Next year will be my first year officially homeschooling both my children ds8 who will be doing bigger hearts and dd4 who will be in little hearts and I'm having a really tough time coming up with a schedule. I feel like I'll have to spend so much one on one time with ds because he has learning disablilites and needs almost everything presented one on one. What kinds of things should my daughter be doing while I'm working with my son? How do you guys plan your days with more than one child? I just don't want my dd to be bored or to get lost in the shuffle.

wow! that's a great one!

Thanks for the tip. I was actually wondering if it would be worth it to be a super member.:001_smile:

I feel for you... My son went to Kindergarten in ps, then we pulled him out to homeschool. So, he thinks that ps is like Kindergarten and they just play all day even in 1st and 2nd grade and hs is soooooo boring because he actually has to read, write, and do real math - plus there's only his little sister to play with. His biggest complaint is there's NO RECESS! I mean he's got a point and I do feel bad and about once a week I question our decision to hs. However, I always come back to the same conclusion- we took him out of school for a reason and I still believe the best place for him to learn (at least for now) is at home. So, what to do about friends? He has karate 2 times a week and there are some kids he's friendly with there - but it's not the same as free play - it's very structured. We also go to church twice a week - but again that's very structured time, not free time. We don't live in a neighborhood where there are other kids to play with. Anyway, all this to say that I have far from solved this problem, but there are 2 steps I have taken. I have started to try to take advantage of times we are with others to make more time for my son to play with his friends. For example, my husband always spends tons of time after church hanging around in the lobby talking to people and I used to always try to hurry him out. Now, we let my son bring a football and he and a couple of boys will play outside for a while while my husband chats and I wait (somewhat) patiently for everyone to be ready to leave. Also, I've kind of unofficially made Friday after school "invite a friend over" day. Any Friday that we don't have some other committment I make it a point to invite a friend over for my son to play with. And the kids are not always the same age as him. I've found that he plays well with slightly older and slighty younger kids also, so his friends (who are mostly from church) are all ages. So, my son still wants to go back to school, but I feel better about the amount of time he's having with other kids now.

I just got the hands of a child type it in lapbook for insects - it was a little pricey, but I just wanted to see if that made a difference for him. It seems pretty cool!

:lurk5:

I know this is strange, but even though we go to the library just about every week - it never occurred to me to look for art stuff there. They actually had a ton of great stuff!

Wow! That littlecitykids website is great! You wouldn't even need any other curriculum1

that's cool! Does anyone know if there's anything similar for mac?

My son had a very bad taste in his mouth from ps. So when we first started hs'ing he never wanted to do work. I gave him a cup and I told him that each day he had the oppurtunity to earn up to 30 bingo chips each day for good behavior. Each chip was worth one minute of computer/videogame time. I would also occasionally take away chips for really bad behavior, but I tried to use it mostly for positive reinforcement. It worked like a charm for him.

:001_smile:

what are your favorite?

These are great sites guys! Thanks!

I downloaded a free font from DonnaYoung.com.

I used math u see for 2 years with my visual/tactile son. It's a wonderful program and it is visual, but it didn't work out for us. We had two problems... First, they only show you one approach to teaching each lesson. My son often needs things presented in several different ways before he catches on. I was spending a lot of time online trying to find new ways to present things. Also my son has dyscalcula and memorizing facts is really hard for him. Unfortunately, each level of math u see focuses solely on mastering one set of facts after another. For example their alpha book is just learning addition and subtraction facts. No measuring, fractions, graphing... Nothing. I understand the concept that mastering the facts comes first and enables them to solve other types of problems more easily later, but my son felt like such a failure because it only focused on the things he was bad at and didn't include any math topics he's good at. We are now using math on the level and it's wonderful. It gives you several different ways to teach each concept, uses real life experiences as often as possible and gives you flexibilty to teach things as your child is ready to learn them. Also, they have a great yahoo group where you can ask question or get ideas from other moms and from the woman who wrote the curriculum. Anyway, sorry if this sounds like an advertisment, but it has changed the way my son feels about math and his confidence has improved so much... I'm a huge fan.

What are your favorite?

:lurk5:

I agree. It is not at all necessary:001_smile:

Thankyou for this list! It all makes so much more sense now!

Thanks for the great ideas. Sometimes I get way too bogged down in what he. "Should" be doing and I forget that the reason we took him out of ps in the first place is so that he won't constantly be bombarded with work that is just too difficult for him. Ok now I have another question... how do you go about the whole lapbooking process? Usually we will read a book (or part of one if it's long) or what an educational movie on the topic each day and do 2-3 lapbook pieces a dAy. What do you guys do?

My son is a very visual learner and I've heard that a lot of visual learners benefit from lapbooking so we've tried a couple. Here's the problem... He also has dysgraphia so writing, cutting, and pasting are really frustrating for him. I've found that a lot of the lapbooks require tons of writing and cutting. I've started cutting things out for him which helps somewhat (although it's a bit time consuming for me). Does anyone have any tips on how to do lapbooking for a visual learner without so much writing?

:D This was a great question! I'm glad you asked. I also found the info very helpful as I too have a VSL.

I love the workbox system. We started it right before Christmas because my son was always asking are we done yet and complaining about doing work. As soon as we started using it his attitude totally improved. I think he just needs that visual cue to see exactly what he has to get done each day and the reward of seeing the boxes disappear off the shelves as he completes each task. I have 12 shoebox sized containers set up on 4 shelves. I use 2 boxes for math, 2 for reading/phonics, 1 for grammar, 3 for science/history (whatever we're working on that day, 1 for bible, 1 for spelling, and the last 2 I use for art, crafts, literature, etc. (basically whatever I want to get done that day.) I break math and reading into 2 boxes each because my son would get very overwhelmed if there is too much presented at once so I'll break his assignments up and put half in each box. Also, at first I made him do all the boxes in order but now I pretty much let him pick which order he does the boxes in as long as he gets them all done. Like anything it's a great system but you really just have to tweak it for whatever works best for your home.

I love it! I started using it a few months ago with my son who is a VERY reluctant writer and it's been great. It's nice because each lesson comes with ideas for modifying it for a less mature or more mature writer. So I am able to modify the lesson to fit his writing level with basically no thought or effort on my part. I would definitely recommend it. Before I bought it I did the sample lesson plans with my son to see if he would like it. You could try that.

I think that there are some things our kids just aren't going to like and that's that. If it's something that's important to their education, they're just going to have to do it anyway whether they like it or not. But also changing the way you present material in some cases can change the way a kid feel about a certain subject. Sometimes if you can teach a subject in a way that matches the child's interests or learning style/preference it makes a huge difference (at least with my son it does).