Is it really possible...

[molon labe]

to afterschool and not feel completely overwhelmed? I have two kids currently in public school. Dd is 5 years old and in kindergarten. Ds is 10 and in fourth grade. Both are intelligent kids and are earning good grades, but...something's missing.

 

I have been a lurker for the last two years. I read TWTM and became fascinated with the idea of educating my two kiddos in the classical method (though I have had dreams of homeschooling even before discovering TWTM). Dh really hasn't been on board with the idea of homeschooling (that is a post in and of itself) so the kids are currently in public school. But both dh and I are becoming increasingly concerned with the quality of education (or lack thereof) in our local public school system. We've been afterschooling (even before I knew there was a term for what we were doing), but am finding myself more and more frustrated...with everything school related. I've been volunteering in the classroom this year and it has really opened my eyes...to alot of things. Grade inflation, incompetent teachers, lack of discipline in the classroom--needless to say I'm not happy but am floundering as to how to remedy the situation.

 

There just doesn't seem to be enough hours in the day to accomplish everything I want to do, education-wise, with my kids. I'm stealing chunks of time here and there to "do school" here at home, but it never seems like enough. I don't feel any rhythm to what we are doing because our time spent afterschooling is so inconsistent. How does everyone do it? I find myself having to teach what isn't being taught at school, correcting things that are taught incorrectly, convince kids who are bored at school that learning really can be enjoyable, and on and on. I want my kids to have a great foundation in everything and I'm overwhelmed.

 

I'm working on dh and his fears of homeschooling-but for now the kids are public school students and I hate it. I'm feeling an intense pressure to make sure they receive the kind of education they deserve, but with them gone for 7 hours of the day I just don't know how to fit in everything with the time we have together.

 

How do other like-minded parents cope????

[SKL]

I will be listening too. My kids are in 1st grade and only one of them really gets much "afterschooling" from me, but yes, it can be overwhelming. In order for me to do what I feel is needed, I've had to let bedtimes go. Lately it's 10 or later when the kids finally go to bed - without a bath most days. (They do sleep in to about 7:30 most days.) What else to give up? The physical activities? No, we'd all go crazy. Therapies? No. Math and reading practice? Not if I want my eldest to be promoted. Test review? Homework? The occasional museum trip? How about dinner? Surely we could do without dinner.

 

If I could do it over, I would have gotten more serious about afterschooling before school started, so we'd stay ahead of the game, instead of reacting to things not clicking in school. Right now I'm spending a good hour or more remediating math most evenings. If I'd planned it better, it would be more like 15-30 minutes and other things would fall into place better. Because I have a kid who struggles to keep up in some areas, I have downloaded all of the grade 1 math worksheets and grades 1-2 language arts workbooks from their school's website, so we can review past lessons during vacations and start back with a bang (here's hoping!). I keep my other (advanced) kid thinking via books (fiction and nonfiction), which she adores. We pop onto the internet to look up topics of interest. I also give my advanced kid some math worksheets ahead of her class (they are doing Singapore math, which is challenging for her if we skip ahead several months). Both kids also do piano and several classes at The Little Gym on school nights.

 

I want to change the balance to where I'm giving my advanced kid more attention in the evenings. For example, I could see her being motivated to write creatively if I would pay more attention to her creations. Right now it's hard to find the mental energy to do both remediation and advanced enrichment every evening.

[molon labe]

.

 

If I could do it over, I would have gotten more serious about afterschooling before school started, so we'd stay ahead of the game, instead of reacting

 

Right now it's hard to find the mental energy to do both remediation and advanced enrichment every evening.

 

 

So glad I'm not the only one who feels this way!

 

When I realize how much other families are able to accomplish and where their kids are educationally, I really feel like my kids are missing out by not being at home during the day. I started out afterschooling as a way to supplement what was going on at school. Now my feeling is that school is just a supplement to what I'm doing at home-that is how little confidence I have in what is actually being learned at school. And yet, after being in desk for 7 hours every day, I know I can't make them sit for another 7 at home to get done what we really need to get done.

[Uff Da!]

It can be overwhelming at times. I can imagine it being more difficult with an older child than these young ones. We have hit the February Funk here. I was getting burnt out so, with the exception of things outside teachers have assigned, we are doing our dinner studies (kids eat and I teach) and our hands on geography crafts that were prepped in the fall. I literally do not have to think for the crafts. I simply let the kids go at it and take a bunch of pictures for scrapbooking. It's a break I tried to avoid - even though I planned for it knowing that every year we start to croak about now and come back to life with the warm weather. I love afterschooling and most of the time the kids and I are enthusiastic about our plans. (My eldest will tell me if she thinks something is less than stellar) I don't think I could ever teach them everything I want to, even if we were homeschooling. We do our best and call it good enough. My enthusiasm is waning at the moment so we are kind of on a break. Kind of.....

 

Editing to add: At one point last year, my husband who is a former PS teacher, told me that sometimes "You just need to move forward regardless of whether you covered everything or not." He said that there were times when he had great plans for his classes and what happened was more skeletal than what he envisioned. Sometimes the lessons here are lush and fleshed out- but if they are skeletal I try not to stress about it. The kids seem to learn regardless.

[mathnerd]

I afterschool and am overwhelmed but keep going at it because I too volunteer in the classroom and know that my child is not adequately challenged or even fully engaged at all times in the classroom. My suggestion would be to use vacation time (spring break, mid year break, staff learning days, planned closures/early dismissal days-in california) and weekends to catch up and then try to keep your children ahead of grade level in the subjects most important to your family. I would also suggest that you get hold of a curriculum (or more) per subject and spend some time reading the teacher's guide for that grade level and then use your own judgement to either teach a topic if it needed remediation at home or skip it if it seems elementary to your children (for e.g. my child skipped the geometric shapes and patterns topics because he seemed to have mastered it from somewhere). That way, you can save some time while also systematically reviewing all the material for that grade level.

As a PP mentioned, I too like staying ahead of grade level because that means that when my son is taught a topic in class it serves as a review and I am not too worried about how much of it is taught at school.

Good luck.

[JenniferLynn]

As my 4YO twins come online with after schooling, it is getting overwhelming to manage 3. I am hoping it is temporary because I started with DD6 (1st grade) 2 years ago and it has worked well to stay ahead of where they are in public school. There isn't much homework yet, though public school friends complain and it appears to take them 5x the time it takes our family. Having the home study habits helps tremendously, so school homework gets out of the way quickly.

 

We have 3 regular after school periods - before school, before dinner (after some playtime) and before bed. Siblings tagging along for ballet lessons, etc. do after schooling work while we wait. DH has agreed to be my teacher's aide on the weekends and some evenings, so I can delegate school homework, listening to them read, monitoring Rosetta Stone usage, spelling review lists. We also listen to SOTW, children's lit, French & Latin CD's in the car.

 

And it ebbs and flows. We prioritize the cumulative subjects that suffer with long breaks - math is by far the priority, then French, then pushing the envelope on reading. I suspect it may differ for each child eventually, but so far there are many subjects that can get away with being done on a weekly basis, or put on the shelf for a few weeks if necessary.

 

Good luck!

[aly9712]

It is hard indeed and sometimes other things just take priority. We constantly steal chunks of time (car rides, breakfast, etc.) I would say make a list of the top 2-3 things you want to get done weekly or even daily. For me it's still centered around the 3 R's. DD uses her personal time to work on science and her research interests. I will say that since we completely cut out weekday TV, it frees time that is more productive...even though I have to be a lot more creative to occupy three kids (ages 8, 4, 3) while I prepare dinner and clean house. Use the weekends and try to find materials that the fourth grader can do independently. Take it easy on yourself, any amount that you manage will is better than nothing :) Just know we're all juggling and anyone who says differently- is lying my hat off to you.

[MtnMama]

For me, the hardest thing was realizing that I couldn't afterschool every subject. So now we just focus on math, history, and lots of reading. I'd love to be doing more, but trying was stressing the whole family out.

[mom2lydia]

We focus on math and reading. During the reading time things we read overlap into other areas like right now we are reading American Girl books so it is overlapping history. Other times it may be books that overlap into science or about a specific topic dd7 wants to explore more in depth or isn't being covered at all that she wants to learn about. We do a few worksheets in math, more when dd is in the mood. Sometimes she will sit for hours and work on workbooks for math other times she just wants a few things and to move to something else. We watch documentaries about things she enjoys as a family. We watch older shows like Little House on the Prarie and the Waltons to get some historical jumping points and talk about what she thinks it would be like to live in those times and what would she do in that situation. She spends a lot of time writing stories and letters and journaling as well. I take a bit of a child led initiative approach. Even with the math unless she is having trouble with an idea they are working on at school, which right now is fractions, we explore whatever area it is she wants to. Usually it means story problems that she makes up and multiplication and division. She surprised me over Christmas break asking about algebra because her babysitter is in algebra and she wants to learn it. We did some basic things with introducing letters into a math equation to figure out and then she went back to focusing on multiplication and division. We also do a lot of strategy games and math games at home like battleship, clue, yahtzee, etc. We aren't super strict with a schedule because my work schedule is unpredictable. Some nights I get home well after bedtime and am gone before she gets home from school. I don't want all my time w/ her spent doing schoolwork but we integrate it in ways that is fun and flexible.

[EKS]

I just started afterschooling my 11yo this year after homeschooling him his entire life. He is going to a school that is supposedly a rigorous private college prep school, but I am not impressed with the quality of the academics.

 

Since I am afterschooling an older child who can have lots of homework from the school, I've had to make choices. There seem to be two main categories:

• Things I have to teach myself because the school doesn't provide it at all. History, grammar, and classic literature are in this category.
  
• Things that the school teaches, but does a poor and/or incomplete job. Math, reading difficult nonfiction, writing, and science are in this category.
  

 

Then I figure out how much I can do in a cuddle on the couch, no output (other than conversation) fashion. For us, this works for history, classic lit, science, and MCT grammar. For non-MCT grammar, I've resorted to bribing my son to work through the Hake 8 book.

 

This leaves math and writing. For this, I need to use what the school is doing but somehow make it more robust. For math, I've bought the TM for the book they use (this saves me having to work all the problems myself in order to check my son's work) and make sure that my son understands the concepts behind the procedures being taught (they don't seem to teach concepts and the book doesn't either) as well as that he has worked all of the problems correctly (the teacher doesn't collect the homework). I am also supplementing with Life of Fred to provide a fun basis for discussion of math concepts because my son loves Fred. It helps that my son is actually placed correctly in math. If he wasn't, I'd be supplementing with material at his level.

 

Writing is more difficult to afterschool. It would be fairly straightforward to discuss any writing assignments that are brought home, but there has only been one assignment (and I don't expect any more this year). I expect the problem to continue at least through next year. I think I'm going to have to bribe my son to work through WWS 2 when he finishes Hake Grammar.

 

Besides dividing tasks into the three categories of cuddle/conversation on the couch, augment what the school does, and hardcore supplementation with bribery, I've also tentatively planned how to cycle through things. I can't do everything at once because it would take too long each day. So, I've decided to save science for the summers rather than add it to the evenings.

 

We also use weekends and vacations to get a little more done. I tie screen time to afterschooling at these times.

 

What this actually looks like on a school night: Kid does whatever homework has been assigned by the school. I augment as necessary. If there has been a lot of output with the assigned homework, we go straight to reading on the couch and skip grammar. If not, we do a Hake lesson and then read on the couch, which takes about an hour. In the summer, I'll add science and we'll probably do about two hours of work most days.

 

Ok, this totally rambled. My intention was to show how I'm trying to make things palatable for both of us so that they'll get done. So far, we've been succeeding, but it does require determination on my part. I also have to be flexible because some nights/weekends he has a ton of homework and that takes priority. I would hope that with a younger child, the homework thing would be less of a problem.

[molon labe]

Thanks to all who responded! So many things written here resonate with me. I've come to the conclusion that a big part of my frustration is actually sadness-I had such high hopes for us using afterschooling time for things like Latin (that I knew for sure they wouldn't get at school but I see the benefit of them learning).

 

But reality has set in and, like so many have posted here, the scant amount of time for afterschooling is going to have be prioritized. It does help to know that I am not alone and to have had the opportunity to read what others in our situation are doing.

[Roadrunner]

I'm working on dh and his fears of homeschooling-but for now the kids are public school students and I hate it. I'm feeling an intense pressure to make sure they receive the kind of education they deserve, but with them gone for 7 hours of the day I just don't know how to fit in everything with the time we have together.

 

How do other like-minded parents cope????

 

 

I can tell you what eased by DH's fears. After 2-3 years of PS, the subjects my kids absolutely excel are the ones we afterschool. Last night my 6 year old was sitting with him solving CWP2 problems from the challenging section and my DH was amazed. Periodically he looks over what our kids are accomplishing in subjects we work on at home and where they are in subjects we don't afterschool and the results are clear. We finally decided to homeschool next year.

 

Afterschooling is easy in K and first grade when one hour is all you need to accomplish a lot. It's harder as they get older, I think.

[Charlened1974]

I afterschool because it's what I, a public school teacher, would love my students' parents to do. I teach my rear end off, but between massive differences in ability levels and major discipline problems, I know that, sadly, all of my students are not being challenged like I want. So when my first grade student struggled in reading, we starting reading everything she was at all interested in. And when my gifted child wasn't challenged, we brought in Art of Problem Solving. This semester we have added ancient history to our bedtime story routine. By next school year, I hope to have science and Latin added in.

I know it is easy to think the school should do more, but I can speak from personal experience that even doing all I can will never be enough. And thanks to standards and testing, many things are not allowed to be taught. If you want your child to have an edge, to get up to grade level, to graduate early, or to just not be bored... whatever your child's goal is, go after it, because public schools can't do what we as parents can.

[IsabelC]

I have just started afterschooling and I find it is almost as challenging as homeschooling, for slightly different reasons.

My kids are around the same age as yours - 4th grade, 2nd grade and preschool - and we are hoping to bring them home again next year, but would imagine that afterschooling would become more demanding as they get further through school and have more homework and/or study to do.

 

I think that the most important thing is to come up with your goals for afterschooling. Is your main aim:

To teach things that just aren't covered in school?

To extend them on topics they are doing in school?

To teach things with a different perspective/method?

To help with the odd thing that they seem to be having trouble with?

 

Once you have decided what you would like to achieve - or at least what would be your number one priority - you can work out how much time that would take and how to go about it.

 

The other important thing is, don't try to do too much. As somebody here kindly reminded me, kids do need unstructure downtime to play, daydream and muck around, so be sure that you allow some time for that during the week.

[IsabelC]

Oops double post sorry

[kiwik]

I just started afterschooling my 11yo this year after homeschooling him his entire life. He is going to a school that is supposedly a rigorous private college prep school, but I am not impressed with the quality of the academics.

 

Since I am afterschooling an older child who can have lots of homework from the school, I've had to make choices. There seem to be two main categories:

• Things I have to teach myself because the school doesn't provide it at all. History, grammar, and classic literature are in this category.
  
• Things that the school teaches, but does a poor and/or incomplete job. Math, reading difficult nonfiction, writing, and science are in this category.
  

Then I figure out how much I can do in a cuddle on the couch, no output (other than conversation) fashion. For us, this works for history, classic lit, science, and MCT grammar. For non-MCT grammar, I've resorted to bribing my son to work through the Hake 8 book.

 

This leaves math and writing. For this, I need to use what the school is doing but somehow make it more robust. For math, I've bought the TM for the book they use (this saves me having to work all the problems myself in order to check my son's work) and make sure that my son understands the concepts behind the procedures being taught (they don't seem to teach concepts and the book doesn't either) as well as that he has worked all of the problems correctly (the teacher doesn't collect the homework). I am also supplementing with Life of Fred to provide a fun basis for discussion of math concepts because my son loves Fred. It helps that my son is actually placed correctly in math. If he wasn't, I'd be supplementing with material at his level.

 

Writing is more difficult to afterschool. It would be fairly straightforward to discuss any writing assignments that are brought home, but there has only been one assignment (and I don't expect any more this year). I expect the problem to continue at least through next year. I think I'm going to have to bribe my son to work through WWS 2 when he finishes Hake Grammar.

 

Besides dividing tasks into the three categories of cuddle/conversation on the couch, augment what the school does, and hardcore supplementation with bribery, I've also tentatively planned how to cycle through things. I can't do everything at once because it would take too long each day. So, I've decided to save science for the summers rather than add it to the evenings.

 

We also use weekends and vacations to get a little more done. I tie screen time to afterschooling at these times.

 

What this actually looks like on a school night: Kid does whatever homework has been assigned by the school. I augment as necessary. If there has been a lot of output with the assigned homework, we go straight to reading on the couch and skip grammar. If not, we do a Hake lesson and then read on the couch, which takes about an hour. In the summer, I'll add science and we'll probably do about two hours of work most days.

 

Ok, this totally rambled. My intention was to show how I'm trying to make things palatable for both of us so that they'll get done. So far, we've been succeeding, but it does require determination on my part. I also have to be flexible because some nights/weekends he has a ton of homework and that takes priority. I would hope that with a younger child, the homework thing would be less of a problem.

 

Sorry why are you paying for a private school? It seems unreasonable to pay through the nose and then do all the work yourself. Is there no way you could go back to home schooling?

[EKS]

Sorry why are you paying for a private school? It seems unreasonable to pay through the nose and then do all the work yourself. Is there no way you could go back to home schooling?

 

 

It does seem unreasonable, doesn't it?

 

What I haven't mentioned is what the school does well, which just happens to be what I don't do well.

• Experiential stuff--outdoor education, hands-on stuff in science, art, music, cooking

• Very small size which allows peer interaction without as much of a threat of peer dependence

• Lots of caring adults to give different perspectives

• After school clubs such as robotics and film

• Academic teams--Knowledge Masters, math teams, History Bowl, etc.

• Foreign language

• A large international student population

 

Despite the issues, my son is thriving there. Whenever I get frustrated (daily, at least), I think of the good things.

[Spy Car]

For me, I understand the "school year" is about 180 days. That leaves another 180 days, plus 5 or 6 days of downtime. That is a lot of time.

 

I also go my 3 imperatives: Flexability, Opportunism and Creativity/Fun/Efficiency

 

Flexability means that if a fun life-opportunity arises then "lesson plans" are usually shelved. Opportunism means taking advantage of time that might otherwise be "wasted" to get in lessons. This goes not mean sucking up every moment, as children need play time, but having an eye out for gaps of time to fill and seizing them. The last imperative is making the afterschooling time and enjoyable, rich, and time efficient that rewards a child with a sense of parental involvement rather than creating a situation that seems like "punishment."

 

Having a child enjoy the learning, rather than feeling resentful of it, make the process a lot easier and more rewarding.

 

Bill

 

 

 

 

 

 

[kiwik]

 

 

It does seem unreasonable, doesn't it?

 

What I haven't mentioned is what the school does well, which just happens to be what I don't do well.

• Experiential stuff--outdoor education, hands-on stuff in science, art, music, cooking

• Very small size which allows peer interaction without as much of a threat of peer dependence

• Lots of caring adults to give different perspectives

• After school clubs such as robotics and film

• Academic teams--Knowledge Masters, math teams, History Bowl, etc.

• Foreign language

• A large international student population

 

Despite the issues, my son is thriving there. Whenever I get frustrated (daily, at least), I think of the good things.

 

 

Fair enough. They must also have not much homework too because that is a lot of work. You have my admiration. I manage very little afterschooling despite having heaps of things I want to do.

[EKS]

They must also have not much homework too because that is a lot of work.

 

The lack of homework is a blessing because it gives me time to afterschool. But it is also a symptom of the problems with the school (for example, a lack of practice with difficult skills).

 

It certainly is a trade off. When it stops working, we will figure something else out.

[shellbelle]

It honestly doesn't happen in our house. My kindergarten and 2nd grade daughters each come home with an hour of homework every day. My fifth grader usually finishes his at school, but is not keen on the idea of more work once he gets home. He loves to read and do science related things like work with his Lego Mindstorms or take out his telescope. I don't push more work on him because he is disappointed with school (bored and ahead of the class) and will likely return to homeschool in the fall. I visit the library and provide him with plenty of reading material and just let him do his own thing.

 

We also have a lot of activities (soccer, piano, gymnastics) and free creative play and outdoor time is more important to me than afterschooling. I suspect we will use our summer to afterschool/summerschool in a relaxed sort of way.

 

I do plan to work on fun projects over the summer and strengthen reading and math skills. We often visit museums and do a lot of art. Everyone loves to read and be read aloud to. It certainly is a trade off having the kids in school, but my girls are thriving. My son is simply waiting for the school year to end. We homeschooled until Dec. 2012 and decided to give school a try. My girls will be returning next year, but my son is better suited for the flexibility and independence that homeschooling provides.

[Free]

I get everything that you are saying, every single thing, because I am exactly in the same boat as you. Yes I want my ds to enjoy learning, but how can I inculcate that when he sees whatever little time away from school as freedom and joy?

 

I think I felt a lot of pressure, stress and anxiety when I hung around regularly on the WTM boards, especially in the education forums, knowing that I could never match up to those standards in my own home. I had to take some time away from the boards and evaluate for myself where I stand. I have for now decided to let go of the idea that I can do everything that homeschooling mothers on WTM boards do and to not create stress for myself and for my ds.

 

I think there are always going to be gaps in knowledge. Rather than trying to fill the knowledge gaps, I have decided to address making learning natural and joyful through discussions, videos, etc. I also try to use the regular school work itself to focus on the skill gaps such as thinking skills, study skills, research skills and writing skills. What I want for my son is for him to drive his own education. We are still a far way from there, but I feel that if I can build in him the enthusiasm to research and learn for himself, it would go a long way in addressing knowledge gaps too.

[Nart]

It honestly doesn't happen in our house. My kindergarten and 2nd grade daughters each come home with an hour of homework every day.

 

Ridiculous! An hour of homework in kinder? My kinder son gets maybe five minutes a day and he finishes it at the before care center at school (he is in afternoon kinder). So I am able to fit in 30 to 60 minutes of afterschooling. Occasionally he has a project that takes longer (make a leprechaun trap, gather 100 items). Aren't parents complaining?

[shellbelle]

Ridiculous! An hour of homework in kinder? My kinder son gets maybe five minutes a day and he finishes it at the before care center at school (he is in afternoon kinder). So I am able to fit in 30 to 60 minutes of afterschooling. Occasionally he has a project that takes longer (make a leprechaun trap, gather 100 items). Aren't parents complaining?

 

She actually loves doing homework. 20 minutes is listening to a read aloud, about 15 is spent reviewing sight words/numbers/rhyming, and the remaining time is spent on various activities. It doesn't involve any worksheets. It's things like naming coins and their values, writing sight words, writing numbers, reading a short story, etc. If she is really focused, it can take about 45 minutes. Her teacher is great and I'm not complaining at all. She has learned so much!

[kiwik]

 

 

She actually loves doing homework. 20 minutes is listening to a read aloud, about 15 is spent reviewing sight words/numbers/rhyming, and the remaining time is spent on various activities. It doesn't involve any worksheets. It's things like naming coins and their values, writing sight words, writing numbers, reading a short story, etc. If she is really focused, it can take about 45 minutes. Her teacher is great and I'm not complaining at all. She has learned so much!

 

I'm glad she likes it but it still seems an awful lot of homework for one so young. They spend hours a day at school, surely they shouldn't need to do a lot more stuff a home.

[Berta]

My daughter is in 2nd grade. We put her in school in the middle of 1st grade because I needed to go back to work. I would love to get all the subjects covered after school but it just wasn't happening. We would spend almost an hour getting busy work done for school, and our homeschooling work really took a hit. Her teacher told us that homework was not being checked for accuracy, just that it was done. Checking for accuracy was the parents job. I made the decision to become a homework-free home. We still do reports and projects, but not the daily homework.

 

We work on math, grammar, spelling and cursive after school. On weekends, vacation time and this coming summer we will add history and science. She is used to homeschooling year round (my older daughter is homeschooled full time) and she loves to do her work so it works for us.

[fourisenough]

My older two daughters went to public school this year and, honestly, it has been a pretty terrific experience for both. They are both a bit accelerated, yet they have been challenged at school, which took me by surprise.

 

We read for pleasure, discuss current events, and support them in their fairly significant homework during the school year. However, each child is going to do a deep-dive in one self-selected subject this summer (Algebra for the rising 8th grader and SAT Prep for the rising 10th grader), plus read a book a week (I'll encourage them to choose a variety of genres- and none will involve romantic encounters with vampires) .

 

I can't imagine doing much more after schooling, paired with their intense swim schedule (they have 6 and 9 practices per week, respectively) throughout the school year.

[truemind]

OP thanks for your posting .  At times, when I read the WTM forum, I feel the same way but realized that I could never give the same level of education a homeschooler can give.  As afterschooler, our time is always going to be limited, so I ask for the best practices from the forum folks.  As you all know there are a lot of knowledgeable folks in this forum.  So, key is to prioritize and use the limited time we have as best as possible.  With my DD 7, we only do LA and math and we allow a lot of free reading at night.  I would love to add few more things but there is not enough time in a day.   We might add grammar or writing as we progress next year or year after(if time permits).  

 

So given the limited time, ask yourself what are the most important things you want your kiddo to learn and do those the best way possible.

[My3girls]

Dd11 was in the gifted program, dd8 is a challenged learner, and dd7 is just a challenge. After a year of fighting to get dd8 services and her falling further and further behind, we decided to pull them. I didn't think it was fair for her to be in school all day and then be working with me on reading and math every night. It's really hard for her and she gets soo frustrated. I work from home so we decided I would just homeschool after work. This way I don't have to worry about homework from school or bedtimes. They sleep in while I work; I make them a meal and they play or watch tv at mid-day; they have chores to do and homework in the afternoon. Then when I get off work, we do lessons so its kinda of the opposite schedule as when they were in school.

 

I found when I was giving them placement tests this summer that dd11 and dd7 weren't doing as well as we thought, either. Dd11 scored nearly perfect on end of year testing in math at ps, but scored a 49% on Math Mammoth's placement test... really? Granted a few questions were duh moments, but not enough to explain the score. What's crazy is that they were both supposed to be based on core curriculum. Makes me really wonder about the grading and reporting being done; not to mention if she is "gifted" and made this score, how would the average student do after being educated at our ps.

 

So we are afterwork homeschooling and really hoping that I can keep up with the work load. My dh for some reason thinks I should just be able to find some free resources on line and use the library and be good. He really isn't understanding the research and planning time that I am putting in plus the expense. I finally told him well I can just buy a boxed curriculum for $400ish for each kid and be done with it. He didn't like that idea so much. Lol

 

Hope, your dh comes around. Until then utilize the school breaks as best you can. Your kids will appreciate you for it one day.