Has anyone used a "block" schedule

[happycc]

for middle school ie math daily

 

But logic for 6 weeks, then 6 weeks of something else, 6 weeks of something else and rotate back around. Would that not give enough daily review in some subjects?

 

What subjects could you do that with?

[elegantlion]

Yes, we do. Here's a blog post where I discuss it, in case it doesn't make sense in this post.

 

 

I've changed some things up a bit since the post, but the general idea is I have two blocks running.

 

The first block rotates on a weekly basis:

 

Latin & writing one week, Math & Literature the next. I've modified that a little, we do writing and lit each day now. Latin and Math still rotate. My reasoning is that we historically get 3 or 4 good days in those subject in each week. By rotating the weeks we can focus longer during the day. I might not do that if he were younger, but at 8th grade sometimes we spend a 90 minutes to two hours on math or Latin. Plus these are his two big "brain drain" subjects.

 

Then we have session classes. Those are done daily for 10-12 weeks.

 

Session 1-2 was formal logic and art history (we've completed those)

Session 3-4 is history and Japanese

Session 5-6 will be science and philosophy (the philosophy might change)

 

The first session went really well. I tried to pair a lighter subject with a more intense one. The logic took a few weeks longer than I had anticipated. I intentionally put a few flexible subjects into the last two sessions, so I can modify how long we study if necessary.

 

Next year I probably won't rotate math or Latin because of high school, but I still plan on doing sessions.

[Susie in CA]

Paula,

 

I really love your block schedule. I seriously have to try this for next school year. We, too, have so many things we'd like to accomplish and don't get to because we have to many things each day. Your schedule makes it all seem for focused. Need to think.

 

Susie

[Create Your Ritual]

Yes, we do it as well. I do all the core subjects daily .. grammar, writing, math. Science is 3 days per week and History is 2 days per week. Latin is 3 days per week and being read to outloud is 2 days per week (currently we are on A Christmas Carol, but have also read My Family and Other Animals). The remaining subjects get split into 6 or 9 week increments. We started the year off with 9 weeks of typing and cursive work. Then switched to 9 weeks of vocabulary building and spelling workbooks. Next we will move to literary analysis, then critical thinking/philosophy, geography, art (may only get 3 weeks in towards the end of the year). I may be forgetting a few, but it is working out well for us doing this. Then we only have 5 core things we work on each day.

[Deee]

Yep, we do. Its very much a Steiner/Waldorf thing. We've just finished 5th grade. We do maths and language arts 4 days each week as middle lessons. First lesson of the day is a 90 minute main lesson. This years main lessons were:

Australian exploration

Decimals

Botany (spread into 4 x 2 week blocks, one each season)

Ancient history (one 6 week block of ancient mythology and history of Persia, Babylon, India and Egypt; a 6 week block on Greece and 2 weeks on Ancient China)

Geometry

Australian geography

 

The maths blocks are used to teach a big new concept, which is then reviewed in daily maths practice. We tend not to do this with language arts, although I often use the main lesson to practice or teach a new grammar or writing concept. My son finds language arts easy - maths is his challenge. We spend additional time on French, music, sport, craft and whatever else comes up, but reading, painting, drawing, some composition and, very occasionally, maths are integrated into the main lesson blocks.

Danielle