How many hours a day do you spend homeschooling?

[duboisa]

how many hours a day does it take to homeschool?

for a 1st grader

7th grader.

[Dianna]

how many hours a day does it take to homeschool?

for a 1st grader

7th grader.

Angie, this varies so much from family to family. As a general guideline, remember that children in public schools spend from 8:00 am (or so) to 3:00 pm (or so) at school. However, studies have shown that very little of that time is spent on direct learning. A lot of it is busywork, standing in line, lunch, recess, waiting on others, etc. In a homeschool setting, you can take much less time, and do so much more.

It also depends on your method of homeschooling. Children using a school-at-home method will probably spend more time during traditional school hours with textbooks and such. Children using a more relaxed or unschooling method will spend time learning that's more difficult to measure. They may read a biography of Ben Franklin at night before bed, watch a documentary earlier that evening, work in the garden with Grandpa earlier in the day, and help Grandma cook dinner in the afternoon. All of that is learning, and it all "counts".

There's no specific amount of time you need to "count" each day for homeschooling, though. Does this help at all?

Dianna

[reedross]

It depends on how you homeschool!

My 6th grader completes his work in about an hour and a half most days!

- April C

[duboisa]

Yes it helps.. I know that i am WAY WAY WAY too uptight about all of this.

[Jenlaana]

I'm really new to this, so I may change my mind on this after next year. :) But right now, in starting out with my 5th grader, we have "school time" during the hours of 8:30am-3pm. We don't sit still during this time. It just means that we try to make the most of our time, doing some workbooks, some online learning, "educational" tv, reading, etc. I give him a list of what he needs to do, and he does it. I have a curriculum and we hit all of the basics and a few added classes that I wanted him to have. I'm trying to encourage independent learning, because he came from school being handfed answers, and had no idea how to find them himself (which to me is more important than actually knowing anything). We don't stick to it all the time, and I don't stress over it. I just record everything in my little Excel workbook and somehow it comes out appearing like we're working pretty hard. :) Its actually a lot less work than I thought it would be (other than math, but thats another story)

[duboisa]

So what all do you put on your list for him to do in a day?

[Dianna]

So what all do you put on your list for him to do in a day?

Angie, I'm not sure if you were asking all of us this question, or someone in particular, but I thought I'd answer anyway. For most of this year, I wrote a list of things I'd like my children to do each day. I came up with the list after trying different things and just knowing how much language arts, math, etc., they could usually handle each day. Sometimes they could do double the math I assigned, sometimes only half, and that was okay. It was just a list that we could use as a guideline and I documented what we actually accomplished in my weekly journal.

Now that we're unschooling, the children research, explore, and learn at their discretion each day and let me know what they accomplished at the end of each day. There's no list. Everything electronic is turned off so they don't have any distractions, and they come to me if they need my help finding resources or need to know how to do something. I document everything at the end of each day.

If you're using the first method I described above (or something similar), I recommend that you just see how much your son can comfortably do in each subject area each day (with whatever resources you use). You'll get a feel for a good schedule within a couple of weeks.

If you don't know where to start, determine how many pages of the text (or other resource) you'd like to complete in a specific amount of time, divide the number of pages by the number of days in which you want to complete it, and see if your son can do that many pages each day in order to get it finished by your deadline. Some resources give you a general idea of how many exercises to assign your child each day. Start with that and adjust as needed.

I hope this helps. :smile2:

Dianna

[Jenlaana]

Not sure if its "right" but I basically write into my little journal something like this:

5/5/06
- math book (from Walmart) pg 19,21,22,24,25 (we did these together, every other problem - about 6-10 on each page - they were review, and we ended up switching out 24/25 with 27/47 because he was sick of doing decimals)
- Language book (from Walmart) pg 30-33 (basically writing story/letter and 2 others which we didn't get to because we decided to finish it up on Monday)
- Science - read "Exploring Earth's Solar System" (my son is really interested in the solar system so we've focused on it through National Geographic, online research and this lesson, which was just reading a book from the library about it)
- Social Studies - pt 2 of "Religions of the World - Western Civilizations" we're studying the religions of the world because I'm hoping to use it as a jump off to study world events next year, and I want him to understand what people believe in Iraq in particular, and why people make world altering decisions based on religious beliefs - This was an excellent movie we got from the library, that wasn't biased towards or against any religion
- Reading - read book of your choice (he's reading sci fi books from my husband's collection at the moment...our house is practically a library unto itself of these things. Usually I have him record in his own little journal what he read - pages, title, author, and I give him a question to answer regarding the story. But as his language book had him writing a lot, I skipped that today)

He finished fairly early today, as we had planned to walk to the dollar store and get some potting soil, seeds and some containers for next week's planting (we're hoping to start our own little "mommy and Cody garden"). We never made it, but we got some housework done, so it balanced out. :) Honestly, just putting aside time where he can't watch cartoons or play with his transformers has gotten him to think outside of his comfort zone about what he would like to read/see/do that would help him learn about things he's interested in. I know that he learns more by reading about things that interest him than by any of the workbook stuff that I make him work through. I guess that part is mostly for me.

Right now we're alternating workbook days with computer days, and doing lessons in the switched on schoolhouse demo, along with internet based learning games and research during our computer days. Its far from perfect, but it has given me an opportunity to get a pulse on how he learns and what direction we need to go in for the new year, when we start fresh.

[MomsTherapy]

This is my second year HSing (by no means a pro). I have a 3 ring "planner" where I do a mix of unschooling and textbook studies. On Sunday nights I try to plan out the meals for the week, then the general plan for the week of what I will try to cover.

For Math, English and Science I use textbooks to make sure I cover the needed materials for her "grade" (3rd). Like was mentioned, if she has "got it" and the workbook or book keeps dwelling on it, we skip ahead, but if she doesn't get it, we pull out paper and find ways to "get it". They cannot do that in regular school.

We start between 8-9 on most days but are not pressured to start at any particular time. And between breaks and playtime here and there we usually finish at 12-1. But then there are days that we go out in the morning and do schoolwork in the evening. We have a history textbook, but it is more like a library book and we use it with the library books.

With spelling I use index cards and write down words that she misspells throughout the week for the next weeks spelling/vocabulary along with a vocabulary workbook. I use workbooks that I find that look interesting to either her or I. Or internet sources from places like AKC.org for animal studies (she is interested in the different breeds right now), the hikes for nature studies, whatever interests her. I am a lot more "loose" about it than I was last year in some ways, but I try to cover every MAIN subject every day and P.E., art, music, spanish, nature studies, etc. on different days. Some days nothing SEEMS to get accomplished but when you stop and think about the gardening, cooking, reading, planning the grocery list together, in depth talks in the car on the way to walmart about how gas works to make the car go...there is so much that we are teaching them by being right there to give them all we know one on one (or one on three like me :) , or four, five, two....) We are giving them what they can never get in a public (or private - that is where we pulled out of) school setting. And she loves it!

And now my 4 year old is unofficially starting with her first preschool workbook. She likes "having school" like big sis. My 2 year old could care less!

And FYI, I felt totally burned out a few times last year - I took 2 weeks off to reorganize my thoughts and change some things. The break did us both good when we needed it most. And most of those days we counted as half days because we did so much learning in subjects without textbooks. I work from home with a family owned business and sometimes I think I am crazy for trying to do all of it. My point being, I am sure we all get burned out from time to time. Don't get discouraged - this is one of the best things we can do for them! And I am talking to myself here too!:biggrin2:

[Dianna]

MomsTherapy, I just wanted to welcome you and thanks for sharing your day. New homeschoolers (and old ones, too :smile2: ) find information like this so helpful!

Warmly,
Dianna

[MomsTherapy]

:cheer2: Thanks! This place is awesome!

[duboisa]

Oh.. I agree.. Without these new friends I would be an uptight wreck by now..I tried to do school at home last year and finally gave it up, thanks to Dianna letting me know to not worry so much!!!.. We are using a unit study this year. A world of adventure, I will scale it down and add phonics for Justin. I just ordered Math u see for both my boys, big investment, I hope it is worth it.

[chrispeters]

Oh.. I agree.. Without these new friends I would be an uptight wreck by now..I tried to do school at home last year and finally gave it up, thanks to Dianna letting me know to not worry so much!!!.. We are using a unit study this year. A world of adventure, I will scale it down and add phonics for Justin. I just ordered Math u see for both my boys, big investment, I hope it is worth it.
I'm doing the exact same thing this year- A World of Adventure and Math-U-See! We'll have to compare notes.:biggrin2: