Feel like I'm falling behind..... (long, sorry)

[Hunter's Moon]

Due to illnesses (Kidney infection, sinus infections, bad allergies, even now have a stomach bug not bad thank God), having friends stay for an extended amount of time (family issues, they were here for 2 months and they are ''homeschoolers'' but just using it as an excuse not to drop out, they're twin sisters so I wasnt really able to get schooling done with them here) and shoveling, I really feel like my schoolwork is starting to slip. I'm behind in most things. Math and Science will be finished by June, but mostly everything else won't be done until July. I have SATs in May and am applying for 3 colleges in August so I need to get this stuff done.

I've made schedule after schedule but it never gets stuck to. My latest scheduling dilemma is should I start school early, or sleep in and start later.

I'm overwhelmed because I went from public school where all assignments were planned and graded by someone else to doing in all on my own. I've already talked to my mother about it all. She was making History and Health tests for awhile, but it is just easier to control it all myself, and she was fine with that.

Its taken me a bit, but I've finally realized all this researching, planning, scheduling, and grading needs to be done by me or it takes me more time to help my mom figure out where to find the answers in the TM, how to grade the worksheets/tests, etc. (She has dementia so it is harder for her to figure these things out).

I guess I'm just looking for advice, suggestions, something along those lines.

I really want to blame my mom, she doesn't work outside the home but still ca't help me, but I've realized blaming her just hurts us both and gets me no where.

I know this is good practice for college, but even then someone Will assign and grade my work.

If you've read this far, thanks. I didn't intend it to get this long.

[Colleen in NS]

Due to illnesses (Kidney infection, sinus infections, bad allergies, even now have a stomach bug not bad thank God), having friends stay for an extended amount of time (family issues, they were here for 2 months and they are ''homeschoolers'' but just using it as an excuse not to drop out, they're twin sisters so I wasnt really able to get schooling done with them here) and shoveling, I really feel like my schoolwork is starting to slip. I'm behind in most things. Math and Science will be finished by June, but mostly everything else won't be done until July. I have SATs in May and am applying for 3 colleges in August so I need to get this stuff done.

I've made schedule after schedule but it never gets stuck to. My latest scheduling dilemma is should I start school early, or sleep in and start later.

I'm overwhelmed because I went from public school where all assignments were planned and graded by someone else to doing in all on my own. I've already talked to my mother about it all. She was making History and Health tests for awhile, but it is just easier to control it all myself, and she was fine with that.

Its taken me a bit, but I've finally realized all this researching, planning, scheduling, and grading needs to be done by me or it takes me more time to help my mom figure out where to find the answers in the TM, how to grade the worksheets/tests, etc. (She has dementia so it is harder for her to figure these things out).

I guess I'm just looking for advice, suggestions, something along those lines.

I really want to blame my mom, she doesn't work outside the home but still ca't help me, but I've realized blaming her just hurts us both and gets me no where.

I know this is good practice for college, but even then someone Will assign and grade my work.

If you've read this far, thanks. I didn't intend it to get this long.

 

I just love reading about your journey!!!!

 

OK, so. You've gotten behind. But you strike me as so motivated, that I have no doubt you'll pick up again.

 

I have to say that you sound like me, on the homeschooling Mom side of things. I get sidetracked at times, esp. if we've gone away for a couple of weeks or have had faraway visitors. At first, I find it hard to get back into the schooling routine. It takes me a day or two to kick myself back into action, but once I do, we get back into it. I also get bored by the same routine, so I tend to start tweaking our schedule! Not by a lot, and not to eliminate what I think is important, but I just get bored. (although sometimes when this happens, I change the furniture around instead, lol!) But I don't let myself get sidetracked or bored enough that we don't accomplish what I set out to accomplish for a year. It's VERY important to me to try to meet certain goals each year.

 

And I think you are wise to recognize that you might not be able to depend on your mother, in your situation. It must be hard for you, though. Again, like looking into a mirror, I, as the homeschooling Mom here, am THE engineer. I am IT. The buck stops with me regarding homeschooling. I do all the research, I find the books, I do the planning, the scheduling, the learning how to teach, etc. etc. And these kids keep growing and so I have to keep doing something new each year! :D Anyway, in a way, you are the homeschooling Mom as well as the student.

 

You are doing your best in your situation, and you can do no better than that. Cheers to you, Stephanie! You will get your groove back. And I'm sure you are doing better than you think you are. Remember, it's also winter, and things can get blah in winter in the northeast. :D (oh, and you might want to be more protective about your time, next time, if possible. They might have family situations going on, but you also need your education, esp. in your own home.)

Edited January 27, 2011 by Colleen in NS

[Hunter's Moon]

I just love reading about your journey!!!!

 

OK, so. You've gotten behind. But you strike me as so motivated, that I have no doubt you'll pick up again.

 

I have to say that you sound like me, on the homeschooling Mom side of things. I get sidetracked at times, esp. if we've gone away for a couple of weeks or have had faraway visitors. At first, I find it hard to get back into the schooling routine. It takes me a day or two to kick myself back into action, but once I do, we get back into it. I also get bored by the same routine, so I tend to start tweaking our schedule! Not by a lot, and not to eliminate what I think is important, but I just get bored. (although sometimes when this happens, I change the furniture around instead, lol!) But I don't let myself get sidetracked or bored enough that we don't accomplish what I set out to accomplish for a year. It's VERY important to me to try to meet certain goals each year.

 

And I think you are wise to recognize that you might not be able to depend on your mother, in your situation. It must be hard for you, though. Again, like looking into a mirror, I, as the homeschooling Mom here, am THE engineer. I am IT. The buck stops with me regarding homeschooling. I do all the research, I find the books, I do the planning, the scheduling, the learning how to teach, etc. etc. And these kids keep growing and so I have to keep doing something new each year! :D Anyway, in a way, you are the homeschooling Mom as well as the student.

 

You are doing your best in your situation, and you can do no better than that. Cheers to you, Stephanie! You will get your groove back. And I'm sure you are doing better than you think you are. Remember, it's also winter, and things can get blah in winter in the northeast. :D (oh, and you might want to be more protective about your time, next time, if possible. They might have family situations going on, but you also need your education, esp. in your own home.)

 

Thank you, I appreciate your input.

I think I need to learn to balance and split up all the different aspects of homeschooling (researching, planning, scheduling, grading).

Looking back, I definitely should have set up stricter boundaries but we were in close quarters. (my sisters old room is connected to mine, so we were always together.) Hoping that Will never happen again but who knows.

Thanks! :)

[Colleen in NS]

I think I need to learn to balance and split up all the different aspects of homeschooling (researching, planning, scheduling, grading).

 

You have a lot on your plate for someone your age! :grouphug: Hang in there. It'll all benefit you in the long run.

[Halcyon]

You sound like a really self-motivated individual, and from reading your blog I have no doubt that you will get yourself back on track. Sometimes life throws us curveballs; it will happen ALL your life, believe me. But you just keep on keeping on...keep chugging along, set a certain amount of time each day to devote to your studies, and you WILL get it done. It sounds like you've had a lot on your plate. Be patient with yourself, but at the same time, be disciplined. It might help you to take your work to the library-I find that being in a different setting than home often helped me (when I was your age) to really get things done. There were fewer distractions and it was nice and quiet.

 

Good luck to you. One step in front of the other, kwim?

[Hunter's Moon]

You sound like a really self-motivated individual, and from reading your blog I have no doubt that you will get yourself back on track. Sometimes life throws us curveballs; it will happen ALL your life, believe me. But you just keep on keeping on...keep chugging along, set a certain amount of time each day to devote to your studies, and you WILL get it done. It sounds like you've had a lot on your plate. Be patient with yourself, but at the same time, be disciplined. It might help you to take your work to the library-I find that being in a different setting than home often helped me (when I was your age) to really get things done. There were fewer distractions and it was nice and quiet.

 

Good luck to you. One step in front of the other, kwim?

 

Thank you.

Self-discipline is hard after going to public school, but I'm getting there.

Going to the library sounds like a good idea. The one I can walk to is only open three days a week (one of those is Saturday), but it might be a nice change.

Thanks :)

[Susan C.]

Hi Stephanie,

We have more productive times of homeschooling, and less productive ones. It all evens out, and by the end of the year, you will find you got a lot done. Public schools have a lot of wasted time, but they still count the days. And, they don't finish their books either. If you can get 3/4's of the texts finished, you will probably be in very good shape.

 

Maybe on Sunday night (or Friday after you are finished with your school) do your planning and grading. Then you can just work during the week. Make yourself stick to your deadlines except for the very few times where you put too much work on the schedule.

[Teachin'Mine]

Stephanie, even if you finish in July, that will be fine. You've got a good idea of what took away the time from your schooling, and that isn't wasted time, but a good learning lesson. It was great of you to try to help out the twins, but I think you learned that they weren't as interested in homeschooling as you had thought. You may run into that in college too, where someone wants to "study" with you, and you find it's just a get together and hang out time. You'll be better able to know what you need to do to take care of your own needs first.

 

Right now, it sounds like you need to make your schooling your top priority. I'm so sorry you don't have someone there to help with grading and all, but it's not unusual for 11th and 12th graders to be doing all their own grading and working almost completely independently. Regarding the grading, you may find that it's fastest to grade the work as it's completed. You'll remember the questions better, so when the answers don't match up, you'll have less researching to find out where you went wrong. It's also immediate feedback.

 

As for scheduling, keep it simple. Take the number of chapters you need to get done, and look at the amount of time you have left, and space it out accordingly. Ideally you might want to take a week off of your regular classes before taking the SAT. Use that week to prepare well as your score will be important for your applications/scholarships. You can do this!!! Why not make the end of June your goal for everything. You can double up the work in one class a day and rotate what class that is. In this way, you'll get a lot further along in your schedule and will be making up some of the time you've lost.

 

Only you know if it's better for you to get up earlier or to sleep in. Are you a morning person or a night person? If you work well in the morning, then get up early and get the majority of your work done by lunch. Don't let other things distract you - phone, computer, etc.. To make it easier to get up, go to bed earlier. But if you're truly a night person, then the reverse might work better for you.

 

I think a lot of us got behind in December - I know we did. All you can do is work with where you're at, and instead of spending a lot of time planning, just do it. You'll begin to feel better when you see that you're making progress again. :)

[Teachin'Mine]

I just wanted to add a couple of hugs for you regarding your mom. It's got to be so hard with the dementia - for both of you. :grouphug::grouphug:

 

Pass one of the hugs along to your mom. :)

[Sherry in OH]

Stephanie,

 

If you are a night person, you might find it easiest to work late at night after everyone else is in bed. It is okay to stay up until two or three in the morning, then sleep in.

 

If you are a morning person, get up extra early and take advantage of the quiet hours before others in house are stirring.

 

Make a schedule showing the week's lessons and assignments. Check things off as you complete them. If you complete one subject's lessons early in the week, use that time to catch up on another subject. (That is, even if you finish this week's math lessons on Tuesday, don't start next week's math lessons until next week. Use the time you would have spent on math for history or health instead.)

[Pam L in Mid Tenn]

You do not have to do all the assignments and all the tests. Well, in Math you'll need to go all the problem sets, but you could skip a few tests. Just read a few chapters of other text books without doing tests. You could skip now and pick up assignments when you feel "caught up".

 

OR You could determine a minimum amount to cover with assignments and tests before the end of May. Say 75%. Then just read the rest of the books in June and July. But you'll probably feel behind all semester.

 

Either way, you'll still cover all the material. And you may find that without the pressure to memorize that you'll actually LEARN more.:001_huh:

 

When my oldest was very sick during her senior year, she actually learned and remembered more after the pressure of assignments was taken away.

 

With me working some right now, we've fallen behind a bit. Not much. So, my ds15 is skipping the end of module 7 science assignments and tests. I might have him just read module 8. I'll still have plenty of grades to average, he is still learning science.

 

I bet if you took Feb. to "just read" and do math, then you'll feel like you are no longer behind and will be able to pick up the written work and memorization in March feeling refreshed!

[Carol in Cal.]

My advice is to get review books for the SAT tests and focus mostly on those starting about 6 weeks before those tests. If you ace those tests, the rest won't be as important--it will just be a matter of checking off the boxes and finishing over the summer. Good scores on the tests don't educate you, but they do give you credibility from an external source.

[Teachin'Mine]

Carol's right. Since you're in your junior year, the SATs are very important for admission criteria and for scholarships. Even though you're behind in some of the classes, scheduling even a half hour each day for SAT work would be a great idea. The week I mentioned isn't enough to prepare in your junior year.

[LuvingLife]

Stephanie' date=' even if you finish in July, that will be fine. You've got a good idea of what took away the time from your schooling, and that isn't wasted time, but a good learning lesson. It was great of you to try to help out the twins, but I think you learned that they weren't as interested in homeschooling as you had thought. You may run into that in college too, where someone wants to "study" with you, and you find it's just a get together and hang out time. You'll be better able to know what you need to do to take care of your own needs first.

 

Right now, it sounds like you need to make your schooling your top priority. I'm so sorry you don't have someone there to help with grading and all, but it's not unusual for 11th and 12th graders to be doing all their own grading and working almost completely independently. Regarding the grading, you may find that it's fastest to grade the work as it's completed. You'll remember the questions better, so when the answers don't match up, you'll have less researching to find out where you went wrong. It's also immediate feedback.

 

As for scheduling, keep it simple. Take the number of chapters you need to get done, and look at the amount of time you have left, and space it out accordingly. Ideally you might want to take a week off of your regular classes before taking the SAT. Use that week to prepare well as your score will be important for your applications/scholarships. You can do this!!! Why not make the end of June your goal for everything. You can double up the work in one class a day and rotate what class that is. In this way, you'll get a lot further along in your schedule and will be making up some of the time you've lost.

 

Only you know if it's better for you to get up earlier or to sleep in. Are you a morning person or a night person? If you work well in the morning, then get up early and get the majority of your work done by lunch. Don't let other things distract you - phone, computer, etc.. To make it easier to get up, go to bed earlier. But if you're truly a night person, then the reverse might work better for you.

 

I think a lot of us got behind in December - I know we did. All you can do is work with where you're at, and instead of spending a lot of time planning, just do it. You'll begin to feel better when you see that you're making progress again. :)[/quote']

 

:iagree: 100% with TeachinMine. I feel like I am behind too at times, and you never feel like you can catch up. I posted how I felt like I was behind because I missed quite a few days in December because I was so busy with Christmas and friends and family that I didn't have time for school. But now that the holiday rush is over, and I planned out a new schedule, my life has somewhat returned to normal. But I am also taking driver's ed three days a week, I have a concert coming up, and I have a party to attend all in February that I am starting to get a little behind again.

 

What I am trying to say is that you are going to get behind in things, I have to accept that, but as long as you can keep up with the most important subjects like math, science, and english, then you should be ok. Just make sure that you are getting plenty of practice for you SAT's, that is most important right now, and that can also be a cause for you stress as well. I know it's hard, but relax and work at a steady pace and you will be caught up in no time.

 

I think it's also hard because both of us are used to ps, the teachers did everything for us, the only thing we had to do was the assignments that they gave us. So all of this is really new and can be difficult, but it is great practice for college!

 

Praying for ya!:grouphug:

[Hunter's Moon]

I really appreciate all your advice and support.

 

Sorry it took so long to reply, crazy around here lately with all the shoveling and my dad working wonky hours.

 

I do plan to take a few weeks off before SATs to focus specifically on them. I will be taking it in May, so I have a bit of time.

 

I do Algebra Review for 30 min./3x week, but once things start settling down I will definitely add more. I do have an SAT study guide which has 3 practice tests and lots of other problems and tips.

 

I think I just have to make a stricter schedule and stick to it. I'm still experimenting with morning/evening school. I am not a morning person or a night person. I can stay up late and sleep in, or go to sleep early and wake up early without any problems. I was never one or the other so I'm seeing which schedule is more productive and then will stick with that.

 

Thanks again for all the advice and support, I appreciate it :) :grouphug: