Discouragement with getting to higher levels

[MomtoJGJE]

First of all, we LOVE CTC. It is by far our favorite guide so far and we have only done two units I think the notebooking pages are really making it easier on both of us.

But...

Jayden was getting discouraged by the amount of time school was taking her compared to how much time it was taking her sisters. First of all, she was saying that they were distracting her.... we've homeschooled from the beginning and by the time she started we already had four kids.... it's not really anything new, and it certainly isn't any different than it was a month ago when we were finishing up Preparing. Second, I would get her started, then I'd do school with her sisters (Bigger, LHFHG, and LHTH) and they would finish and she'd still be working. I tried to explain that when she was doing Bigger it didn't take her any longer than it's taking Grace, and when Grace is in CTC it will take her roughly the same amount of time. That wasn't working After they got finished she would dawdle, complain that she didn't know something or that it couldn't be done (yes, AS I WAS EXPLAINING how to do something, she was telling me it could not possibly be done) I can't say that our school time is running long. The MOST time it's taken her has been 5 hours and that was on a day where she was complaining about everything, not paying attention to instructions and having to re-do a lot, and she took two breaks plus lunch. On a day where she's really doing things the way she should, even if she runs into a tough spot it takes 3-3.5 hours usually, not doing DITHOR. But to her, having THAT MUCH SCHOOL after her sisters were ALL done was just overwhelming.

Then I remembered seeing on here where Carrie or Julie or maybe both have their kids get up early and do their Bible study first thing. Jayden LOVES getting up early. She LOVES getting up before her sisters.

So I made a deal with her. I told her that I would allow her to get up as early as 6:30 IF and only if she did Bible study and either history or science and anything else she could do before 7. At 7, when her sisters are allowed up, she would stop and eat and do whatever they do before school/chore time.

Now, granted this only happened today, so who knows if it will actually work once it begins. But dh thought it was a fantastic idea, and Jayden really liked it too. If it does work, it possibly could have her finishing at about the same time as Grace, because the reading takes her the longest of anything to do when she's not dawdling and complaining.

[Carrie]

Lora Beth,

Starting CTC can be a big change for kiddos as they have a longer day because their school load is increasing, and they begin to have to take on more responsibility. However, just as you're already discovering, this change also allows for kiddos to be more in control of their day, meaning they can actually have more say-so about when they start school and the order in which they do things. They no longer have to wait on me to run the show!

Once my boys could see that by getting up early they could be done much earlier with their school, and have time left in their day to pursue their own interests, they became very motivated to rise early. They still enjoy their school, but it doesn't rule their entire day.

One of my sons is really more of a night person, and this last school year he started doing a couple hours of his next day's school at night, so he could sleep in an extra hour the next morning. I wasn't sure about that at first, until I talked to my husband about it. He told me, "What other 14 year old boy do you know who would choose to do school the night before to be ahead? How can this be a bad thing?!?" Anyway, sometimes it's hard for me to think outside the box of the "school day" too!

I encourage you to let her see that doing a more grown-up guide means she has more control over how her day goes. Since more of the guide is independent, she can be more independent from you if she only takes hold of the concept. Tell her things will go so much more quickly if she doesn't need you so much to prod her. She may want to "set-up" for her school day the night before, so her things are all out in the order that she wants them to be. My second oldest son does this to jumpstart his day. It also gives him an idea of what the next day will bring. He sets out his books in the order he desires and reads over the plans to be prepared. This is something he's chosen to do on his own, and he was my giant procrastinator and distractor! So, I know that good changes come from this type of responsibility, but it does take time to see the change, and it can be a bit painful in the process. I look at it as life-skills training!

Blessings,
Carrie

[moedertje]

Lora Beth, thank you for bringing this up!

Carrie, Thank you for your input. We made it to unit 12 in CTC, before summer break and I hope and pray that these life skills will begin to take root in my 10 year old this coming year as well. He can be very easily distracted, and gets a bit discouraged to end much later than his 2 siblings. We are all night owls in my home, which makes it very difficult to have early days to begin with!

I love the idea your son has, of setting up his school day the night before, to know what is coming at him and that might work for my ds. He may embrace the fact that another young man came up with such a wonderful plan or perhaps it will spur him on to come up with his own idea!
The getting up early idea has not worked well for him, with the late prayer meetings or midweek evening services we have. He tried it, but he was exhausted the next day and it had a worse effect on his day .

[8arrows]

My high schooler was complaining because her day took longer than her 5th and 6th grade brothers, so take heart! I timed her when she was actually working and showed her how much time she was actually wasting. She was amazed. When I told her how long each subject was supposed to take in high school, and that in most of the subjects she was actually coming in under (minus the wandering, drinks, bathroom breaks, etc.), it really improved things at our house. I love timers!

[MomtoJGJE]

Yes I tried telling her how long the average CTC day takes and that unless it's a pretty bad day she's right at or under that average. Like I said, even our WORST day was 5 hours, which really isn't that far off the mark. And that was from the moment she did her first school work until she put her books away. Including painting, which is taking us a bit to figure out, especially with the lack of reading instructions thoroughly

Carrie, I will definitely tell her that you said that if she really takes hold of the independent part of the guide it'll go much faster. Working at night wouldn't work for us, because she'd once again be doing something when her sisters aren't... hmm.. unless I just have all of them get their books ready for the next day. If I have all of them do that right before supper then that might help. Of course, half the time I already get them together because I like to see what's coming up so generally their books are all there, not in the right order for them I'm sure, but all together anyway.

It IS less work getting her to do her work. It has changed dramatically over the course of a month. Those little "I" marks in the corners of the boxes are wonderful things

DH also pointed out to me that in order to teach her how much time SHE is taking verses how much time her total school is taking that I should do everything that I have a part in first. Not counting what she might do early, but when we actually start our school day. Time how long (without her knowing) for a few days the teaching parts are and then time how long the independent parts take. Most times he doesn't say anything even when I ask him stuff about school, but when he does it's normally good ideas.

OH, and I have to say that her written narrations have just gotten so much better!! I'm sure part of it is that she knows this material pretty well already.... between church, an Ancient Egypt class she took (that started with creation), Preparing, and listening in on her sisters do LHFHG.... BUT she's done two narrations in CTC and both of them only had punctuation/capitalization errors.

[8arrows]

Does she have any privileges that the younger students do not? This is something that has worked well with my children. The older ones get to stay up later, play a game with Mom and Dad after the littlers go to bed, etc. If they have some extra privileges, then the extra work doesn't seem so bad.

[MomtoJGJE]

She does, but she requires more sleep than they do AND she's the only one who will not stay in bed in the morning if we have a late night. so staying up later is NOT an option at the moment. Not to mention with DH's schedule WE are in bed by 9, so in order for us to have time without kids, they have to be in bed earlier than normal people do

She does have privileges, but generally loses them for some reason or the other. It's annoying, but evidently the season of life we are in.

[MelInKansas]

I am sure my oldest will be the same way. She is already a dawdler and already is a bit resentful that her sisters do so much less school work than they do. I do have to remember that I need to check in with her more often and gently encourage her to focus. I think the little kids ARE a distraction. I'm sure the work in CTC requires some thought. My oldest sometimes can't keep herself from engaging with what the little ones are doing (especially baby brother, she loves him so much she can't resist). If she seems to be having trouble staying on task and is taking a really long time to get something done that I've started her on I try to sit down with her again, see what she's doing, see if she needs help, and then encourage her again to keep going. Of course she is just in Bigger so she's not supposed to have "independent" work to do like your DD does. She finishes some assignments independently and then we go over it, but I know it's not the same. Is there another area where your daughter could do some of her independent work? Maybe she needs to move around a little bit while she's doing it (like, do math, then go sit on the porch and read history, go to your room and finish Bible or something). That might break it up a bit and make it not feel like she is just sitting in one place with 4 assignments to do.

[MomtoJGJE]

Well, we started out independent work in Bigger as well So she's had practice doing independent work even with a baby around

She is allowed to do school wherever she wants to and change as much as she wants to, although I do not let her take ALL her school outside at the same time. One thing at a time outside. Wherever she goes she is distracted by SOMETHING A cool bug, leaves, wallpaper, paint, grass, carpet She gets distracted easily.

However, it's really not so much of a challenge as you'd think. She does have a hard time with a few parts, but we discuss those together. Like there is a prophecy page that they have to fill out. She really struggles with figuring out what the prophecy is and how it was fulfilled. So she reads the verses, thinks about it and writes down what she thinks it is (so I know she has actually thought about it but she doesn't know that) and then we discuss the verses and what they could mean individually, then look at how they connect. That's supposed to be Independent, but she just really can't get that right now. So I'm happy to help. Sometimes she just doesn't think all the way through with math, so I'll help her out occasionally with that, sometimes more firmly than others. I expect to be her teacher

Like today... she procrastinated getting started... Finally, when I finished with everyone else and she had not done a single thing (there goes the getting up early! but in her defense we were away from home until 9 last night) I told her that she WAS finishing today. She started at 11? 11:30? somewhere around there. No earlier than 11 and no later than 11:30 Anyway, she was done by 1:30. Completely. And that included the time where we went over the prophecy page and where she had to correct 3/4 of her math So when she actually focuses, she really does not have trouble with the work.

She was encouraged though when I told her about Carrie saying to take ownership of her guide. I think that really helped her move along today. To realize she didn't NEED me to help in most cases if she actually READ and PAID ATTENTION to the instructions. That the instructions were written to HER, not to me and I was having her do them, but to HER.

[MelInKansas]

Oh I do so see my future in your post!

I made a schedule, which I thought would be a good tool for me. Then this week it all got thrown out the window because my 3YO had dance camp and I had to take her and pick her up every day. But when we were doing the schedule (for that one week), my oldest liked looking at it so she knew what she was supposed to be doing. It gave her some sense of ownership over what we were doing, or maybe just knowledge of what was supposed to be happening. She realized pretty quickly what I already knew, it's hard for us to keep to a schedule that strictly. And I don't really want to, but I was trying to create a structure we could then flow with as needed. Anyway, you are right, they can always be distracted by something. I hope you are able to figure out how to help her focus and get her school work done so she can then go on to other things.

[MomtoJGJE]

FWIW, just writing out a list of her stuff she had to do really helped Jayden when she was in Bigger.

It would look something like:

History and Storytime (see mommy)
Timeline
Poetry (read poem, see mommy)
Bible (work on AWANA, see mommy for school)
English (read lesson, see mommy for work)
DITHOR (read section, see mommy for workbook)
cursive (do one page)
math (see mommy for activity, do pages x)
science (read pg x, see mommy for experiment)

Then she could go through and figure out what order she wanted to do school work, do whatever she could do independently, come to me when she needed to, etc. And she could mark it off Now the guide does that for me with the T, S, and I boxes. She did read her history during part of Preparing, so I'd still occasionally do the checklist for her in there too...

Hmmm... now that I think about it... I could probably make a simple checklist for her just with the names of the boxes...that way she could see with ease what she has left to do and what she's already done. That's one of her major complaints is that she doesn't know what she needs to do next.

[flackattack]

I just wanted to chime in about siblings being a distraction... My oldest ds, 15, started this last year using an app called iDream, which is a collection of sounds that help people fall asleep. In my ds' case, he listens to a waterfall sound when he does his independent work to help reduce unwanted noise. It has been amazing at helping him stay on task. He has a really hard time concentrating when there is any noise, which is inevitable with 3 siblings.
Blessings,
Katie

[pjdobro]

It sounds like you have great ideas and Jayden is getting into the flow of CTC. I'm really impressed how quickly she is adapting. I think the jump up in independence and overall workload in CTC is pretty big from Preparing. Plus this age can be challenging with the hormonal changes that come with puberty, at least it has been for my dd. We really struggled for the first couple of months in CTC trying to find our rhythm. My dd especially had a difficult time staying focused, knowing which task to do next, etc. If we had younger siblings, I can see how that would have been really disheartening to her. I did lay out the schedule/order for her on the large whiteboard and that helped her stay focused and move more quickly from task to task. It took some time but eventually both of my dc found their groove and began to thrive on the new found independence. I'm sure Jayden will settle in and soar!

[mom23]

I also have a dawdler...along the list idea that someone mentioned, I found I liked using a type of workbox system. I made out a block schedule for everyone and then each kid got boxes numbered according to each block. Then we filled the boxes with all the books, pencils, notebooks, etc. needed for that assignment and when the box is completed they turn it backwards on the shelf (so the number doesn't show) to signify it's done. My dd said that helped her when we were able to stick to the schedule, it helped me to visualize how she was tracking with her day because I could easily look at the shelf and see which boxes had/not been done at any time, and I think it helped her not be overwhelmed with a whole stack of books to get through that day-just these couple of books to get through in the next 40 mins.