Opie Posted December 9, 2018 Share Posted December 9, 2018 I have been lax on homeschooling. We push reading, reading comprehension and spelling. I feel like when we go to do a math lesson or a language lesson (Shiller math, language from Susan Wise) the kids already know it. How do I find where to start my lessons? Do I take sectional tests in math and glance over what they got incorrect? How do I find what language lessons book to get? The first one was way too easy. Thanks for any advice. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maize Posted December 9, 2018 Share Posted December 9, 2018 How old are your kids? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HomeAgain Posted December 9, 2018 Share Posted December 9, 2018 How old are your kids? I'd take these few weeks before Christmas and do an assessment. Get to know the next 5 lessons in math tonight. Then sit down tomorrow and go as far as you can. Tomorrow, repeat. Continue until you reach a stopping point. Or do the tests, if it would make it easier. You didn't say how old your kids are. The FLL books I found to be a nice, easy spiraling review and introduction of concepts. You may find a different program to be a better fit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
73349 Posted December 9, 2018 Share Posted December 9, 2018 (edited) Compacting is the idea of only doing as much instruction and practice as the student needs to master something. So you get to lesson 20 and your DC already knows it? Pick 2 easy and 2 hard questions to verify; if they're all right, yup, move on to lesson 21 and try the same thing. You can go as far as it takes to get to new material. That may mean you need to buy a higher level of books. Some have placement tests, or at least a table of contents preview from which you could try things with your DC to see where to jump in. Edited December 9, 2018 by whitehawk 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opie Posted December 9, 2018 Author Share Posted December 9, 2018 1 hour ago, HomeAgain said: How old are your kids? I'd take these few weeks before Christmas and do an assessment. Get to know the next 5 lessons in math tonight. Then sit down tomorrow and go as far as you can. Tomorrow, repeat. Continue until you reach a stopping point. Or do the tests, if it would make it easier. You didn't say how old your kids are. The FLL books I found to be a nice, easy spiraling review and introduction of concepts. You may find a different program to be a better fit. They are 8 and 10. 1 hour ago, whitehawk said: Compacting is the idea of only doing as much instruction and practice as the student needs to master something. So you get to lesson 20 and your DC already knows it? Pick 2 easy and 2 hard questions to verify; if they're all right, yup, move on to lesson 21 and try the same thing. You can go as far as it takes to get to new material. That may mean you need to buy a higher level of books. Some have placement tests, or at least a table of contents preview from which you could try things with your DC to see where to jump I like the idea of asking two easy, two hard questions, then jump ahead. I feel like its such a waste of time to do a lesson if they know it. Then impossible to get ahead. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeterPan Posted December 10, 2018 Share Posted December 10, 2018 (edited) It's easy to get off the bandwagon with Thanksgiving and find it hard to get back on. You can check your vitamin D, see if you're eating right, those kinds of things to keep yourself on track. For me, I try to make mini-goals at times like this. You're not going to have enough consistency with the holidays and parties and people going in and out to get back on track nicely till January. So if you instead sit down and pick a few things and make some MINI-goals, that you might be able to do. Like for me right now, I've got some things I've been doing with ds and I'm telling myself to get through those pages of those workbooks. And I picked a book about the history of Christmas carols, and we'll read that. And we're working on memorizing the Christmas story. (as much as someone with significant apraxia can, hmm) Math we do every day, just because it's a thing for us. So don't beat yourself up. It happens to anyone, everyone. Make some mini-goals that you can get done in 1-2 hours a day and tell yourself to do it. Create some structures and expectations for their time so you're not going crazy. Like if they can read, then still require them to read daily, which will give you 1-2 hours of time when you can work on things you feel stressed about or don't have done like wrapping. As far as the Shiller, I think the combo of compacting and also scanning the next 10 lessons so you have a sense of where it's going can help. It sounds like it may not be a good fit for your style, if it's not happening. But if you're not prepping, then that may be it. My ds has SLD math, and the methods we use take some prep. I think Shiller could be like that too, where reading ahead a bit could make you more comfortable. Also consider having what I call "idiot-proof" math. Sure I do my really interactive math with ds (Ronit Bird, totally custom lessons), but I also have kits of math where we just do 2-4 cards a day, boom done. And I have some nice open and go interactive workbooks like the Didax Advanced Pattern Blocks book. When you're doing math lessons that depend on you, it helps to have something that's idiotproof that you can assign. That way if you're having a bad day or are stressed or whatever, you can just whip that out. What I try to do is have 3 components to my math, so something for brain tingling, something that is your more mundane (computation) and something that is conceptual instruction. And maybe you're super happy with Shiller, but even then a little something might make your life easier. There are holiday graphing art books you can buy https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Holiday-Graph-Art-67040 That particular book is really fun, but Teacher Created Resources (which is vending on TPT there) has TONS of fun stuff for math. There are daily word problems and brain teasers and all kinds of things. It can help you work through some of that guilt with your math, because it's open and go, stuff that can always happen, just by throwing the page in the pile. Here's an example of some of the math kits I'm using. Again, they're just to give me that open and go, definitely happens math, because the conceptual instruction takes more time and prep. Hands-On Subtraction Regrouping Kit We've worked through the addition and subtraction of these and will do the multiplication next. Math Reasoning Challenge Activity Kit - Gr. 4 I just bought the grades 2-5 of this and LOVE it. The little packets of tiles are color coded to the cards, so it's just open and go, boom. Even if the concepts are familiar, the way it makes them think will keep it interesting. For my ds, who is gifted with disabilities, it's a really nice balance. Edited December 10, 2018 by PeterPan 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maize Posted December 10, 2018 Share Posted December 10, 2018 Compacting sounds like a good idea to try. The other thing I will suggest is to get on a prodigy math group buy and use that for additional math practice. Its been great for getting around math resistance here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pegs Posted December 10, 2018 Share Posted December 10, 2018 8 hours ago, maize said: Compacting sounds like a good idea to try. The other thing I will suggest is to get on a prodigy math group buy and use that for additional math practice. Its been great for getting around math resistance here. You can use prodigy math without paying anything. 🙂 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HomeAgain Posted December 10, 2018 Share Posted December 10, 2018 3 hours ago, Pegs said: You can use prodigy math without paying anything. 🙂 Yep. And you can just let them do the assessment for a week so you get an idea of what they're missing or are having trouble on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maize Posted December 10, 2018 Share Posted December 10, 2018 4 hours ago, Pegs said: You can use prodigy math without paying anything. 🙂 You can, but it gets annoying by always telling you what great benefits there are to being a member. Membership is well worth the $13 or $14 per year it costs through a group buy and there are entire Facebook groups dedicated to setting up group buys so they are easy to jump in on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opie Posted January 4, 2019 Author Share Posted January 4, 2019 Thank you guys! I really am thankful for your tips. I will check out prodigy too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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