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What do you expect during the day?


DragonflyAcademy
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I need a reality check.. are my expectations too high? They may be.. I hold a HIGH standard.. I feel as if I need to.. we are homeschooling.. and I have to "prove" my children are receiving a good education.. so maybe I need a reality check..

 

My expectations:

1. Work is done in a timely fashion.. this means math does not take 4 hours to complete..

2. Work is done with a good attitude.. which means no eye rolling, sass or back talk about the work.

3. That we have fun... which hardly seems to happen because of the sass and eye rolling..

 

My daily expectations for the older children (grade 3 and 6) are that they complete:

1 lesson of Saxon math.. some orally..some written (30 problems)

1 Lesson of english (2 pages of BJU english/grammar.. 1 done with me step by step, 1 done by themselves)

1 lesson of reading (silent reading of assigned pages, oral comprehension questions, written questions or phonics lesson.. never both in the same day)

1 Handwriting practice page

1 spelling lesson page

1 IEW lesson (done together at this point.. step by step, broken down into different days)

 

2 days a week there are assigned Health readings and oral questions

4 days a week there is either assigned history reading (living book) or a lapbook page to correspond with what we are doing

1 day a week an art lesson

4 days a week, music.. composer study.. either reading on the composer or a lapbook type lesson

Piano practice, daily..

 

 

(we did science over the summer... I will start to assign some science reading as we go on but our formal science was completed over the summer months)

 

 

Is this too much to expect???? I should add that anything that the child does not understand is carefully gone over.. but if it is just a "I don't want to do it" attitude.. they are left to work through the problem on their own.. Math in particular seems to be the latter at this point... for the oldest..

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I need a reality check.. are my expectations too high? They may be.. I hold a HIGH standard.. I feel as if I need to.. we are homeschooling.. and I have to "prove" my children are receiving a good education.. so maybe I need a reality check.. My expectations: 1. Work is done in a timely fashion.. this means math does not take 4 hours to complete.. 2. Work is done with a good attitude.. which means no eye rolling, sass or back talk about the work. 3. That we have fun... which hardly seems to happen because of the sass and eye rolling.. My daily expectations for the older children (grade 3 and 6) are that they complete: 1 lesson of Saxon math.. some orally..some written (30 problems) 1 Lesson of english (2 pages of BJU english/grammar.. 1 done with me step by step, 1 done by themselves) 1 lesson of reading (silent reading of assigned pages, oral comprehension questions, written questions or phonics lesson.. never both in the same day) 1 Handwriting practice page 1 spelling lesson page 1 IEW lesson (done together at this point.. step by step, broken down into different days) 2 days a week there are assigned Health readings and oral questions 4 days a week there is either assigned history reading (living book) or a lapbook page to correspond with what we are doing 1 day a week an art lesson 4 days a week, music.. composer study.. either reading on the composer or a lapbook type lesson Piano practice, daily.. (we did science over the summer... I will start to assign some science reading as we go on but our formal science was completed over the summer months) Is this too much to expect???? I should add that anything that the child does not understand is carefully gone over.. but if it is just a "I don't want to do it" attitude.. they are left to work through the problem on their own.. Math in particular seems to be the latter at this point... for the oldest..

 

I think that your expectations are clear and reasonable. They are actually very similar to mine, although I don't 'expect' that they have fun. I expect them to do their work with a good and cheerful attitude which sometimes means that they may end up enjoying what they do. But other times it is just plain old work which still needs to be done.

 

Maybe you could have some sort of reward system for doing work cheerfully and in a timely manner. My kids earn GOLD points for work done well. At the moment the points mainly apply to their household chores but I will soon be applying them to attitude and timeliness in their schoolwork time as well. These GOLD points accumulate and when they gain a set amount they win a GOLD morning tea with me (translation: a trip out to a cafe or coffee shop with me ;) ) This is working well.

 

Another idea would be to place 3 jelly beans (or whatever) in front of each child during their work time. Each time they whine or complain or go off task you remove one (you could eat it yourself.....;) ). At the end of the session they get to have whatever is left.

 

Just some ideas.

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I might gain a few pounds with all those jelly beans.. hahahaahhhhaa..

 

They can earn compter time for doing school work pleasantly.....

 

It is my oldest, 6th grade.. who is having the issue.. the sass, back talk, eye rolling, drama and length of time is just over the top with this kid.. and I am ready to ship him off to public school.....

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I think it sounds just right. I understand the desire to have high expectations. I feel that way, too. I do strongly desire to give my dc at least the quality and rigor that they would have in a private school. Ofcourse different hs moms have different expectations, goals and personalities. IMO, your list sounds perfectly reasonable.

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I am not sure it is reasonable to expect they have fun, if by that you mean the kids have some responsibility to have fun. While having a good attitude makes work more fun, not every day will be fun for all kinds of reasons. And I think it can be pretty frustrating and maddening to kids to be told they need to enjoy themselves doing things they are obliged to do. Kind of like your boss telling you to smile more when you are trying to fix the malfunctioning photocopier for the third time.

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I don't expect them to have fun..

 

I do expect them to act with respect, have a good attitude.. I try to make the work fun.. doing art projects or activities that are out of the box..things I know they would enjoy (like this week was soap carving)... that is more of what I meant.. But I do stress that just as in real life, there are things about school that we want to do.. and things we must do.. but they should all be done pleasantly.. It is NO fun when the attitude card gets pulled out..

 

that was more what I was trying to say.. not that it would all be happy every day...

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If math is taking 4 hours, I would wonder whether the material is either too easy or too hard. Either one can cause math to take forever. ;)

 

If it's too easy, the kid gets into a mode of, "Why do I have to do this stuff that I already know over and over and over again every day?!?!?" If it's too hard, the kid is struggling to finish the work because, well, it's too hard.

 

My oldest is mathy. If he is given 30 problems that are super duper easy, he will hem and haw. Now yes, a child should be able to do them if they're easy, as easy problems are quick to do, but if they're given day after day after day, the kid is going to be wondering why? What's the point? So if it's a case of too easy, you might tell him that if the problems are too easy, show you how easy they are - get them done super quick, and we'll change things to make the work more appropriate. That way, he's not getting away with spending 4 hours on math - he has to do it quickly and efficiently that one time to prove to you that it's too easy. Then you change it up to make it more worth his while to do the work. Just an idea. Personally, I would be bored to tears with Saxon math, and so would my son. :tongue_smilie:

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Saxon seems to be working really well for him actually, he thinks it is great compared to Rod and Staff... It seems to be just the right mix of review right now with things he missed in the past.. He is still making some careless mistakes but they have decreased significantly...

 

His attitude is that he doesn't want to do school, at all...

 

We seem to have gotten over the worst, he helped design a schedule breaking his day down into chunks for each subject and that seems to work better for him.. at least so far....

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I think your expectations are right on (but I have high expectations too).

 

Has this been a recent thing with your oldest or on-going? (i.e., is it "the age"?)

 

My oldest dislikes that she has "more work" than the youngers. Since she has always been older, she's always had "more work" than any of the other kids. It rankles. The next one in line disliked that she had "more work" than #3 last year. (This year, they have the exact same amount, so I don't hear the complaint from her, just #3 who wants to have the same amount of free time she had last year.)

 

I'd say keep doing what you are doing.

 

We have the opportunity to earn "virtual dollars" that they can save up to "buy" toys. They can earn $1/day, earn nothing, or lose up to $1/day. If they have an attitude problem, they don't earn their $1 that day. If they have another one, they lose a $1 they already earned. It hasn't quite sunken in that ATTITUDE counts, but it is a good thing I don't let them continue to lose dollars or some would be down $5-$20 in just one day. (We have some really impressive tantrums at our house.)

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Ummm, I would expect everything but the "have fun" part. The curriculum you've chosen is not known for being "fun". I agree with PP that the math may be too repetative for your son. If he understands it, why waste time doing the same stuff day after day... 5 problems for review would be plenty.... move on th the more interesting new stuff. My DS also 6th went from hating Math to loving it becuse I started saying, "skip every other one", or "you know that, just do a couple of them".

 

If the work is to hard then 30 problems on his own is way too much. Sit down and watch him to see if he struggles, do the first 3-5 for him, help him with the next 3-5 problems, then wait/watch while he does another 3-5 problems.

 

These are the things that have helped with my DC who both now LOVE math. I will admit that in DD's case it's because we are using Beast Academy:D.

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My boys at this age don't enjoy school work either. What I do notice, though, reading through your list is that it seems like a lot of reading assignments and answering questions and not much else to interact with the material. My boys seem to really need to 'work' with the material.

 

Here is what I mean:

 

Most of the time we don't answer comprehension questions. We discuss things we find interesting. We rarely answer comprehension questions in writing. We do a lot of talking.

 

They do have writing assignments like summaries, outlines, or opinion pieces.

 

We do lots of drawing and painting, not only during art, but also for history or science assignments. We are currently doing Physics. Many drawings involve how machines work. Then they label them.

 

We try to do projects when time permits. Projects could be word search puzzles, painting, cooking, clay work etc.

 

All this to say this: I don't think your expectations are too high, however, there may be a way to have them learn the information in a more varied way. On a side note, my boys always disliked lapbooks as projects. They always needed materials other then just paper.

 

I hope some of this helps.

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It is my oldest, 6th grade.. who is having the issue.. the sass, back talk, eye rolling, drama and length of time is just over the top with this kid.. and I am ready to ship him off to public school.....

 

I don't think your expectations are unrealistic.

 

I have 3 boys and the youngest is currently a 6th grader. I have noticed that there was a period for each of mine, usually around 5th or 6th grade, where each boy became a bit more difficult about his schoolwork. It manifested itself differently with each one but boiled down to being resistant and not putting forth a good effort. I just made sure my expectations were clear and also reminded them of what was not acceptable regarding their responses to the work. So here, sassing and back talk would not be acceptable and the offender would be reminded of that and also reminded of what the consequence would be if it continued. Drama might be ignored or I might try to lighten the mood in some way depending on how the drama was presented...and how the previous hours with that child had gone :tongue_smilie:.

 

Now, if math is taking that long there may other things going on than just being resistant to schoolwork. I would spend some additional time with him when it comes to math to try and figure out what the issues are.

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Those sound similar to my expectations of my kids. I don't think it's too much. Math was a real stumbling block for us last year though (with DS -- DD was fine) and his reluctance to work ate up a lot of time. This year is going better. I wish I had advice for you.

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The expectations are fine. Mine are a little different, but not so much.

 

However, I also know my kids won't always get there. And just like learning math, they're learning expectations and practicing good habits. I guess I also don't expect perfection. If they have a bad day, well, everyone is entitled to a few of those. If I see they're working hard and the academic things I want done aren't all happening, I readjust. Maybe you do those things to, I was just sensing an inflexibility from your post. I personally find that helping a kid's attitude has to be done with a little understanding that they won't always get it all right nd the more I dig in my heels, the more they don't even bother to try to get it right.

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