Your Thoughts, Please (schedule related)

[Penguin]

I see a lot of schedules that give the child a weekly list of things to do and a deadline (Friday at 4 pm or something similar).

 

Instead, I am thinking about using staggered due dates for content subjects.

 

For example:

 

Science - due on Monday

History- due on Tuesday

Geography-due on Wednesday

Story of Science -due on Thursday

Art and Music-due on Friday

 

I would like to give DS some independent time after lunch to do his work and then we would get back together.  For the next block of time, we would focus on the one subject.  During this focus time, we would discuss the readings / assignments. We would also work out his next batch of readings / assignments for that subject.

 

Does anyone do something similar?

 

 

[AK_Mom4]

We don't do that because DD12 works on each subject every day and discusses it with me as we go.   I do help her fill out her planner with her assignments on Sunday and she mostly just does the next thing. Your schedule looks fine to me.

 

But I wanted to give you a bump up in case others had ideas on your schedule.

[angela in ohio]

This is similar to how I handled middle school age and up. I used a university-like schedule. We met for most classes 1-3 days per week, with assigned work to be done during the days off. We would discuss this work at our next meeting, then I would teach, then we I would go over the next assignment. I gave them a syllabus of the work at the beginning of each semester or year, depending on the course. For math and languages, I asked that they work some each day, but for anything else, they could do a week's worth in one sitting or spread it out, as long as they had things done when they were supposed to. It was a great mix between accountability and independence.

 

My oldest has been doing this for about five years, and she adjusted to college (dual enrollment) classes and online classes which meet once a week extremely well. She is also great at projects and tasks at work, because she knows how to schedule herself.

[Penguin]

This is similar to how I handled middle school age and up. I used a university-like schedule. We met for most classes 1-3 days per week, with assigned work to be done during the days off. We would discuss this work at our next meeting, then I would teach, then we I would go over the next assignment. I gave them a syllabus of the work at the beginning of each semester or year, depending on the course. For math and languages, I asked that they work some each day, but for anything else, they could do a week's worth in one sitting or spread it out, as long as they had things done when they were supposed to. It was a great mix between accountability and independence.

 

My oldest has been doing this for about five years, and she adjusted to college (dual enrollment) classes and online classes which meet once a week extremely well. She is also great at projects and tasks at work, because she knows how to schedule herself.

 

This is exactly what I would like to do.  I am just having a hard time envisioning the balance between the teaching/meeting times and the independent times. 

[Debbie]

I really like this idea. But this is our first year and my kids are 5th and 6th grades..I will give them their assignments for the week, but we will work every day. I am going to keep this in mind for next year though, I bet it really prepares them for college level classes!

[angela in ohio]

This is exactly what I would like to do.  I am just having a hard time envisioning the balance between the teaching/meeting times and the independent times. 

 

What subjects/courses do you have scheduled?

[Penguin]

angela in ohio,

 

This is for 7th grade:

 

Morning:

8:00 to 9:00 Math - we sit together for math

9:00 to 11:00 English (the typical mix of grammar, vocab, literature and composition)

11:00 to 11:30  Danish (Skype tutor once per week)

 

11:30-12:30  Lunch Break

 

Afternoon:

 

Science

History

Modern Greek / Latin:  hoping for about 45 minutes per day for the combination - but we do these together and just do-the-next-thing

 

And then there are the "extras." None of these are full courses:

 

Joy Hakim's Story of Science (8 pages per week)

Geography

Logic (he has some workbooks and we are going to do Art of Argument together)

 

Friday afternoons are for art and music.  He will have a small amount of Art History reading to do and he is studying for ABRSM music theory.  I am teaching him the music theory.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[angela in ohio]

Okay, so it this was me....

 

I would do math and English twice per week, teaching and discussing 2-3 lessons each time (we school 40-some weeks, so it often works for us to do 2x2 each week.) Then I would have your ds work on those each morning, and be somewhat nearby for questions. I might even be more flexible on the English, but I ask dc to touch math each day at that age.  For the Danish, it is already set up for one day per week, and I would require daily work in that as well. Depending on what you use for science and history, I would go to 1-2 days per week for those. So maybe:

 

Mon - Math, English, Logic, Latin/Greek

Tues - Science (Including Story of Science), Latin/Greek

Wed - Math, English, Geography, Latin/Greek

Thurs - History, Latin/Greek

 

The science and history would be the start of independent scheduling, because you are giving him one week to schedule at a time on his own. Then each year, you can increase the amount of independent scheduling.

[Penguin]

Thank you, angela.

 

I am going to start this with the History and the Science.