Do you guys ever have days where your kids just seem to forget everything they've been taught in the last while? I don't know what is wrong with my son (almost 6yrs old) today! He's got a bit of a cold, but were he in ps it wouldn't be enough to keep him home, so I thought we'd go ahead with school anyways. Apparently, I shouldn't have bothered! Even the simplest concepts that I know he should be able to grasp are being met with "I don't know". So I tried to just get him to do simple things, but even getting him to colour the pictures in his lapbook has been an exercise in frustration. UGH. I know it's only one really bad day, but I'm starting to second guess my decision to hs. I can't help but think that were he in a group of kids who were all working on something, that he would do the same. In fact, I know he would, because he does so in Sunday School. Here at home, I'm constantly being asked for break after break. And it's not like I'm asking him to do heaps of work. A page of printing that I know that if he only would sit down and work would take him 20mins max takes him an hour. What I've been doing is making him sit and work for 10 mins, then he gets a 10min break. I checked with a friend of mine who teaches K at ps to see if the amount of work I'm giving is too much, and she said it definately isn't. Feeling deflated. Hope tomorrow goes better!
How abut a first grader you think is doing just great, then come back from a two week break at Christmas/New Year and he's apparently forgotten the ENTIRE first half of the year!!!
Mine is turning 13 next month and does the same thing!!!! I have decided that boys REALLY are on earth to test their mother's patience levels Some days are AWESOME - some days..... well not so much Hang in there - the end result can be totally worth it!!
I don't know what it is with boys. My son is 15 and he gives a lot of I don't knows and such. I had a discussion with him today and basically asked if he was doing his best. He admitted that he wasn't. I then proceeded to tell him that if he fails a semester then he has to start all over. If he did his best, I wouldn't even harp on grades as much. I don't talk about it too often, but he needs to know there are consequences to not doing his best. I will give him practice spelling words and he will misspell some of them on the same sheet of paper I wrote them on. I will have him do the few questions "on your own" in the Apologia book and he gets, usually, half or more wrong. I don't mind wrong answers. The problem is that when I ask him if he looked for the answer or how to figure it out-he doesn't bother. I also tell him to ask me for help. Part of this is my fault. When he was younger and in public school-I would tell him what page and sometimes what paragraph to find the answer in (oops). I would like to see him flip pages to see the graphs, use the index, use the dictionary, or maybe even look at the examples. He does some of this some of the time, but.... he would rather be done than actually spend the time doing something to find the correct answer. It is frustrating. I remember when he was in public school the answers he would give would be so far off-not even the category. It would be asking like, "Who was the first president?", and his answer would be, "the White House." (not that exactly but something like that). He is smart and very creative.
Boys. I have found that for us, discussion seems to imprint information a bit more than worksheets or research. I don't think helping an under high schooler with where to go for the answers is too much help...you start where they need it and then make them do a bit more on thier own each time. Research is not intuitive, and for struggling readers it is just so difficult to keep the question in your head while you are trying to decode the paragraph. I have started reading questions to the boys and then have them listen to me while I read the paragraph with the answer in it and still it is a struggle. I don't know about the breaks verses work done. (especially for a little one) because we have these "episodes" every day.
Thanks for the encouragement! Just hearing about others struggles is helpful. Shortly after I posted this, a homeschool ass'n in another town emailed our local one of an upcoming speaker they have next week. The topic is.... Teaching Boys! The good Lord knew I needed some help. It's an hour and a half drive away, but count me as there! I'll take notes and share!
I was having problems with my son too as I posted last week. We have made a few changes to our set up. 1. Make sure he gets enough sleep for his little body. 2. Make new ways to do the same old stuff. For example, we have 2 nitendo ds lites so we can pictochat with each other here at the house so sometimes I will let him practice writing his blends to me that way. He loves it. 3. I have small snacks scheduled in ever hour so he doesn't even have time to ask for one and distracted his brain! LOL These things seems to be helping for us tons. I would love to hear what you can share from the teaching boys speaker!!
Kids go through that. My DS woke up this morning claiming to have a severe migraine. So I am deciding if I should even bother with school today, but he was off yesterday. Clearly he's not feeling it today, but I wish he would just say that. It will just be a huge headache for me in the end. So I making him stay in the bed today. No games, No train, No toys, No Lego club. I am waiting for him to come downstairs and tell me that he has miraculously healed.
its not just boys, I have gone through this with both my girls and those are days you say ok we are going to do fun things. board games, watch educational tv. Sometimes we all need breaks. maybe he just alittle break or change the teaching stuff around.
First, we all feel deflated at times, it come with HS and it comes and goes. Just try to focus on the times when you feel elated when he grasps something easily because of the way you taught it. If he is used to going to school when he feels a little sick and staying home when it is worse to have mommy take care of him, he may be associating it with the stay at home/take care of me. One of the things I love about HS is that we do what we want with the schedule. It gives the freedom to teach or not teach, just as long as it all gets done within the year. Try doing things that seem as if you are just spending time with him but still count towards classwork. Make it a light restful day for him as well as you. If you want him to color, color with him. Read to him and discuss the story. Ask him what he would do differently in the story and write it down. Promise that the two of you will write "his" story out. Write down an imaginative story about another aspect of a subject, this way you can teach a subject on the sly, such as a simple science lesson. One thing I would do is sit my DS at the kitchen table and I would bake something. I would double the recipe, which I read out loud, and then ask him, "If it says one teaspoon cinnamon, but we are making two recipes at the same time, how much cinnamon should I use? One cup of sugar, etc. Math is so much fun when you can taste it!
it's not just boys. Lol 9yo DD had a cold, not a bad one. and was consistently going for her blonde merit badge ( duh moments). me: erase the wrong answer and put the right answer on the line (we had just finished the correct answers and they were literally 2 inches from where they needed to be). it took her 3 tries to do that. sheesh some days
I'm sure they all have their off days. I guess I was just in a bit of a state too, so that didn't help! Today has gone much better. Although, I'm still not completely sure I'm teaching him all I ought to be, but then again, he is only 5! I need to relax.
See if this matches him- I went through the same thing: he might be a visual spatial learner and they often have short term memory issues. Look up visual spatial learners and see if it matches him. Also, we found starting my son on Clariten (generic works fine) and using a neti pot helped clear the fog some. Two things more- it may be a physical cause. have you had his vitamin d level checked? It's coming out more and more that due to sunscreen and being inside MOST children (and parents) are low now. That causes mental fogginess, easy illness, reduced ability to fight off allergies, etc etc. That and omega 3 seem to make a huge difference in foggy kiddos.
I have had similar thoughts when my 8 year old lets his brain sleep in while his body comes to the table to do school. However, if our boys were in a brick school, their brains would still be laying on their pillow at home snoozing somedays. The only difference is probably no one would notice. I know I often let my mind go on vacation while my body kept the seat at my desk in school warm.
