heartofdakota.com

I noticed that in a couple of weeks my dd will start the book Little Miriam. Is there anyone on here who's children are slow at reading? My dd loves the books but she is SLOW LOL! She doesn't actually seem to mind though that she takes forever. If your children are slow at reading, what did you do to help with the challenge of some of the reading? The one thing I DO NOT want to do is to read it to her. I feel like I set the president at the beginning of the year and gave her the expectation and all is well with that so far. So I was just curious how others have combatted this challenge or if you even noticed a challenge. And one solution I thought of is going 3/4 speed if I needed to or have her split the reading in morning and night time slots. Any suggestions are great!

Daneale,
Preparing is just that...preparing for CTC. If you believe that kiddo needs to slow down I would do that now rather than wait. CTC is a big jump in reading skills. I see that most days TM says to read 1 chapter. Is that too much for one day. Maybe slow down to 1/2 speed. I see it starts in unit 16, and that is almost 1/2 way done with the book. Does your kiddo have dx for dyslexia, vision problems, etc that would indicate the need for you to read past the usual age? If not as a 9 yo that is in the middle of the age range for Preparing so slowing it down might buy some time for that area of skills to catch up. How are the other skills/boxes? How is the science reading? In CTC the independent boxes increases so it would be best to get this skill firmed up. In CTC they read the history independently. If you are using Drawn Into The Heart of Reading that should help with reading. Also, if you don't want to slow down Preparing you could tag team read-say read 1 page and kiddo reads next page. This will take more time to complete each day but perhaps that is ok. Would kiddo be able to read on 5th day since it is a 4 day unit. It surprises me because kiddos will be slow at reading and then kaboom they just take off. Hope you clearly find a solution.

Thank you so much for your thoughts. She does all of the other boxes beautifully. Event he written narrations. We are now at the part that she chooses one of the 3 topics and she always formulates a beautiful thought out narration alone and writes it. And her spelling and grammar are usually pretty solid too. She is doing DITHOR as well. I am mainly having her read the level 4 books (I had purchased the Level 3 book pack but switched a few books - 2 up and 1 down from it). And she probably had/has mildly dyslexicia. We didn't really know it when she was younger because we just didn't know what that looked like. And with her being my oldest and that fact that she can't sit still.....at all.....ever.....still.....means I thought she was just goofing off 100% of the time and not focusing. But we had used Abeka with her and she did okay. She could read the readers but then I would take her to library and she couldn't any of those books on her own. ???? But then her reading actually really took off once we started using All About spelling. Weird that it was a spelling program but it helped her to read! And to help her take off, last year was just a full year of reading, reading, reading.

At this point, I am thinking some of the issue with her reading is that she re-reads stuff over and over and over again. She gets an excellent story flowing in her head of the events as they happen. She just finished Toliver's Secret and that book probably has similar sized words on the page and is a similar length. That book took my DD an HOUR to read every day - she had to read approximately 12 pages I think. But she is used to chapter books and such. Over the summer she read Mr. Poppers Penguins, Strawberry Girl (and that has some crazy hard language), Black Beauty - abridged to a 3rd grade reading level, and a few other books. But she has just always has taken her time.

I am not afraid to slow down some. I would still like to try and finish a unit in a week if I can but if I need more time then I will take it. I am not completely opposed to using the 5th day for school, however, we do a co-op on Mondays so we would probably have to push stuff out to Saturdays to finish. This year I didn't want to participate in the co-op but my kids love it so much. I gain nothing educational from it at all and I would love to just drop it from our schedule but my kids have made some good friends there. That is the only reason I let them still go at all. They now have plenty of other opportunities to see friends outside of co-op too but it is just hard to drop something like that once you start it up. I am currently praying hard about a way to drop co-op next year. Then if the unit took me a week to finish, I wouldn't care at all.

As for the science reading - she is doing very well with that. Much better than I though. I think it is purely a length thing.

The one thing I had thought about doing with that book - Little Miriam - is setting a timer and see how much she gets done in 30 minutes. If she works really hard (and I mean not looking out the window, not getting a drink every 5 minutes, not goofing off) and she accomplishes a lot, I would be willing to read the last page or two to help her finish timely. But if she is goofing off - which I think some days is part of her issue - then she can put the book down, take a break and finish it later that night.

I am just really praying that the day where her reading takes off comes soon! I actually was a very late bloomer reading wise so I am sure in the end she will be fine. But I guess after I typed this all out and thought about it more, there are a lot of reasons it takes her a long time to read and realistically they aren't all "reading" related.

The two of you have talked out the reading concerns so well, that I'll just comment on another part of this. I wonder - does she have a few planned breaks in her day? This makes a big difference in our dc's day. It seems to help them work hard during their planned work times, knowing that they have a break coming after completing a certain amount of work. Another thought - does she move around from place to place? For example, do her history reading with you for Reading about History on the couch, do her independent history reading in a chair by a lamp, do her Bible Quiet Time and music in her bedroom first thing in the morning, all her seatwork at a certain table (kitchen or dining), science experiments in the kitchen, etc. These are the places our dc do these things, and the planned movement gets them up and moving enough that they don't feel the need for much other wandering. Those are just a few other thoughts I had. As far as the reading goes, I think I'd have her try it and see how it goes. On a markerboard, you can briefly go over the characters' names and places before she reads just to help her with those more repetitive words that may be more difficult to pronounce. HTH!

In Christ,
Julie

Thank you Julie so much for your thoughts.

Breaks - we do and don't have planned breaks - clear as mud right? We are trying out a new schedule at my house and am happy to incorporate even more structure. Currently she starts school at 8:45 and works independently trying to accomplish 2 boxes (can be History Project, Independent History, Reading from the DITHOR book, Science or the rotating box if that can be done alone) until 10:00. I did this because I work from home from 6:00AM to 10:00AM most mornings. She can ask a few questions if she needs to and her younger siblings are quietly playing in a different room same level or upstairs together playing louder with the door closed. At 10:00 it is snack time and I read to her from the Reading About History box. And we sit on the couch. Then she gets a 15-30 minute break depending on how much she accomplished before the break. Then she works for another 30 minutes alone finishing up anything independent while I teach to the other 2 kids (except on day 4, we don't take the 15-30 minute break until after she does the narration and she breaks till I am ready to teach math). At 11:30 ish, we do the math lesson. When the math lesson is done, she does whatever computations she needs to do alone while I prepare. Lunch - we take an hour and half break. Normally we try and go for a 30 minute walk just to get the wiggles out. Then after we get back, I do story time for the younger 2 and she usually listens (so she make take a longer break than 1.5 hours). Then I sit with her and do DITHOR teacher portion (but if there is pre-teaching, I usually take a break from work and hit that first thing in the AM right when she starts school), grammar and poetry. Usually she takes a 30 minute break after this. Then she finishes anything else up. As for Bible - we do it with a meal. I prefer my husband does it with her directly after he makes the kids breakfast but lately we have been doing it at dinner. On days she does bible alone, she has just been doing it as part of her independent time. But I think I will move it to first thing in the morning on those days in preparation for next year with CTC. And the music portion - we actually have an activity we go at least 4 times a week (weekday and weekends included in the 4 trips) so we like to listen to the music for all of the kids in the car. One child's CD on the way there and the other children's CD on the way home. All 3 love the music so we are all having fun memorizing the verses and songs.

As for rotating through the house, we need a chair with a lamp! Right now we have chairs, and most rooms are lit well but maybe a nice lamp shining down would do even more for her. I hadn't even thought of that! Her "school room" is the living room and we have a desk in there for her right in the middle of the living rooms suite LOL. So she does her copy work, the writing of her science experiments, narrations and such at that desk. She keeps all of her stuff at that table. Math she does in the dining room with me since I have a white board in that room. Spelling we actually do when I start dinner because I can go over review stuff with her at the white board to start if I need it but usually there is some oral review for 5 min and then she spells what I say for the next 5-10 minutes. So it is very easy to do dictate something to her while I am cooking and she gets done quickly.

And I love the idea of going over names/challenging words in advanced. I must admit, sheepishly, I haven't done that very much yet. With science she has just been reading that out loud to her brother and sister (it is the dinosaur book and she usually does science at 8:45 - they love to listen to her) and it is loud enough I can completely hear her because she is the room right next to me. She has done wonderfully on the vocab there because I think she is familiar enough with the different words in that book. Don't get me wrong, she does take time to sounds stuff out but the things that slow her down is I catch her point at the pictures and explaining things to her brother and sister that she just read. Also, I did have her read the 5,000 year old puzzle at the dinning room table while I worked so that she could ask me any names or any words she didn't know. She read this to herself but was able to easily ask me anything she wanted when she had a question. And I found I did actually preview each day's worth of reading little bit with her because there were some names that I had a hard time pronouncing and knew she wouldn't get it without help. That is my anticipation with the constellation book too - she will probably need for me to tell her some of the pronunciations in advance.

Thank you again for you thoughts - very helpful.

I guess part of this comes down to what you consider a problem! If she is a careful and comprehending reader, I would not consider slow a problem.

My mother, along with all of her siblings, are slow readers. I would suggest for them it is natural, given that all of them are alike in this. They just don't scan a page quickly and they read every word. The result is that maybe they read a little less than other people do. But they are excellent editors, they remember what they do read and they are all deeply critical readers because they really examine the argument in a non fiction book. My mom says she struggled to keep up in her survey courses in college because those often had piles of readings. However, by the time she got to her masters she did better. She is an economist and very successful professor and her siblings are an accountant, an aeronautical engineer, an AP chemistry teacher and an environmental compliance officer. I think their more deliberate pace makes them all thoughtful and careful people. So, being a a slow reader isn't necessarily bad in the long run! So long as you dd is doing well and not complaining, maybe it is okay to be slower paced.

Thank you mmschool. Those are some very comforting thoughts. It is hard because you want to get done with school in a reasonable amount of time and sometimes I feel bad for her that school takes her longer than her brother and sister. But she is just different. I have to keep reminding myself that God made her that way for a reason. And I think I mentioned I used to be a slow reader also. I still am. And I am an......accountant. Yep, I am reading every single word and paying close attention. I have to if I have any hope of remembering what I read. Thank you for the reminder though that it really is okay for me to be fine with my dd reading slower. I just know we will never finish that box in 30 minutes.

But I am still investing in that lamp. Going shopping after lunch!

Thank you for describing your day! I too work part-time, with more hours in the late spring and summer. I know how much it helps to try to plan things in a schedule, as it keeps things running more smoothly. Though we aren't always exactly on our schedule, we are usually within half an hour of it. You have done some good planning here, and you should definitely give it a try to see how it goes, and then make changes as needed.

One thing that I found that helped my dc when doing PHFHG and trying to learn some independence was to briefly go through the directions of the boxes they would have to do on their own. For example, for your dc's first morning work time, you could briefly (as in about 5 minutes) go through the 3 boxes or so you expect her do complete form 8:45 to 10 AM and have her "x" them off in the corner of each box of plans as she completes them (this helps dc see what portion of their daily plans they have finished, and what they have left). To help with realistic goals for this hour and fifteen minutes, here are the suggested time allotments for PHFHG, figuring long:

Left side of plans...
Reading about History: 15 minutes
Research/Geog./Timeline: 20 minutes
Independent History Box: 20-25 minutes
History Project box: 20 minutes
Storytime: 20 minutes
1 hour 40 minutes

Right side of plans...
Math: 20-30 minutes
DITHOR: 30 minutes (3 x a week); Creative Writing: 20-30 minutes (1 x a week)
Dictation: 5 minutes (3 x a week)
Grammar: 15 minutes
Bible Study: 15 minutes
Science: 20- 30 minutes
Poetry: 5 minutes
2 hours 10 minutes

So, you could probably expect her to independently complete the Independent History Box (20-25 minutes), Science (20-30 minutes), and either her History Project as she'll probably need help with this more semi-independent box (20 minutes), or have her do Bible Study as this can be more independent and you can follow up with her later easily by asking the questions and listening to her say her Bible verse (15 minutes). I think you could easily do this at the start of your 15 minutes for Reading about History and snack time on couch. However, if the Bible Study box is getting done and going well with dh, by all means - keep that up! By taking 5 minutes to go over the History Project with her before she starts her independent block, I think she'll be more successful with completing it (I'm basing this on what my ds needed for this age ). Actually, if she is completing these 3 subject areas within an hour and 15 minutes, she is doing things exactly right! At the tail end of your Reading about History time, I would read through the directions of the Rotating History box with her and make sure she understands it and gets off to the right start there. She should be able to finish that in about 20 minutes or so, while you read to your Beyond... dc. I'd set the timer for her. Then when she finishes her rotating box, you could have your Beyond dc do their poetry copywork, while you read the Storytime for PHFHG to your dd. So, now she should be done with the entire left side of plans and possibly Bible Study. It's probably 11 AM then, right? You really have a fair bit of teaching let yet, for all dc. I wonder if it would be good to take your walk and do lunch here? It seems like she needs a break, and also some playtime with her siblings? You could do the walk and then have her play with siblings as you get lunch on the table? Just an idea, but not sure about piano needs, etc.. However, either way, the idea is she needs to be done with her left side of plans and possibly Bible Study by now, and she can have those boxes "x"ed off, so she can visually see her progress - very motivating.

It's maybe noon? I think you have several teaching blocks left now. For dd, this 45 minute block could work well...
all at table: dictation (5 min.) , grammar (15 min. only having her write one small section, doing rest orally or on markerboard), math (15 min. teaching part only); on couch or somewhere else: DITHOR/Writing (10 min.) doing your lesson, hearing her read 2 pages out loud to you so you can help her pronounce any difficult words), and then leave her for the last 30 minutes to finish her math and any DITHOR while you meet with Beyond group. With Beyond group, you could do your left side of teaching "Reading about History" at this point. 30 minutes should suffice as you've done Storytime already.

It's maybe 1:30 (maybe lunch took longer or piano was in there, so I'm figuring long)? Now all that is left is the right side of Beyond and for dd, poetry (5 min.) and checking DITHOR and math. Probably about 30-45 minutes. You could enlist dd in helping with Beyond group if she is done - would she like to be in a "teacher" role? Or would she like free time? After they finish, this should be around 2:15, which is pretty good!

I totally get that these exact ideas may not work, but it seems that dd may benefit from a concentrated teaching block of time with you in the afternoon, as this will move her along and keep her on track. It also seems like she may want some time with the siblings. Maybe moving the walk and lunch/playtime a bit earlier would come at a good break time for her without her needing another break again then for a bit, which helps YOU out as you can finish her school and get to your Beyond dc's school before it's getting late. I bet your dd would LOVE to finish BEFORE the Beyond... dc?!? It's funny, but for our dc, finishing last isn't great. My oldest ds is in high school and gets up very early in the morning (in part) to finish at the same time as the others. If the above doesn't work, another idea would be to put a big play break in the middle for older dd to play with siblings for an hour, and then finish from 3:30 to 5 or so? We are doing that this year, and it is working well! Also, marking off her boxes herself will help her see her progress and how much she has left. That motivates both of my older dc immensely, and they feel more in control of their work Hope something here helps!

In Christ,
Julie

Thank you SO much Julie for taking so much time to type all of this out. I am actually printing this off and I am going to try this schedule tomorrow! This will hopefully help to keep her even more focused and encouraged as she rotates though. It will set some goals for her to strive for. And it gets the time period earlier to spend with siblings. And getting the wiggles everyday too. We need that desperately in this family. Plus, I think every one would be really happy to have me more spread out equally throughout the day rather than in larger chunks. This way each child can work really hard but feel overwhelmed when it is there turn with me. Thank you so much for time again and God bless you!

Okay, I put it all in my excel spreadsheet and think I got everything just right like you said (or close to it)

https://www.dropbox.com/s/wj6c62okos0i7 ... edule.xlsx

All I can say is I am pretty excited for tomorrow. I also sat down with dd and dh (LOL) and shared the changes. My oldest dd has actually made a lot of progress this year so far and I am truly proud of her good attitude. Not doing Bigger last year has probably make it more of a challenge but she has risen to the occasion. And there are just days where she just takes her sweet time on everything she does though LOL but she is trying to work hard and now she rarely complains at all about the amount of work she has to do. I think you are right though, she does need a better, longer, more formal break in the AM. This new schedule is great because she can see now that her break comes a lot earlier than before and this will be even more of an incentive to get everything done with in the set time frame. Plus, I thinks she will like that one on one time with me in the afternoon right after lunch.

Thanks again so much for the great ideas! I do truly love HOD and am so glad I to have found it. It has already been a huge blessing for me and the kids. They tell me all the time how much they love what they are learning - especially my oldest. She still thanks me weekly and we are in unit 13! And even my younger 2 kids are so much happier. They do great together - better than I thought. I think they will all love this new schedule. Thank you again.

One thought with the slow reading-would it help you to move that outside of "school time"? One thing I've tried for my children at different points is to have special reading times. Build it up, make it a really fun time-maybe they can snuggle in a favorite chair, or on Mommy's bed with lots of pillows and read-for the enjoyment of it! You can still do your discussions or activities with the books-take a look at them the next day in school (so maybe she's reading tomorrow's chapter a day ahead) or discuss them while you're fixing supper, or something. I also have a child that really likes to do things like this at bedtime. It just helps take some of the pressure off you, not stressing about fitting everything in; and helps take some of the pressure off the kids because it doesn't feel like work so much anymore.

Also, could you build in some kind of incentive-like a break when she's done with the reading, or a snack time...

Nealewill wrote:Thank you SO much Julie for taking so much time to type all of this out. I am actually printing this off and I am going to try this schedule tomorrow! This will hopefully help to keep her even more focused and encouraged as she rotates though. It will set some goals for her to strive for. And it gets the time period earlier to spend with siblings. And getting the wiggles everyday too. We need that desperately in this family. Plus, I think every one would be really happy to have me more spread out equally throughout the day rather than in larger chunks. This way each child can work really hard but feel overwhelmed when it is there turn with me. Thank you so much for time again and God bless you!

I'm glad to help in any way, and in no way think I have all the answers! Just ideas to try, and you as the mama will know best. Carrie and I were just talking about how we need to do a joint post about how we talked through scheduling together and came up with different things to try and different things that worked for each of us based on our different needs. A lot of times, just talking through it with another person and then trying some different things can really help. I hope our chat can help, but do feel free to share what worked and what didn't, as maybe that in turn will help someone else too. I am hoping you have a good day tomorrow! I think your dc are very blessed to have such a hard-working caring mom who takes such care and time to try to figure out the very best for her sweeties. What a blessing for them to have a mom like that - no matter what the details of the day are!

In Christ,
Julie

Thank you. I may try and do that. I am thinking and hoping that by trying the new schedule that Julie posted, I might be able to get a little bit more bang for my buck with her time. If I can get her to focus really hard and try her best for the times she has listed for school, I can probably get a little bit more accomplished. And then I am thinking that if we set the time and she doesn't get it all done, then she will just have to do it about an hour before bed. And I think she will be fine with it.

Sometimes it is such a blessing that all my kids are almost the same age and sometimes it isn't (my oldest two are 18 months apart and then my younger two are 20 months apart). She really struggles with the fact that she has more school than them because they play a lot together and she is left out doing school. So I honestly don't know what she would think if I assigned her more school before bed or not. Mainly because they younger two would be allowed to play and she wouldn't. I think am thinking if she is "racing" the other two to get done, some of that competitiveness might come out of her and push her a little bit to get done faster. But we will see. Just praying for a better week next week in general and praying for when we start that book!

[quote="my3sons] I'm glad to help in any way, and in no way think I have all the answers! Just ideas to try, and you as the mama will know best. Carrie and I were just talking about how we need to do a joint post about how we talked through scheduling together and came up with different things to try and different things that worked for each of us based on our different needs. A lot of times, just talking through it with another person and then trying some different things can really help. I hope our chat can help, but do feel free to share what worked and what didn't, as maybe that in turn will help someone else too. I am hoping you have a good day tomorrow! I think your dc are very blessed to have such a hard-working caring mom who takes such care and time to try to figure out the very best for her sweeties. What a blessing for them to have a mom like that - no matter what the details of the day are!

In Christ,
Julie[/quote]

Thank you - and I know not every has all the answers. But yours I am thinking are pretty helpful! It definitely does help having someone to talk with. Plus you are running 3 guides at time with working too!!! I am really glad that you and Carrie both are in the forums and so helpful with scheduling in general. This is such a great program and it teaches so many wonderful things. And I love that it is written so that it is very doable for mom to run more than one guide. Not sure if you ever sign up to teach a class / or lead discussions at the conventions but this would be a great topic.........

Looks like you got some great advice! I'll be praying for your day to go smoothly tomorrow with the new schedule!