Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments February Slump

So I know this is the time of year when many homeschoolers start to wonder what they were thinking and find themselves gazing longingly at the schoolbus as it goes by... but even though I know the February Slump is coming, it hasn't yet failed to send me into a spiral of self-doubt.

Neither of my kids wants to go to school, but they don't particularly like doing anything at home that looks too much like schoolwork. When I insist, I feel like a taskmaster and I worry that our relationship only consists of me trying to get them to do things they don't want to do. When I relax, I feel like a lazy schlep and I worry that I'm setting them up with a poor work ethic or failing to develop their talents, intellectual and otherwise. They never complain of boredom and their #1 choice for free time is active and imaginative play together, like building obstacle courses with couch cushions. They're both well ahead of grade level in most areas and definitely not behind in any (yet).

DD8 used to say math was her favorite (when she was enrolled in public school K, accelerated to 1st grade math), now she says she hates math and never does it without many complaints and at least a few tears, so obviously I'm doing something wrong.

Do you think we should be more relaxed or self-directed? Or should I insist that X number of assignments must be completed each week, or else. (...and "or else" what??) Days like this, I just feel like I'm not cut out for this.

Have you ever read any of Peggy Kaye's books math games is one. I found some great games in it when I home schooled my so. And it made me realize I could take any lesson and make it into a game. When your girls need time being creative they could make generic game boards and you can get spinners and dice from other games. You can use pieces from other games to move around the board or they can make pieces or find small toys.

Make the questions straight from the lesson. You can have questions separate levels for each player or general questions if they did the same lesson.

Nothing beats a fun game.

How about a field trip? (we don't homeschool but we do love the occasional (weekend) field trip).

We struggle with keeping up a rhythm or sticking to a routine. Ideally, I would like to start with them early in the morning- exercise together, cook & eat a healthy breakfast with enough protein and fat to keep them going, then get their core subject instruction done over the next couple of hours with a few short breaks and be pretty much done before lunch so we can do fun things- projects, field trips, classes, the park, library, independent reading.... they love to do all those things, but I don't feel good about saying "Sure, let's go to the park after lunch!" if they whined and moaned through every little thing all morning.

On a typical day, they're up between 7-7:30 and feel sluggish so they want to snuggle for a while. Then they take forever at breakfast, sneak it into the trash if they've decided whatever food they begged me for that morning is suddenly unacceptable for some reason, then complain 15 minutes later that they're hungry.

I try to get them going with their math with one doing computer-based math while I help the other with a lesson (Singapore). Generally this involves a lot of loud protestation and procrastination. And a lot of complaints about being hungry because they rejected breakfast or ate something that wasn't filling enough.

By the time we actually get one lesson done for each of them, it's lunchtime and they want to play after lunch. I might be able to get my K'er to read aloud to me for a while and get DD8 to practice piano (with much wailing and gnashing of teeth.) But other than that, we have to squeeze any other subjects in on days when they're feeling more agreeable.

This isn't every single day, but it is pretty typical. They go to school one day a week for an enrichment program with other homeschoolers.


I have read that one. We have done some math games and they're definitely more receptive to computer games or math apps than math board games. I think I saw that Richard Rusczyk had said you can pretty much do games for math up through 4th grade but that idea makes the control freak in me rear its ugly head. It just feels like we've accomplished more when I can look back at a book they've completed, you know?

2 things. Going to the park after lunch is not a reward for doing school well in the morning, it is part of their school day/PE requirement. Two I would try going to the park straight after breakfast. Eat, park,snack, school. If they don't eat their breakfast and get hungry at the park you don't have any food so they have to wait.

Portia - how do you tell the difference? We're not homeschooling, but I'm still often stumped as to when I should be pushing harder or letting go.

We are fairly relaxed homeschoolers, and my kids do a lot of independent projects (DD7 writes and DS9 programs). I consider our school to be 7 days a week. On the weekends we don't do any book work, but it's not unusual for DH to give the kids a lesson in programming, or to pull out a science kit and play with it. We don't call it school (that would be a disaster!), but learning doesn't end at 3pm on Friday.

A lot of our learning happens during lunch and snack time. I've got both kids as a captive audience, so that's when I'll read a few pages from our history or science books, then have a discussion about it.

We also do a lot of car-schooling (again, captive audience). We used to listen to SOTW (history) a lot, now we tend towards fiction audiobooks. Yesterday I gave an impromptu lesson on blood types/basic genetics while driving to a friend's house (and texted their grandparents when we got there to see if they knew their type). It certainly wasn't planned and I can't even remember how it came up. But learning happened! Our car thermometer gives us a daily math problem (is the temp above or below freezing? Boiling? By how much?)

That said, I still often feel like we're not getting enough "formal" schooling done during the week. We are miles behind where I thought we would be in history, and our science units seem to take longer than expected. It *would* be much easier for me if I could just check some boxes each week and know that we were finished. But one of the big reasons we're homeschooling is because my kids don't do well with checking-the-boxes. I try not to compare myself to other homeschoolers (different kids, different rhythms, different needs). And I try not to be too hard on myself when we "fall behind," because if I'm not comparing myself to others, than who are we behind?

So, take a break for a week and only focus on fun science projects, or museums, or something like that. Skip the formal math for a week and check out some living math books from the library instead, or play some games that require math, or have the kids double a recipe for cookies. Skip formal language arts and practice writing in the form of a letter to a relative or a favorite author.

And be easy on yourself! Homeschooling is not a walk in the park, especially kids who challenge the status quo.

Kids seem a lot more willing to push the boundaries with a parent than with a "real" teacher. Drives me nuts.

I think of it like playing a fish that you're reeling in (not that I fish) -- you have to sense when to reel in a bit, when to let it go slack a bit, but always trending towards your goal. (Which is, ultimately, them doing the work promptly and with good grace.)

One thing I do is call her out when she uses excuses that I know are just excuses, like she just CAN'T find a comfortable position to do her read-aloud. If I let her know that I know it's a delaying tactic, she will deny it furiously, but then she is much less likely to do it again in the future.

If she's being REALLY resistant, I will use the same system I use for getting her to do chores or get out the door on time, which is three-strikes-and-then-consequence system. (Some people drop a marble in a jar or some other noticable sensory event for the warnings, but since I don't always have marbles handy I use finger snaps. I always have my fingers with me.)

I try not to use overbearing authority too much with this kid, because she HATES knuckling under and it's bad for our relationship, but there are a few things where I draw a hard line and she knows it, and that helps.

Because she's smart and self-aware, I find that talking about the issue explicitly helps. I note to her how much time we wasted, and give her my estimate of how fast she could have been done if she'd just done it. I know that some parents can repeat this till they're blue in the face and the kid doesn't care, but mine does seem to get it to a certain extent.

I also limit the subjects that I insist on. Reading and math, and that's it. Everything else is "fun learning," and I sometimes have to nudge gently that we're going to read some history now instead of more Pippi, but generally she's into it.

I don't care that she's resenting the math at this early age. I keep telling her that she's working on learning the tools right now (four functions, fractions, decimals), and after that she'll be ready for "real" math, which will be a lot more interesting.

I do try to mix it up with math, doing different iPad games or board games to practice certain topics. But it's a fine line, because too much "gamification" leads to a sense of entitlement, where she complains about the game because it has some math in it and isn't pure game!

I started out feeling like we had to progress through a math book, but the longer I do this, the more of a sense I get of what she understands and what she doesn't, and what she needs to work on next. The workbooks were just a proxy for that.

Whew, that was a lot! I hope at least some of that was helpful!

Thanks for expanding MegMeg and Portia. We're strictly after schooling - both as enrichment and remediation - and I find it a continual challenge to figure out how to gauge long-term gain vs. short term pain. I appreciate your insights.

Thank you, a lot of this is helpful.