losing my mind today

[SamuraiMom]

I don't even know where to begin. My 6 y/o DD is doing well, she's willing to work, math is a slight challenge, but it may only seem that way because she reads so well. My DS/8 is making me pull my hair out. Once he starts working it's fine, but to get him to sit down initially is like trying to catch a super ball in a rubber room. And changing subjects just starts us all over again- though not as bad. We are doing k12 through the public school system here in MA. If we quit we lose all of the curriculum and supplies the have sent us- I really like the program, I am just not crazy about adhering to the attendance laws in MA. We are not going to complete the program by June, we started a month or two later than the rest of the group- and to make matters more challenging, in my mind at least- I started him at the 1rst grade level- because that was were he was with reading at, but with math he is way ahead- he is the exact opposite of his sister. I would have loved to have spent the year focussing on Reading and Math and language skills and to have put science, history and the extra curricula's on the back burner till next year, but because we are technically part of the public school system, we can't do that. Sigh. I think ideally, I would like to get as far as we can with this program and then next year, buy the k12 program and do it on our own. I'm sorry, I am just venting- I don't want to fret- I have always been one to go with the flow, but the flow is feeling like a torrent. I thought the hardest part of HSing would be finding a curriculum that worked for us. Well I seem to have found the perfect one, but I can't get the kid to do his work . thats all, thanks for letting me vent. 

[OTMomma]

If your child won't do his work, maybe it isn't the perfect curriculum for him? As a homeschooling mom, I've had to realize that my idea of the perfect curriculum and what I want for my child's education is secondary to figuring out what actually works for my child.    Is there any way you can do just one subject a day, and do that one subject a week's worth?  Or maybe 2, one before lunch and one after?   I personally, don't teach every subject every day, dd and I would rather do less subjects but with more depth a few times a week.    And if you are ready to consider doing things very differently, it sounds like your son might enjoy doing  a unit study- you do all your subjects through studying one topic, and you don't have to make a big deal of changing subjects.  If the idea appeals to you, I would let him help pick the topic for the unit study, because if the topic interests him, he may be a lot happier to sit down and learn about it.  Plus in my opinion, unit studies lend themselves well to hands on activities- like building replicas out of Lego's, which your son might enjoy.

[SamuraiMom]

I did not understand what unit studies were until now, that is an excellent idea. He would like that too. Thank you. 

[OTMomma]

So glad to help.  :)  If you want a jumping off point- www.homeschoolshare.com has some free unit studies.  I haven't used many of them, so not sure how comprehensive they are.  I think the most challenging thing to work in can be math- but with ours I've done things like making and understanding a time-line, and using that to figure out how long ago or how long apart in history events took place.  We've also done measurement, comparison, and grouping which are all math skills.  And of course you can play with word problems- like if you study frogs you can make up math problems to add and subtract frogs jumping in a pond, or add up how many legs 3 frogs have all together, or pretend to be frogs and jump along a line and measure how far you jumped.   Have fun with it.  :)