So my dc children are currently in bm school and not doing very well, particularly in math. I posted asking for help about a month or so ago and have been consistently working with them at home about 6 days a week. Since then,my husband has finally agreed to the possibility of bringing them home as early as February or March. This is super exciting(also scary) for me because we have been going back and forth about this for years. So, the plan right now is to have my dd return to school in the fall for 7th I would like to keep home longer but she LOVEs school and is very social. I really would like to keep my ds who is in 4th home through middle school and revisit bm school for HS. But we shall see. So I am kind of wondering about getting them "caught up" . How much is realistic? Based on several test my 4th grader needs to go back to 2nd grade math and my 6th grader is not much better. Lots of holes. Do we just focus heavily on math once they are home? My thought is to let them listen to and read plenty of books(they really enjoy reading) and maybe choose one other focus for direct instruction. Let them self guide based on interest, my ds wants more science and dd wants art and Japanese. Unfortunately, especially with dd since she will return to school pretty soon, we wont have time to really "deschool" per say. SO I guess my real questions are 1: Can we get caught up ? 2: How long has it taken others in similar circumstances to get caught up? Also as a side question since homeschooling generally takes less time and children go beyond in subjects why does it seem that most people choose to work on "grade level" with typical kids? Or is some of it just developmental? Working more in depth or spending time to cover other interest ? I say this knowing that "most" means nothing and assumes a lot about a group that may not be true....

I run a LEGO Robotics club at my children's school. I started out with JrFll and ended up not using because the format didn't work for us. We only use WEDO right now. You have gotten some great suggestions. Here is a another website that I found helpful:http://www.legoengineering.com/get-started/ I bought this book:http://www.amazon.com/Elementary-Robotics-Sustaining-Engineering-Instincts/dp/1493524194/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1447466630&sr=8-1&keywords=elementary+robotics&pebp=1447466638105&perid=09ZMEWVJKPPHMWPV1A81 The book is more helpful if you plan to have a more structured class with particular goals in mind. I found it helpful but you could definitely get by just using free sites on line. The no starch press books are also great.

A mini follow up: I am super excited about my curriculum that is coming in the mail in a few days! For my dd(6th) I decided to mainly focus on fractions for right now. I purchased both the mm and key to fraction sets. Ill see when they arrive if I will mainly use one or the other. I also ordered BA 3A. Both kiddos can read the guide, but right now I plan to just have dd do the practice book. I ended up buying some used math-u-see blocks and started playing addition games from crewtonramoneshouseofmath.com/ with my son. Amazing how his brain picked up the colors and was able to remember the facts so much better! I will go through some of the Beta MUS ( which a very kind person lent us) which covers addition and subtraction with ds for now. I do sprinkle in at least 1 challenge problem( current 4th school math) to help him use the skills he knows to work them out. We continue to do skip counting and multiplication facts. I really wanted to buy the Ronit Bird but we don't have an Ipad. My kids really enjoyed the dragronbox game and I see they are coming out with a numbers game that looks like using cuisenaire rods. I think this will be helpful for ds. From what I have read it seems he may have dyscalculia among other things. A big part is building their self esteem up and keeping up our practice daily. I know there is a long road in front of us. I am encouraged by the tiny amount of growth I have seen in the last few weeks. Thank you for all the ideas!

Thank you for your thoughts. I greatly appreciate your view it is so full of hope. Today my dc improved by 4mins on a times table drill he did yesterday and again today during our fact boot camp. There is hope.

I do think there is some type of math learning problem. That being said I always get "When we work in small groups he does ok". He was also pulled by a math tutor who would help kids in our school and she said the same thing, but also that there were some things she didn't quite get that he did. Even with small numbers it is very hard for him do mental calculations or explain a relationship between numbers. If you were to ask him, What is the difference between 8 and 10, how far apart are they? He can't tell you right away. I just asked to be sure...he said one. Yet he understands what he needs to do with word problems some to most of the time , although he has to use all kinds of ways to figure the math out. He can show you with objects what a multiplication problem looks like. I will look into CSMP. LOL. Yes I think for some kids they need math to be a bit more straight forward. I also work at the dc school and I think for some kids the math works. It works for the middle of the road kid not too good at math and not a kid who needs more structure and explicit teaching. Traditional algorithms are taught in later grades. Sadly, for my kids they need more explicit teaching. Also there are student books now ,so more structured than what you are talking about. I have tried helping them but it hasn't been a long concerted effort on my part. I feel frustrated that they go to school all day and I have to reteach them. For awhile I thought it was just confusing for them having school do one thing and me doing something else. I also felt strongly about having to do school twice. We have tried to make it work. Sigh. At this point I just want to make sure they learn math and I am not going to worry about what is happening at school. I was homeschooled the majority of my life and while there are some really good things about our school, there are some things I just don't understand. Thank you for all the responses I will check out all the info you have sent my way. My kiddos love graphic novels so I may just get the BA to have around until they can catch up to it. In the meantime I will check into the other programs for the spine of our after schooling.

Yes, that is the same curriculum! We could not cover cost for both children for Kumon...as it is paying a tutor for 1 day a week is hard but doable. I will check Singapore and MM out. Thank you all for the suggestions!

I have 2 dc children in grades 4th and 6th. They both attend a charter school that uses Investigations math curriculum. Both children have been struggling through math for quite sometime...My eldest has attended the schools free tutoring once a week for quite sometime. While she feels it helps I don't see much progress. My youngest struggles the most and does not seem to understand number relationships, really at all. I am not at a place where I can pull them out of school or place dc in a different school, but I am committed to afterschool them . My eldest is getting some out of school tutoring once a week also. Both dc children were born quite early (10 &12 wks) and I have been told preemies tend to struggle in math. Not sure how true this is. I mostly want some realistic curriculum ideas. I love the idea of Beast Academy but don't know that it would be appropriate for children that are struggling. We have the first few books of LOF but I feel like they need more practice more bang for my time. My math experience/foundation was/is not that great, so I feel like I need something that really helps the teacher teach. Currently we are doing fact boot camp for the month of October and I will add something in November. The youngest dc teacher said she felt that a lot of her class was lacking in math skills due to the heavy focus on reading(due to law changes in our state) for 3rd grade. I think my youngest child may easily be 2 grades behind and eldest not much better. Is it even possible to get them where they need to be? Any ideas would be helpful... Thank you