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Hi all-

As you may recall from my previous posts, I have been "homeschooling" my ds7 (2nd grade) with k12 public option for about 1 month now. He attends brick/mortar school 2 afternoons a week, where he receives special ed. services and recess/time with his class.

So far (fingers crossed) it is going well! No big behavioral challenges or changes at home or school.

The only thing that is kind of starting to concern me is being able to get through all the lessons in the k12 curriculum. It is not that they are too difficult for my ds, but at times we delve deeper and don't get a "formal" lesson completed for a while in a subject. Of course then there are times we breeze through 2 formal lessons in no time!
Also, we are kind of skipping around based upon his interests. For example, he has had an interest in greek mythology for several years. He heard about Perseus and Medusa from somewhere which sparked his interest. If we are studying ancient Rome in history and discussing how Romans borrowed many ideas from Greece doesn't it only make sense to do the Roman/Greek Mythology unit in literature at the same time?!

I do view the curriculum as a whole and anticipate being able to complete it by the end of the school year... but I do find myself a little panicky at times if I start focusing on having to get through a certain number of lessons a month. Yikes!

Ending on a happy note: my ds has started making his own scrambled eggs for breakfast during this past month! Of course with a little prompting and stove supervision from me. He's proud and that is so cool to see!

Thanks for your thoughts and ideas!

Best wishes to all-
quinn17

Would it help to give yourselves a bit of a loose schedule? Lay out the curriculum alongside a calendar and mark off when you plan on completing various things, and then work out how much time you have for the informal off-shoots you like to study.

Does your virtual academy allow you to set your own pace? We used K12 independently, and I modified it (pace, output requirements, etc) as needed. I would not have been able to use it effectively if I had to conform to someone else's pace requirements and output expectations.

we're using a variation of this - i printed out all the curriculum expectations for DD's grade-level and then i use a highlighter to "complete" them - it's a nice visual cue for how we're doing.

Thanks for the ideas! DS virtual teacher said that she likes to see about 10% progress being made in each class monthly. Our progress is tracked online and so I can visually see how well we are doing with meeting that goal- along the same lines as your suggestion epoh!

I guess the number of lessons we need to complete sometimes seems overwhelming. We are making good progress though, except for spelling...ugh! I think we may have to "fudge" our progress there and modify the lessons.

Anyway, thank you for the support!

quinn17

You don't have to do all the activities in the lessons. Just do what is necessary to master the objectives.

22B, thank you for the reminder! I feel guilty if I skip part of a lesson, as though I am somehow cheating. I also have a hard time with determining "mastery". For me it means 100%. I think there was a thread on the subject of what is mastery?

As time permits, or if an optional activity is something I think DS would enjoy, we do optional activities. We like that many of the optional activities are hands-on versus writing, drawing or coloring...things my DS really struggles with completing.

I appreciate the reminder that if DS doesn't need to do all the activities to master the material, we really don't need to do them all. It is okay to skip.

quinn17

Also consider block scheduling, that is, doing several lessons in a row of one subject. You can totally ignore the "daily plan" on the OLS, as long as there is enough progress in each subject.

We have done quite a bit of block scheduling for science, history and literature. My DS and I both love doing these subjects this way-just focusing on it for the most part instead of switching every half hour to another subject-we can really fly. I am trying to do a little math every day (4-5 times a week). He enjoys it but doesn't seem to like to do it in blocks. 22B, you seem to be a k12 veteran...any other ideas or thoughts you have are most welcome!

Our real struggle is with spelling. By the end of 1st grade my DS had become so anxious and stressed over spelling that we almost completely backed off working on it formally at school. We tried modifying the writing portion of it but that didn't help much. Today was the first day I got out the lesson. His anxiety immediately flared. I had him write a little and then switched to giving him scrambled scrabble tile letters for each word. He then worked on spelling each word by unscrambling/spelling. I can't decide how hard I should push him on spelling. He is doing VT and hoping that will help with his visual memory & spelling. One part of me believes that insisting and pushing will do more harm than good at this point. Then there is the side of me that worries I am being to easy on him. Although, I know his struggles are genuine with spelling. Any thoughts??!!

I just reread the title of my thread and realize I have kind of veered off course. Please excuse my mental chaos!

quinn17