Today’s post is super simple and short. I’ll be honest, it’s been a long (but good!) day and I’m beat. But I will absolutely write every day like my life depends on it!!
I don’t know about you, but I can’t concentrate on something for a long amount of time. I don’t have adhd, I’m just human and get bored with doing the same task over and over. The same goes for children, they have a hard time staying in one place and concentrating for long periods of time. This is when a timer can really help.
For example, instead of my 8 year old doing 2 pages of math a day which takes him 45 minutes and he’s horribly tired and frustrated by the end of it and so am I because I had to help him the entire 45 minutes and the 10 year old is done with her reading and the 5 year old needs a snack and the dog just pooped on the carpet and I haven’t even had breakfast yet…… Do you see where I’m going here? I set a timer for 15 minutes. He knows to work as hard as he possibly can for 15 minutes straight. I use those words too, “work hard!” And you know what? He does. He works hard for those 15 minutes because he knows I can see if he’s stalling or wasting time on purpose. He doesn’t stall though, because he likes the timer way more than having to do a certain amount of pages. Now, does he get 2 pages done in 15 minutes by working hard? No way. But I know that he’s done the absolute best he can, without tears and without feeling frustrated. Sometimes I have him come back later and do another 15 minutes, most of the time I don’t. As he grows the time will increase, but for now, 15 minutes is perfect.
The goal of homeschool is to not just have school at home. We don’t want to take the traditional school model and transport it into our living rooms. Well, maybe you do. If you do, then my way of homeschooling won’t appeal to you at all. Anyway… the goal is to make home our school. Everything is a learning experience, learning is happening all the time. When we do have to sit down and complete a workpage or do some math, it is within a time frame that our children can manage. Who knows…maybe by doing something like math in 15 minute increments you find they never get frustrated…they learn to love math…become an engineer…invent something amazing…and can buy their parents mansions when they’re older 🙂