6th Grade--Is this too much?

[yvonne]

Hi,

 

This is what I'm planning for my 6th grade boys who will be 11 in Sept. We've been doing Math, Rod and Staff, and Latin this way for a couple of years and it works, so I don't want to change those. However, we were not consistent about history, literature, and writing last year in 5th, mostly because _I_ was not consistent, not because the boys did not have the time to do more. I'm trying to remedy that for 6th, but don't want to go overboard the other way. (And, if this is not too much, I want to be able to tell the boys that this is just what 6th graders do. :) ) Laying it all out on a schedule, it's looking like about 6.5-7 hours/day, not including extracurriculars like piano, fencing, & chess.

 

Math: Horizons 6, Singapore Math 6 (textbook, workbook, CWP) (±1.25 hours/day)

 

Language Arts

Grammar: Rod and Staff 6 (mostly oral, worksheets written) (±45 mins/day, 5x/wk.)

Spelling: a private school program (20 mins, 2x/wk)

Literature: VP online Literature III (1.25 hour class/2x wk, maybe 4 hours additional reading during the week?)

Writing: WWS (45 mins/3x/wk?)

Vocab: Vocabulary from Classical Roots A (1 lesson, ±1.5 hours/week?)

 

Latin: probably with VP online, just to make sure it actually gets done (1.25 hour class/2x week, 30 mins./3x wk)

 

Logic: Orbiting with Logic (2x/wk), Chess (1.5 hours/1x/wk)

 

History: History Odyssey Level 1 Moderns (looked at L2 Moderns and it would be way too much of a stretch at this point. Hoping that Level 1 consistently will be better in the long run than L2 done sporadically. I'd like to combine HO w/ SOTW 4's outlining work.) (±4.5 hours/week?)

 

Science: Plato online and supplementary reading (±2? hours/week online and 30 mins. reading 3x/wk)

 

 

Any thoughts?

Edited August 13, 2011 by yvonne

[abbeyej]

Everything looks doable to me, but I'm not sure I understand your history plans. Are you doing ancients or moderns? Or ... both? I don't think I'd do HO1 with 6th graders. I'd rather do HO2 and cross out some assignments if necessary than try to adapt HO1 to fit them... What about Sonlight 6 instead? It also uses SOTW 1, but the extra readings would be more appropriate to their age. You could just do the first half and slot in some extra history readings, then do the second half (middle ages) next year.

[yvonne]

Abbey, Thank you so much for your thoughts on this.

 

We'll be on Moderns this fall, so I was looking at History Odyssey's Modern Times, Level 1 or 2. I like the way HO groups reading into big ideas (Africa, Victorian Era, World War 1,...) It feels more cohesive than reading SOTW straight through.

 

I don't know if you remember, but I'd asked about HO Level 2 Early Modern Times this time last year. I made big plans, rewriting some of the HO L2 weeks. I bit off way more than I could chew and we ended up doing... nothing. In March, I signed them up for VP's self-paced Explorers to 1815 history, which is heavily US focused, but is at least getting done and giving them some exposure to the period. HUGE mistake not having them do HO Early Moderns, Level 2. I should have left well enough alone, done HO L2 Early Moderns as written, and helped them through anything that was too hard. I could kick myself for not taking your advice back then to "rip off the bandaid!"

 

So, here I am now, wanting to move them to something "more"--more world history oriented (not the total US focus of VP's Moderns), more in depth, more demanding, more independent. BUT something that will get done. HO Moderns Level 2 may be too much "more." My kids are average, maybe a little above, but definitely not gifted. They are, however, able to focus and work fairly hard when it's required.

 

I guess I could try HO Moderns Level 2, but I don't think I've laid a strong enough foundation for them to be able to do it. With topics like nationalism, fascism, communism, etc., the assignments are on the level of things like:

 

"Write a two-to three-paragraph summary of isolationism. List the advantages isolationism brought to the USA as well as the disadvantages."

 

"Write a three paragraph summary of the Balkan Wars... In the first paragraph, summarize the political background leading up to the conflicts. Include information about nationalism: the declining Ottoman Empire and the power of the Ottoman Turks; Russia's increasing power..."

 

History Odyssey Moderns, Level 1, would definitely be doable for them independently. A lot of reading of SOTW & CHOW chapters, mapwork and simple written work (main ideas, major events and people.) No serious writing spelled out; it would have to be added. No outlining; I'd have them do the SOTW AG pages for each chapter where the student fills in the outlines and later writes from an outline. So, Moderns L1 doesn't have the depth of analysis or the serious writing projects that Level 2 has, but it could be done fairly independently (ie, _I_ won't be the stumbling block) and they would at least get a pretty solid overview of modern world history.

 

Would that be "selling them short," though?

 

Alternatively, maybe I should just have them do HO's Early Modern Level 2 this year. I was thinking of wrapping up Moderns this year and having them do K12's Human Odyssey in 7th & 8th before they get to whatever they'll be doing in high school. But they would get a lot out of Early Modern Level 2 and they could do it mostly independently (taking me out of the middle). Maybe that's what matters the most.

 

I'll run over and take a look at Sonlight. Looks like their History H is modern world history.

[HeidiKC]

I don't think it looks like too much at all, but then look at my signature - I AM worried that WE are doing too much! But I think the load you've got scheduled looks just about right.

 

I would not do HO 2 Moderns - I think you're right that it's too much of a stretch. And if I remember correctly, the curriculum was written with Ancients in mind for 5th grade, Middle Ages for 6th, Early Modern for 7th, and Modern for 8th? Or about that. So it'd be a bit above them anyway, and add to it the fact that you haven't been working through HO up to this point, or at least didn't do Early Modern this past year. I think it would end up being a very frustrating and difficult year for them. I like either of your ideas about either using Level 1 (which seems it would be fine if you chose more age-appropriate books for them and had them doing some outlining) or doing Early Moderns. I think I'd probably go with the first choice myself if you're worried about stuff not getting done if they need a lot of help.

[yvonne]

Thank you so much, Heidi, for taking the time to read my endless ponderings and lend your thoughts! :)

 

To whom are you outsourcing CComposition?!? I was looking at the MP online classes for that, but my book order was delayed (despite paying for priority shipping!) and I still haven't had a chance to look at the actual texts. Now the MP class is full. :(

 

(I know, at this point, it's not really called "home" schooling anymore... :) )

[HeidiKC]

Thank you so much, Heidi, for taking the time to read my endless ponderings and lend your thoughts! :)

 

To whom are you outsourcing CComposition?!? I was looking at the MP online classes for that, but my book order was delayed (despite paying for priority shipping!) and I still haven't had a chance to look at the actual texts. Now the MP class is full. :(

 

(I know, at this point, it's not really called "home" schooling anymore... :) )

 

We are doing CC through a local school here. We did Narrative last year and I just thought it was ok, but my son loved it. So we're doing Chreia this year, and the author's wife is teaching it. I'm not sure I'm sold on the program, which is why I also want to do IEW here myself (just in case!). We're going to go very light on it, though.

[HeidiKC]

Also, wanted to add that I struggled with trying to decide about Vocab from Classical Roots because it sounds excellent. But I finally decided to skip it since we're doing Latin and Greek and learning derivatives in the process. My son is also a huge reader. So I felt like it was the one thing to let go. And he is learning some vocab through SWO.

 

Secret: we are also doing Orbiting with Logic and Chess, but I didn't want to add it to my sig because I already sounded nuts enough as it is! But I think that's it - really!

[yvonne]

Secret: we are also doing Orbiting with Logic and Chess, but I didn't want to add it to my sig because I already sounded nuts enough as it is! But I think that's it - really!

 

:lol: If (when!) my boys complain, I'm going to show them what you're doing and suggest that they're obviously bored because they don't have enough to do. :)

 

If you have a moment, could you expound on your hesitations about CComposition? You could pm/email me if you prefer. I think I've decided against CComp. in favor of WWS bec. WWS is much more likely to get done. If there were a CComp. class nearby, though, I'd probably try that.

[HeidiKC]

If you have a moment, could you expound on your hesitations about CComposition? You could pm/email me if you prefer. I think I've decided against CComp. in favor of WWS bec. WWS is much more likely to get done. If there were a CComp. class nearby, though, I'd probably try that.

 

Well, I'm probably not being fair. I'm not sure if it is CC I'm hesitant about or the fact that someone else is teaching it and I'm not completely clear on the expectations, and my son knows that! I'd say it is more the latter. Last year was our first year homeschooling and I didn't feel confident teaching writing, so I signed him up for that class since I thought the progym method sounded great. But it always felt a bit too easy for him and I wasn't sure how much he was learning. As I'm sure you know, the student imitates a particular piece of writing, changing words, phrases and/or sentences. That was all great, but the next week when they used the same story and were to re-write it in a different way (different point of view, in reverse, etc.) I never felt like he changed it up enough. He wanted to just change the descriptive words and I wanted him to re-write the entire sentence. When he did it his way, he still got an A+, so there was a bit of a struggle there. He insisted his teacher was fine with the way he was doing it (which was very slacker-ish, in my opinion!). I didn't have the teacher's manual, of course, so it was all rather vague to me. When I'd ask the instructor about it (a different person than who we'll have this coming year), she was very helpful and said that he should do more than just use new adjectives. But the problem was that she didn't have his paper from the previous week (we did), so she couldn't compare it to how he'd worded his sentence from the week before. Does that make sense?

 

I think it would have worked better if I had taught it myself - then my son would have had to go along with my expectations and I could have been more clear about how I wanted the second, third, etc. versions of the stories written. Or it might have worked better if he had a new story each week to imitate. I always thought he did the first version pretty well because he changed it up quite a bit. But on subsequent versions, not so much.

 

Another thing I didn't think was all that helpful for a student of his age was that they spent a lot of time coming up with various adjectives and figures of description. This is all good, but that wasn't too hard for him. What was really hard, and where he didn't seem to receive any guidance or instruction, was coming up with ways of completely changing a sentence. So maybe the original sentence might read (and of course I'm COMPLETELY simplifying): "The young boy kicked the ball". He might change it to: "The small lad punted the football". All fine, but that is just new words. I wanted something like, "The playground ball was launched high into the air by one of the kindergarten boys". Or some such! And the teacher seemed to agree that this is what she'd like to see, but my son didn't seem to be receiving any help as far as how to do this or examples. I may be wrong, but I couldn't see it from his notes and he had a hard time coming up with ideas. Again, might have been the teacher, might have been the fact that I didn't have the TM.

 

It will be interesting to see what it's like this year with the other teacher. I decided to sign him up again since he liked it so much, there'd be a new teacher, and I felt like it wasn't teaching him poor writing skills - just not quite as many as I'd like him to have. It's a bit ironic that I signed him up for a writing class because I didn't feel I could teach it, and then that was the hardest part - having someone else teach it!

 

I decided to do IEW with him myself since it seemed clearer to me as far as how to teach it. Then of course WWS came out which looks GREAT! I didn't get the sample of that until I'd already bought IEW or I might have used WWS.

 

Well, hope this makes sense. It's midnight and I'm rambling! btw, what did you use last year for writing?

[yvonne]

Heidi,

 

Thank you for your comments on the CC class. It sounds like it's more an issue w/ the instructor than with the actual curriculum.

 

My boys did IEW last year with our Classical Conversations co-op. They _loved_ it, but we won't be doing CC this year.

 

I think I've finally settled on having my boys do HO Early Moderns, Level 2, this fall. I'll be interested in seeing how it goes with them and how your 6th grader likes the HO L2 Middle Ages.

 

yvonne

[HeidiKC]

Heidi,

 

Thank you for your comments on the CC class. It sounds like it's more an issue w/ the instructor than with the actual curriculum.

 

My boys did IEW last year with our Classical Conversations co-op. They _loved_ it, but we won't be doing CC this year.

 

I think I've finally settled on having my boys do HO Early Moderns, Level 2, this fall. I'll be interested in seeing how it goes with them and how your 6th grader likes the HO L2 Middle Ages.

 

yvonne

 

I think it's likely that it was the instructor, so it'll be interesting this year with Mrs. Selby teaching. I hear great things about her.

 

My son loved HO L2 Ancients last year - it was his favorite subject. So he was very disappointed when I said we were just going to focus on geography instead this year, and do a reading list for Middle Ages. This from a kid who likes to do the bare minimum. So how could I say no?! (Which is part of the reason we've got a very full plate this year). Hope your boys enjoy Early Moderns.

[HSMom2One]

Your subjects and workload look very similar to what we did last year for dd's 6th grade year. I think you will be fine.

 

Have a wonderful time and enjoy those kids. Time is short -- love each day because it is a gift.

 

Blessings,

Lucinda