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If you're "behind" what do you do?


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I school Jan-Dec and I am getting a bit overwhelmed with how "behind" we are. I am thinking of "shrinking" our science and history down from the lessons left to a couple of lapbooks/unit studies that cover the same topics but not as deeply. But the rest....

 

Do you edit your to do list so that it will fit in the time left for the school year? Or do you cram things in to get it all finished? Or do you just throw your hands up in the year, throw out the curriculum, have a holiday for what is left of the school year and start again next year? :001_huh:

 

Best wishes

Jen in Oz

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Can you just continue into the new year? Some of our subjects I like to finish at the end of our school year. Others I just continue. Is this the first time you've fallen behind or is this yearly? I ask because you may want to reconsider your planning for the next year if you're trying to cover too much ground during your school year. If this isn't common, I would try to continue next year and see if you can make it work.

 

:grouphug: You sound stressed. You still have 4 months!

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First I would take a look at what I was doing and see if I was trying to do too much. If what I was trying to accomplish was reasonable, then I'd look at what was keeping us from getting the work done. Maybe it is a scheduling issue or something simple to fix.

 

But honestly, awhile back I stopped worrying about being behind. Every season of life is different and sometimes we cruise through material and sometimes we slow way down. The important thing is if the child is learning and understanding. Sometimes we don't finish the year when I want to so we just keep going with the material. The nice thing about homeschooling is that we don't have a deadline where we have to move on to the next book without finish the previous one. Don't cram or move too fast or the kids might not get anything out of it.

 

My oldest is 8th grade. I know I will once again start worrying about being behind when my oldest enters 9th grade. Then I think I will have certain deadlines I have to meet in order to ensure a certain amount of credits before graduation. But K-8? Nope.

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For the 3R's we just work consistently wherever we may be. We don't get behind or ahead...we just move a bit further along everyday. Well, if we take a break longer than a week, we lose ground...but I don't panic anymore...just pick it back up and move along. For everything else, revamp the plans. Still, I wouldn't cut and cram too much...just keep moving along.

 

I don't think I've ever had a year where we finished all of a year's books by the end of our school year and started all new at the beginning. We are always in the middle of something. It's never been an issue. (My oldest is only 4th grade, and I might sing a different tune if we are talking high school.)

 

What happens if you don't finish this year's books by the end of Dec? Probably nothing.

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If I really knew I was behind, I would trim absolutely EVERYTHING out of our schedule for a year and spend that year getting back on track. When we were caught up, I would be extremely careful with. Outside activities to ensure that never happened again.

 

Life does happen and I did fall behind once. I always make sure the three R's are done daily, no matter what. Unless my kid is sick. I like to have all curriculum completed by years end.

 

If you are schooling year round, how can you fall behind? Are you taking any time off? Are you doing too much?

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I'm going to 'echo' a lot of what others have already said. ;) Mind you, I only have an upper elementary age child and don't know the age/s of your child/ren. (I also school year-round Jan-Dec, just for reference.)

 

In past years, I always felt like we weren't getting everything accomplished. I spent last year evaluating how I plan and how much I have planned. I lined everything out on the floor and realized I was trying to cram 8 hours of school into 4 hours. Of course I felt behind. So step one: Take a realistic look at your curriculum. Don't take on more than you can realistically cover.

 

That helped us so much - but we still got very far behind earlier this year. My mom was in ICU out-of-state and we missed so much school.

Before we started back up, I did two things:

1.) Looked back over the schedule to see what we could ditch or push off until later. Really, all those great books I wanted to read? Want to cover sometime, but it won't kill us to read them next year instead of this.

2.) Dedicated myself to focusing on school for two months. We schooled hard four days a week all summer long. We were able to cover so much ground during that time.

 

Hope you find something that helps. I hate the feeling of being behind!

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well it depends on what your focus is. We started school last year in late October. So from the get go we were almost 2 months behind anyone else's school year who started on time. But we focused and finished everything by the end of June. We skipped the field trips and home school day events and did school daily, and a lot of Saturdays as well, but we got it all done. I found that I didn't let anything slip knowing we didn't have wiggle room that year.

 

If it's younger kids just do the basics...reading, writing/grammar/spelling, math. Add in history and science if you can. Double up if you can on the basics.

 

Or just keep plugging along with what you have knowing it's ok to not be on a schedule. Finish when you do and adjust your future plans to be less in an area...like a unit study instead of a full history year.

 

lots of ways to get 'back on track' mentally but honestly, it doesn't matter. Just do what feel right to you.

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It depends on the situation. We school year round, so in order to do 36 weeks of school (which is typical of many schools), I need to do 3 weeks per month. After two years of falling dreadfully behind in October (we run Jan to Dec as well), I am doing things differently this year. When things are going well, we haul arse. Right now we're running about a week ahead. We were a week ahead at the end of June and then July was a disaster but August has been a good month.

 

I work from home, so I need the flexibility. I've also learned to stick to a weekly schedule of sorts. We do formal school on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Tuesday is Nature Study and town. Thursday is choir and catch-up (if we need it). Tuesday and Thursday also work for extras like handicrafts, composer study (in the car) and free reads (audiobooks in the car). We also often do math on Tuesdays and Thursdays but not always. If Monday is a holiday, we don't do school, and then we carry on with our routine on Tuesday. Having that set in stone rather than a target number of days I want to complete this month helps me get going in the morning. I know it's a school day - I don't get distracted on other things and then say, Oh well, I guess today we aren't doing school and then get into a crisis situation.

 

The past two years when we have had trouble, it's been tough, and I will admit there have been tears (on my part). My goal this year is to be finished by Thanksgiving so I have all of December as "grace" because that last quarter seems to be when things slide the worst.

 

The first year this happened, I simply condensed our schedule. We do Ambleside so I just did more readings per day so we could finish our books. Last year we did about a week of "finishing up" in January. Our basics - math and reading - and on a do-the-next-lesson type of schedule. As long as my child is performing well in the things we are doing and I'm on track overall for our learning goals, I don't worry about what lesson we are on. We use the McGuffey Readers and Ray's Arithmetic. When we switched back to Math Mammoth, I simply skipped pages covering things my student was already proficient at rather than plodding through each lesson.

 

I also, as a result of such crises, have shortened our formal school "week" to three days rather than four. So we do 3x36 weeks of formal days of school (our MWF routine). I work from home, and with my work schedule and other things (like family trips or people coming to visit and such) that works for us. We get through all of our curriculum goals in that time. The remaining "school days" are spent doing our Tuesday/Thursday routine and other special activities we do on the weekends. That's what works for us. Previously we were doing four formals days of school for each "week" of school. As long as we're working at grade level or above, I see no problem with a "shortened" school week. Later on we may add more things to our Tuesday/Thursday routines, so that remains and option but doesn't seem to be needed at this time. I also used to do 40 weeks of school instead of 36. So you can tweak on that level as well.

 

There are two things that you have to look at - how are you going to finish this school year, and what do you need to change so that this doesn't happen again? Only you can answer those questions. I've been known to call a "teacher inservice day" on a Saturday or an evening and go to Starbucks with my computer for a couple hours in order to tweak our routine and figure out what we need to do to keep on track and get everything done. Don't hesitate to take some time like that if you need it. Better to get a plan that works so you can shed the stress than to be pulling your hair out for the remainder of the year.

 

Figure out what is essential. I've also dropped certain things I decided simply weren't THAT important to me, making our routine shorter so we were able to get things done without wearing ourselves out. Other things got streamlined (for instance, our memory work only gets done on formal school days, which is part of what defines "formal" school days).

 

I know it's hard to be in a situation like this, but you will get through it. Figure out what YOU need to do, get a plan and then follow it. It's much easier to follow a plan than to be stressed out and not have one.

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The year before last we were behind on Math. Not entirely my fault, just our program did not arrive when it was supposed to(still bitter about that) and we had to park on a concept for a month or so. We hammered it hard and did Sat lessons, double lesson days and all through to the end of Summer to finish it. I don't know that was crucial that we did that I just couldn't stand the thought of not finishing it and then having to start the new year behind. Last year I made sure everything stayed on track so it wasn't an issue. I'd focus on the 3rs and hit it hard, you still have a bit over 3 months to go, all is not lost. I also agree with pp I'd look to see if you are setting realistic expectations. If you are then why is it not getting done? If you are that behind it didn't just happen and you cannot wait until 9 months in to assess I think, without lots of stress. I don't like strict schedules but I have a vague guideline of what needs to be done each week in order to stay on track.

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I had this wonderful idea of doing 90 odd lessons of science spread over the year but it hasn't happened with health issues and a toddler. Same for history. I have decided that I will do a unit study on each major area of study over the next few months. The children involved in these are Grades 1 and 4 so a general hit at the topics will be fine.

 

I am getting together some lapbooks for the toddler to keep him occupied while I work with the others. He is 4 so I guess I could really be looking to doing "school" with him too now.

 

I really do need a "teacher inservice" day to get my head around the new schedule. I guess I have been hiding my head in the sand for too long. I should have my goals for the year broken down into smaller chunks with regular review every term. I would have realised we were getting behind before it became a full blown stressful event.

 

Thank you for sharing your experiences. I really appreciate your insight and ways of doing things.

 

Best wishes

Jen in Oz

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First off -relax -it's only August - you have a while to go yet ;)

 

Second narrow down your worry of being behind to just the 3r's - the rest can be made up easily because those topics tend to get covered over and over in the school years.

 

I tend not to worry about finishing books or curriculums by years end - we just keep going till we are done. I only worry if my child's progress seems to be slowing or stalling - that's what I claim as being behind - not how far along they are in the actual curriculum.

 

You have September holidays and 6 weeks at Christmas to use as make up if you are really worried. I don't think I would try double lessons or speeding up the work for a 1st grader -my DD would freak out if I did that. You're 4th grader might be able to handle a bit extra though -maybe try 1.5 lessons or something.

 

And lastly -relax :D - you are probably not as behind as you think you are.

 

I can tell you my personal experience. My DD hates school -she protests and resists most days. This usually leads us to schooling the bare minimum for maybe three days a week (I've usually given up by Thursday) :D I thought my DD was crazy behind with so little amount of schooling.

 

A few weeks ago she spent a day in a regular classroom. It was a combined K-2 class. My DD is K but ended up working with the second graders because that was where she was at. The class had a spelling test and my DD was the only kid who got the entire list correct (despite the fact I haven't taught her spelling yet or given her any tests). :D I thought she was horribly behind and turns out she is way ahead (and she is not gifted -just an average child).

 

The moral of the story is -your kids are probably not as behind as you think. ;)

 

However I don't advise giving up and taking a holiday just yet - keep going steady and you'll get there.

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First off -relax -it's only August - you have a while to go yet ;)
Actually, No.

She said in the original post that she schools Jan-Dec. I don't know how the seasons feel in "Oz," but I school Jan-Dec and time is rushing away... (Or so it seems.) Once September hits, it is soon October and then it is downhill from there with (in America) Thanksgiving, then Christmas. :001_huh:

 

I really do need a "teacher inservice" day to get my head around the new schedule. I guess I have been hiding my head in the sand for too long. I should have my goals for the year broken down into smaller chunks with regular review every term. I would have realised we were getting behind before it became a full blown stressful event.

I am glad you have a plan of action. Or attack. ;)

I started doing terms last years so I had checkpoints along the school year. It has helped me stay on track so much better!

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We school year round and just continue along, moving up when we're ready, which is usually different times of year for each thing. I do September to August though so we are "done" but I'm changing very little from last year (which was really last week :D).

 

It might be different if I had to report to someone and they were expected to have something done for portfolio or testing, but that isn't the case here. So, even if they were "behind" it's only according to what I wanted to accomplish so I would probably reevaluate, decide what was important to me to finish, what was important to them (did they really want to learn something this year), and make plans accordingly.

 

I don't really worry about "done". My kids are working where they need to be, at the pace they need.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thank you to the suggestion of "chunking". We are getting through a lot more work. I know CM recommends shorter lessons so I am not pushing but if a child is happy enough to do an extra page or two I am letting them. It sometimes means only maths get done in a morning so the next day we do a big chunk of L.Arts. It is working well and I am not feeling so "behind".

 

Thank you,

Jen in Oz

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