We've had a busy but good week. Our pool is up. The summer reading program has started. We went to the skating rink. We had a nice time, but we sure didn't get as much spring cleaning done as I would have liked. :-( since I have to go to mom's house to work and since our afternoons were filling up so much, I left notes for the kids about what they should work on while I was gone, but they misunderstood what I wanted them to do. Sometimes I think we speak a different language, or at the very least, a different dialect. :-P
A mom at the skating rink asked for my advice about homeschooling her boys who are going to be kindergarten age this year. I think she pictures homeschooling as sitting down working for 5 or 6 hours a day and I just don't think these boys (or most boys, really) are ready for that at 5. They may be able to be subdued and sit down in the schools, but I don't think it's good for them. I've been looking around at curriculum and may suggest Five In a Row for her. Does anyone have any experience with this curriculum? It looks good to me. I didn''t actually start teaching mine at home until after kindergarten so I'm not sure exactly how to start with the littlest ones. If it were me doing it over again, I'd probably just play with them, read to them and watch the Leapfrog videos on how to read but people who are not sure of themselves in homeschooling (including me when I first started) want curriculum, some kind of a guide.
I've spent quite a bit of time working on my book that I'm writing this week. It might be almost done, but I'm afraid to say so since I told someone it was basically done last November and it wasn't. :-P
I'm with you in the thinking that little ones that age (especially boys) are too little to make sit still for hours at a time. Now, I did homeschool all mine from the very beginning & we certainly didn't do alot of book work at that age. I remember trying to teach Chris to tell time with the math workbook I had for him...he was 5 or 6 & had been counting by 5s forever so I thought it would be easy, but he just didn't GET IT. So, I totally laid off for awhile.....tried again the next year & he GOT IT....no problem at all. I'd suggest, like you said....lots of reading aloud to them, learning games, learning fieldtrips, etc.
ReplyDeleteFive in a Row is great. We did a little of it when Violet was young, but she was starting to get a bit old for it when I discovered it. We kind of did our own version with books we wanted to read too.
ReplyDeleteMainly I wanted to mention that Five in a Row is what the veteran homeschoolers on our local list always recommend to someone looking for curriculum for that age group. It is easy to do, good material, feels like curriculum (which is what they really want) and still lets kids be kids and not cram academics down their throats before they are ready.
I'm late posting so you've probably already made your decision, but giving my 2c anyway. :)