Help!

[sschott]

I need a little advice from some of you moms who've homeschooled for a while. I am hs'ing my son, 7 1/2. I work full-time, but the job is flexible and I am able to take him with me two days a week. Other times I work are evenings and weekends, so he is with my husband then. Last year, things went great. He happily did his work and we had no problems. This year, not so much. I take a pretty relaxed approach, but I do want him to stay close to public school grade level with math. Since there is no possibility of me not working, and since I expect to get a new boss within the next year, I see the slim possibility of having to return him to public school. Not what I want, but I feel it would be wise to keep that option open.

He's just a "second-grader", and I don't think it should take more than an hour or two (total) to do his school most days. However, the kid dawdles his way through math to the point that I am ready to scream! He can, and does, make a 30 minute lesson take 2 1/2 hours on a regular basis. I am tired of saying, "do your math" over and over, and I am tired of the frustration of it all. I think his reading and spelling and all that are fine ... but he really wants to spend his days playing (mostly imaginative stuff, like pretending that he and his sister are Davy Crockett and his sidekick, etc, but really, anything other than school work is what he's interested in). Again, I don't WANT school to take all day, but to get anything done, it seems that it IS taking all day.

Advice? Any ideas would be so appreciated!

[pinky]

Have you talked with him about it?  When we get in a homechooling rut, I take my dd out to a coffee shop (a special treat) for a "homeschooling meeting."  I would just say something like, "It's important to me that you do XYZ for school (fill in math, etc.), and I want you to have plenty of time to do the things that you want to do (like play), but it seems like it's taking you so long to do your schoolwork that there's not time for other things.  How can we make this work better?"

I find that involving my kids in the trouble-shooting always helps.

Also just want to throw out there that IME, 7-8 is a tough age!

[happy1nluv]

Can you give him a challenge based on the material?  Like, gee it would be great to make cookies but i need a cup of flour and only have a 1/4 measuring cup (no clue if that would work or what you're learning...  ) Too bad we don't know how to add fractions to find out how much we need...  the challenge my kids are working on now is money.  if they can divide a pile of coins into equal amounts (they are 3,5 so i "stack" the deck but will stop as they master it) they can add it to their piggy banks...  :)

[simple living mama]

I was extremely relaxed with my kids math until they got a bit older.  The reason was mainly, I knew at some stage I would have to get them a math tutor as I was not one who excelled at math and my own math was very limited.  I knew I could get them to division with no problem so I took my time and make sure they knew it by this year.  They are 12 and 13.  The math tutor I got for them this year told me last week, they are excelling rapidly with math and it's probably a good idea I did what I did because they really don't have any math hang ups and they seem to learn everything he's throwing at them. He feels like he can get them up to speed in no time.

  He said with a lot of parents who homeschool, by the time he gets the kids, they have to unlearn what the parents taught because they might not have taught it right or the kid has blocks because of negative experiences.  Math is a whole different can of worms than the other subjects.     So anyway, just know, if your kid is struggling with math, give it a rest for awhile. Take your time to learn and take many breaks away from it. Try different approaches.  There are lots of fun games that teach math.  Try to keep math positive and don't always raise the bar so high, your child struggles.  Let them stay with a math concept so they feel confident and good. Wait for a bit until you  move on to something new.