What would you cut?

[...................]

My daughter is not getting everything done and struggling with her school day. We have long days on Monday and Tuesday to complete more work but they are just ending up to be nightmares.

She has:

Horizons pre-Alg
English from local class (one essay each week plus reader response journal each day)
Abeka science (just book, vocab and quizzes)
Sonlight History of US plus readers (just read)
Seterra for geography
Duolingo for Spanish
Guitar practice half an hour
Spelling- apples secondary drills

She's not even getting to bible at all

I am thinking of cutting Spanish, Seterra, everything but History of Us for history, (she loves history of US), and I am afraid to cut spelling but I would love to (she is a terrible speller.)

She also does swimming, youth group, and a co OP sewing class and she is an ENFP so needs time almost daily to create and make stuff and paint ans whatever..this is NOT an academic child and she is NOT trying to get into a competitive uni.  

Edited October 25, 2016 by Calming Tea

[regentrude]

nm did not read carefully

Edited October 25, 2016 by regentrude

[birchbark]

I'm assuming your DD is 12 from your siggy.

 

I would drop geography, Spanish, the history items you mentioned, and one of the extracurriculars. I would also drop the Abeka science and let her read library books on science topics that interest her on a less-than-daily basis.

 

Is the spelling time-consuming?

[Ellie]

My daughter is not getting everything done and struggling with her school day. We have long days on Monday and Tuesday to complete more work but they are just ending up to be nightmares.

 

She has:

 

Horizons pre-Alg

English from local class (one essay each week plus reader response journal each day)

Abeka science (just book, vocab and quizzes)

Sonlight History of US plus readers (just read)

Seterra for geography

Duolingo for Spanish

Guitar practice half an hour

Spelling- apples secondary drills

 

She's not even getting to bible at all

 

I am thinking of cutting Spanish, Seterra, everything but History of Us for history, (she loves history of US), and I am afraid to cut spelling but I would love to (she is a terrible speller.)

 

She also does swimming, youth group, and a co OP sewing class and she is an ENFP so needs time almost daily to create and make stuff and paint ans whatever..this is NOT an academic child and she is NOT trying to get into a competitive uni.  

 

Yes, I'd drop the things you were thinking of dropping.

 

[RootAnn]

Are you trying to do all of those each day?

 

If she's having issues getting through everything, I'd probably do math, English, and guitar every day. I'd try to do History of US three times per week and science and Bible the other two days.

Everything else would go into a loop - one per day:

Seterra for geography
Duolingo for Spanish
Spelling- apples secondary drills

 

So, Day 1: math, English, guitar, History of US + geography

Day 2: math, English, guitar, Bible + Duolingo

Day 3: math, English, guitar, History of US + Spelling

Day 4: math, English, guitar, science + geography

Day 5: math, English, guitar, History of US + Duolingo

 

If you feel like spelling needs to be hit more often, just add it into the loop twice as often (spelling, geography, spelling, Spanish, repeat). If you have enough time, you could increase science to twice per week. If this still doesn't get you enough time, you could put Bible into your loop instead of having it separate. Loops are really flexible. If you only have two days of school one week, just pick up on Day 3 the next time you do school. 

 

 

[Julie Smith]

Horizons pre-Alg

English from local class (one essay each week plus reader response journal each day)

Abeka science (just book, vocab and quizzes)

Sonlight History of US plus readers (just read)

Seterra for geography

Duolingo for Spanish

Guitar practice half an hour

Spelling- apples secondary drills

 

She's not even getting to bible at all

 

I am thinking of cutting Spanish, Seterra, everything but History of Us for history, (she loves history of US), and I am afraid to cut spelling but I would love to (she is a terrible speller.)

 

She also does swimming, youth group, and a co OP sewing class and she is an ENFP so needs time almost daily to create and make stuff and paint ans whatever..this is NOT an academic child and she is NOT trying to get into a competitive uni.  

 

I would drop: 

- Abeka Science 

- Seterra for geography

- and decrease guitar practice to 20 minutes a day

 

I would then add in a requirement to read or watch something science related weekly and to talk about it a bit with you. I don't know how important Spanish is to your daughter. But in our area French in really important and my son really likes learning it with Duolingo. He is about 15 skills away from finishing his tree. They also now have the duo bots available which will be fun for him. For Duolingo I would just set the goal of 30 XP a day, every day. It is amazing how much progress can be made with just that amount. Or if she isn't a fan of Duolingo do something similar but with memrise. 

[Lori D.]

I would drop the Geography first and see how things feel.

If that is not enough, then I'd drop the Spanish as well.

 

 

In case it helps you feel better, at age 12, neither DS here could have handled the schedule you listed. One also had mild LDs in math, writing and spelling, so we had to continue spelling all the way through all of high school, so I totally get it -- if you have to keep doing the Spelling, you have to, and there's no way around it. We also had to do some other remedial/therapy types of things that sucked even more time out of our daily schedule. sigh. It was just what we had to do.

 

For both DSs, we saved foreign language until 12th grade and knocked out 2 credits as 2 semesters of dual enrollment. One of the best decisions we made for high school, as it allowed DSs time in 9th/10th to get used to the workload while still being able to explore interests and develop some great maturity and skills in public speaking, responsibility, etc. through extracurriculars. AND it allowed them to "dip a toe" in the water of community college when they were old enough and ready for it, AND it gave them dual credit, which benefitted both of them college-credit-wise later on after graduation. :)

 

BEST of luck in shifting things to find what works best for your family this year. Warmly, Lori D.

[Carra]

I would drop geography, do Sonlight at half the pace, and adopt birchbark's recommendation for science.

[...................]

Thanks! You guys really helped me decide.  I really wanted to drop Science but, we can't.  We just will never get to it and believe it or not my dd loves her Abeka Science book and there are a lot of cute hands on things that you can do with household items that she's into.

 

So, now that everything is whittled down to 5 subjects, she feels a zillion times better.  4 main subjects plus guitar.  Still haven't figured out BIble, but I think I will assign BIble reading from Proverbs plus some books such as More Than a Carpenter, and other similar books.

[kolamum]

Due to her being 12, I'd drop HUS. The core is pretty heavy for a 12 year old & it may be the one thing pushing her load too far. I know that's probably not helpful because you mentioned she loved the books.. Did you know you can get them in audio format? Would it help if she could listen to them being read?  My 13 year old is in Core G because we found there was a point where tagging along with the older meant he couldn't cope with the workload & thus he gained precious little, kwim??

 

If she doesn't need a second language right now I'd consider doing DuoLingo when there is time or only working towards 10xp vs a higher level. We've got the high schooler doing a great quantity with Duo then the younger who doesn't need it yet. I told the younger that doing it now will give him some background & help his 2 mandatory years be easier. ;)

 

For geography, did you know that Knowledge Quest sells maps that match up with HUS so you could combine those vs having something totally seperate. Would it be possible to keep up with spelling, but set a limit to how much time you'll devote to it? Would that split the difference of not dropping it, but keeping the schedule moving along each day?

[...................]

^^  Can you link me to the maps that corrolate with History of US.  WE LOVE History of US but don't love the Sonlight schedule and notes and all the fru fru with SL.  I would love to take a look at the maps and color them together for fun, but I can't figure out on KQ's website where they are.

[...................]

never mind I found it.  COOL

[...................]

decided not to add the mapping...we are learning so much just reading the books :)  and, I am trying to cut stuff..not add LOL

[kolamum]

never mind I found it.  COOL

Sorry, glad you found it. Yeah, we didn't end up using it either as we're just using the markable map, & much of the mapping is repeated throughout so with the markable map if you've marked it once you're good. :)