time blocks and unit studies...vs. class periods...

[Linda in NM]

I'm wondering the "how" of teaching highschool...in 8th grade, we float (with a general schedule, but we're not rigidly adhered to it)--language arts, literature, history, and health or geography in the morning (with the unit study approach of Trisms); algebra, science, foreign languages, logic, art, music in the afternoons (not all on the same day!) I'm wondering if I want to keep my mornings less structured, using, again, Trisms Ancients, and go to "formal periods" in the afternoons? I'm waffling, and I'd like any opinions on what has worked or not worked for you all...my son is an "only," but we usually have to leave the house late afternoons for various sports activities...

[Jane in NC]

Hi Linda,

 

I present my son on Monday morning with a schedule for the week. Everything is subject to change, of course, but I am usually pretty good at predicting about how much can be accomplished within a particular timeframe. Anyway, I want my son to work on each subject at least four days a week. There are times when he is, say, on a role in Latin and just wants to continue doing it. Fine. But I think that it is a mistake not to schedule math and foreign language on an almost daily basis. (If my son were not an avid reader, I think that I would also schedule some daily reading time.)

 

This year my son is also doing AP Biology. With AP there is so much work that one needs to schedule a minimum of an hour and a half a day (or more) on that subject. At least this is what we have found with biology.

 

Because science labs can require a longer time period, some flexibility in the day is needed, in my opinion. We sometimes do labs on the weekend. Alternately, if you spend an afternoon doing a lab, you can work on a history project (or whatever) the next day to compensate for time lost.

 

My son was taking power skating lessons last year that interupted our school day. It was not unusual to find my son in the car with books or for us to listen to books on tape while on the road.

 

Good luck in figuring it all out!

Jane

[Nan in Mass]

So we have a schedule. We don't stick to it, but we don't stick to it a different way each day, so it evens out and we hit everything in about the proportions that I've decided on at the beginning of the year. Luckily, the makers of textbooks have a pretty good idea of how much it is possible to cover in a typical school year. We just do the next thing. The textbook-less things are easy for me to replan when I see that I've misjudged. The schedule lets us know when we are done, too, something nice for us not very academicly minded bears of little brain. The schedule helps us balance our free time and school, and makes sure that enough of both happen. It is easy in high school to have academics take over every other aspect of growing up, which we have chosen not to do. We have subjects that we have to hit twice a day or we don't learn them - foreign languages and math. We're seive-brained and a day is too long and everything gets forgotten. So we have the traditional schedule/homework sort of thing. It is what we do during the time slots that makes us the non-traditional schoolers that we are.

-Nan

[Linda in NM]

Thanks, Jane...that's what I'm leaning towards, I think...we do a lot of books on tape--got Great Gatsby and Nick Adams stories (as well as WWII) scheduled for our trip to Utah to the Rocky Mtn District Select Camp...my husband wants us to drive. That would be me and the boy...and maybe my "other son"--my son's hockey buddy...

[Linda in NM]

Wow--do you do more than one foreign language? I'd like him to continue with Latin, but he'd probably rather just continue with German...in 9th grade, which was my jr. high, I did Biology, Latin, French, English, Home Ec, and Algebra...and PE twice/week, I think it was...back in the dark ages. (I think PE and Home Ec shared a time slot...)

[Jane in NC]

Wow--do you do more than one foreign language?

 

Not Nan but my son does both French and Latin. I'll admit that it can be challenging.

 

Jane

[Nan in Mass]

Multiple languages definately eat up time.

 

And I forgot to say that we, too, spend lots of time doing schoolwork in the car.

[Linda in NM]

Um...do you have foreign language materials that you use in the car?

[Nan in Mass]

When anybody is doing Pimsleur tapes, those of course go in the car fine. Mine do Latin in the car all the time, but that is just a matter of doing flashcards or written excersizes. We read aloud in the car. We discuss things in the car. We listen to TC tapes. They read to themselves or do written work. Every once in awhile someone will bring a laptop and work on writing a paper. That sort of thing. My children like the car because it is comparatively free from distractions.

-Nan

[Linda in NM]

Thanks, Nan--we listen to books on CD in the car...I'm thinking about some language CDs--wonder what's available...hmmm.