Consequences

One of the problems with a gifted child, especially those gifted in language, is their tendency to act like a lawyer. My parents will probably enjoy reading this post as they remember the parent curse they put me under; "I hope someday you have a child just like you!"

JT has become an expert litigator. We ask him to do something or not to do something and he can spout off every reason why he shouldn't be asked to do whatever it is. We have been dealing with this since he was able to speak. But recently, he's thrown in an exciting new twist. He no longer seems to care about consequences. Usually when JT is refusing to do assignments for school, we work towards taking away privileges. A couple days ago, he declared he didn't care if he lost his computer privileges. From there it moved towards not caring for the loss of any other fun stuff. He was determined to hold out to win the battle.

My husband has come up with a new plan that involves moving JT through a series of levels where he loses different privileges and can't regain them until he stops moving to the next level down the ladder. This seems to be helping a bit. Part of my problem has come from the fact that when JT would lose several days at a time on one bad day, I would allow him to gain back what he had lost with good behavior. I think he had decided that he could be as 'bad' as he wanted, then when he felt like it, be 'good' and regain what he had lost.

I have to admit, this was my worst week since we started cyber school. I felt miserable and did NOT want to spend another minute in the classroom. I had friends who warned me not to give up the first couple weeks we started. I wasn't prepared for this when things had been going so well. So my bit of advice to other parents is; be prepared for the low points. I believe they will come throughout the process. I've had jobs (out in the REAL world) where I wanted to give up. I didn't because I needed the money. I think it would be easier to give up here when so many people already think you are doing something unnecessary. Because I know this is so very necessary for my child, I will remember that this time in my life will be over in a flash. When the boys have gone on to succesful lives, the percentage of 'bad' days will be a small portion of the big picture. At least, I hope they will be.... :-)

Socialization

I used to be very annoyed when someone would find out that we were about to pull our son out of traditional school and they would say, "Aren't you worried about socialization?" I would smile and say, "Not at all."

This week JT told us that he's lonely. We have had 3 weeks of happenings that have kept us from our usual out-of-the-house activities. We had sickness and bad weather. So, we have been a little high on the cabin fever scale. When we aren't trapped at home, JT has piano lessons, cub scouts and church activities that take up 4 days a week, so you can't say he isn't being 'socialized'.

I started panicking and thinking he'd be asking to go back to brick and mortar school any day now. But when he talked with my husband, JT said he likes being at home for school, but misses his friends. A fellow homeschooling mom comforted me by reminding me that being 'lonely' is different than lack of socialization. Everyone can get lonely. That is easily fixed by spending time with other people.

I made a few phone calls the next day. We are now trying to decide if JT will start both Kung Fu and drawing classes before summer starts. I don't want to go overboard, but I also want to make sure he has a chance to get out of the house on a regular basis. I enjoy being at home and would make a happy hermit. I have to remember that not everyone thrives on that alone time.

The good thing is, he doesn't want to go back to the way things used to be. We just need to stay alert to any signs that things need improvement. It's a learning experience for all of us.

Best Laid Plans....

I finally motivated myself to begin serious lesson planning Saturday morning. I spent around 6 hours laying out an outline for the next 20 lessons and specific instructions for the first week for all subjects. I felt positive about what I had accomplished and excited to start school Monday morning. Sunday morning the stomach virus hit our house.

We spent some time Monday watching an educational video. We also did a little reading for geography and I introduced our new spelling list. Not quite what I had planned.

Tuesday we managed to put in about half a day's worth of school. Mostly things we could do while sitting on the couch. However, by day three I learned something very important. Calvin and Hobbes can teach your kid more in 30 minutes than what they can learn in a full day of structured school!

If you aren't familiar with Calvin and Hobbes, it's a comic strip (see this wikipedia article) about a boy (Calvin) and his stuffed tiger (Hobbes) that only Calvin sees as a real tiger. This comic is not really targeting young kids, but my boys love it. The vocabulary is challenging and the strip itself deals with many deep subjects. So, Wednesday morning I was assaulted by such questions....

"What is pachysandra?"

"Why is this joke funny?" "A man is walking his dog. He says to his dog, "Heel". The dog says, "It takes one to know one."

"What is a grade curve?"

"How do you do this math problem?" "Mr. Jones lives 50 miles away from you. You both leave home at 5:00 and drive toward each other. Mr. Jones travels at 35 mph and you drive at 40 mph. At what time will you pass Mr. Jones?"

And my favorite...."What does anatomically correct mean?"

From this one bit of reading, JT had a botany lesson, a lesson on homonyms, a lesson on statistics, a lesson in Algebra and finally, a biology lesson! Now that's a well rounded education!

When we allow our children to explore their interests and we follow their lead...what wonderful things they can learn. I don't think I could spend every school day like that. We would probably end up neglecting the subjects JT needs the most work on...the ones he doesn't like (COMPOSITION!). But an occassional day without the plan, can really pay off.

Hopefully next time, we don't need to be sick.

Planning

Suddenly I realize the two weeks of our holiday break is nearly over! I meant to do so many things to prepare for heading back to school. This weekend will definitely be crunch time.

I did spend a little time looking ahead. I'm trying to change the way I do my lesson planning. I used to look ahead through one week's worth of the provided lesson plans, toss the things I thought JT did not need, then use the remaining items to form my lessons. Using this process, we really didn't find opportunity to add the 'fun' stuff and more advanced study I wanted to get into.

My new plan involves working in 20 lesson blocks. Since each of the testing days involves 20 lessons worth of material, I looked at our next tests to really see what they are looking for from these lessons, then removed all the material that had nothing to do with the tests or had little educational value. The remaining material leaves us with much more time to add our own things. For example, the science lessons would be spread out in tiny chunks over the week. I can compact one week of their material into one day and then expand with my own things when I look at the big picture and know that we aren't going to miss something vital by skipping ahead. In the next 20 lessons our science material covers the Earth and the Moon in very little detail. I have some really good books and movies that we can use to cover that more thoroughly. The language arts will spend a lesson or two working on analogies, but I plan to spend more time on those. JT has always been good with them but could work at a more challenging level. We are going to hold off on moving ahead in the provided math and instead really go into detail with fractions.

One more note, JT celebrated his 8th birthday today. He's a much happier kid than he was one year ago. I'm glad I have had the chance to bring him home and attempt to provide what he needs. I know we are going to have many challenges ahead of us, but we'll take those one day at a time.

Half Way

We have reached the half-way point in our curriculum this week! It doesn't necessarily mean we are halfway through the year, but it's an exciting benchmark. JT spent the week working on some lessons and completing test Lesson 80 for all the subjects, except math. Tomorrow he will take the Lesson 140 math test. We spent 3 days covering their material on fractions that was supposed to take about 2 weeks. What we covered will allow him to take the test that only expects minimum knowledge of the concept. After the holiday break, we will spend some serious time really covering fractions. The tiny glimpse they gave brought on plenty of questions that we can cover with our extra time. Since we are so far ahead, I will request the 4th grade math be ordered, but I'm not sure if we will actually do anything with it this year. The remaining sections for the 3rd grade math are decimals and working with larger numbers. We will probably dive into the decimals much deeper than the material provides and stretch that out. After that, I think we'll spend some time exploring ancient number systems.

As the break approaches, we are spending less and less time in our regular routine. JT is still learning new things all the time, but not in such a structured way. He has been reading a book about the seige of Troy. He designed his own strategy game to play with his brother. Today while taking a break from testing, he spent 45 minutes reading online about poisonous snake bites, what to do if you are bitten, how to survive a bear attack and other fun things. I'm sure they might come in handy some day.... I'm trying to let him explore a few of his own interests this week while I get ready for the holiday. We will still have school Monday and Tuesday of next week. We have been putting together a pile of "fun" things to do then. We are planning crafts and games. Isn't that what they do the last two days before break in the brick and mortars? :-)

One small change in our classroom. I decided the chalk board was way too much of a mess. I love the feel of writing with chalk. Chalk board paint is the coolest stuff. The chalk dust all over my carpet, molding and bookcases is not. My parents bought us a new dry erase board. It's 48" x 36". We will hang it up over the holiday. I also plan to do some classroom cleaning and organizing then. It's amazing what a mess things become in such a short period of time! I am also trying to come up with a plan for a craft area. Right now, JT just works on his desk for crafts. I would like to make a counter under one of the windows to allow room to stretch out and leave projects as they are in production. That might have to wait for summer and the next school year.

I will not be posting next week. I'm taking a MUCH needed break from all things schooling. But I will be back the following week with my plans for the second half of our school year.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

To Complain or Not to Complain....

When we started out with PA Cyber, I was especially pleased that they allowed us to choose between primarily virtual classes or the more traditional homeschooling option using Calvert curriculum. I am still happy that I have the choice to not use the virtual classes, but I'm starting to really despise the Calvert material.

This week we received the corrections from the Lesson 60 test for all subjects, except math, which was lesson 100. JT had all As. Personally, I don't really worry about the grades, more about if he is really learning anything. On these particular tests, there were a few things marked wrong. As I looked over the mistakes, I found that he actually had 3 of the 4 correct. One problem was on the math test. It was a matching question and two were marked wrong. I assume the answer key was probably wrong; they had just been flipped. I figured the teacher must have just missed it. Then we came to the Geography test. The test directions instructed the student to use a map from the text book to answer several questions. One section required the student to find a location on the map, then list something to the East, West, South and North of that location. JT had done it right, but one was marked wrong. From using this text book, I know that most of the answer keys are not very accurate. I have stopped looking at it and just grade the materials myself. I guess that the teacher must not have had a copy of the map available or the answer would have been ovbiously correct.

I have contacted the school about the problem. I emailed our IS and she forwarded the information to the head of the Calvert department and our teacher. It seems we are not easily able to contact the teacher. I am not sure what the reason for that is, but we need to go through the IS for most communication. I would like to press this further, but worry if I complain too much they will pull the option of using Calvert. Calvert is not the best choice of curriculum, by a long shot, but it gives us the opportunity to easily differentiate most lessons. I hate allowing faulty materials to continue to be used, but I'm guessing there would be no replacement for those who don't want virtual classes. So...do I just say, "Oh well!" and move on, or do I fight? I need to figure this out since the next math test has questions that defy logic.......

Bounciness

I think the thing that makes my days rough is the massive volume of movement JT can produce. I was never the kind of person who needed to tap my toes and twiddle my fingers. When I was really young, I chewed my hair and nails, but that was the extent of my nervous habits. This kid CAN NOT stop moving! The exercise ball does little to alleviate the problem. I send him outside to run around. I allow him to sit on the floor, lay on the floor, sit on his desk. If he's concentrating on reading a book he's really into, he stops moving. That is the only exception. If I could, I'd have him read all day! I just hope he grows out of this before his teen years, or I'll need new furniture every week.

With the holiday, we've had kind of a slow two weeks. Wednesday we put in almost a full school day and I felt like we had accomplished quite a bit. Today we had the morning in the classroom and then a friend of JT's that also cyber schools came over to play games. That was a nice break for all of us. The moms were able to visit and the kids got to play. I need to work a few more sanity savers like that into our schedule.

I'm hoping to get a full day in tomorrow. It's still difficult to get him to want to work on composition assignments. I haven't found any tricky ways to convince him it's fun. At bedtime last night we had a funny conversation. He was reading a non-fiction book about a bird rescue shelter. When he finished it he said, "I hate it when I come to the end of books like that one". I told him there are plenty of other non-fiction books at our library. "Plus," I said, "there are people writing more every day, maybe you could even write one". He said, "I'd love to write a report on fungus farms". Isn't that what every 7-year old would love to do?! This idea came because on Thanksgiving while channel surfing at my parent's home (we don't have tv, so it's always funny when the kids get access to it) he made my husband stop on the History channel. There was a show about fungus and mold. He bypassed all the cartoon channels, etc to stop on fungus and mold. Then he was irritated that everyone was talking and he couldn't hear what was being said on the show. We sent him alone to another room and he watched the whole program. Come to think of it, he sat perfectly still through the entire thing! If only I can find enough material to engage him at that level we might have peace in the classroom.