Tuesday, December 14, 2010

How much is enough?

I struggle as a homeschooling mom with how much is enough. It's across the board for me. How much math practice? How much time on spelling? How much time on school, on free play, with other kids, with other teachers?

It's easy to feel like it's never right, and never enough. I've been thinking about this a lot specifically with math and writing.

Math is something that I think should be done frequently, without big breaks for primary students. We do math five times a week, and sometimes it's more then that. We are using two math programs together as well as extra practice sheets I print off online. I fall under the, "Deep, not wide" wisdom here- we are cementing math facts until I am nearly dreaming them. I'm fairly certain Sweet Pea is, as well. This is good, though. I know when we move on (gulp, multiplication) that we won't lose the ground we've already covered.

I think it's a fairly widely talked about fact that most homeschooled kids write less then their public schooled peers. It's not all a bad thing. Sometimes kids are pushed into churning out volume before mastering quality, and that's not how it should be. It's also easy to go to the opposite extreme and I'm always a little surprised when I hear so many kids Sweet Pea's age described as writing reluctant. How can you really know if you like writing or not when the process is still so new?

I expect 10-20 sentences a day. It's usually a combination of writing across history and science and doing a writing assignment I've made or or from Maxwell's Primary Lessons.

I know it's more then a lot of homeschooled kids in 1st do- but is it enough?

I guess we'll see.

3 comments:

  1. The nice thing about being in homeschooling for the long haul is that you can take the approach of "well, we're doing a little less writing now than our public school counterparts, but by the time we hit late middle school and high school, our output will be significantly higher." I struggle with some of the same questions, but I guarantee you I would be an absolute WRECK if I thought I had to make sure they could jump into an institutional school setting at any moment!

    ReplyDelete
  2. You deserve a pat on the back for even comtemplating these things! You care very much about giving your kids the tools to succeed and that is a valuable gift to them. I think you're doing a great job!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Kash- that's true, and something I bank on, as well.
    Helpful teacher- thank you!

    ReplyDelete