fruitofthewomb Posted June 12, 2012 Share Posted June 12, 2012 I am trying to plan out next year (1st grade with 3 littles tagging along). On days when we aren't busy with summer activities we do bible, phonics, handwriting, math play. I had originally planned to start early (mid July) with the other daily stuff-math and spelling then add in other stuff slowly (maybe one or two subjects a week-FLL, WWE, History, Science, Art) as we found our groove. But now I am rethinking this. Can any veterans give me some advice as to why you prefer one way over the other? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amy Jo Posted June 12, 2012 Share Posted June 12, 2012 Adding in slowly sounds like a good idea to me - especially with little kids. They keep throwing monkey wrenches into the best laid plans ... :P Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tess in the Burbs Posted June 12, 2012 Share Posted June 12, 2012 when mine were younger I added in subjects slowly in Aug/Sept until we had it all. I will tell you that I advise a less is more approach for K, 1st grades, especially with youngers added in. Do the basics: reading, writing, math. Then get memberships to local places and get out to see/touch things. Go to kid museums, go to aquariums, go to the zoo. Go to the local historical places. Draw outside once a month at the same spot. Kids like this. Play. Build with things. Do fun science like slime. Get quality art supplies and let them play/learn on their own for art. History can wait. My son did only the basics in 1st. We added in all subjects when my dd hit first and ds was 2nd. But I wish we had waited a year for her as well. Time goes so fast and with the youngers you may find less in the beginning a better way to go. My kids have done 4 years of SL. And they really don't remember the 1st/2nd grade. I had so much extra hands on stuff. Nope, they don't remember any of it. We should have kept the field trips going and done less bookwork. I now highly advise younger kids to do the basics until solidly reading, writing. Then you can really jump in. You will have a day you can't afford the time to do the fun stuff. Enjoy them now. Our K and 1st grade with the basics was less than an hour a day. Then we were outside drawing or watching a pond and going on field trips. :grouphug: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LillyMama Posted June 12, 2012 Share Posted June 12, 2012 We used the whole year of Kindergarten to come up with our first grade schedule. I tried different times, orders, breaks, schedules, etc. until I found what we're doing now (we started first grade this May.) I think starting slow is perfect, especially because you add so much in for first grade. One tip I have is to actually drop an every day thing when you first add in something. Or cut it short. For example, when we added WWE, I did half a spelling lesson or no spelling lesson for a week. (Because we do phonics and reading, too, I felt we wouldn't suffer too much.) I think it can be hard to add not only a new thing, but also more time to the school day all at once, so I decided to add a new thing without adding time. Then the second week, we went back to our normal spelling schedule and also included WWE. It was a little more gentle for us. Because we year-round school, I also started with doing WWE only 2-3 times a week for the first month. After a couple of weeks we added FLL, then we added history and science... The other thing is to take note of when your child is best able to pay attention and what subjects or activities are the hardest. Try to make those line up together. For us, narrations are hard for my kids (my son hates to write, my daughter hates to listen) and I've found that first thing in the morning is their best sit still time. So we do a narration first thing in the morning, over breakfast. I've found my kids aren't so great in the afternoon, so we do our projects and activities then. You'll probably want to work around naps and snacks from your little ones, so I would keep that in mind when figuring things in. And be flexible- if someone is sick or hungry or acting up during your normal math time, then just try to fit in math at a different time. And, the thing i would actually try to go back in time and tell myself, put away the checklists. The first couple of months will not go as planned- it's new for everyone. You first grader will have to adjust, your little ones will, you will... and as mtcougar said, things change just about every day. I use HST+ to keep track of what we do and I just aim to keep pace. As long as we read at some point every day, I sort of shrug my shoulders at the rest. Between weekends, extra time in the afternoons and finishing things early, we always seem to fit in more than a week's worth of school. It sometimes looks NOTHING like what is on our schedule, but it works. I have a copy of the schedule we work towards for first grade on my blog. As I said, we started K in September, finished it in March, and then played around with things the next couple of months to come up with it. And now it's summer and that is screwing everything up. ;) But this is our target. Having it like this has helped me to pace ourselves. http://coloradostrongs.blogspot.com/2012/05/this-is-test-to-see-if-i-can-figure.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fruitofthewomb Posted June 12, 2012 Author Share Posted June 12, 2012 when mine were younger I added in subjects slowly in Aug/Sept until we had it all. I will tell you that I advise a less is more approach for K, 1st grades, especially with youngers added in. Do the basics: reading, writing, math. Then get memberships to local places and get out to see/touch things. Go to kid museums, go to aquariums, go to the zoo. Go to the local historical places. Draw outside once a month at the same spot. Kids like this. Play. Build with things. Do fun science like slime. Get quality art supplies and let them play/learn on their own for art. History can wait. My son did only the basics in 1st. We added in all subjects when my dd hit first and ds was 2nd. But I wish we had waited a year for her as well. Time goes so fast and with the youngers you may find less in the beginning a better way to go. My kids have done 4 years of SL. And they really don't remember the 1st/2nd grade. I had so much extra hands on stuff. Nope, they don't remember any of it. We should have kept the field trips going and done less bookwork. I now highly advise younger kids to do the basics until solidly reading, writing. Then you can really jump in. You will have a day you can't afford the time to do the fun stuff. Enjoy them now. Our K and 1st grade with the basics was less than an hour a day. Then we were outside drawing or watching a pond and going on field trips. :grouphug: I appreciate the advice. We had a very relaxed k year and dd still learned to read and write, haha. I am planning to focus on the core subjects and won't stress if we don't get to history and science each week. I am new to all this and am still learning! About what I bolded above-I couldn't help but laugh a little-we live in a very rural area so-no museums or zoos here. The closest one is about 2 hours away. And I have a 4 mo old and an 18 mo old-try taking those two on a field trip. :lol: It requires a valium and an extra adult. ;) But we have access to nature and spend a lot of time outside around ponds, rivers, woods, family farm, etc. And I think that is what you were really getting at. Get outside. We do go into the 'big city' about once a year for the museums and parks and zoos and culture. :tongue_smilie: BTW-you want me to really blow your mind? The nearest IKEA is about 8 hours away!!!! :w00t: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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