S/O of How Long for Kindergarten....threa

[Kerileanne99]

Okay, so I have been reading about how many of you spend with you Kinder kiddo's for sit-down work... And I can totally relate to those of you that differentiate between seat work and all the hands on science, read-alouds, art projects, and field trips. And lets face it, for Kindy age mom's errands totally count:))

 

Here is my question. I have a very young dd, and she is working well in advance of what most people would consider Kindy level. In some areas, more like 2nd and 3rd grade, or higher in reading.

I know that many of you have kiddos working ahead. So do you consider them Kindy for seat-work requirements? How do you address this?

And I think this actually affects many homeschool children who simply absorb their environment. Kids are sponges who will work to whatever levels we expect of them, especially in multi-age families.

 

Do you base your requirements of them on ability, experience, age, or a combination of factors?

Love to hear what more experienced HS moms think....

[thegirlwhopaintedtrees]

My DD (6) is advanced (doing 3rd grade work) .  I give her the amount of work her own personal attention span can handle. She can do long days (unless she's having a bad day).  My son (newly 4) is working at K and 1st grade level but can only manage 5 to 15 minutes per "session" then I lose his attention and he goes off to play.  My DD at that age could sit and color or draw or write stories for an hour or more at a time.  Her attention span now is actually less than it used to be because now her dear brother distracts her:)  So the answer to your question is probably that for me it depends on a variety of factors, mostly being the child him or herself.  Your daughter is even more ahead for her age than mine was/is.  My advice is keep challenging her, but if she seems tired, let her go play:)  Let her lead the learning.

[abba12]

Your signature indicates she is 3.5? Wow, she is talented.

 

I would actually recommend going and asking on the accelerated learners board a bit further down, they probably have more experience with youngsters doing much older work and how to juggle that. I'd love to see their responses.

 

My opinion is probably somewhere in the middle. I could have been classified as gifted as a child, I remember doing addition at 3yo. So from my experience I think kids who are as far advanced as your little one probably have a higher attention span and can stand more seat time than kids their age. Having said that, I wouldn't expect a 3.5yo to do a full 4 hour school schedule, which is what many h/s 3rd graders do. Really, I think she will tell you how much she wants. If she asks for more (and hasn't spent the whole day on books already!) I'd give it to her. If she wants to stop after a half hour, she sounds as if she will pick up a lot, books or not, and she is so far ahead I wouldn't worry.

 

If I had to put a time on what I thought was appropriate given her age and curriculum choices, assuming she is wanting to do the work, I would probably figure out a core schedule which gives about 1.5 hours of seatwork, and allow her to do up to one more day worth of work on her own choice, so a maximum of 3 hours before I MAKE her leave the books to go play. (yeah, it means she might finish a curriculum in 6 months, but if she is capable, I'm all for it)

[Jackie]

My DD is 3. Other than handwriting/fine motor, she is doing what would be traditional K work now. And going through some of that quickly. I break things up into 2-10 minute chunks and if she gets restless within that, we stop. I honestly don't know what our average is for seat work in a day, but I would estimate 30 minutes? Over an hour some days when she is really into it, though. I know at some age I'll almost certainly institute requirements, but for me that's not now at age 3. So, ability-driven information and interest-driven amount of time here.

 

Now, if you count read-alouds, art, music, science experiments, educational field trips, etc, then I would say we average 5-6 hours of school per day. Much of that stuff is her chosen play.

[boscopup]

I know that many of you have kiddos working ahead. So do you consider them Kindy for seat-work requirements? How do you address this?

Prior to age 5, I let them do what they want. If they want to do a reading lesson, a math lesson, and a handwriting lesson, fine. We'll do that. If they don't want to do any of that, also fine. We won't do any of it. My 4 year old has two big brothers doing school, so he wants to "do school" as well. He's also very independent (and is reading and writing). So when he wants to join in, he does. If he wants to do a math lesson, he has a K math book to work through. When he wants to do a reading lesson, he pulls out Phonics Pathways and often does it himself while I'm working with another kid. :lol: We've recently started doing some Spalding all together, and he is writing words from dictation just fine and loves it. In fact, he is doing more of them than his 6 year old brother is, just because while I was zooming the 9 year old through the early parts, the 4 year old decides to write the same words on the board while the 6 year old is outside playing in the sandbox.

 

So there are ZERO seatwork requirements for my 4 year old. He just does what he wants, when he wants. It's all up to him. I have no school plans for him. I just have materials available, and will do them if he requests it.

 

Come his K year (when he's 5 next year), I'll start requiring phonics/handwriting/math each day for about 30ish minutes at a minimum - whatever level he is working at, that's what he'll do. But my requirement is age-appropriate. If he wants to do more, that's fine. I just only *require* the minimum. Of course, since he's teaching himself K materials now, I'm not really worried about his K year. He can tag along with his big brothers in history and science, read some books on his own, etc.

 

I didn't homeschool my oldest at that age, but I also didn't send him to preschool. He started cold turkey in K in a private school. I did absolutely zero intentional academics with him prior to K age. I answered his questions, and we had a lot of discussions (he was big into math discussions in the van). Basically, I just parented him. But if I even tried to teach him something that he didn't initiate, he resisted big time. He wasn't ready for formal school yet. He taught himself to read and do math though, so it wasn't a big deal. Writing waited until K age. My middle son's writing waited until he was 6 to get formal (about halfway through his K year). My current 4 year old is the only one to really learn how to write before K age, and he has crazy good fine motor skills in general compared to his big brothers, so that's probably why.

 

Anyway, in general, with my accelerated children (my oldest being the most accelerated at this point), I give them input appropriate to their abilities, and I require output and time spent equivalent to what I'd expect from an average child of that age. Now if they are ready to give more output, fine. My 4 year old certainly gives more output than I expect of a 4 year old (since I don't expect a 4 year old to be writing), so maybe he'll have a little bit more output expectation when he's older, based on his ability. But the time spent is age appropriate. I don't make my 4th grader do 1.5 hours of math just because he's doing 7th grade math. I have him do about 45 minutes of math (his attention span limit for math), and I don't worry about finishing the book in a year.

[sewingmama]

I dont require anything from my under 5's either. I do school with my 4yo when he asks for it. Usually I will ask him if he wants to do school and he will answer yes or no. What usually happens is he plays next to us as while we do school and joins in with whatever catches hs interest. He is quite bright and reading a little already but is a wriggly worm and would rather play.

 

My 5 year old is accelerated and doing 1st grade work. He works alongside his sister with everything. We do about 3 hours a day and he does a better job of it then DD who is 7. He has always had an extremely long concentration span, is not wiggly and loves to interact and do educational things. I had to start him early because he would just cry and cry if I tried to send him away when I was teaching his sister last year. He would sit through all her lessons voluntarily no matter how long they took and he wanted to do it all. I soon started noticing that he was keeping up really well (in fact surpassing his sister) so I just added him in to our lessons and he's just flying along. I often send the 7yo off to burn energy while DS is still sitting at the table working happily.

 

So my answer is ...it totally depends on the child and their attention span and wiggliness. If they will sit and want to do the lessons...then work at the level they are at for however long they will sit. Intelligence and the ability to sit still don't always corrolate. There is much you can do to feed her brain without the need for formal seatwork.

[Walking-Iris]

I look at their age first. Even if a 3 year old is advanced or gifted in some areas, I would give them only as much as a 3 year old could manage. Most advanced or gifted children are asynchronous. So they may be reading at a 2nd grade level, but may still have the social maturity or fine motor skills of a 3 year old.  

 

You would have to look at their entire development and address things as needed. I only give my 3 year old as much as she seems to be interested in. And even though i sense she could do a most K or even 1st grade math books, I don't do it, because she's 3, and I feel play and hands on and practical skills are more important than anything in a workbook. 

 

Also I wouldn't classify a 3 year old as a Kindergartner.  Even if the work my children are doing is ahead or behind, I always say they are the grade they would be based on age. Homeschool children can typically be ahead, behind, or right on target in various subjects or topics. It's best to think of the ages 3-6 as one long developmental range. 

[Pamela H in Texas]

When my daughter was little, my stepmom was upset that I was doing such advanced work with her (we had high school materials by the time she was seven).  I told her that it doesn't take her any longer to do high school than a typical child to do 2nd grade (discussing homeschoolers, not how long school kids are locked in school buildings). I'm sure that isn't totally true for every child and situation.  For a younger child, number of formal subjects may differ also. 

 

I would just balance it the best you can.  I think, "can still be a child;" but fact is that SOME children are much more academically minded than others and it *is* their childhood to be wrapped up in learning.  My current 7yo exercises several hours per day.  My 6yo spends a couple hours daily reading books about animals and other critters.  I have no doubt that these are things they will remember they chose to do with their childhoods. I'm not going to stop them just because average kids don't do those things to the degree they do.

[Walking-Iris]

I don't think anyone was suggesting to stop a child working at their level, or to hold a child back. I believe a problem can arise IF a parent sees that a child CAN work at an advanced level and then starts pushing them into doing academic school work before a child is developmentally ready. My 3 year COULD learn to write and read, but there are other aspects of her whole development that are more important imho for a 3 year old than reading and writing. 

 

 

[SilverMoon]

I had one reading fluently at 3. Her work expectations were and are kept age appropriate, no matter what the number is on her book. Today she is a third grader who will turn 8 next month. She doesn't have a single 3 book, but her seatwork is kept to no more than 3 hours a day, and she's not working any harder than her siblings did when they were third graders with nearly all 3 books.

[macmacmoo]

Our kindy is a boy who recently figure out how to blend three letter words. big hurdle for us. We did school work consistently once we found something that worked for us. At 4.5 we stated doing one page of math mammoth 1 and two pages of plaid phonics level a. He just turned five, we still do one page of math, but will be adding another page per day of the "applied" math (money, masument, etc), we do two pages of etc, a colum fom the I can read it word list book and tag team read a I can read it book passage.

 

Most weeks we school four days out of the week, lately it's been crazy with the move so only one. I tried to do back to back but breaks in between works best. Some times it's five minute breaks others thirty. We to school iChat after breakfast so he is free after lunch.

 

I thrive on him doin workbooks, I had a hard time with learn by environment. DH is good at the take advantage of a sudden interest. Science and history is DH department, he doesn't do anything formal or planned and it drives me bananas.

[Coco_Clark]

I agree with the poster who recommended asking on the accelerated learning board. A three year old doing Singapore 2b (division, fractions, ect) and reading at above a third grade level is not "working ahead". My 6 yr old (double your dd's age) isn't where she is at and is considered "working ahead". What you have is an extremely gifted child and what a more average child does for k is not going to translate at all. It's comparing apples to oranges. On the accelerated board they will have other oranges :). Giftedness is a whole different ball game.

[Coco_Clark]

Double

[Korrale]

I had my son doing seat work daily.... Then he hit 3.5 and became a little nuttier and more active again. Which is normal. Now we set goals based on achievement rather than time. For example: I give him some math work and tell him to complete a certain section and to do his best. Some days he will sit and request more. Other days he flies through the work haphazardly. He only ever does his work in 10-15 minutes segments unless he desires to sit longer.

 

I require math and language arts work daily. As he is 3 we limit handwriting but I do wish to add some daily.

[8filltheheart]

nm, I just read that your dd is only 3.5.  My response is irrelevant......other than I treat them according to age, not ability.

[Kerileanne99]

Thanks everyone for your responses, and apologies for getting back so late- we had a bit of a family emergency and time and Internet access have been sporadic.

 

I really appreciate all the constructive answers and ideas from everyone as I was quite fearful of the 'just let her be a child' response. I absolutely agree that she needs plenty- read vast majority- of her time to play, both structured and unstructured. And this is absolutely the case. She just seems to incorporate much of her 'learning' into that play:)

 

And whilst I know it probably sounds as though she spends a great deal of time working on 'academic' things, she actually has gotten to this point primarily through games and play. Mostly board games and apps. Addition and subtraction reinforcement with GiggleFacts math games, multiplication/simple division with the Multiplication.com stories, read-alouds, etc.

 

However, she DOES thrive on structure. I would say that she probably spends anywhere between 45 min to an hour at the table for 'school', but all I require is getting there and 10-15 minutes of math and a bit of writing. This is followed by whatever she wants to work on, or she knows to tell me she has had enough. For math, I generally give her a little lesson if it is needed, and she insists I 'go away' (meaning a few feet away where I can't see the page!) as she works 4-5 problems, before she gleefully calls me back to check her work. Rinse, repeat, until she (or I) tire of the game for the day.

Right now she is REALLY into memory work and wants a new poem or similar constantly, so I do give these to her as well.

Reading is separate, but is buddy reading and read- alouds at quiet time, whilst bed time is reserved for lighter reading and she usually wants 1-2 non-fiction books as well.

 

I am heartened to know that many of you have young kids doing seat work as well, and it seems as though most have a similar idea of allowing them to work as they like with very little true requirement!