a race to see whose kids can start algebra the earliest even if some HSers act that way.

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I do intentionally slow my kids down, but by going "deeper" rather than piling on more easy work. I see no advantage to having my kids be radically accelerated via using a super-easy program. It's not a race to see whose kids can start algebra the earliest even if some HSers act that way.

 

The pp said her husband wanted to slow their son down by adding more busy work. IMO, it's not *slowing down* to delve more deeply into a topic than might be covered in a *typical* curriculum. You're still providing a challenge that way -- developing critical thinking skills, etc. Perhaps I misunderstood, but I took what she said to mean her dh wants to keep their son in a holding pattern until his peers catch up. I would have a serious problem with that.

 

I agree with you that there's no race. For us, I don't anticipate starting algebra until 8th grade at the earliest. I'm much more interested in developing those deep thinking skills, which is why I asked a question about challenging work. I'm still relatively new at this whole thing, and most of what I come up with for adding intensity involves either working more or working faster. I know there must be better ways to go deep, so I'm here looking for ideas (although maybe I haven't articulated that clearly -- I'm still fleshing out my own thoughts here). I appreciate everybody's input.

 

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I am also intentionally slowing my son down to go deeper. In fact, I cut out a lot of things I had planned for this year because I decided that they were busywork and/or had little educational value. We only homeschool 3 days per week (he also goes to a charter school 3 days/week), and I have a 15 month old to chase after. I have no time or interest in busywork. 

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This thread is absolutely our curricular challenge!  We have to provide material at an outrageous depth for our kids' ages, but somehow not over-accelerate them.  Is such a thing possible?

 

So, we look for courses which add value, but not "busy work" courses.  Honestly, Conceptual Physics and Conceptual Chemistry are two of our cop-outs to buy time.  So is Number Theory and Analytic Geometry (for the older one).

 

We're going to try getting the older one hooked on MIT-OCW computer science courses.  Those can chew up some time, and allow us to pace other courses a little better.  He loves the courses he has taken from that site, but the audio/video courses are a bit limited.

 

For the younger one, we're plugging in astrophysics and astrobiology next year.  That'll hold off the college physics :scared: :crying:  until at least fourth grade :svengo: , but we'd like to find one more physics filler before taking that leap.  His math could use a little more maturation first.

 

We really struggle with this.  How do you provide meaningful content to kids that can not, will not, slow down? :driving:

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Arctic Mama, I like the thought, and we do try that where we can.  For instance, we alternate earth science and life science for DS8, which slows each of them down.  But he is convinced that he will be a scientist, and if we try to add filler, he just calls our bluff by reading secretly on his own.  We've already added all kinds of enrichment activities, worksheets, story books, Hawking videos, etc -- it's absolutely nuts.  Thankfully, he takes a bit more time with other subjects.  We memorize and analyze poems, do plenty of writing, and interweave multiple social studies curricula into one stream of work.  It's only the sciences that are really problematic at this point.

 

For DS12, math is the toughest to slow down.  He only needs 20-30 minutes per day as it is to consume 3-4 courses per year.  We're going to have to add lots of material -- symbolic logic, non-Euclidean geometry, prob & stats, discrete math, abstract algebra, etc.  He doesn't have any patience for math games or contests -- he just wants to do proofs.  Bio & chemistry we've just about given up on.  We'll let him do what MIT-OCW offers, and let him choose his own path from there, because he is rapidly exceeding our level of expertise in those subjects.  I really think the computer science courses will help him a lot, but this is the kid that has meltdowns when material is not challenging or fast-paced enough.  He is nowhere near mature enough for college right now, and he wants to go to a good one, not just the local one, so we need to hold him for a couple more years.  It's a strange, strange world.

 

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I think it's easier when you get to a high enough level to have more options. If I tried to keep my DD on 4th grade level stuff, I'd have a rebellion on my hands, and it would take a lot of busywork to keep her occupied, but she's on her 3rd year of herpetology and is not likely to run out of topics to investigate any time soon-if anything, her list of books and topics and projects keeps increasing, and she keeps getting more opportunities (which in turn slows down other subjects just due to time). AOPS slowed down math by itself, and extra books will help keep her busy and engaged without being busywork. In fact, I find I have to add extra practice at time of simpler problems to AOPS for her to truly get it-something that wasn't the case at lower levels.

 

In humanities topics, having others to discuss with slows the pace dramatically, and as long as we can afford online classes, there are umpteen zillion options-these may not be challenging intellectually, but they're fun socially, and also give practice at keeping up with deadlines and different instructor requirements.

 

She's not ready to be a high school student yet emotionally or socially, but as long as there's new content to access, she's happy while growing up a bit.

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Good timing on this thread! My husband wants more busywork to slow our son down. I've learned to hang on to our sons coat tails. We are having a great year but dad is worried that this speed isn't sustainable and wants more review/busywork. This all started when I noticed we will be doing preAlg in 4th grade. I think dad is worried about keeping him close to his friends to minimize conflict.

 

If I give more than one easy busywork day then the next real work day my son complains. We are loving Beast so I'm not changing.

Both my husband and my father have said this exact thing. I honestly believe this might be a very male thing. I have watched how many males interact from about middle elementary on. Many of them seem to congregate around some form of shared mission - fixing a car, watching or playing a game, a sports event or sport they play, a video game, a television show. I see these few examples appear over and over and over. They are the "in". The conversation from then on is extremely superficial. It has been confirmed to me by about four different guys that asking or making deeper conversation "would be weird." Those conversations are reserved for very intimate interaction which takes years and one-on-one discussion instead of groups. The idea of keeping my son at the same place as his peers is so that he can participate in this superficial conversation. In the elementary school age and into middle school the topics are often school. When my son jumps into deeper discussion, he becomes "weird." We have had to directly work on appropriate conversation.

 

We are not participating in this ideology. My son began PreA exploring in third grade and formal curriculum in fourth grade. However, learning appropriate conversation is something all kids have to do. We just focus very heavily on it and often have to completely remove academics from the conversation. So my son actually has MineCraft time for school, skateboarding for school as well. These are topics which are acceptable conversation. It is an honest topic which is just as important to his development. It is not learned through osmosis of a classroom or holding patterns. It is learned from active discussion.

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Yes, dad was talking busy work as in pages of problems. We are doing Beast so it's pretty deep. We like this less problems but more thinking curriculum. We are going to be done with grade 3 at the beginning of March though. I am thinking of putting Zaccaro's Primary Challenge problems, from the library, on our schedule. I have Math Mammoth 1-6 but I feel like that would be backwards now. We might do some MM on the white board but only if we get stumped on Beast.

 

As I write this I notice this is slower than last year. We had done one first grade and two second grade curriculums last year in the same year. (completely because I have a problem skipping things)

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My kids' education is the antithesis of busy work. I try to make their educations revolve around making connections on their own, defending their opinions/positions, and most importantly encouraging internal motivation for learning.

 

For me, not using textbooks and designing each child's courses offers the best critical thinking/challenging approach to academics.

 

My dd who is in 10th grade has always loved languages. She originally started with Latin in 2nd, but we switched to French in 3rd. We added back in Latin in 6th, and she added Russian in 9th. Poetry is another area where she has absolutely thrived. She LOVES poetry. Epic poems like Marmion, Lady of the Lake, Siege of Valencia, Lancelot and Elaine were just part of a long list that she read in 7th grade. I have never liked poetry, so I didn't even think about introducing it at a younger age. But, it truly is a love. She spends so much time reading complex works now that when she reads something with every day language, it has little appeal b/c she loves words and well-crafted sentences.

 

History and science is reading whole books on individual topics. (I have taken this approach for 20 yrs. There is no end of possible topics and none of it is grade leveled.)

 

HTH!

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My kids' education is the antithesis of busy work. I try to make their educations revolve around making connections on their own, defending their opinions/positions, and most importantly encouraging internal motivation for learning.

 

For me, not using textbooks and designing each child's courses offers the best critical thinking/challenging approach to academics.

 

My dd who is in 10th grade has always loved languages. She originally started with Latin in 2nd, but we switched to French in 3rd. We added back in Latin in 6th, and she added Russian in 9th. Poetry is another area where she has absolutely thrived. She LOVES poetry. Epic poems like Marmion, Lady of the Lake, Siege of Valencia, Lancelot and Elaine were just part of a long list that she read in 7th grade. I have never liked poetry, so I didn't even think about introducing it at a younger age. But, it truly is a love. She spends so much time reading complex works now that when she reads something with every day language, it has little appeal b/c she loves words and well-crafted sentences.

 

History and science is reading whole books on individual topics. (I have taken this approach for 20 yrs. There is no end of possible topics and none of it is grade leveled.)

 

HTH!

 

Love, love, LOVE everything you just said! My brain is imploding, thinking of the myriad of ways we can begin implementing some of your ideas... :willy_nilly:

 

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Love, love, LOVE everything you just said! My brain is imploding, thinking of the myriad of ways we can begin implementing some of your ideas... :willy_nilly:

 

I have no idea if these would interest you or not, but here are some links that might help:

 

http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2009/05/25/the-best-resources-for-helping-teachers-use-blooms-taxonomy-in-the-classroom/

 

http://www.celt.iastate.edu/pdfs-docs/teaching/RevisedBloomsHandout.pdf

 

I have never used these type of sheets, but it is probably a good visual of what just happens naturally in our home via discussion/teaching:

http://www.exploratree.org.uk

 

Here are a couple of posts where I describe some of our homeschool:

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/317513-x-post-beautiful-autumn-metaphorpersonification-example/

 

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/173293-interest-driven-education-and-real-tea-time/

 

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/529027-for-8filltheheart-re-science-and-history-interest-led-planning/?p=5939873

 

I have a lot of fun putting together studies for my kids. It keeps me motivated.

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I have no idea if these would interest you or not, but here are some links that might help:

 

http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2009/05/25/the-best-resources-for-helping-teachers-use-blooms-taxonomy-in-the-classroom/

 

http://www.celt.iastate.edu/pdfs-docs/teaching/RevisedBloomsHandout.pdf

 

I have never used these type of sheets, but it is probably a good visual of what just happens naturally in our home via discussion/teaching:

http://www.exploratree.org.uk

 

Here are a couple of posts where I describe some of our homeschool:

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/317513-x-post-beautiful-autumn-metaphorpersonification-example/

 

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/173293-interest-driven-education-and-real-tea-time/

 

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/529027-for-8filltheheart-re-science-and-history-interest-led-planning/?p=5939873

 

I have a lot of fun putting together studies for my kids. It keeps me motivated.

 

Absolutely! I am interested in anything that leads to a deeper conversation in our school. Thank you for sharing!

 

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