cintinative Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 Just looking for some encouragement here. We started Algebra I in late May, went through the summer (less vacation) and are still going--and are only about halfway through. (We work four days a week) We have done all the review exercises in the back because I felt he needed them (still having issues and/or making errors) and a couple times I have even brought in even more exercises and parked for a bit when he was not quite there. I know that Algebra I is foundational for the later math. Also he is 13. Prior to Algebra I, we kept a normal pace without an issue for the most part. Does anyone have a story of a pokey math student who found his/her stride? Quote
Lori D. Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 Well, I can encourage you that you're doing absolutely the right thing of going at *this* student's pace for as long as it takes to make sure that he is solid in the first of the higher maths that is foundational to the rest of the higher maths. Better to take it at the pace needed now, then to try and rush/push and have to back up and re-do with a lot of tears and frustration later on... I don't have the sort of story you're looking for, but DS#2 was our math struggler due to mild LDs. We needed 1.5 years each for Algebra 1 and 2 -- but he flew through Geometry in 0.5 year. So, not a pokey math student who found his stride, but a math struggler who persevered at his pace and succeeded in the end -- more along the lines of a "Little Engine That Could" sort of story. 😉 6 1 Quote
cintinative Posted January 29, 2021 Author Posted January 29, 2021 @Lori D.Thank you for your story. It does help to hear that. He is much more visual-spatial than my oldest so I can see where he will struggle less with some of the geometry. I doubt we will get through it in a half-year (too many proofs!). 😃 I was just thinking today though that we probably need to build in Algebra review during Geometry so we don't lose it. There might already be something in the book that we are skipping that would work. 😃 1 Quote
elegantlion Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 My son was successfully doing pre-algebra (old Dolciani text) in 6th grade, but stalled with Alg I. We also ended up doing two year of Algebra (labeled as Algebra 1A and 1B on his transcript). Part of it was probably due to my instruction (math isn't my strong suit, although my Alg 1 was okay), but he needed longer to soak in the material. He's graduating college with a math degree this spring. 5 1 Quote
klmama Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 It may be time to reconsider how many days a week he works on math. Having a 3-day weekend can contribute to forgetting material, and the length of time spent on it daily will also affect how quickly he progresses. Many algebra students need 1.5-2 hours daily to complete a typical day's worth of work, just like students in traditional schools who attend 50-55 minutes of class five days per week, plus spend more time later on homework. 4 Quote
regentrude Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 (edited) Math is not a race. I want to encourage you to take whatever time is needed for YOUR student to thoroughly master algebra 1. I teach physics in college, and the students who struggle with math in my courses all struggle not because of insufficient calculus, but because of a lack of rock solid algebra skills. Take whatever time is needed to make sure he has this foundation. I want to comment on @klmama's suggestion: I recommend exactly the opposite: pay attention to your student's attention span and stop the math lesson when he begins making careless mistakes at a higher rate, indicating a lack of concentration. It is perfectly normal if a 13 y/o boy can not focus on math for an hour (or even more) in one session. Going longer is only frustrating, increases the mistakes but not the retention. Start fresh the next day. Shorter lessons every day. This does not mean he is a "weak" math student! My DS could not concentrate on math longer than 40 minutes at that age! There was absolutely no point in making the lessons longer. He is now successfully finishing his physics degree with a possible double major in mathematics and is in the math honors society. Edited January 29, 2021 by regentrude 10 1 Quote
cintinative Posted January 29, 2021 Author Posted January 29, 2021 @klmamaWe actually take off math on Wednesdays, so there isn't a three day weekend. We started taking off Wednesdays a long time ago due to co-op, and even though we aren't doing co-op this year, we continued to take off. Normally it works since we do math through the summer. 😃 And @regentrude he definitely can't work more than an hour without losing focus. He has ADD-inattentive so focus is already an issue. My other child can work up to 1.5 hours in a sitting, but this one can't. I could add in Wednesdays or we could add in additional time later in the day (break up the math into shorter chunks adding up to more than an hour). Or should we just continue this pace and wait for his brain to catch up? Since he was not this "pokey" with the prior math (we did Math in Focus through course 1 and then Dolciani Pre-A), I suspect this is a blend of 13 y.o. brain, ADD-inattentive, and needing more time for algebra to percolate in his brain. 4 Quote
RootAnn Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 Well, @lewelma's older son took two years to do Algebra 1, I seem to remember. It didn't hurt him as he went on to compete well in international math competitions and is now at MIT, I believe. Obviously not an outcome for everyone! 5 Quote
regentrude Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 8 minutes ago, cintinative said: And @regentrude he definitely can't work more than an hour without losing focus. He has ADD-inattentive so focus is already an issue. My other child can work up to 1.5 hours in a sitting, but this one can't. I could add in Wednesdays or we could add in additional time later in the day (break up the math into shorter chunks adding up to more than an hour). Or should we just continue this pace and wait for his brain to catch up? Since he was not this "pokey" with the prior math (we did Math in Focus through course 1 and then Dolciani Pre-A), I suspect this is a blend of 13 y.o. brain, ADD-inattentive, and needing more time for algebra to percolate in his brain. Can be two things in combination: puberty starting, which is often accompanied by a lack of focus, and algebra being more abstract. We had a road block experience with math where we had to take a semester break with some different math waiting for more brain maturity, so "brain catching up" is definitely a thing! The big advantage of homeschooling is that you can observe your son and know what his attention span is. I do not think the Wednesday is a hill to die on, but doing math five days a week would definitely be beneficial. I do not think two sessions a day will be great. Just chug along and ignore all ideas of when a student "should" be doing xyz math! He is perfectly fine where he is, actually ahead of the public school curve, so just give him the time he needs to mature. 3 Quote
cintinative Posted January 29, 2021 Author Posted January 29, 2021 1 minute ago, regentrude said: Can be two things in combination: puberty starting, which is often accompanied by a lack of focus, and algebra being more abstract. We had a road block experience with math where we had to take a semester break with some different math waiting for more brain maturity, so "brain catching up" is definitely a thing! The big advantage of homeschooling is that you can observe your son and know what his attention span is. I do not think the Wednesday is a hill to die on, but doing math five days a week would definitely be beneficial. I do not think two sessions a day will be great. Just chug along and ignore all ideas of when a student "should" be doing xyz math! He is perfectly fine where he is, actually ahead of the public school curve, so just give him the time he needs to mature. Thank you so much! I will try to work in doing some math on Wed, even if it is a smaller amount to begin with. I am sure I will get some push back. 😃 Quote
Lori D. Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 (edited) 36 minutes ago, regentrude said: ...pay attention to your student's attention span and stop the math lesson when he begins making careless mistakes at a higher rate, indicating a lack of concentration. It is perfectly normal if a 13 y/o boy can not focus on math for an hour (or even more) in one session. Going longer is only frustrating, increases the mistakes but not the retention. Start fresh the next day. Shorter lessons every day. This does not mean he is a "weak" math student! My DS could not concentrate on math longer than 40 minutes at that age! There was absolutely no point in making the lessons longer... This was our DSs as well. 45-55 minutes was the maximum in high school, even for my math-lover DS#1. I know everyone is different, and that doing those 1.5-2.0 hours of math a day for high school works well for some families, but for us, it was a big "law of diminishing returns" -- after 45-50 minutes, DSs peaked in optimal working and learning. After that, the yield of actual useful work/learning per amount of time spent on math went WAAAAYYYY down -- it really wasn't worth it to put in another 30 minutes just to get another 3 problems done -- and they often ended being problems that usually had a high amount of errors in them. I've read studies that this is true for adults in the workplace, that you get the most "bang for the buck" productivity-wise and concentration-wise by working in a focused steady way for about 50 minutes, then take a 10-15 minute break. Here's one description of that: "The ideal work-to-break ratio was 52 minutes of work, followed by 17 minutes of rest. People who maintained this schedule had a unique level of focus in their work. For roughly an hour at a time, they were 100% dedicated to the task they needed to accomplish. They didn’t check Facebook “real quick” or get distracted by e-mails. When they felt fatigue (again, after about an hour), they took short breaks, during which they completely separated themselves from their work. This helped them to dive back in refreshed for another productive hour of work....People who have discovered this magic productivity ratio crush their competition because they tap into a fundamental need of the human mind: the brain naturally functions in spurts of high energy (roughly an hour) followed by spurts of low energy (15–20 minutes)." -- excerpt from an article on the Next Big Idea Club website Edited January 29, 2021 by Lori D. 3 Quote
lewelma Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 1 hour ago, RootAnn said: Well, @lewelma's older son took two years to do Algebra 1, I seem to remember. It didn't hurt him as he went on to compete well in international math competitions and is now at MIT, I believe. Obviously not an outcome for everyone! Actually, it took him THREE full years to get through AoPS Intro Algebra. 4 4 Quote
RootAnn Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 Thank goodness I remembered wrong, @lewelma! This way I'm not nearly as creepy/stalker-y that I remember stuff from 6+ years ago about another homeschooler from halfway around the world from me. 1 6 Quote
klmama Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 2 hours ago, regentrude said: I want to comment on @klmama's suggestion: I recommend exactly the opposite: pay attention to your student's attention span and stop the math lesson when he begins making careless mistakes at a higher rate, indicating a lack of concentration. It is perfectly normal if a 13 y/o boy can not focus on math for an hour (or even more) in one session. Going longer is only frustrating, increases the mistakes but not the retention. Start fresh the next day. Shorter lessons every day. Sorry, I clearly didn't explain well. I wasn't suggesting she have him work 1.5-2 hours all in one sitting. I just wanted her to know that many kids need to put in that much time each day in order to finish a high school math course in a year, which seemed to be what she was expecting/wishing for. My non-mathy, ADHD-inattentive student needed 2 hours most days, but it was spread out over several sittings. That dc needed a lot (and I mean A LOT) of repetition to remember math concepts. Even though dc always seemed to grasp the concepts easily and would start the assignments well, after taking a break, dc needed to go over it all again as if it were completely new. The info was just... gone. Doing math twice a day was the only way for math to stick long-term. 2 1 Quote
lewelma Posted January 29, 2021 Posted January 29, 2021 59 minutes ago, RootAnn said: Thank goodness I remembered wrong, @lewelma! This way I'm not nearly as creepy/stalker-y that I remember stuff from 6+ years ago about another homeschooler from halfway around the world from me. LOL! No, I've talked about it again and again over the years because I want people to know that taking your time in math can be GOOD. You do not need to keep to someone else's schedule if you are not in school. Homeschooling is all about adapting to what the child needs and if they need more time in math, well give it to them. 8 Quote
Farrar Posted January 30, 2021 Posted January 30, 2021 This sounds almost identical to the situation with my kids. They both started Algebra I in spring of 7th grade. Plugged away through with it through 8th. Finished it up finally at the start of 9th grade. We didn't have any issues finishing geometry during 9th. They finished Algebra II without issue. I think Mushroom may take a smidge longer with Pre-Calc, which he's doing at Derek Owens. BalletBoy is doing Pre-Calc at Mr. D's. He'll... gosh he's slow. He's mostly on track. Mostly. But just generally, my kids took longer with a "year" of math at that age. I think more middle schools should offer Algebra IA and IB as a model. A lot of kids would benefit from it. And it would fit with the doubling model that you see for foreign language. Two years of middle school foreign language is one year of high school typically. Two years of high school foreign language is one year of college. Would make sense for many students for math as well. 5 Quote
fourisenough Posted January 30, 2021 Posted January 30, 2021 (edited) I agree with others upthread— take whatever time is needed for a strong foundation in Algebra. Even my strongest math student (and mine are all relatively stronger in English/writing/humanities) needed two years for Algebra. This was her path: 5th— MM6 6th— MM7/Pre-Algebra 7th— DO Algebra 1 (first pass, mom-graded) 8th— WHA Dolciani Algebra 1 (much deeper understanding this time) 9th— WHA Geometry 10th— WHA Algebra 2 11th— WHA AP Stats & Blue Tent Honors Pre-Calc 12th— (Planned) Blue Tent AP Calc AB My youngest (ADHD/anxiety) is relatively weaker in math. Not sure what path she’ll take. Currently doing CLE 6 in 6th. May just keep with what’s working and do pre-Algebra over two years by completing CLE 7 & 8, then begin Algebra 1 in 9th. Or do My Homeschool Math Class sequence beginning with pre-algebra online with Jann. Not sure if I’m ready to ‘let go’ of her math instruction yet, though. All this to say, keep plodding away with your pokey one. I’d probably add Wednesday math to the planner if it were me. Going forward, math will likely take at least 5 sessions per week. Edited January 30, 2021 by fourisenough 3 Quote
cintinative Posted January 30, 2021 Author Posted January 30, 2021 13 hours ago, Farrar said: I think more middle schools should offer Algebra IA and IB as a model. I was wondering how to transcript this. Thanks for this reminder. Worst case, I can transcript this year as Algebra IA. 2 Quote
Farrar Posted January 30, 2021 Posted January 30, 2021 1 hour ago, cintinative said: I was wondering how to transcript this. Thanks for this reminder. Worst case, I can transcript this year as Algebra IA. You can also do a subject transcript down the line, which may obscure just a little bit exactly when courses were taken. I think it works much better if a student takes uneven amounts of time on some things or if a student has a lot of courses in one area. 2 Quote
cintinative Posted January 30, 2021 Author Posted January 30, 2021 6 minutes ago, Farrar said: You can also do a subject transcript down the line, which may obscure just a little bit exactly when courses were taken. I think it works much better if a student takes uneven amounts of time on some things or if a student has a lot of courses in one area. This may be how we proceed. Right now I have everything grouped by subject in a column but the years are along the top. Anyway, yet another reason why I might want to hire you to look at it later! 😃 1 Quote
lewelma Posted January 30, 2021 Posted January 30, 2021 You can also do integrated math. I have found that it is very good that the big algebra exam is not given until 10th grade here in NZ. So in 8th, 9th, and 10th grade they get through algebra, geometry, and statistics. This gives time for the algebra to settle in over many years, and it gives a bit of variety to kids that get sick of doing the same thing day after day. It also allows the brain to mature. You don't even need an integrated math book, just pick 3 books you like and do a third each year. 1 Quote
lewelma Posted January 30, 2021 Posted January 30, 2021 I will also mention that once my ds had done those 3 years of algebra and was rock solid, he took 3 year to do: geometry, number theory, combinatorics, algebra 2, olympiad geometry, intermediate number theory, intermediate combinatorics, precalculus, and calculus, all done with AoPS. So just because they are slow in the beginning, does not dictate their speed later. 2 1 Quote
regentrude Posted January 30, 2021 Posted January 30, 2021 (edited) 4 hours ago, cintinative said: I was wondering how to transcript this. Thanks for this reminder. Worst case, I can transcript this year as Algebra IA. That is totally fine. Algebra 1A and 1B works. Nobody will care that he took two years to complete algebra. As long as he completes precalculus by the end of 12th grade and is solid, he will be right on track to place into calc 1 at college, which is the typical setup even for STEM majors (you would be surprised what large fraction of incoming freshmen at our engineering school do not place in calc, even though they had some in high school) Edited January 30, 2021 by regentrude 3 Quote
regentrude Posted January 30, 2021 Posted January 30, 2021 one more thought re transcript: you can simply make a year column and title it "before 9th grade". if that's worth it and you have enough highschool level coursework to list. But if you start algebra 1 in 8th grade and finish algebra1 some time in 9th, you can simply list "algebra 1" for 9th grade when it was completed. nobody will ask when yous tarted. 8th grade does not have to be part of the high school transcript. 6 Quote
Alice Posted January 31, 2021 Posted January 31, 2021 6 hours ago, regentrude said: one more thought re transcript: you can simply make a year column and title it "before 9th grade". if that's worth it and you have enough highschool level coursework to list. But if you start algebra 1 in 8th grade and finish algebra1 some time in 9th, you can simply list "algebra 1" for 9th grade when it was completed. nobody will ask when yous tarted. 8th grade does not have to be part of the high school transcript. This is what we are doing with my second son. He sounds very similar to the OP’s son. He has ADD. He was 13 in 8th grade when he started Algebra I. It took him about a year and a half to finish. We took the summer off, which I had mixed feelings about. I don’t think it’s a great idea but we had a house fire and in the middle of the pandemic everything was too chaotic. We all needed a break and I couldn’t fight him to do math all summer. He was able to pick back up in the fall and finish fine. He just started Geometry and will likely take a year or possibly 1 1/2 years to finish. I plan to put 9th grade for Algebra I and likely 10th grade for Geometry. 1 Quote
lewelma Posted January 31, 2021 Posted January 31, 2021 21 hours ago, regentrude said: But if you start algebra 1 in 8th grade and finish algebra1 some time in 9th, you can simply list "algebra 1" for 9th grade when it was completed. nobody will ask when yous tarted. 8th grade does not have to be part of the high school transcript. We did this with Physics. My older boy did it over 3 years. Mechanic and EM year 1, Wave and Modern year 2, and the 3 big labs in year 3. I just listed it on his transcript in the year he finished it. 1 Quote
Momto6inIN Posted February 1, 2021 Posted February 1, 2021 My 2nd DS took 2.5 years to do Alg 1 and 2, and I was worried too. He enjoyed math, but it took a lot of effort and concentration for him and he's slow at it and anymore than 1 hr per day of it absutely drained him. We started in 8th grade and took 5 years to get through Alg 1, Alg 2, Geometry, and PreCalc. He just earned an A in his university calc class. Repeating what everyone else has said to take the time and get Algebra right! 5 Quote
Not_a_Number Posted February 1, 2021 Posted February 1, 2021 (edited) On the one hand, I'd absolutely encourage you to get algebra rock solid. I taught calculus classes in college, and like @regentrude, I found that the BIGGEST problem was insufficient algebra. So if what you're doing right now is really cementing algebra idea in his head, you should keep that up. On the other hand, I might do some detective work and figure out why he's making mistakes. Is it conceptual or is it just sloppiness? If it's conceptual, I'd troubleshoot the concepts. If it's just sloppiness, I wouldn't necessarily LET IT GO, per se... but I might start going through the book quicker so that you can do the next thing, while concurrently maybe do some drilling to make it more automated. Edited February 1, 2021 by Not_a_Number Quote
Momto6inIN Posted February 1, 2021 Posted February 1, 2021 On 1/30/2021 at 3:52 PM, regentrude said: one more thought re transcript: you can simply make a year column and title it "before 9th grade". if that's worth it and you have enough highschool level coursework to list. But if you start algebra 1 in 8th grade and finish algebra1 some time in 9th, you can simply list "algebra 1" for 9th grade when it was completed. nobody will ask when yous tarted. 8th grade does not have to be part of the high school transcript. We did this too. I just listed Alg 1 in 9th, Alg 2 in 10th, Geometry in 11th, and PreCalc in 12th even though for DS he did Alg 1 in 8th & most of 9th, Alg 2 in 9th and half of 10th, Geometry in half of 10th and 11th, and took the rest of 11th and all of 12th to do PreCalc. I'm convinced that we homeschool moms obsess over this without really needing to because nobody in admissions really cares when they took each course as long as it's on there. 5 Quote
cintinative Posted February 1, 2021 Author Posted February 1, 2021 10 hours ago, Not_a_Number said: Is it conceptual or is it just sloppiness? Both. Sometimes he has forgotten how to do something (evidence he didn't truly get it all the first time) and sometimes it is that he has made math errors like failing to cancel something or adding something wrong (usually because he has not written all his work down). A little bit of I don't get it and a little bit of I'm 13. 😃 Quote
Not_a_Number Posted February 1, 2021 Posted February 1, 2021 1 hour ago, cintinative said: Both. Sometimes he has forgotten how to do something (evidence he didn't truly get it all the first time) and sometimes it is that he has made math errors like failing to cancel something or adding something wrong (usually because he has not written all his work down). A little bit of I don't get it and a little bit of I'm 13. 😃 What kinds of things is he forgetting how to do? Quote
cintinative Posted February 1, 2021 Author Posted February 1, 2021 8 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said: What kinds of things is he forgetting how to do? Well, he has ADD--inattentive so this is nothing new. Sometimes he is forgetting how to set the problem up. Then once I show him, he remembers, and is good to go. He just needs lots of repetition to get it stuck, and I'm trying my hardest to provide it. 😃 Quote
Not_a_Number Posted February 1, 2021 Posted February 1, 2021 1 hour ago, cintinative said: Well, he has ADD--inattentive so this is nothing new. Sometimes he is forgetting how to set the problem up. Then once I show him, he remembers, and is good to go. He just needs lots of repetition to get it stuck, and I'm trying my hardest to provide it. 😃 Set up how? Mind giving me an example? 🙂 1 Quote
cintinative Posted February 1, 2021 Author Posted February 1, 2021 47 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said: Set up how? Mind giving me an example? 🙂 Basically, he doesn't remember how to do step one. For a problem recently, he didn't remember that he needed to move all the terms to one side and then solve. As a result, he came up with one root instead of two. Quote
regentrude Posted February 1, 2021 Posted February 1, 2021 51 minutes ago, cintinative said: Basically, he doesn't remember how to do step one. For a problem recently, he didn't remember that he needed to move all the terms to one side and then solve. As a result, he came up with one root instead of two. Could you be a little more specific? have the example? Because "forgetting to move all the terms to one side and then solve" is not something he should be remembering to do; he should be understanding what is happening in the problem. Your description gets me a little concerned that he might be trying to do math by pattern matching 1 1 Quote
Not_a_Number Posted February 1, 2021 Posted February 1, 2021 2 minutes ago, regentrude said: Could you be a little more specific? have the example? Because "forgetting to move all the terms to one side and then solve" is not something he should be remembering to do; he should be understanding what is happening in the problem. Your description gets me a little concerned that he might be trying to do math by pattern matching Thanks, @regentrude. That's what I'm trying to figure out -- whether there's a conceptual issue that needs active remediating or not. @cintinative, a very specific example with all the specific things he does and says and forgets to do would be tremendously helpful. I've seen a lot of algebra issues in my life, and they tend to have predictable causes. 1 Quote
Garga Posted February 1, 2021 Posted February 1, 2021 (edited) When I started learning the math with my son who wasn’t too happy about math, and once I sat next to him and did every problem he did at the same time he did it...he started improving by leaps and bounds. So, we learn the lesson together. We work on problem #1 separately, each getting an answer on our own, and he tells me his answer. If I got the same answer, we move on. If we got different answers, we each check our work and figure out which one of us went wrong, until we agree on an answer. If I’m pretty sure he went wrong, I show him where. Once #1 is sorted out we move on to #2, each of us working on our own, then comparing answers. When we get to the end of the work, we check our answers in the book to make sure we were right. If it turns out we both got one wrong, we figure out why. And my student who dreaded math 2 years ago, now loves it. He used to struggle, and now it’s easy to him. He’s 15 now and we started doing it this way when he was 14. It often takes 1-1.5 hours to do math. But if he could only do 1 hour, we’d stop after 1 hour. Edited February 1, 2021 by Garga 2 Quote
cintinative Posted February 1, 2021 Author Posted February 1, 2021 1 hour ago, regentrude said: Could you be a little more specific? have the example? Because "forgetting to move all the terms to one side and then solve" is not something he should be remembering to do; he should be understanding what is happening in the problem. Your description gets me a little concerned that he might be trying to do math by pattern matching That is such a good point. 1 Quote
Not_a_Number Posted February 2, 2021 Posted February 2, 2021 5 hours ago, Garga said: When I started learning the math with my son who wasn’t too happy about math, and once I sat next to him and did every problem he did at the same time he did it...he started improving by leaps and bounds. So, we learn the lesson together. We work on problem #1 separately, each getting an answer on our own, and he tells me his answer. If I got the same answer, we move on. If we got different answers, we each check our work and figure out which one of us went wrong, until we agree on an answer. If I’m pretty sure he went wrong, I show him where. Once #1 is sorted out we move on to #2, each of us working on our own, then comparing answers. When we get to the end of the work, we check our answers in the book to make sure we were right. If it turns out we both got one wrong, we figure out why. And my student who dreaded math 2 years ago, now loves it. He used to struggle, and now it’s easy to him. He’s 15 now and we started doing it this way when he was 14. It often takes 1-1.5 hours to do math. But if he could only do 1 hour, we’d stop after 1 hour. I think that's a GREAT way to do it, Garga. And I'm probably going to do the same thing for sciences I don't know myself. It keeps the work real and makes it clear what's hard and what isn't. And it keeps it... collaborative, I guess? I think that's just the right thing to do. 1 Quote
Garga Posted February 2, 2021 Posted February 2, 2021 (edited) 9 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said: I think that's a GREAT way to do it, Garga. And I'm probably going to do the same thing for sciences I don't know myself. It keeps the work real and makes it clear what's hard and what isn't. And it keeps it... collaborative, I guess? I think that's just the right thing to do. Collaborative was definitely a goal, absolutely. He likes to work with someone else. My oldest, not so much. He got almost insulted if I tried working with him as if I thought he wasn’t capable. Very different personalities. Mostly, for me, if he has a question, I know exactly what he’s talking about so I can answer it, instead of being like, “Gee, I don’t know....let me try to figure it out in the book...maybe we could try googling it...or I could ask my WTM friends...”. Instead I know exactly where we learned it, where it is in the book, all the context of why we’re doing it, etc, etc. Edited February 2, 2021 by Garga 2 Quote
Not_a_Number Posted February 2, 2021 Posted February 2, 2021 1 minute ago, Garga said: Mostly, for me, if he has a question, I know exactly what he’s talking about so I can answer it, instead of being like, “Gee, I don’t know....let me try to figure it out in the book...maybe we could try googling it...or I could ask my WTM friends...”. Instead I know exactly where we learned it, where it is in the book, all the context of why we’re doing it, etc, etc. And I'm absolutely certain that makes you a much better teacher. 🙂 1 Quote
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