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Passions Vs Content Subjects


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I'd love thoughts on content subjects in the early years. I know this board weighs heavily towards a classical education, and my oldest child thrives with that model, but she never had very clear passions like my second kid. So, for an almost seven year old, would you sacrifice content subjects like history and science to devote more time to a passion for music? Right now, we struggle to hit science and history once a week, while practices with him average around an hour. (I have multiple kids with a spacing that makes them difficult to combine and a tendency to pick parent-intensive curricula for the three Rs.) He's been playing for over two years (after he begged for a year) and has big ambitions: this intensity is not new. Part of me thinks I should nip the practices to a half an hour to facilitate more consistency around science and history. Part of me thinks that, given how little he is, maybe going with his passion would be better. 

 

I'd love thoughts from parents with kids who had clear passions very early and finding balance.

Edited by rainbowmama
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"'So, for an almost seven year old, would you sacrifice content subjects like history and science to devote more time to a passion for music""

 

If it required that sacrifice, yes.

 

But I don't think it does.

 

For my kid that is PASSIONATE, he's doing it all the time. I don't have to make it happen during school time, which, at 7 was only like an hour long.

 

It was nbd to say ok we are going to read these history things for twenty minutes.

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I have a kid who has been focused since about age 7. What we do is do school stuff first. That was the case at 7, when school took about 2 hours/day, and it's the case now when she has about 5-6 hours of schoolwork a day. She spends several hours a day on her passion in various forms. What I do is to look at academics and see where I can reasonably work what she does for her passion into it (so, for example, turning some of her writing assignments into doing essays on topics related to her passion, which then lets a good part of her reading count as school).

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For a seven year old, you bet. And as he got older, I would be conscious of keeping free time free for him to pursue those passions, whatever they happened to be. Regardless of whether I insisted on having history and science twice or three times a week. Music and art (and writing) are time intensive passions, and as you get more involved, you need more time to imagine, to practice, to invent. Watch the free time. And help the student to find a balance. A musician might benefit from time spend writing or in painting or drawing. Writers need to spend time walking in the fresh air. I often find that doing a little geometry or Latin before writing does some interesting things to my creativity. Spending time exploring in nature also is good for the creative mind (and it doubles as science). And what about studying some composers and listening to their music? You just got history done, right there.

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How does your day go typically? My kids spend more than 4 hours on their favorite hobbies from an early age. However the 3Rs are done in less than 2hrs daily in K-5 leaving plenty of time to spend on music daily as well as on art, science, history, another language at least weekly.

 

History was reading and watching documentaries. Science was reading and hands on. My kids would bring their reading materials to read on car rides to classes as well as while waiting for their music or art class to start. They took music theory lessons and art lessons at an art and music center. My kids don't like certain subjects and it is worse if we don't allocate time to those.

 

My friend's kid spends at least 2hrs on gym and 1hr on swimming daily after school (public school) since she was in K (young 5). My friend has 3 kids and her husband would check school homework after dinner for all their kids. Can your husband help for some of the homeschool tasks?

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In your case, passion. Hands down.

 

I would NEVER cut into the time that an elementary aged student devotes to growing skilled in an area of their passion. I vote let him do 3Rs as you see fit for your family culture and mode of education do what you can to encourage, nurture and develop his musical passions for a few more years.

 

What is a 7yo really going to get out of forced science and history lessons at this point? I'm assuming that your time is at a premium. 

 

How is his reading? Maybe you should get some elementary school textbooks on content subjects and let his "reading time" consist of reading and discussing those chapters with you, that way he's covering reading and content in the same amount of time.

 

If he's not reading independently/fluently yet, then keep it simple and just continue to work on his reading and once he's able to read well then use elementary level textbooks for content and choose nonfiction from the library when you deem him to need assigned reading.

Edited by mom2bee
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"'So, for an almost seven year old, would you sacrifice content subjects like history and science to devote more time to a passion for music""

 

If it required that sacrifice, yes.

 

But I don't think it does.

 

For my kid that is PASSIONATE, he's doing it all the time. I don't have to make it happen during school time, which, at 7 was only like an hour long.

 

It was nbd to say ok we are going to read these history things for twenty minutes.

 

I think it has more to do with balancing my time. He plays a lot, both violin and piano and other instruments we have around the home, quite a bit by himself, teaching himself songs, but definitely from a skills point of view, he really benefits from and appreciates the time I work with him. I just find it hard to balance my time among my kids, and really, I feel like he dominates my time. Maybe part of it is his other school takes too long: reading/writing/math generally takes 1.5 hours. When we do science and history, it generally takes an hour for each. 

Edited by rainbowmama
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If that's the only option to make things work, absolutely--without question, I'd do that.

 

However, I'd also consider other options that he could do more independently:

 

videos like the discover and do series from Sonlight

audio books that he can listen to while playing (SOTW, MOH, Your Story Hour, even Adventures in Odyssey is packed with history--in fact, most times when my kids told me they already knew about a person or event in history, the place they heard about it was AiO!)

working towards something less parent-intensive for some of the skills subjects as he grows so that you do have time/energy for science/history.

 

Enjoy his passions!

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I would follow the passion. Science and history in elementary are just about exposure. I wouldn't sacrifice a passion for that. I would try to still sneak a bit in here and there, but I wouldn't cut into music for it. Maybe SOTW audio book in the car, or Science Saturday where you pick a fun looking experiment from pinterest to do for a bit on saturday morning. 

 

For my DD, it's the opposite, she is obsessed with science. So history, music, and foreign language took a back seat to science for 1st and 2nd. Now she's in PS and they don't do science or social studies. I only worry about hitting science at home. I considered doing history as well, but she's not interested so I'm not going to. I'd rather spend all the time we can on her passion of science than split that time with history. 

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Are you saying that you are actually sitting next to him helping him practice for a hour? I would call that lessons, not his practice. In that case, no I couldn't spend an hour teaching and helping with piano and would nip that to 30 mins as we do for most other subjects. My daughter would have me work with her on her passion de jour for 5 hours a day if I let her but I have other things to tend to.

He should be able to play as many hours as he wants outside of scheduled school time. That's a different thing altogether. Maybe he needs more help organizing the things he can do independently after your shared time is over?

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In general, I think it's worth sacrificing some vision of content greatness for passions. Absolutely.

 

I also think it's okay to cut off a practice time sometimes to accomplish some core schoolwork.

 

But in this case, I don't know where the time is going. Why should a practice have to be half an hour in order to regularly accomplish some science and history? If the passion is really a passion, the kid will do it with pretty minimal encouragement. At this age, there's no need for regular schoolwork for skills to take more than an hour or two tops. Toss in maybe half an hour or hour twice a week - once for history, once for science and you've got plenty of time for passions.

 

I think the time when it starts to get hard to make choices is middle and high school - especially when the passion is in the arts and chances of financial and traditional success in the passion are limited just because you have to be incredibly good.

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I would let him practice music all he wants, but cut your time actively teaching him to a 1/2 an hour. That's already a lot of one on one time spent on music if you do it daily. I also wouldn't feel a need to do more than an hour or two of science/history a week.

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I am thinking something similar as previous posters: why such intensive schooling at 7? I get having a kid with a passion. We traveled regionally with my kid at 7 so he could speak to large crowds of people. That never took the place of school. At 7 school should take a max of 2.5 hours, maybe 3 hours. That leaves the entire afternoon to do tons of passions.

 

I understand you have multiple kids. That makes it all a big juggle. Perhaps letting go of needing to be the overseer and just let the kid play his music.

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1.5 hours for reading and math and .5 to 1 hour for rotating through other subjects, that's 2 to 2 1/2 hours per day on academics (not  seat work, just what one might consider academics). 

 

Add in the hour per day of music, and that's 3 to 3 1/2 hours per day. We had quite short schooldays when my kids were 7, but I guess I'm not seeing why you have to choose between anything at this point? 

 

I would personally consider a lot of other things first.

 

Switching to something less time-intensive for reading and math, or, if you truly love the programs you are using, using them 4 days a week and looping through other subjects on the 5th day. 

 

Working with him 30 minutes per day and letting him practice as much as he likes on his own - he will hours and hours each day even in the max time scenario. 

 

There are lots of potential adjustments and schedules, but a lot depends on the other kids, what you are using, and so on. 

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My dd was passionate about music at 7yo and practicing between 1.5-2 hours a day plus playing a lot on her own in her free time but we never had to cut any of her other schoolwork to get it done. We did core subjects like math and language arts daily with science and history every other day on alternate days.

 

She's currently practicing 3+ hours a day plus frequent travel (often long weekends but sometimes weeks at a time) for performances but still managing a full caseload (7 credits) of high school classes including AP and still having free time to pursue other interests/projects. We have not had to sacrifice anything...yet.

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How long is each subject taking? What are the age and ability ranges?  Are you combining any kids on any subjects?

If the reading, writing and math curricula are so parent intensive that history and science aren't really an option, then it seems to me changing the curricula makes the most sense.  I know 2 different homeschoolers with 5 kids each who do all those subjects daily or with a history/science schedule that's every other day and their kids still get in music practice on 2 different instruments. I know others with smaller families who fit those things in.

Note* At these boards most people include the number of kids and their ages in their signature so when they post a question readers have a sense of family size and developmental ranges without having to ask.  Our answers for people with littles are different than answers for those with all ages, those with older kids, those with larger families, and those with smaller ones.

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I personally think that making room for for the content subjects is important but I also believe it doesn't have to be done in big blocks of time to be effective either. Rethinking how you do history and science

 

Reading five minutes a day from a well written children's biography about George Washington and then spending a couple of minutes talking about the reading and then pointing out Virginia (or Great Britain or the Delaware River) on a globe is an effective lesson in history and geography for a seven year old. If you do that every day for a week, you have spent the same amount of time as on a once-a-week 60 minute long history lesson with the reading and narration and mapwork and activity and adding to a timeline and whatever else makes up that lesson in the history program that you are using. I also notice that my kids remember more about a topic when we spend a little time on it every day for a week than if I try to do all of the little things in one longer block of time.

 

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I think it's important to do some history and science.  In the case of history, it really only needs to be reading, either together or independantly for that age.  As they get older history can easily be used to practice some writing skills.  Science can be largely nature study at that age and be combined with outdoor time to a large extent. 

 

I'm a big history person, but for that age we spend about 10 min a day on history, reading from a narrative text and maybe looking at maps.

 

An hour a week on each is not a lot of time, and realistically, he may want more time to devote to music later, when history and science will also need more time.

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