From BM to Homeschool-getting caught up

[hadera]

So my dc children are currently in bm school and not doing very well, particularly in math. I posted asking for help about a month or so ago and have been consistently working with them at home about 6 days a week. Since then,my husband has finally agreed to the possibility of bringing them home as early as February or March. This is super exciting(also scary) for me because we have been going back and forth about this for years. So, the plan right now is to have my dd return to school in the fall for 7th I would like to keep home longer but she LOVEs school and is very social. I really would like to keep my ds who is in 4th home through middle school and revisit bm school for HS. But we shall see.

So I am kind of wondering about getting them "caught up" .  How much is realistic? Based on several test my 4th grader needs to go back to 2nd grade math and my 6th grader is not much better.  Lots of holes. Do we just focus heavily on math once they are home? My thought is to let them listen to and read plenty of books(they really enjoy reading) and maybe choose one other focus for direct instruction. Let them self guide based on interest, my ds wants more science and dd wants art and Japanese. Unfortunately, especially with dd since she will return to school pretty soon, we wont have time to really "deschool" per say.  

SO I guess my real questions are  1: Can we get caught up ? 2: How long has it taken others in similar circumstances to get caught up? Also as a side question since homeschooling generally takes less time and children go beyond in subjects why does it seem that most people choose to work on "grade level" with typical kids? Or is some of it just developmental? Working more in depth or spending time to cover other interest ? I say this knowing that "most" means nothing and assumes a lot about a group that may not be true....

[Farrar]

It's impossible to say if you can get caught up or not. I think a lot of responders will likely tell you yes, absolutely. However, so much is dependent on your kids and you. If there turn out to be underlying issues for why they were lagging behind, that could hold them back. If there turn out to be problems getting into the groove of homeschooling, that could put a wrench in the works as well. In general, I would say almost definitely for your 4th grader who will be home for two and a half years, if I read that correctly. However, for a child that you're only going to have home for half a year? Who is at one of the most difficult stages by virtue of being a young middle schooler? I think it's a big question mark. Maybe? Who knows. I think it's worth a try if you really can't keep her home longer - schools tend to be really lousy at remediation and if that's what she needs then you at least have a better shot at it than the school. But it's going to change the character of how you homeschool and I feel like I have to be honest and say it may not be possible.

 

I think when you know a child is going right back to school that it's almost impossible to take advantage of some of the best aspects of homeschooling - the relaxed lifestyle, the relaxed schedule, the chance to delve into interests, the chance to take lots of field trips, etc. Like you said, you can't even really deschool.

 

Good luck. I hope you're able to make it work.

[hadera]

 

I think when you know a child is going right back to school that it's almost impossible to take advantage of some of the best aspects of homeschooling - the relaxed lifestyle, the relaxed schedule, the chance to delve into interests, the chance to take lots of field trips, etc. Like you said, you can't even really deschool.

 

Thank you for your honest and thoughtful reply. This part in particular articulates what I have been feeling about the whole deal. I would really like to keep my dd and ds  home until  at least HS but at this point I don't think my husband would be all on board.  This would give them 2 1/2 and 4 1/2 years at home IF they choose to do HS at a BM school. I feel like I need to SELL homeschool to both the kiddos while working on getting them caught up. At this point it is not really a choice for them if they homeschool or not.  We are making this choice as their parents for their well being. But for it to be the best I think they need to buy into it at some point. In other words making the beginning so wonderful that they don't have any desire to return. For both of them it means having lots of social time and time to follow their interest. I am under no delusion that homeschool is some sort of utopia, as I was homeschooled myself. BUT, I do feel that for my particular children that almost anything I do would be better than what school is doing for them, and my kids go to a pretty good school.

As a side note my son gets in trouble at school for reading...obviously when he is supposed to be doing something else. This could be used in homeschool for good instead of being seen as a negative.

Thanks again. I will try my best as that is all I can do.

 

[rdj2027]

Every child is different.  When we took our son out of school at the end of 5th grade, he had just been put into remedial math.  We did a year of not doing much that was structured because he was so stressed out.  We focused on multiplication tables.  The second year he took the AOPS online Pre-Algebra class and got an A.  In 7th we again focused on fluency because he understood the concepts but was slow with basic operations.  He is now in 8th grade in PS with a solid A and bored out of his mind because they put him into Math 8 rather than Algebra 1.  He asked if I could sign him up for the AOPS Intro to Algebra class because he wants to move ahead.

In his case it was a mixture of bad teaching and developmental maturity that caused him to fall behind but not a lack of ability.

My daughter is very good when it comes to manipulating numbers and drill type questions but the conceptual understanding often lags by quite a bit.  Both kids do well in math in school for different reasons, both have some issues that can cause problems, both have strengths that allow them to compensate or adapt.

I would first figure out exactly where the problem lies and this will allow you to see if the cause was insufficient teaching, difficulty with understanding or something else entirely.  This will allow you to figure out whether your children can close the gap, whether they will need more support throughout school, whether they just need time or as in the case of one of my kids an attitude adjustment (no, you are not getting back at your teacher for being a meanie by failing your math exams and doodeling flowers on your standardized test).  Another one is now in Algebra II and still doing most math in his head. He only writes down his work because he wants to please his teacher. His grades in math in PS were usually mediocre because he was bored and didn't pay attention.  He was in detention many times for reading in class ;-)

[Garga]

Are they behind in anything else besides math?

 

You'll have 6 months to get your 6th grader from about 2nd grade math to be ready for 7th grade math? Am I reading that right? (You said the 4th grader is at a 2nd grade level and the 6th grader is not much better.) I'm not sure that 4 or 5 years of math can be squeezed into 6 months.

 

On the other hand, if your 6th grader misses 3 months of school (Mar-Apr-May), then she won't really fall behind her peers in other subjects when she starts back at school in August. They won't get that far ahead of her in the last 3 months of school for the 2015-2016 year.

 

I guess if you do 2-3 (or maybe 4) hours a math a day with her, broken into little pieces, she could get caught up, but it depends on exactly how far behind she is. The time depends on how fast she is.

 

How about having her take the CLE (christian light education) placement tests and see where she falls? CLE gets consistently excellent reviews for math and is a spiral program with lots of review. You could combine 4 lessons a day, skipping any review questions that are redundent among the 4 lessons you do. Take lots of breaks between each lesson to do fun stuff: reading and the other things she likes.

 

If it's just math where she falls behind, then this is doable. Not fun, per se, but doable. You can also work through the summer as well on math.

 

The younger child is easy because you can spread things out over many years.

 

I think this all hinges on how far behind the older one is in other subjects besides math. If you have to catch her up in 3 or 4 subjects in 6 months, and if she's really 4 or so years behind in each one...that might not be possible. There may not be enough hours in the day.

[Garga]

My kids work on grade level because I teach them 10 different subjects each week. Some subjects are taught daily (math, LA, writing) and some are 4 times a week (history, science), one is 3 times a week (reading), and some are just once a week (logic, art, computer, music.) Plus we do daily bible for 20 minutes and typing for 10. We spend an hour on each subject and we do 6 subjects a day. It works out to 6.5 hours of school a day for us. :)

 

When you are working on 6 different subjects each day and it takes 6 hours each day, there's not much time to get ahead. So we are plugging away on grade level. I could drop a few subjects and double others up if I wanted to get ahead. For instance, I could drop science and history to once a week and ditch art, logic, computer, and music, and then double up on writing and math and be ahead of grade level.

 

But we like to do all those subjects. We look forward to history and science and the others. And if you do that many subjects, it takes up a lot of time.

 

Not everyone does their homeschool the way we do. Not everyone takes as long for each subject. It's ok. But you asked why people stay on grade level and don't advance. For us, the above is why.

[hadera]

Are they behind in anything else besides math?

Both kids could use some improvement in other skills, some of which the school doesn't teach much. Spelling and grammar would fall into this category. They both generally do well with reading. My daughter scored in the 77 percentile range for reading on her last MAP test. But I want to start with math because they both really struggle with it,

 

You'll have 6 months to get your 6th grader from about 2nd grade math to be ready for 7th grade math? Am I reading that right? (You said the 4th grader is at a 2nd grade level and the 6th grader is not much better.) I'm not sure that 4 or 5 years of math can be squeezed into 6 months.

 

My 6 grader isn't at a 2nd grade level in math. She has a lot of holes and may be at a 4th-5th grade level? I am currently having her do  a MM placement test just to get an idea. The problem is there ARE things she can do on the 5th and 6th grade level and the math is so different from how she has been taught. I may take your suggestion and look at CLE to see what the math placement test looks like. She has her facts memorized and  understands add/sub and mult/div. She seems to have an okay understanding of numbers compared to her brother who struggles more.

I think both of my kiddos struggle learning with the curriculum that is used in school and in large groups. Both have attention challenges that look very different. Teachers always describe my dd as sweet and quiet. She struggles to keep up because she works slowly and daydreams at times. She also would rather disappear than raise her hand and say she doesn't understand. I think sometimes she thinks she understands when she doesn't fully. So when she does her work most times she doesn't get immediate feed back about whether it was correct or not and I think she needs that. For her it would be more helpful if the teacher reviewed some of the answers each time a new concept is taught.

 

 

.

[hadera]

Every child is different.  When we took our son out of school at the end of 5th grade, he had just been put into remedial math.  We did a year of not doing much that was structured because he was so stressed out.  We focused on multiplication tables.  The second year he took the AOPS online Pre-Algebra class and got an A.  In 7th we again focused on fluency because he understood the concepts but was slow with basic operations.  He is now in 8th grade in PS with a solid A and bored out of his mind because they put him into Math 8 rather than Algebra 1.  He asked if I could sign him up for the AOPS Intro to Algebra class because he wants to move ahead.

 

Thank you. That gives me some hope.

 

  He was in detention many times for reading in class ;-)

We are not alone! ;)

 

[My3girls]

When I brought my 3 girls home from PS, it took us about 6 months to plug up all the holes in math for my then 5th grader. My then 2nd grader repeated the grade and is still not "on-level". My then 1st grader just did a a quick review and jumped into grade 2 just fine. All that to say, it depends on the child.

 

As for advancing, my girls are on different levels in different subjects. I think it really depends on their interests. My 8th grader is ahead in everything but math because she doesn't like it. My 5th grader is ahead in reading and history but behind in math and science. My 4th grader is ahead in math and science and on grade level with everything else. We spend about the same amount of time on each subject, but they use their own time to advance themselves in areas they like, kwim? I think that is part of the joy of homeschooling: they learn something interesting during "school" and follow up on it on their own. There are no peers to tell them that that is not cool. lol

[MerryAtHope]

Also as a side question since homeschooling generally takes less time and children go beyond in subjects why does it seem that most people choose to work on "grade level" with typical kids? Or is some of it just developmental? Working more in depth or spending time to cover other interest ? I say this knowing that "most" means nothing and assumes a lot about a group that may not be true....

 

I think there's kind of a myth about homeschooling that kids will be advanced, that's not necessarily true. Most of the time, you'll find kids at different levels in different subjects--they may be advanced in some subjects, on grade level for some, and perhaps even even behind on one or two. "Grade level" is kind of a myth as well--it's an arbitrary assumption that kids of a certain age should be at a certain level. In reality, kids are all unique, and they are going to have many strengths and weaknesses--just like adults. Homeschooling doesn't guarantee they'll be advanced, doesn't guarantee they won't struggle or have learning disabilities, doesn't guarantee they'll like subjects (I find that's a common one moms worry about too), and so on.

 

Homeschooling DOES make it easy for advanced students to school at a pace more suited to their abilities, and we do tend to hear more about those students. But I wouldn't say it's true across the board. Most students have a range of abilities. I do think homeschooling allows you to uniquely meet their abilities, and tailor education to students' needs. However, just because it may take less time, doesn't mean a student is ready for more advanced material. It's a rare student who is ready for algebra in 6th grade. Most are ready for it sometime in the 7th-9th grade years--just like in public school. Similarly, most logic-stage students (5th-8th grade) are not ready for rhetoric-stage learning (9th & up). There are always exceptions again, but for most students, the brain needs more time to grow and develop. The benefits of homeschooling are in the one on one attention you can give, the ability to know your student well and allow your student to pursue interest, the flexibility, the choice in teaching methods, the ability to tailor things to a child's particular bent, and so on. 

 

That said, you absolutely can help them get caught up--but that may or may not happen in the next 6 months. Older students do tend to be able to go through subjects more quickly, so I think that no matter what, you can make good headway. Just go into it knowing it's not "magic," that it takes work and time. 

 

I think it will take time to find out why your kids are behind (is there any kind of struggle going on or any kind of learning disability, do they simply have gaps in their understanding that school, being large-group oriented, didn't catch, did the methods used at school not make sense to them but the subject kept moving forward, etc...)  If your 6th grader just has a few gaps here and there, you may be able to catch her up, but if the gaps are significant or there is something deeper going on, it will likely take longer. It might be worth a conference with her teacher now, while she's still in school. You don't have to discuss that you are planning on homeschooling if you don't want to. Let her know you are trying to help them after school, share what you noticed and your concern, and find out how her teacher thinks she's doing. You may find she's unconcerned because a lot of kids are at a similar level. Or she may be able to steer you to ideas of things to work on with her. She may help you find that starting point, in other words. 

 

Anyway, I hope your homeschooling journey will go well, and that you enjoy this time with your kids!