WTM recommendations: What do you do or leave out?

[abacus2]

I've been reading through The Well-Trained Mind, which is an amazing book, and trying to decide how these recommendations will impact my homeschool in practice. The recommendation that is giving me the most pause is notebooks. How do you maintain so many detailed notebooks? Where do you store them all? Do you reference them again or do they just end up stored as records of your child's work?

 

I'm also really unsure about Latin study. Have you found it to be worth the time investment or do you see more value in spending that time on other academic pursuits?

 

My local libraries are not close (20-30 minutes away) or good. What, if any, companies sell book packages for the classical model that include everything you need?

 

What other recommendations have you tried and liked or tried and not liked?

Edited April 19, 2011 by abacus2

[abacus2]

:bigear:

[mom2boys030507]

I found the easiest way to do the WTM is to add in the recs little by little.

 

I started with the basics reading, writing, math and grammar. Then I added in history, science and greek.

 

I still don't keep notebooks. I have my boys do their writing in notebooks. When they do drawings or other projects I take pictures to keep track of what they have done. I am about to add in a timeline and hope to do more notebooking. I use WTM as a guide and not my master. If my boys never do the notebooks they will be fine. They still do the reading, writing and recording in other ways or the same way and it is stored a different way.

 

Yes, I have found our study of Greek to be well worth the time. At this point, we only spend about 20 min per day on Greek. The boys think learning Greek is really fun and it has helped their penmanship. As my oldest is learning more of the endings for different word meanings, he is paying more attention to his writing in all other subjects.

[robsiew]

I've been reading through The Well-Trained Mind, which is an amazing book, and trying to decide how these recommendations will impact my homeschool in practice. The recommendation that is giving me the most pause is notebooks. How do you maintain so many detailed notebooks? Where do you store them all? Do you reference them again or do they just end up stored as records of your child's work?

 

I'm also really unsure about Latin study. Have you found it to be worth the time investment or do you see more value in spending that time on other academic pursuits?

 

My local libraries are not close (20-30 minutes away) or good. What, if any, companies sell book packages for the classical model that include everything you need?

 

What other recommendations have you tried and liked or tried and not liked?

 

My younger grammar stage students do not keep notebooks. Starting in 3rd grade they keep a science notebook (made easy by using Elemental Science) and in 4th grade we add in the history notebook (using a timeline I found online, mapping and coloring sheets from Story of the World). I don't do a "reading" notebook at all in grammar stage.

 

Each of the kids have a cart where they store their supplies. Their notebooks get stored on the cart. My kids aren't ones to really look back through things so I end up taking out the papers and putting them in the files of work from the year. I'm thinking though starting in 5th grade we'll keep one big history and a science notebook for Logic stage that hopefully will be more of a keepsake. I won't start them keeping a literature notebook until they are writing responses to their reading... sometime later in Logic stage.

 

We do Latin only because it really interested my first ds. We don't start it until 3rd grade though. We aren't Latin centered here and basically are studying it to help with English word roots and to practice learning a foreign language. Latin is a nice beginner language because it's not spoken anymore so you can not worry as much about pronunciation. My oldest ds will start Spanish this next year and I think Latin was a good warm-up to it. It would be the first thing I'd leave out or ditch if I were overwhelmed.

 

We use the library extensively. That's too bad yours is so far away. I use the "request" system a lot... you may want to try that. Look ahead and get any books you'll need for the month... request them so they are all pulled for you and go get them. That way you're only making one trip. You have to be organized, but I would think it would be worth it.

 

There are some package deals that include literature... I know a lot of people use Sonlight or Tapestry of Grace which sell their books. I tend to like to choose my own books so I don't really know a lot about these programs. I'm sure others will chime in there...

 

My suggestion is to start small. Just get your reading, writing and math basics down. Then add in your other things. Story of the World is a great place to start with history and Elemental Science follows the WTM guidelines and Paige has done all the hard work for you by providing schedules, narration sheets, experiment sheets, etc.

 

Good luck on the start of your adventure! :001_smile: You can check my signature line for the rest of our curriculum....

[Hedgehog]

I've been reading through The Well-Trained Mind, which is an amazing book, and trying to decide how these recommendations will impact my homeschool in practice. The recommendation that is giving me the most pause is notebooks. How do you maintain so many detailed notebooks? Where do you store them all? Do you reference them again or do they just end up stored as records of your child's work?

 

That's quite a lot of questions!!

 

I don't think most of the people on here are homeschooling exactly as suggested in TWTM. We pick the bits that we like, that work, and leave the ones that don't.

 

So.. notebooks. I don't keep notebooks quite as recommended, because I simply don't have the space in my house. These are the notebooks I have at the moment:

 

- each child has an English notebook, with dividers for Phonics/Spelling, Grammar, Reading, Writing, and Memory Work. They have workbooks for handwriting, and the reading section is just a list of the books they've read. Rather than having some Memory Work for English and some for History, I've condensed it all into the English notebook. This was partly because the stuff the kids are learning isn't always related to the period of History that we're studying.

 

- each child has a History notebook. For my eldest, this now includes her Kingfisher Encyc. outlines, as well as any activities she does from SOTW. My middle two dc do narrations and activities from SOTW.

 

- we have a combined Bible notebook, with dividers for each child.

 

- my oldest has her own Latin notebook; my middle two dc share a notebook.

 

- my older two dc share one notebook for French and one notebook for Critical Thinking.

 

That leaves Math - Saxon - we use box files for their papers

Science - Apologia Elementary - we're using the notebooks and lapbooks from Knowledge Box

Music Theory - we use the ABRSM workbooks.

 

When they get full - every year, or every other year, depending on the subject, I put the work in marked boxes and the box goes in the loft. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the boxes eventually - probably decide that with the kids when the time comes!

 

I'm also really unsure about Latin study. Have you found it to be worth the time investment or do you see more value in spending that time on other academic pursuits?

 

We've been doing Latin (in a rather relaxed way, mind you) for around 2 years now. I have been noticing, this year particularly, that my eldest is developing a really good understanding of grammar and etymology, and I'm almost certain that it has a lot to do with her Latin studies. But SWB herself says that although she believes Latin study to be valuable, nothing terrible will happen if you don't do it. It's not for everyone.

 

My local libraries are not close (20-30 minutes away) or good. What, if any, companies sell book packages for the classical model that include everything you need?

 

I don't use the library, period. I am terrible at getting the books back on time.. if at all.. :blushing: We don't buy books as a package, I just get what I want when I want it.

 

What other recommendations have you tried and liked or tried and not liked?

 

To start with, because we were coming from an unschooling approach to classical education, I just went with TWTM first/best recommendation for curricula: Saxon Math, Spelling Workout, First Language Lessons, SOTW, 4yr Science rotation (Biology, Astronomy/Earth Science, Chemistry, Physics), Prima Latina, Mind Benders. We didn't stick with them all, and we added one or two others as we needed. To Spelling Workout we added MCP Phonics/MCP Word Study; we switched from FLL to R&S; we added Writing with Ease this year; we gave up the 4yr Science rotation in favor of Apologia; and Prima Latina drove my oldest crazy, so we sold it and used Song School Latin/Latin for Children instead. IMO it's a question of trial and error, and finding your teaching style and your child's learning style (both are equally important).

 

One final thought.. start slowly, and build. I did it myself, and I've seen others write about it - you try and start everything at once, and it's too much so you crash and burn. No point in that. Homeschooling is not a race. Start with English and Math, get that up and running for a week.. or even a few weeks.. and then add other subjects in one by one.

 

HTH! Have fun! :001_smile:

[Julie Kirkwood]

We have done only the basics this year because my goal was to get my first grader reading well and interested in learning again after a year in public school. We did math (RightStart), reading (OPG didn't work for us so we moved to Progressive Phonics), handwriting (HWOT) and science (REAL Science Odyssey) because he is very interested in that. We just started using SOTW for history and will do that over the summer (we'll take a break from math, science and handwriting). I am thinking about Latin for the fall but not sure where to fit that in. I have two younger ones and so we don't always get done all that we set out to do each day.

 

We didn't do notebooks because my son detested writing so we only did HWOT and very little other writing. Now he is finally at a place where he doesn't hate it so much so we will add some more writing in for the fall.

 

I'm re-reading the relevant parts of TWTM now as I plan for my son's 2nd grade year and my daughter's K year.

 

Good luck!

[Critterfixer]

How do you maintain so many detailed notebooks? Where do you store them all? Do you reference them again or do they just end up stored as records of your child's work?

 

I seem to be in the minority because I do keep the notebooks. I must admit that I liked the idea of notebooks for several reasons.

1. Right now, I keep them. Next year, I expect my children to keep them and file them daily. They need the practice of keeping things in order. So notebook is a little bit of practice for college, I guess.

2. I don't have a home-school planner outside of a notebook. Best I keep up with their work for now.

3. Their father is away at work all week. Saving their papers in the notebooks allows him to be able to review their work.

So yes, notebooks are more or less short-term storage. At the end of the year I purge their notebooks and their art-files with their input, so that they get to save a few things for their own private collection. I have a homemade bookcase that did service for out-of-date encyclopedias when I was a child, and I store their notebooks in that.

 

I'm also really unsure about Latin study. Have you found it to be worth the time investment or do you see more value in spending that time on other academic pursuits?

 

I see the use in Latin study. And in Greek for that matter. Having said that, I might be putting Latin in the fourth grade year and not in third grade. I just don't know yet. We'll see.

 

My local libraries are not close (20-30 minutes away) or good

Neither are mine close. My local library is twenty minutes one way, and very limited. I use my state central library instead. It is two hours one way. However, I travel there to work at least once monthly, and the borrowing terms are good (four weeks, vs local two weeks). I sort of consider "library Saturdays" to be my "day off". After work I hit my favorite ones and get books for the weeks of study, and pick up books for my own study as well. I used to have trouble returning books. Now I actually log every book I borrow into a notebook that gets checked off on the Friday night before my Saturday trip. I am not organized in any great sense of the word. I do this because my brain is small and the books grow legs and walk around the house.

I could not afford the vast number of books we go through. However, I will and do buy literature when I can find it used.

 

What other recommendations have you tried and liked or tried and not liked?

There seem to be plenty of things that I've tried and didn't like. That said, I'm sticking to it for now. Sometimes I find that what I don't like doing is exactly what I need to be doing to get better at it.

 

It does help to start out slowly and develop a framework for the day. The schedule is still quite flexible, but I try to make sure that we hit the skill subjects daily. But--if science or history gets bumped because Math took longer than usual, or lunch turns out to be at the park, or if the washing machine overflows, or if the garden needs to be tilled because of bad weather coming on, that's okay. We can double up a chapter or cover bears on the next camping trip.

[....]

We do a lot of different stuff...but following TWTM usually trumps everything else. We do the notebooking. Each kid has one 5-subject notebook, divided into: reading, language arts, latin, math/science and history. That way, we don't have 300 notebooks everywhere. Each kid has one. The notebooking has made a huge difference in their writing. In fact, we follow SWB's recommendations for writing and my 9 yro is creeping into the logic stage early. She can write a good paragraph on her own and has started writing literary essays and narrative summaries on her own.

 

The one thing we do not follow in TWTM - science. Our science is entirely child-led for the 9 yro and 8 yro.

[Pata]

This is our third full year following the WTM and each year I get better about it. The one thing I still struggle with is the memory work. We also don't do a LA notebook the way it's suggested in the book. I was also unsure about Latin, but we tried it out this year and I've been thoroughly surprised by how much dd has enjoyed it. She wouldn't let me drop it now :). I also don't have access to a library because I live oversees, so I plan the whole year in one shot so I can order all the books I'll need. I would echo what others have said, start slow, each year you'll get better at it. These boards are a great place to ask about specific curricula and advice when you get stuck. Best of luck!

[2_girls_mommy]

For us, the notebooks are a kind of record of the children's work. They do their paper, it goes in the correct binder. I love being able to see all of their writing or spelling in chronological order in one place. The history and science notebooks are the most re-looked at :) (I made up a word!) I take pics of projects and put on a paper. They include flyers from museums and field trips related to the subjects we are studying. And they have every narration and coloring sheet and map.

 

Yes, we are doing Latin as our foreign language. It just makes sense. The children need a fluent speaker to teach them a modern language. This is giving them the foundation for that later and the grammar that will help in most Western languages. Kids that have studied Latin score much higher on SATs too from what I have read.

 

As for what we leave out, hmm. Well, I use a phonics and math program that aren't listed in WTM, but I like them. And we do Science at home only once a week in 3rd grade, as we just can't do it twice a week (and it has always been enough with the exposure they get in scouts, co-op, field trips, etc.) I love the guidelines that WTM gives me to pull my own stuff together. It is how I would do it on my own, but laid out for me.

[TheAutumnOak]

I really like WTM and am moving towards following it...I do keep some of the notebooks (made it so much easier to file away completed work)...I will keep all of them in the fall, when we start doing history and science...

 

The ways I can see where I have done something different deliberately was in choosing math and science...We are using Math Mammoth, and that is not recommended in the book...We are also using Elemental Science, and while that is not recommended in the book, it follows the same recommendations as WTM, so it is easier for me to use that than to create my own...I am hoping that it will be recommended in the next edition...But even if it is not, we will continue to use it...

 

WTM is working for us, so I intend to follow it more closely as we go along...It just takes time for me to go from not doing things that way to doing them with my oldest...My younger two will follow from the start ;)