Parents who after school - how do you get it all done?

[Anonymous]

Chess is a great game as it combines so many of these skills. Critical thinking, predictive reasoning, patterns, strategizing, trade off etc. I wish chess was taught in all schools

[Anonymous]

Keep it simple.
I liked the reading advice.
I have a neighbor who forces her boys to journal. Two sentences is all she asks of her second graders. I think this is a great idea. Of course the easter bunny bought journals and they havne't been cracked yet.

But, I leave lots of paper around and I see all sorts of strange "mindcraft" plans. And he wrote a thank you note last night without crying. I'm thrilled that my DS is writing for fun as an 8 year old. We spent YEARs in OT and special preschool on all those skills.

So, look that you see your DS using the skills he needs in "fun" ways - Math for the "purchasing" of coins in video games. Writing for battle plans. Break out the maps when planning for trips.

[Anonymous]

22:02 - is Lollipop Logic any good, or does your DD find it too easy? I've heard conflicting things about it but I was thinking of getting it for my first grader.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just do the history as bedtime reading, thus accomplishing both required reading and supplemental history at the same time. No advice for science, we save it for the summers. Here's what we do:

Penmanship/writing, social studies, and logic are the major subjects I supplement during the school year. We also practice math facts and do daily reading as required by the girls’ school. Since reading and practicing math is required by the school I don’t consider that extra. Depending on the day, our supplemental subjects take my youngest 5-35 minutes and my oldest 15-45 minutes.

We do 5 minutes of penmanship (DD5.5) or 15 minutes of writing (DD7) every day. Every other day, we also do around 30 minutes of logic games and exercises (that they selected). On the days we don’t do logic, we use Story of the World, a non-fiction book about something historical/cultural, or a biography as our bedtime story. This covers the half hour of reading or being read to assigned by their school while simultaneously providing enrichment in Social Studies. Since it is to fulfill a school requirement as well I don’t consider it part of the time spent supplementing. Other days we read fiction and more typical bedtime stories.

Either doing math homework or practicing math facts for a few minutes a day is recommended by their school so we do that but no extra math. We would if they seemed to need it but so far they don’t.

Science and geography are saved for the summers -- we go to museums, go geocaching, do weekly country studies that involve me learning to make something new for dinner at least once or twice, mess around with science kits, or even just make explosions in the back yard with coke and mentos and then explore why things explode and what else we could safely blow up (chemistry, early-elementary style). These are things that at their age I want to just be natural, fun exploration and not a formal curriculum, so I save it for summer when we have more time to dig into a topic in depth.

The above is implemented in a really flexible way at our house; if we need to skip a few days or a week of the supplemental work for some reason, we will. The one standing exception to the above routine is that in the week following a birthday or the two week period following a holiday on which gifts were received, I suspend our “formal” writing practice and we do a “practical” writing program each day – thank you notes as copywork until all the notes have been written and mailed.

Not the OP, but thank you for being so specific. This is helpful.
(and you sound life a great mom!)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mastermind sounds kind of like Battleships. We have fun with Battleships and Chess.

Those are all great games, we have and love all 3 although DD5 hasn't quite grasped chess yet. I'm not really sure mastermind is all that similar to Battleship, though. Battleship is a lot of guessing at first to find the ship while in mastermind you are supposed to use clues and small bits of information to reason through the solution. It's still guessing in a way but the guess is supposed to be supported by logic. In mastermind the point is for one player (or in my girls' case both of them together) to figure out a color pattern that the other player (me) has hidden beforehand. The color options are white, red, blue, and green. They start by guessing the pattern, and then they are told how many colors they have correct and how many are in the right order. They have a limited number of tries to guess the pattern.

For example, lets say the hidden color pattern is (Blue Green Red Red). Their first guess is Red White Blue Green. I tell them that they have 3 of the four colors correct, but none in the right order. So next they have to guess which is the wrong color and get rid of it. Maybe they guess green is wrong, because they know I don't like that color, and replace it with a blue. Their new guess is Red White Blue Blue. So I tell them they have 2 of the four colors correct now. Since 2 is one less than last time, they should realize that taking away green was wrong. They put back the green and take away the white. DD5.5 points out that red is one of my favorite colors so maybe I used that. They replace the white with red. Now their guess is Red Red Blue Green. I tell them they have all 4 colors right but the order all wrong. Now they spend several turns trying to figure out the order. If they get the right answer before they run out of space on the game board, they win the game.

It's loads of fun, but sometimes they get frustrated still so I will give them hints or ask leading questions to suggest how they might solve it if that happens. The junior version is easier and probably a safer bet to start out with at this age, actually, but they learned about the regular version from their grandfather and would not settle for the junior version after that.

Mastermind is an awesome game. I used to play it as a kid and now play with with my own kids. So simple, but fun.

[Anonymous]

Tips from a mom who went from having a struggling student to a "top student". I still fell like my child could revert back quickly though. Math we do two hours every Saturday and child is assigned 2 hours of homework per week. We go to the library and child is required to read book at appropriate lexile level once every two weeks. Lexile level is 4 grades above current grade level. Child picks out other books that are of interest too. We are going to implement a writing program too this fall as writing isn't up to par.

[Anonymous]

I'm PP and work 50-60 hours a week too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just do the history as bedtime reading, thus accomplishing both required reading and supplemental history at the same time. No advice for science, we save it for the summers. Here's what we do:

Penmanship/writing, social studies, and logic are the major subjects I supplement during the school year. We also practice math facts and do daily reading as required by the girls’ school. Since reading and practicing math is required by the school I don’t consider that extra. Depending on the day, our supplemental subjects take my youngest 5-35 minutes and my oldest 15-45 minutes.

We do 5 minutes of penmanship (DD5.5) or 15 minutes of writing (DD7) every day. Every other day, we also do around 30 minutes of logic games and exercises (that they selected). On the days we don’t do logic, we use Story of the World, a non-fiction book about something historical/cultural, or a biography as our bedtime story. This covers the half hour of reading or being read to assigned by their school while simultaneously providing enrichment in Social Studies. Since it is to fulfill a school requirement as well I don’t consider it part of the time spent supplementing. Other days we read fiction and more typical bedtime stories.

Either doing math homework or practicing math facts for a few minutes a day is recommended by their school so we do that but no extra math. We would if they seemed to need it but so far they don’t.

Science and geography are saved for the summers -- we go to museums, go geocaching, do weekly country studies that involve me learning to make something new for dinner at least once or twice, mess around with science kits, or even just make explosions in the back yard with coke and mentos and then explore why things explode and what else we could safely blow up (chemistry, early-elementary style). These are things that at their age I want to just be natural, fun exploration and not a formal curriculum, so I save it for summer when we have more time to dig into a topic in depth.

The above is implemented in a really flexible way at our house; if we need to skip a few days or a week of the supplemental work for some reason, we will. The one standing exception to the above routine is that in the week following a birthday or the two week period following a holiday on which gifts were received, I suspend our “formal” writing practice and we do a “practical” writing program each day – thank you notes as copywork until all the notes have been written and mailed.

What a wonderful approach to learning. Thank you for taking the time to write this out. (NP)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Tips from a mom who went from having a struggling student to a "top student". I still fell like my child could revert back quickly though. Math we do two hours every Saturday and child is assigned 2 hours of homework per week. We go to the library and child is required to read book at appropriate lexile level once every two weeks. Lexile level is 4 grades above current grade level. Child picks out other books that are of interest too. We are going to implement a writing program too this fall as writing isn't up to par.

How old is your child?

[Anonymous]

I have a 2nd grader.

I get home at 5:30. We eat dinner immediately (husband has already picked up son and made dinner.) If it's daylight, we go out for 30-45 minutes to get more exercise (very high energy kid). He's gotten some exercise at aftercare, but I find he does best with more if I can squeeze it in.

Then we sit down to homework. That can be 1/2 hour's worth, between school and a heritage language class he takes on Saturdays. Plus printing practice. His handwriting is pretty bad.

Then we read before bed for 1/2 hour. Like PP, I include something educational. He happens to LOVE history, so that's easy, but we read things like Little House books, and other nature/farm oriented books because he loves those. He also likes science, so we read a lot of that. It's a mix of his reading to me, and vice versa, depending on the difficulty level.

Since he loves American history so much, we spent this summer touring local sites like Williamsburg, Gettysburg, Ft. McHenry, the Lincoln Memorial, etc.

I do intermittent science projects with him on weekends, especially in the winter with shorter days. Rock and Gem Digs, water purification kits, make solar vehicles, ant farms, snap circuits, levitation kits, crystal growing, etc. Then I try to find a kid's science book about the science behind whatever he did, to add to the reading and the learning aspect. The Wacky Lab toys at Toys R Us are fun, and there are several nice science-related toys at Barnes and Noble.

Museum visits, too. We've done both air and space a million times and the Natural History museum as well. Native American Museum is also a big hit. And the zoo. We live at the zoo. I'm going to add art in this year because we've neglected that. And a trip or two to the planetarium.

You know your kids and what they find interesting. Use those interests as a basis and build fun educational activities around them. It doesn't have to be daily or even weekly. But I do find a little planning to match a book to an activity or museum visit is a very good way to maximize learning.

[Anonymous]

Here's my lazy-mom's guide for those of you so inclined -

School year - We get home around 5:45 and walk the dog. Mondays, I spend two minutes looking at the homework assignment while I prep dinner, and we have a brief discussion about what DC should work on for the week (most of it is unnecessary busy work, so I just pick a few things that look useful or that DC may need to work on). Sometimes I remember to check it later in the week and sometimes I don't - in my view, it's DC's responsibility, and the earlier that's learned, the better. I do a 1 minute quiz of the spelling words, and if DC misses any I'll usually remember to repeat 1-2 more times that week.

Summers - We get new books from the library every few weeks.

We learn geography while looking at maps and researching our vacations. We learn about the environment and biology when going for hikes on the weekend. We learn about the world and foreign affairs by hearing about and discussing something we've heard during the 10 minutes of morning news that I usually watch. We learn about economics and budgeting by talking about things to buy (or not buy) at the store.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My child is 10 and after 2 years, we are going back to private because the burden of after schooling and sports was too much for all of us. Nothing was getting done really well and everything was getting done halfway.

At home, we will still concentrate on Math as well as Geography but other areas will now be covered during the school day.

Private school tutition is going to be very hard on us as a family finacially but overall I think it will be a better fit for us.

I don't understand your issue.

I just don't.

[Anonymous]

I get it done because my kid entered kindergarten already knowing how to read at a second grade level and was doing first grade Singapore Math. I taught him to read, he didn't just pick it up by himself. Once he was ahead it has been easy to stay ahead. Homework is done quickly because it is so easy for him. If he had to actually spend 30 to 60 minutes on homework we wouldn't have time to afterschool. I don't ask for additional work for him at home because I prefer to teach him math at home. Just remember there are 180 days a year that kids aren't in school. Even if you just afterschool during the non-school days your kid will advance a year working at home.

I use Singapore Math Standards edition (home instructor's guide, textbook, workbook, and challenging word problems.) I also had him memorize his addition/subtraction math facts the summer before 1st grade and his multiplication facts the summer before 2nd grade.

[Anonymous]

I feel very stressed out about it. My child has just started kindergarten. She is well ahead in math because I've been working with her a little bit over the last year but we definitely need to work more on reading.

I'm so stressed out because I don't know how to fit reading, math, science - all into 45 minutes a day that I have with her. She's pretty tired when she comes from school so I don't want to wear her out. In addition to that we read books before she falls asleep, have swimming classes and art classes and play dates. And I must make sure she gets enough sleep because she wakes up at 6:00 am.

The school just started and I'm a nervous wreck. I feel resentful towards DH because he does not do any of the activities with her at all. It's all on me. He might drive her for a class, but that's about it. He is not teaching her anything and doesn't feel like reading more than one book. In addition, I have to clean, cook and work.

[Anonymous]

PP just read. Don't worry about the rest in kindergarten. Hang in there.