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How does your Co-op schedule classes?


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If you are part of a co-op where parents are expected to help teach, what does the schedule look like on a meeting day? I'm expecially interested in how elementary grades work. In our co-op there are 3 elem. classes, broken down by grades. There are 3 class periods and the kids rotate through them each week. There are about 10-12 kids in each class. If you are teaching, you teach all 3 periods. The only break is lunch when parents are responsible for their own kids. Right now parents teach 1-2 quarters and help another. They try to give everyone 1 quarter off where you can just drop off your kids.

 

Not everyone likes this, but the leadership doesn't seem to think there is any other way. I know there are other ways to do this. Please share with me your co-op schedule. I would like to be able to share with our leadership some alternate ideas. Thanks!!

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We have 12 week semesters--fall and spring. Classes are generally scheduled to last the whole year, except for the primary grades (K - 2) which have semester-long classes. The class schedule is set the spring prior by people stating what they want to teach and preparing a class description. Registration for those classes happens in July--you sign up for the classes you want your kids to have all year.

 

If you are teaching, it's for one hour of the two hours of programming. If you are assisting (we don't require people to teach), it's the same deal--one hour of the two. You teach/assist in the same class all year.  In your "off" hour you can attend a Bible study, use it to get to know others, or whatever. But you have to stay on property and you have to be willing to sub for someone who is absent.

 

If you PM me I can send a schedule from past years.

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Ours is a very large, very organized co-op. 

Three periods, each 50 minutes. Younger elementary age (1st-3rd grades) kids actually have four classes, two are 25 minutes and 2 are 50 minutes. 

 

So schedule for everyone in upper elementary/jr high and high school is: 

Class 1 9:50-10:40
Class 2 10:45-11:35

Class 3 11:40-12:30 

 

(We all meet together from 9:30-9:45 for devotionals.) 

 

Younger elementary

Class 1: 9:50-10:15

Class 2: 10:15-10:40

Class 3: 10:45-11:35

Class 4: 11:40-12:30 

 

Preschool and nursery kids stay in the same room for the whole time so they don't really divide into times but the teachers are organized into three shifts. 

 

Younger elementary kids all take the same classes (no choices) but they change each semester. One semester is Art, PE, Handbells and Geography. The other is Science, Five in a Row, Choir and Drama. 

 

Older elementary, jr high and high school students take electives that last the whole year. 

 

If you teach, you teach the same class all year. You have to teach two periods and the third period is a support group. Support group is a time with food, speakers and just to hang out. It's somewhat optional but most people go because it's a good time. You can be a lead teacher, or an assistant or volunteer in the nursery but you have to have two periods where you are working. 

 

There is no drop-off. When you sign up for co-op it's a family commitment. We do have people who are assigned as "floaters" who fill in when there is an absence for sickness. If you know you will be absent you are expected to arrange for a sub or let the floaters know. If one of your kids is sick and you need to stay home, you are allowed to drop off older kids (school-age) as long as you arrange for an adult to be responsible for them and you let the organizers know who that is. That isn't meant to be a reason to miss frequently, but since we have a lot of high-schoolers and some classes are more academic it ensures that an older student isn't missing classes because of younger siblings. 

 

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Our co-op is small (around 25 kids), broken into three different age groups (early elementary; middle elementary/early middle school; late middle school/high school). The two younger groups have 8 kids, while the older group has 11.

 

There are three periods, so with the three age groups we have 9 total classes going.

 

But, we hire an outside vendor for two periods of art, so really 7 classes.

 

Parents teach one class per term. We run three terms (fall, winter, spring). Parents not teaching are responsible for clean-up, little children monitoring, and general on-site help. We don't run a drop-off program, although a lot of grace is extended for parents who need to run errands or who have other life issues pop up occasionally.

 

Teaching three classes seems very taxing, especially if they are different grade levels and there is some effort made to differentiate lessons. How many parents do you have on hand?

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The co-ops in our area tend to run for 2-4 hours, with classes usually about 50 minutes and a 10-minute "passing period" for bathroom break and water/snacks (classrooms not allowed to have food) -- also used for the teacher who just finished to clear out and let the next teacher to set up for their class. Some high school classes run 90 minutes; the remaining 20 minutes of that time, students go to a "study hall" room.

 

The co-ops run on a semester basis, and semesters are usually 12 weeks long (one co-op runs 10 weeks, another runs 14-16 weeks for high school classes and 12 weeks for other classes). There are 2 semesters a year: a fall and a spring semester. Usually there is at least 1 class for each grade level at each time frame, and a nursery and a pre-school that runs the whole time.

 

In the past, some co-ops required you to attend for the whole time, and either your children must be in a class at every time period, or in the "study hall" room. But the current co-ops around town are now allowing "a la carte", so you can just sign up one student for one class if you wish. Some co-ops have both "true co-op" classes (free, run by parents) AND for-a-fee classes run by someone outside of the homeschool group, giving group art lessons, etc. Some co-ops don't permit those "outside" classes, and what usually happens is that after 2-3 years, all the moms are burned out on all the work it takes to teach co-op classes, when what they really wanted was to be able to hand off 1-2 classes once a week, and the co-op folds. Those co-ops that permit some "for-a-fee" classes tend to have a longer life span.

 

Because of insurance issues of the local facilities used for co-ops, and due to the needs of the homeschool groups running the co-ops, there are no drop-offs; parents must remain on-site the entire time. However, there is a "parent break room" usually set up for parents who are not doing a shift of volunteering to hang out.

 

While parents are not required to *teach*, they are required to do some sort of volunteering each week. That usually gets set up on a schedule at the beginning of the semester. That might be teaching. But mostly that ends up being either volunteering to be a parent assistant for one class, or working in the nursery or preschool for one hour, or working on-site in some other capacity for one hour -- such as arriving early for set up, or staying late for clean up, or walking around the grounds as "security" or as-needed help for an hour.

 

 

 

When I run my individual Lit & Comp classes for grade 7-12, using my church facility, it's just me, no other co-op classes concurrent. I allow parents to drop off, but also have a second classroom available if it's more convenient for parent with younger siblings coming from far away to just stay.

 

I also require a parent volunteer to stay each week in class with me, so I always have a helper, but really, mostly for a "two-deep" policy for everyone's protection (including my church, so the facility doesn't get sued for some weird reason). It usually works out so that a parent only needs to stay 1-2 times per semester, and can drop off for the rest of the classes, or let their older teens drive themselves to/from class.

 

Since my class is a "for pay" class, I sometimes offer to scholarship a student in exchange for a parent staying as the volunteer for 6 weeks of the semester. That way I can offer 2 scholarships per semester to families with financial needs.

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Parents are not required to teach in our co op.  If you teach, you get a discount on your child's classes.  Classes are offered for ages K-high school, and students are enrolled in whichever classes they need.  The classes last 1 hour for most classes and 1 1/2 hours for middle and high school sciences.  There is no "passing period".  Classes dismiss at the hour and kids get right to the next class.  The schedule works such that multiple classes are offered during the same time period so people have a choice.  We meet from 8 am - 12:30 pm on Fridays.  Parents and students are only present during the times that their classes are held.  There are core classes and enrichment (electives).  Typically, the enrichment classes are for elementary students and may involve something as simple as board games for an hour.  My rising 4th grader will be taking a science class and a dissection class next year.  The dissection class is only for one semester.  The science class lasts all year.  We run two semesters.  Also offered for elementary students is another science class, yoga, board games, K-2nd geography class, math tutoring, and drama (all ages for drama class).  That is off the top of my head, and there are likely more options.  I am teaching 9th grade English next year, and my older sons will be in my class.

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On coop - elementary through high school does elective type classes in co-op. PE, hands on science, art, geography, etc. Teachers pick there own subject and curriculum and therefore can teach out of their passions. I've even done fun math classes based on Mathcounts activities.

 

Teachers are paid nominally. Parents are expected to volunteer about 8 hours per semester in the younger classes to help. You can pick and choose your classes and don't have to take all hours. If you take only one class, you'll end up volunteering about 8 days of the 12 weeks to get in your time. If you take classes all three hours, then you might only volunteer 3 of the days. The rest you can leave.

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Thank you all for your replies. Here is where our co-op gets hung-up. There are too many elem. kids to have them go to each class all together so that a teacher could only teach 1 period. When we divide them up, then the teacher teaches all 3 periods. What do you do in that situation? For instance, if one class is a science class, do you have 3 teachers, one for each class period? How can we make this work better?

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Thank you all for your replies. Here is where our co-op gets hung-up. There are too many elem. kids to have them go to each class all together so that a teacher could only teach 1 period. When we divide them up, then the teacher teaches all 3 periods. What do you do in that situation?

 

In the co-ops here, it's first come-first serve. So if there are more students than class space, oh well… not everyone gets in. Those students either:

- sign up for a different class at the same time

- go to study hall or game room

- family doesn't do co-op that semester (if there are no other classes of interest)

 

I can NOT imagine being forced to be a teacher -- or worse, forced as the teacher to do 3 hours in a row of the same class!!  :eek:

 

Last year, I did a massively time-consuming and exhausting hands-on science co-op class for elementary ages that I created myself -- one hour for gr. 1-3 and then back-to-back the same class with gr. 4-6. Never again!! Loved the kids, and it was lots of fun, but massively time consuming to prepare the week before, set-up that morning, and then clean up after  -- I was just doing this out of kindness and love for the families of our homeschool group, getting no benefit for any kids of my own, since all of mine are graduated. While I would do a science class again, never again would I do more than 1 science class in a day. I can't imagine doing that AND still homeschooling your own!

 

 

For instance, if one class is a science class, do you have 3 teachers, one for each class period?

 

JMO, but yes!

 

 

How can we make this work better?

 

Solution #1

If everyone wants science, and there are tons of elementary-age students, then have 3 parents run 3 science classes at the same time, each with an in-class assistant parent. For simplicity, you could have all 3 use the same curriculum or take turns preparing the materials for all 3 classes, so that actually makes it easier -- your turn to go buy supplies or make photocopies only comes around once every 3 weeks. Or, if something has to be prepped in advance, all 3 parent-teachers could meet earlier in the week and "assembly-line" it to make it all go faster.

 

Solution #2

Or, have all the students (3 classes-worth) meet in one big room with one head teacher running the info part, and 3 small-group parent-teachers overseeing individual smaller groups when you break out for the hands-on portion. And the head teacher can circulate among all the tables of the 3 smaller groups as needed, with 2 parent assistants.

 

Solution #3

Hire some teachers. ;)

 

 

I would definitely find some way of re-structuring, because this current structure will burn out your good people who are teaching and putting in the most work super fast. If it were me, I'd structure it so that there's no longer an entire quarter where the parent gets to just drop off, BUT:

 

- a parent who teaches a class for one period has the other two periods OFF

- a parent who assists in classes works two periods, and has one period OFF

- a parent who wants to be "scholarshiped" (i.e., doesn't pay the co-op fee, or gets one student class fee for or supplies free, etc) works all three periods as assistant (or, works two periods AND comes early for set-up OR stays late for clean-up, on a pre-arranged schedule)

 

I would probably also work to reschedule the whole 3 hours of co-op to take place before or after lunch (instead of around lunch) so lunch could happen at home and not have the extra stress of having to bring or buy. Or make lunch an optional relaxing/social time for those who can/want to each week before/after the co-op.

 

 

There are 3 class periods and the kids rotate through them each week… If you are teaching, you teach all 3 periods. The only break is lunch when parents are responsible for their own kids. Right now parents teach 1-2 quarters and help another. They try to give everyone 1 quarter off where you can just drop off your kids.

 

From this, it sounds like you have enough parents that you could make it easier on the teachers, and some parents who are really not gifted or able to teach a class could just volunteer as assistants (above suggestion). No one would get a quarter of drop-off -- although maybe for their 1-2 hours off, they could run errands, go for a run or a walk, or work on personal projects in a parent break room -- or have a DVD of yoga or aerobics or whatever and a room with mats for parents to do stretching, yoga, or some exercise...

 

And I would definitely consider hiring some outside people with expertise for some classes as a "paid class elective" to give your parents a break from teaching, esp. if not all parents are comfortable with teaching a class.

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We have 3 class periods of 1 hour each. Each hour has a different lead teacher and other parents are helping somewhere each hour. The lead teachers should also be able to have one planning period. 

 

We have 2 core subjects with homework  and 1 elective completed entirely in class.

 

We break down into these age increments.

 

1st Hour Science: (6th and younger Astronomy; 7th and up Physical Science)

3-4 year olds

K-2

3-4

5-6

7 and up

 

2nd Hour Literature and/or Writing

3-4 year olds studying letters

K-2 Literature unit study with tall tales

3-5 IEW All Things Fun and Fascinating

6-8 Writing (Put together by teachers)

9-10 American Lit and Composition (MP American Lit and teacher stuff)

 

3rd Hour GA History

3-4 year olds (play time, snack, games)

K-3

4-5

6-12

 

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Four class periods, 55 min each.

12-18 year olds usually have 4 choices, though many classes are two hours long so really during the day the total number of class options might be 8-10 and not 16. This is the only group that has homework outside of co-op essential to the course.

 

8-12 year olds have three choices each hour, so 12 different classes run each day. Sometimes teachers assign things, but it is always optional (even in literature classes, which can make things interesting). Mostly these kids are working on projects in class and field trips.

 

5-8 year olds have two options each hour, so 8 classes run each day.

 

There's a nursery/preschool group that currently meet together, though we are working on separating the 0-2 and 2-4 demographics.

 

My personal feeling is that there's too much going each day. I think it would be easier on mom teachers to have the afternoons for kids under 12 be survey classes - mom or dad or community member take turns teaching for 2-3 weeks a mini class/project and then it's someone else's turn. In the morning there would still be more traditional sounding classes for the 8-12 crowd. Still mulling this idea over though - I'm supposed to help plan these classes next year.

 

We put out a suggestion board in the spring, that kids and parents can write on to suggest classes. Then those are taken by the co-op board and used to select the next year's classes.

 

Parents teach, assist, or do some co-op job for 3/4 of the day, with 1 unassigned hour. There is an option to drop of your 12+ kid and not work at co-op, but that also comes with an increased per child tuition. We only have about 5 of the roughly 35 kids in that age range who are dropped off.

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Our co-op class last year offered one small and two large classes for each age child, and all parents were expected to do something. Typically, that was teach one class or assist in multiple classes, but it varied a little. If you had an infant, you were given priority for watching the nursery for both class periods. The small class was picture study. We dismissed the nursery class (two and under) before that. I taught picture study (which counted as a teaching spot), and I taught it to all of the children except the already dismissed nursery and the preschoolers. The preschoolers had picture study in a separate corner of the room with their own teacher. After picture study, we broke the children into groups, according to age, and each group had a class. Each class had a teacher and an assistant or two, and the class lasted for an hour. Then there was a twenty minute break, then a second class for each age group. Nursery babies stayed in the nursery, and during the second class, the preschoolers didn't have an official class, but they played in the play area with supervision. Supervising the play area was another teaching spot, because you were still responsible for making sure everyone remained there, got to the bathroom if needed, etc. Since I was teaching picture study (shorter class but still some home prep), and since I had a toddler (who wasn't at the "leave him in the nursery" stage), I got to watch the preschoolers in the play area. So I was definitely "on" for picture study, off for the first period (although I put stars on everyone's picture study sheets), and semi-on for the second class period. But if you didn't teach at all, thus no home prep, you needed to assist in both class periods. We did not have a drop-off option, but we offered something for every age, so we needed as many hands as we could get.

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One thing that is done locally with young kids in coop is to have a big gym class for them as one of the classes.  It is a good experience for the kids to do big group games they couldn't otherwise do, and it takes less teachers.

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Our co-op is an a la cart co-op.  Parents do not necessarily have to teach but if they do not teach they are required to aide for 1/2 the number of periods in the building, so everyone has to help or teach.

 

The co-op has 5 periods, each 55 minutes long and we have 1/2 hr for lunch.  The co-op runs for 2 ten week sessions a year but we do extend the co-op with additional weeks for some of the high school classes (especially the labs).  Since we are a la cart some folks only come in for the morning, some for the afternoon, some a combo or some all day.  We try to offer a min of 2-3 classes for each age group (we have room for about 13-14 classes each period).  We have about 70 families in the co-op and the classes range in size from about 5 kids up to 15/20 kids (gym classes tend to go a little bigger).  Teachers get first chance at registration and we guarantee your child will get into a class if you are teaching that period (we also have a nursery for teachers who have children younger than 2-3).  We have some folks who teach 1 class and some who teach 3-4 classes.  Most folks who teach also aide in a class but that is there choice.  What we offer depends on what the parent wants to bring in to teach.  Because of this we do not guarantee there will be a certain subject each session but there are usually science classes for each age range, a history, gym and sometimes art or music.  Sometime folks bring in specialty classes such as cooking, computer programming, sewing....

 

We also require each family to help set up 2 x and clean up 2x a session.  This helps spread the work around.  We try to be fairly organized and that has helped us a lot.  We have a co-op board that works together to take care of all the jobs to run and structure the co-op.

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