imagine.more
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Posts posted by imagine.more
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I'm not sure what games he'd enjoy during breaks but you can make the actual lesson time a bit more interesting/fun. Like to review phonological awareness instead of using plain colored tiles use different colored monsters/matchbox cars to represent the phoneme sounds. You can also review sight words by writing them on a hopscotch and have him call them out as he hops on them. Or write them on a jenga game and as he pulls a jenga piece out he has to say the sound/syllable.
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I'm considering using Dynamo Math this year with my daughter. In fact I'm mostly convinced, just trying to get the guts to spend the money :)
OneStep, which Ronit Bird books have you been using with Dynamo Maths? Any tips for making it look good on paper (in public school logic, not normal people logic) that I'm going way backwards in math? We're in PA and have crazy strict portfolio requirements and the districts are starting to overstep their bounds with some other local homeschoolers, particular those with special needs students.
Princess Ariel, from what I can tell if your son has already hit a few snags in the trial and has a diagnosis of dyscalculia then it'd definitely be worthwhile. I know from experience with remediating dyslexia that it's often scary but totally worthwhile to quit the traditional grade-level curriculum for a bit and just work on remediating the underlying conceptual issues before moving on. Cheryl Swope, a classical homeschooler with 2 special needs kids who wrote Simply Classical, said she repeated an entire year of math with her son at about middle school age because he was suddenly struggling a lot with it and she was sure his math scores would go down. But at his annual test his math scores actually improved! So taking the time to get the core concepts down can be totally worth it and even in a quantifiable way.
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superlotto, while 2 hours a day of remediation might be an ideal I can assure you most parents of dyslexics don't do that and still make fantastic progress. My 12 year old DD is very ADHD and dyslexic and we do 1 hour of Barton 5 days a week. I have just been trained in Orton Gillingham myself so I can take over her tutoring independently and in my course (taught by an O-G fellow) we were not told 2 hours at all. She recommends 1 hour tutoring, 5 days a week if possible and definitely no less than 2 days a week. Since I'm homeschooling obviously I can do tutoring every day in O-G but will definitely only do 1 hour. I am adding in more language arts through Memoria Press' read-aloud and enrichment curriculum so my daughter can get the vocabulary and story exposure she needs orally without straining her in asking her to read more. So if you totaled up our language arts it'd likely cover 1.5+ hours a day but it'll be broken up and during read-alouds you can change position and let your son build with legos, play with cars/trains quietly, do a puzzle, stand on his head, or just snuggle with you as the fancy strikes him. Also, the woman I was trained by requires all her tutors to take a 5-7 minute non-educational game break sometime during each 1 hour tutoring session. That sounds sensible to me so we'll be doing something similar at home with basically 50 minutes of instruction and then 10 minutes of break alternating the whole school time. For a 7 year old you could even do 45/15 minutes, kinda like Finland does with their schools.
Btw the tutoring group I was trained with tutors even 16 year old illiterate dyslexics and you'd be amazed the progress they make with even those much older kids with just 1 hour a day of O-G. At 7 you are doing fantastic to already have identified the dyslexia and be remediating his reading intensively one-on-one. I'd suggest focusing on finding his 'currency' this summer as far as games and activities he enjoys and build those into his school day at regular intervals to keep him going and just stay super positive with him. Even as adults we all sit there and think "okay, if I finish the dishes quickly I can catch Downton Abbey at 8pm" or "if I just make it until nap time with the kids I can relax and have a coffee" lol! Those natural rewards can often be even better than physical or edible rewards.
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I also have a pro click, I got it on sale several years ago and I do use it pretty regularly. It's super useful, especially for someone like me who is so picky about paper products and who thinks binders are too bulky for things like planners. I'm ridiculous I know. But I like that I can add things to it. I can also re-use the same spine each year by taking it off the old pages and putting it on the new ones. You can also cut the spines to any size you want.
I print my daily planner in a 7 x 8.5 size, so not a standard letter size paper. That means I can cut legal size (14 x 8.5) paper in half with my scrapbook paper cutter and use that as my printer paper for the planner. I also recommend slightly heavier than normal paper for a planner, it'll be more durable and ink won't bleed through. 28-32lb is a good weight. I find the 7 x 8.5 size is a good size with plenty of room for writing but small enough that I can fit it in my purse. A homeschool-only planner can be bigger but the smaller size might still be nice if you regularly school on-the-go, do a lot of co-ops, or like to jot down notes while out and about.
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I'd rather have a federal tax break than State funds and the resulting State meddling any day.
I totally agree. I have a friend who home schools in New Zealand and they receive an annual stipend per child. And they have fewer requirements than we do in Pennsylvania.
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You can find them here.
Thanks so much for that link! I think I'll be getting my 12 year old one, I've been searching for a good student planner for her and I love the character building focus!
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The women's role is different between the Lutheran groups. Women in the ELCA can become ordained pastors. Pretty sure Catholics pray through Mary and the other saints, much like we ask others to pray for our concerns, not to them but one of our Catholic friends can clarify that point.
(putting on ELCA pastor's wife hat) Yes in the ELCA women can be ordained pastors and bishops...the current presiding bishop is female. I believe the ELCA and NALC are alone in this among Lutherans but since the ELCA is the biggest Lutheran denomination it's become almost more common to allow women pastors than not even though other denominations completely prohibit it. So it very much depends on who you ask what women's roles are in the church.
(putting on Catholic hat) yes, prayers 'to' saints and Mary are intercessory prayers, not worshipping prayers. Catholics do not worship anyone but the triune God. But we do ask saints to pray for our concerns just like we would ask a friend to pray for us. The thought is they are holy and in heaven close to God, therefore clearly good people to ask to pray for you :) Kind of like you might ask for the prayers of a pastor or devout friend more often.
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This is a great discussion for me. I have been seriously struggling for years to find somewhere I feel like I belong. I was raised Catholic, became Protestant (Baptist), and have been back to reading a lot about Catholicism and truly appreciating it. I am still not 100% that it is THE fit for me, but I know I'm much closer to Catholic than Baptist at this point.
I have been looking at Episcopalian, but the more conservative Lutheran churches may be a good fit.
Can anyone explain the differences between Episcopalian and Lutheran?
The Episcopal Church grounds their beliefs in the Book of Common Prayer (which is their formula for worship) and the traditions of their Bishops (hence Episcopalian name), and Lutherans have the Book of Concord. Of course both hold the Bible in common as primary.
Episcopals have 2 Sacraments (baptism and communion) and 5 Sacramental Rites (the other 5 Sacraments the Catholic Church has) and Lutherans only have 2 Sacraments (baptism and communion) and no explicit Sacramental Rites.
Lutheran churches see the gathering of the people of God as the authority. Episcopals see the office of the Bishop as the authority. So one is democratic, one is more top-down. Lutherans can literally vote on doctrine (this one realization that sent me running back to the Catholic Church in the middle of DH's seminary studies, lol!). The Episcopal church tends to be more able to make changes quicker because of that top-down structure. But I think (at least from what I've seen) that Lutheran churches can vary a lot more from one area to another.
The Lutheran and Episcopal Churches (well, at least the ELCA and the Episcopal Church) are in full communion with one another. So they really are incredibly similar. Lots of families switch attendance between the two if they end up in an area without many churches of their own Lutheran or Episcopal Church.
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Gosh, maybe you're right. I was thinking we had first communion only after we finished confirmation classes. But, maybe we had it before. (That was over 35 years ago!) I know I was quite a bit older than 6 though for my first communion. I would have been at least 12. Must be something each church can decide.
The (ELCA) church does seem to be slowly changing and becoming less traditional. One Lutheran church in our town allows babies to take communion! I'm not even sure how they would do that...
Actually, communing babies is done usually by the more traditional Lutherans, like the high-church ones like my husband....who would absolutely commune infants if his congregation could accept it. The more liberal churches tend to just do communion at the standard 7-8 years old and some conservative but not traditional churches do it at 6th-8th grade even.
But yes, basically if you read the Small Catechism you'll have a good basis on what Lutherans believe. That's what my husband uses in teaching confirmation class.
ELCA is extremely liberal...but depending on where you attend they can be more or less so. If you live in a more republican area you'll find slightly more conservative values but still pretty liberal theology in my experience. ELCA has open communion. They are the largest Lutheran denomination in the U.S. and grew out of the LCA I think about 40-50 years ago?
LCMS is much more conservative, traditional Lutheran. IMO they stick more closely to Luther's beliefs. Like others said, I'm fairly certain LCMS has closed communion but switching membership to LCMS is fairly easy.
Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS) is VERY conservative. They are a fairly small denomination currently.
North American Lutheran Church (NALC) is *I think* the newest denomination that grew out of pastors and congregations who were concerned that the ELCA was straying too far from traditional Christianity and from unity with the worldwide Christian Church.
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Hm, interesting, I'd seen this test elsewhere but never actually clicked the link. This time I clicked the link for fun and did it. I got all of them correct, 2 I looked at a second time to double check myself. My Dh did it and he got 8 of them correct, 3 of those he had to look at 2-3 times to get it correct. We have no Autism or anything in our families and we're both pretty average people. DH is way better adjusted than me (he's just a better person all around so people like him :) ) but I'm far more intuitive (INFP). I'm one who can walk into a new church and almost immediately pick out the trouble makers....it's like my pastor's wife super power ;)
For me I couldn't fully see each face but I was able to register a strong emotion with each one immediately even with only half-seeing it because it was so fast. Not sure, maybe that's kind of the intent? I dunno, but it was an interesting little test!
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Coffee was the treatment for ADHD before Ritalin. Many adults help manage their ADHD with coffee.
(The other ideas are good, too, just throwing this out there as an easy, inexpensive help.)
This is what my DH uses :) He drinks insane amounts of coffee and it truly helps him focus, he's a mess without coffee, he started drinking it at 12 which I think is too young for many but for a 16+ I definitely think a big cup of coffee in the morning along with protein and the other natural suggestions can help.
Also, I've read that for people with ADHD coffee does not make them hyper or impede sleep. I know my DH at least can drink coffee right before bed and sleep great. It baffles me as a non-ADHD person but it seems to work for him.
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geodob, yes you are right that we kind of are already an informal group. I'm not sure how much clout we'd have but it might not hurt to ask.
mommymonster, I agree we'd have to really look into it more in depth to make sure we could justify meeting the qualifications. A few emails or phone calls could sort out how they view schools and co-ops and other less formal organizations.
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I was just checking out Dynamo Maths and the more I learn about it the more I think I'd like to try it for Daisy for next year (possibly starting this summer). But why does everything for special needs kids have to be so expensive!? I'm already stretching us thin to meet her needs in reading through Barton (which she has made fantastic progress in) and by getting myself O-G trained next month.
Looking at the actual order form I realized that a 1 year school subscription for up to 5 students is $173.50. But an in-home subscription for one family for 1 year is $159.00. Is it just me or does that seem silly?
Crazy Idea Alert: There is no school code place on the order form. It just wants a school/organization name and address. What if 3-5 of us got together as an informal "organization" and ordered it as if we were a school and used it? It's online-based so there's no software I don't think. We could even have someone call and ask about if it can be used with a "multi-campus" school ;) If we did that we could all use Dynamo Maths for a fraction of the cost.
If we had 5 people it would be $34.70 per person per year.
If we had 4 people it would be $43.38 per person per year.
If we had 3 people it would be $57.83 per person per year.
Heck, for that matter if just 2 of us wanted to do it it would be $86.75, still a savings of $72.25 for each of us.
It's only a 1 year subscription so people would be free to go a different direction the next year, no big deal. And for those of us hoping to try it but new to it even if it's a total fail (doubtful) we'd have gotten the chance to try it for the year with less financial risk. I don't know if we could get away with calling ourselves an organization but it couldn't hurt to try, right?
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Georgia, South Carolina, or North Carolina are the best IMO. West Virginia has a very low COL but extraordinarily low pay (been there, done that). Pennsylvania is not nearly so low COL as native PA people think it is and the pay is only average at best. Maryland, New Jersey, Delaware I've always heard of as high COL areas though I've not lived there. MA and CT and high COL. NH can be low COL but only if, like West Virginia, you're willing to take a significant pay cut.
Georgia still has a somewhat low COL (though it's creeping up steadily at least where home prices and gas are concerned) and excellent job opportunities with good pay, especially around Atlanta. South Carolina has decent pay and very low COL. North Carolina's COL is slightly lower than Georgia and yet has a higher pay depending on the job.
We've been looking at the same things and we're fairly settled on North Carolina as the place we want to focus DH's job hunt.
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Ooh, this is such a great offer!
Did you ever struggle with wanting to be of the same race/ethnicity as your adoptive family?
How can an adoptive mom help a transracially adopted daughter realize she's beautiful?
(you can tell what issues we're having...I'm fielding constant comments of "I wish I had hair like _______" and "Can I straighten my hair?" and "Tahlia has such beautiful blue eyes, I want blue eyes")
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Thanks so much, this gives me a great list for next year! He's already read many of them but even with that I can easily pull out a dozen from this list to strew about the house for him to read so he quits pilfering my bookshelves :)
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Alice in Wonderland, duh, how did I not think of that?
And I adore the James Herriot Treasury for Children, thanks for reminding me of that!
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My son will be 6 this summer so I'm currently planning curriculum for fall, his 1st grade year though it'll be mostly 2nd grade work. His reading however is way ahead of everything else and this year he (yet again) shocked me by jumping several levels ahead in decoding and comprehension. Last time I checked this he was decoding about a 6th grade level and comprehending a 3rd grade level but that was this fall before his mental growth spurt when he started reading more challenging chapter books without my knowledge before bed so I'd say he's currently decoding at 7-8th and comprehending at a 4th grade level.
So this year he read, independently, Mr. Popper's Penguins, the first 3 Narnia books, Sparks Story Bible (80% of it at least), Charlotte's Web (twice), Frog and Toad, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, and many more I can't remember at the moment. I'm running out of appropriate chapter books for him. Harry Potter is definitely the highest I'll let him go in the mature-content area....I've already warned him he's not allowed to read Harry Potter 2 until next year and #3 until 8 and #4 until 10 because the content jumps up quite a bit in the 4th book. He's read half of the Magic Treehouse Series and all the classic Beatrix Potter, A.A. Milne, etc.
Anyway, so what books in the 3rd-6th grade reading level did your advanced readers enjoy that were appropriate for a 6 year old boy? He's not overly sensitive to things but I want to maintain a certain level of innocence of course. I'm thinking Stuart Little by EB White would be a good one he hasn't read yet and I might read aloud The Hobbit with him but am blanking on others.
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As far as the ability to create well-informed thoughts and communicate them clearly my 5 year old does excellent, on par with his academic level in other areas. But putting pencil to paper? Not at all. He's exactly on grade level, Kindergarten, with actual writing. Each letter is still formed individually and getting him to do copy work, even short things, is like pulling teeth.
So yes, I'd say writing does tend to be the one thing accelerated kids are often not accelerated in for the reasons Kai mentioned above. Motor skills are often not affected by sheer brain power...in fact some gifted kids are behind in certain motor skills, my son being one of them. That theory would fit with several other posters' responses that their advanced learners are advanced writers when typing, but not in handwriting....or what I've often seen which is that advanced kids are not always advanced writers in K-2nd grade but by high school have become advanced writers. Essentially their fine motor skills and executive functioning have finally caught up with their verbal and reasoning abilities. That's just my thought based purely on anecdotal evidence. But it is interesting to see everyone's experiences.
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I'm trying to nail down my curriculum plans for next year.
My son (age 6, first grade next year) is finishing up First Language Lessons this year and reading 4-6th grade books for leisure and school. He hates writing (like physically holding a pencil, lol) but does well with oral narrations.
My new adoptive daughter (age 12, sixth grade next year) just started homeschooling this February and is remediating with Barton Reading and Spelling Level 2 for her dyslexia and is generally working on a 1st grade level. She writes easily but with poor structure...so oral narrations are a struggle for her but copy work is no problem, even very long passages.
I lean heavily towards the Classical side of things (Well-Trained Mind, Circe, Ambleside Online, etc). I'm a former lit major and would love to handcraft their Language Arts curriculum but with all I have to keep up with on a daily basis I'm not sure if I have the time or mental capacity right now to do that. So I need something fairly open-and-go, very classical, and ideally something I can use with both kids.
I like the look of Writing With Ease and think it would likely dovetail nicely with First Language Lessons and our other WTM-suggested curricula. But then I saw Classical Writing-Primer and Classical Writing-Aesop and they seem like they'd be a wonderful match. I love the seasonal focus on the Primer one, but worry it might be too young for my 6th grader? And I'm just not sure how the two compare.
Has anyone here used WWE and Classical Writing? Which would you recommend? Or has anyone handcrafted a WTM-ish Language Arts program for their kids (without the benefit of a classical education themselves)?
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Honestly, I started gaining weight in 8th grade. I went away to Outward Bound that summer before high school(by my own choice), and after 3 weeks of backpacking in the NC heat/humidity mountains, I came home several sizes lighter. Best weight loss that could have happened! Nothing like being hungry all the time, exercising 20 hours a day, and sweating in the summer humidity.
I seriously had an awesome/amazing time, but I truly lost a lot of weight that summer. And kept it off until college.....sigh.
This is actually how I finally lost weight as a teen too. I wasn't quite overweight though I hovered on the edge of it and was certainly out of shape from age 14-17. But then a few things helped. First, I spent two entire summers working as a horseback riding instructor at the YMCA. 50 hours a week lifting hay bales, mucking a dozen stalls, feeding and brushing and caring for a dozen horses, teaching 3 1-hour classes a day in a hot arena, and being unable to just leave to get lunch/snack most days. I not only lost shape but had muscle and energy and just felt good about myself. I think for teens, and anyone really, meaningful hard work is the best way to lose weight and gain strength. Maybe see if there are any summer camps or volunteering opportunities where he could get really active.
And we're currently in a similar situation with my 12 year old adoptive DD. She's in the 97th percentile and well into the overweight category for her age and height :( Her issue is clear though....she overeats, sneaks food, and doesn't like to be active. We're slowly getting her into activities she enjoys...cheerleading and swimming, and I at least see a change in her energy level for the better so I think it's a good start.
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I agree, it is extremely costly. We have had to stretch ourselves a lot just to purchase it at all and that is with re-selling each level as we finish (we are halfway through level 2 currently and we sold level 1 for $208 when I bought it for $250 so not a bad re-sale at all!) Anyway, re-selling is the only way we're able to keep afloat with this program, and I use it because I know that DD needs it. Everyone else is right that tutoring for dyslexia would cost far more, so I keep reminding myself that in the end this is saving us money compared to private tutoring. We also just don't have tutors close enough to use so Barton was our only chance to get started on O-G until I can take the official course and learn it myself this summer (a friend got me in to the class at no cost to me). After I've taken the class I'll likely sell my last Barton level and move on from there independently.
And yes, to move through the program in just one month is pretty fast. It took us 1 month to get through level 1 but it's looking like it should take 2 months to get through level 2 and I've heard each level takes slightly longer, with 4 and 5 taking about 6-9 months, so a full school year. Maybe using All About Reading with some extra O-G exercises would be sufficient in your case?
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I think if your daughter is under 90lbs you don't need to be too concerned about it happening within a year or two. Typically (though not always of course) girls hit puberty right around the point they hit 100lbs....which is why thinner/smaller girls like gymnasts tend to hit it later. Again, this isn't a hard and fast rule but it is a general guideline I was told by a nurse. So if your daughter hits 100lbs early then definitely be on the lookout for puberty to start any time.
Anyway, my adoptive daughter got her first period at 9! It's been a bit of a struggle for her but now that she's 12 and her friends are hitting puberty it's evening out just a bit. My aunt got her period at 9 and her mother hadn't thought to explain it to her yet since she was so young. It started just before school and instead of going to school she hid in the laundry room crying all day, convinced something was horribly wrong with her. Her mom found out when she got home from work that afternoon! So yeah, my mom explained to my sister and I the ins and outs quite early (probably around 7) just in case because that experience was so traumatic for her younger sister. I plan to watch carefully for signs of puberty and if I can I'll wait until age 9-10 but if she shows signs I'll definitely explain things earlier. So since the doctor thinks her early teeth development might be a sign then I think it's worth considering broaching the topic gradually over the next couple of years.
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One thing I think that is key to any of these conversations is that ultimately it boils down to having trust in yourself that you can provide the education you envision. I was at a homeschool meeting last night and most of the moms were new homeschoolers. The anxiety and overwhelmed emotions were high. It seemed the intensity of the feelings came from comparing themselves to schools and wanting similar to school output.
Teaching from your core educational values and meeting your objectives puts you in the drivers seat and controlling the direction vs. feeling like you are lost and constantly feeling like you need to find someone else's directions to make sure you aren't lost (or wrong by their definition.)
Believing in yourself and that you can forge a solid educational path for your kids and that schools do not have the answer or need to be replicated is the real starting place.
I love this, I think this clarifies the "teaching from a state of rest" thing so much. Thank you.
OP, I'm currently musing on the exact same things.
8FilltheHeart, I'm like you, I love reading about educational methodologies. And I agree that in general the WTM forum isn't the ideal place for those bigger conversations. Too many people here and you're right, a lot are just in the nitty gritty trying to get that 6 year old to figure out phonics or keep the high schooler on track while keeping up with the laundry :) And I'm there too I suppose but I also like to retreat into the world of ideas and ideals to refresh myself and bring a focus back to our homeschooling. Without it I am often overtaken with the tyranny of the urgent...as Susan Wise Bauer mentions in her talk on educating ourselves while we educate our children.
Of course marrying those big ideas to the nitty gritty is where I kind of fall flat. :) I suppose that's exactly where the OP is too. And I suspect there is a decent group of us in the exact same place.
Morning Sickness Poll
in The Chat Board
Posted
#1, boy: Intermittent nausea, threw up a handful of times for sure and car rides were terrible but mostly just extreme fatigue and food aversions
#2, boy: All day nausea all 9 months, mostly laid listless on the couch nibbling crackers and peanut butter as it was all I could keep down
#3, girl: Strong nausea most of the day from 5-12 weeks then mysteriously disappeared and never returned. Great pregnancy!
My theory is that I'm just allergic to boys ;)