Wondering if we are rigorous enough/time spent

[madteaparty]

Recent threads on my mind. I want to be rigorous, because this is the very reason I negotiated myself a paycut (went part time) and pulled him of public school. But I'm hard pressed to fill more than 3 hours a day with my 4th grader, and that is not everyday. On the two days I work, in one he is at a sitter and does light homework. During the other he does snap circuits, some scratch and also Lego league with his dad.

When we are home, it's 45 min to one hour of math (Singapore), 30 min each of 2 foreign languages, 30 min of language arts/ spelling, 10 min handwriting and 30 min of Sotw. He does do chemistry coop once a week. That is it. It feels like we breeze through everything; do we need more? I cannot say he is spending the rest of the time in interest-led pursuits, because he is not. He also reads about 1 hr a day and I read to him 30 min a day, but that isn't school. It just feels...light.

[lorisuewho]

You know your child best.  Can he be pushed to do more?  Is he working at his potential?  He is challenged?  Rigor is not always quantifiable by time spent, if you know what I mean.

 

As for the times you listed, I guess I would wonder if 30 minutes 3 times a week total is enough for teaching writing, spelling, and grammar.  Although maybe he is learning grammar through the languages he is studying.  Is one day of science enough?  Is there studying, researching, or reading outside of the coop that is required?

[8filltheheart]

I would say that his language arts looks light for 4th grade.   My kids are spending about 30 mins-45 mins daily at that point on some sort of writing assignment.   They only write one report per week, so depending on the day they might be researching, taking notes, writing an outline, writing a rough draft, revising/improving, etc.    Also, could his reading be stretched by adding in specific literature readings for him to read daily?

[2_girls_mommy]

It sounds ok to me, if he is doing homework on the day you aren't there.  Though I agree that you could fill in with more science work at home.  Also, I could never do all that I do w/SOTW in 30 min.  It takes us that long to just read the section and answer questions.  Are you doing the map and written narration?  How about any of the projects.  Also you could add art or music in there once a week too.

[Mom2TheTeam]

My oldest is in 2nd. ;)

 

If it feels light to you, I think it probably is. 

 

I agree with the LA's comments.  My 2nd grader does at least 30 minutes of LA, probably more, but I don't time it.  Mine does spelling, which takes 10 minutes or less, WWE (another 10 minutes or so), grammar, another 10-15, and then most days some sort of other writing, copywork or writing a letter or narration, taking another 10-20 minutes.

 

So, seeing that my son usually does 30-45 minutes of LA a day and he is in 2nd, I would think 30 would be low for a 4th grader.

 

[abba12]

Ignore the times, look at the content. I would consider my family to have had a rigorous education and a 4th gracer would have done about 3 hours, 4 times a week. How much are you getting done in those timeslots?

 

The thing is we a. Cut out the busywork, and b. Just got it done. Some children and families are more able to just sit and work. Our family was raised in such a way that there were few arguments/stalling regarding schoolwork, so that helped a lot with time spent.

The lack of busywork also had us speeding through.

 

Ifyou feel like you want to do more, you can double pace your lessons to accelerate, particularly math. But i have never been one yo say that homeschool should last 6 hours a day.

[madteaparty]

Thanks for all your thoughts, everyone, much appreciated. Will attempt to beef up the LA, perhaps with some more writing assignments and more assigned reading. I do feel we are getting a lot done in math, even with supplementing the texts with other curricula. Language arts is a bit more difficult to assess progress, though I do hear you that around 30 min a day 4 days a week is not sufficient. (We also school on Sundays)

[Stellalarella]

The best way to look at it is to ask whether or not the child is meeting the goals you have set for him.  

 

I will just speak for myself and say that when I let myself get focused on whether or not the kiddo gets his workbook done, or whether he did enough work,  I am definitely not teaching the child with real goals in mind.  

 

I needed that reminder tonight, so thank you for your post.

 

[marlowefamily]

No perfect answer here, I've been struggling between light days that make the kids happier versus high work days that require intense pushing but which make me feel like the kids are meeting the goals I want.

So, last week, I finally got around to putting down on a list every workbook, text, reference, and subject matter I wanted the kids to work through during this year.  Then today, I used that list to create a simple spreadsheet showing what I want done each day of the week.  This allowed me to realistically assess the workload and cut down some subjects.  And, I told the kids they are free to play/etc after they've done the work on the list for whatever day it is, but only if the work is high quality.  I think giving the kids certainty about what is expected is key.  The work just isn't coming out of large pile that grows to consume all their free time.

 

I have a 3rd and 5th grader.  The 3rd is much more sensitive.  The 5th grader only demand is that he has time for competitive sports, but he likes the idea of working quickly and finishing the day earlier.

[serendipitous journey]

OP, what is your LA?  Just curious ...

 

(FWIW, we are still getting in the third grade groove here; at the moment our LA involves MCT Island level, Classical Writing, Evan Moor Spelling, IEW Poetry Memorization.  We're at 16" Official Independent Reading a day, plus various read-alouds.  I've ordered Mosdos literature and Reading Detective A through our charter school and hope to pick up with those when they arrive, probably spacing out the other stuff a bit so we don't get too hectic.  And A. is just the opposite of marlowefamily's littles apparently -- on light days I feel GREAT because I've had time to do other stuff, but A. cracks up because his little head needs to be kept busy!!!) 

[PeterPan]

Madteaparty I know it feels like you're not doing enough, but when I add up your times you're at 4 1/2 hours of work daily.  On top of that you're doing co-op AND working on Sundays.  That's plenty, mercy.  If you do any more you're cutting out his time to read more or find his own interests.  I guess I'd be trying to figure out what does interest him.  Yes you want to make sure he's writing (narrations, what have you), but I'm wondering if you're actually doing anything with the history or the science.  Build things, dig in, do some projects.  If he likes legos, get him some over the top lego kits.  If he likes playmobil, recreate some scenes and do stop motion videos.  He doesn't need more *school* work that you drive, but he could definitely use some inspiration and time to connect with his own drive.

 

Have you looked at the Timberdoodle catalog?  Maybe considered lego robotics or some chess software?  Don't feel compelled to add more formal school work.  My dd enjoyed Fritz & Chesster at that age.  He could also work on typing.  Really though, you want him to find his own things he wants to drive, and he needs some boredom and some inspiring things around to make that happen.  Maybe get him entered in a science fair?

[madteaparty]

Madteaparty I know it feels like you're not doing enough, but when I add up your times you're at 4 1/2 hours of work daily. On top of that you're doing co-op AND working on Sundays. That's plenty, mercy. If you do any more you're cutting out his time to read more or find his own interests. I guess I'd be trying to figure out what does interest him. Yes you want to make sure he's writing (narrations, what have you), but I'm wondering if you're actually doing anything with the history or the science. Build things, dig in, do some projects. If he likes legos, get him some over the top lego kits. If he likes playmobil, recreate some scenes and do stop motion videos. He doesn't need more *school* work that you drive, but he could definitely use some inspiration and time to connect with his own drive.

 

Have you looked at the Timberdoodle catalog? Maybe considered lego robotics or some chess software? Don't feel compelled to add more formal school work. My dd enjoyed Fritz & Chesster at that age. He could also work on typing. Really though, you want him to find his own things he wants to drive, and he needs some boredom and some inspiring things around to make that happen. Maybe get him entered in a science fair?

He is in FLL and enjoying it. He has massive, massive Lego sets (i do not joke when I state that my net worth is exclusively in Lego sets) and spends his free time doing battles between very specific, and very specifically accesorised Lego guys. He likes minecraft. I do wish he had more interests of his own, but, he went to public school until June of this year. I imagine they will come. History, yes, most days we are phoning it in because he is not adoring the ancients. But, we do read extra and watch the respective documentaries. His co-op is chemistry so we watched the NOVA documentary on the elements. He is supposed to be in a competitive tennis program come November. We're trying to feel our way, I suppose I could be doing more to foster interests, but I am not a very sciency, nature study person. Trying to reform self, though. Thanks so much for your post.

Someone asked re language arts: we do Galore Park, WWE and the Ceasar English part of the MCT curriculum. We also memorize poems here and there. We do not formally study grammar.

[Mrs Twain]

If I were you and aiming to be rigorous, I would do more writing.  My 4th grader did 30-40 minutes of writing per day, in addition to spelling, grammar, and vocabulary.  We used different programs, but it included taking notes and rewriting paragraphs as well as writing original paragraphs, research reports, short stories and an occasional friendly letter (to practice the format).

 

An easy way to beef up some of your subjects is to order the Studies Weekly newspapers.  They are quite good and inexpensive, though a little liberal and non-Christian for my taste.  I got the social studies one that covers state history and the science and health newspapers.  Once per week my kids read the newspapers and then do the tests to check comprehension and recall.  I try to go over the information briefly with them after they are done.  It takes little of my time, and I think it is a valuable supplement.  Your son could do them independently on the days you are working.

 

[Mrs Twain]

p.s. to post above

My son wants to know what Lego sets your son has. 

[Soror]

I would agree that the LA looks light to me. I would wonder if what you are doing in this area is not challenging him enough.

[ThatHomeschoolDad]

DD12 is usually done in about 6ish hours each day, but I still need reassurance at times.   One of the best things I heard was Dr. B. answer a similar question at a conference -- something like "When were you confident that you were doing the right thing."   Her answer was priceless:

 

"When my son got his first college acceptance letter."

 

I should really have that on a wall plaque.

[madteaparty]

It sounds like we need to do more writing. Galore park does have some writing exercises; I will focus on those. What writing program do you use? Many thanks

[Laura Corin]

It sounds like we need to do more writing. Galore park does have some writing exercises; I will focus on those. What writing program do you use? Many thanks

 

When we did Galore Park we did a large number of the writing exercises from each chapter: for us it was not 'pick one' but 'work through most'.

 

L

[Wabi Sabi]

It sounds like we need to do more writing. Galore park does have some writing exercises; I will focus on those. What writing program do you use? Many thanks

We started using Evan Moor Daily 6 Trait writing this year, and so far we're quite happy with it. It's very much open and go. Quite easy to implement, and ds' writing ability has already improved markedly.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Daily-6-Trait-Writing-Grade-4/dp/1596732881

[msjones]

I think your schedule sounds good.  I would require him to do some interest-led research and related writing projects or presentations.  That would beef things up.

[mom2bee]

What foreign languages does he study and with what materials?

 

I'm just curious about the FLangs.

 

I would say that his language arts looks light for 4th grade.

 

 

My oldest is in 2nd. ;)

 

If it feels light to you, I think it probably is. 

 

I agree with the LA's comments.

 

 

I would agree that the LA looks light to me.

I am not sure about the langauge arts, I'm not sure what his foreign language studies look like, he could be getting in more work writing, spelling, and working with the parts of grammar through those languages than I imagine. Is it possible for you to rework your schedule so that he is getting more time on fewer topics each day? Perhaps doing math, 1 foreign language and LA daily for ~1 hour, but switching and giving 2 days a week to the other topics?

 

Or take the time to set up accounts in educational websites like KhanAcademy, SpellingCity etc so that he can get in some additional topics without you directly overseeing his work on the day to day basis? Also, what do you do for reading? You can get in a lot of content areas by giving him reading assigned in other content heavy subjects like history or science. Check your library to see what they have, also browse around youtube. You could probably put together some nice playlists and booklists to flesh out various science topics quite nicely with some effort and time. Maybe start working on it now and just slowly weave in/ramp up the studies for next semester.

[8filltheheart]

I am not sure about the langauge arts, I'm not sure what his foreign language studies look like, he could be getting in more work writing, spelling, and working with the parts of grammar through those languages than I imagine..

?????

 

I'm not sure why you quoted me. In my post, I was referring to writing as in compositions. I do not refer to writing as spelling and grammar. I consider them part of LA, but writing compositions should be a regualr part of 4tH grade work, imho. Nor would I consider anything done in foreign languages as writing unless they are actually writing reports, essays, etc in a foreign lang which is very doubtful in 4th grade non-bilingual homes.

[Mom2TheTeam]

?????

 

I'm not sure why you quoted me. In my post, I was referring to writing as in compositions. I do not refer to writing as spelling and grammar. I consider them part of LA, but writing compositions should be a regualr part of 4tH grade work, imho. Nor would I consider anything done in foreign languages as writing unless they are actually writing reports, essays, etc in a foreign lang which is very doubtful in 4th grade non-bilingual homes.

 

I was thinking writing too.  Though, I did mention the LA we do including spelling and grammar and how long it takes and I did not specifically say writing like the poster above did.  But, I was more typing it out to count it out.  LOL.  And, I did say my oldest is only in 2nd.  ;)

 

So, if I was confusing in my original reply, I apologize.  I was agreeing with those above me and that was the writing portion of LA.  :)

[madteaparty]

What foreign languages does he study and with what materials?

 

I'm just curious about the FLangs.

 

Hi, we use Galore Park for French as well. For the other language, it is a curriculum of my own making since I am a native speaker of that language.

 

I agree that the writing we seem to be light in is the composition type.

 

He is assigned non-fiction as history tie-ins, and also dabbles in the Horrible Science books.