When I started this blog, I promised my friends that I’d share the good, the bad, the funny, and the ugly of homeschooling. Homeschooling isn’t all sunshine and roses, folks. Well I’ve got some ugly to share with you today! We’ve encountered some homeschool challenges recently, and it hasn’t been pretty!
First, a little bit of background:
Homeschooling has been far easier than expected and it has also been incredibly fun. It is enjoyable because Leo is learning what he wants to learn, rather than something he’s been told he has to learn. I haven’t been “teaching” much at all. In fact, I often feel as if he is teaching me. I have learned an incredible amount of information, much of which I’m sure I “learned” at some point years ago but then promptly forgot once I’d passed the unit test. Now, believe me it’s not all sunshine and roses over here. I said learning with Leo has been both fun and easier than expected. I did not say living with Leo is always fun and easy. He challenges my patience multiple times daily. Those who know us in real life are fully aware that Leo has strengths and weaknesses, and while I haven’t had to under-arm him out of a public place lately, it does happen.
Well, recently the fun-homeschooling-Leo morphed into the under-arming-out-of-public-places-Leo while working on math. Math! He loves math! Because it’s one of his favorite subjects, he dabbles in a lot of different math sources including Khan, Beast Academy, Life of Fred, Alchemy, Singapore, Zaccaro, some logic, etc., but Leo loves EPGY math. I think EPGY does a very thorough job of covering a wide array of math topics, although I personally find the program quite dry. Leo, however, enjoys it and chooses to work on EPGY math and language arts almost daily.
Well, a couple weeks ago, EPGY started giving him problems like this one:
Leo did not like this problem. Up to this point, math had been fun for him. He solved all problems mentally, and he rarely required assistance. The above equation, and the problems that followed (which contained larger numbers) taxed his working memory. I suggested that perhaps he use a piece of scrap paper to assist his memory. Drama ensued. I calmly tried to show him how I tackled such problems. More drama. He did not want to listen to me. He did not want to use paper to solve math problems. And yet, the very next day, he wanted to do EPGY again. When faced with one of these equations, he’d hit enter thirty-seven times in a fit of rage so that he’d get the problem wrong and go to the next one. But, minutes later…
Yesterday afternoon, following the daily dose of EPGY-induced dramatics, I tried something new. I reached out to my village. I’ve mentioned my beloved village before. Recently, I expressed how thankful I am to have met even more village folk through this blog and several other online sources such as Gifted Homeschoolers Forum, Hoagies’ Gifted Education, and a couple other gifted communities. Well, the new village folks made me smile this morning.
I presented the EPGY drama to the village, and I got some great advice from multiple people. Then, a fellow mom of a gifted learner offered her assistance. This mom also happens to be a mathematician. She gave me a lot of helpful advice, including one gem in particular. She simply stated that even though she’s a mathematician, she sometimes needs to use a scrap of paper, or even her fingers, to help out her working memory. I read her response to Leo. He beamed.
And then he did this:
|
And then this:
|
And then he did a bunch more all with a smile on his face. And, do you know what? When the EPGY Guy was satisfied and moved on to a different topic, Leo pitched a fit!! He wanted more of the dreaded equations because they were now so much fun.
My kids do all of the math online….and I have a box of tissues next to it for “math tears”. I do teach math, accelerated math to mostly genius-type kids and it’s true that a lot of them surprisingly hate using scrap paper to work out problems. A lot of them are sloppy too. I think many kids think using scrap paper is “more work” when of course it’s not and it lends to more accuracy.
Haha! “Math tears”… I love that and may need to put tissues near our computer, too!
Seems like so much strong work all around! It’s all about increasing the time gap between frustration and drama. Success in math surely impacts positive self talk. Both take time; I was once “inconsolable” when I couldn’t solve a worksheet, to hear my patient mom describe it.
We have quite a bit of dramatics over here! 🙂
[…] his breakfast speedily so that he can get started with his day. Lately, he’s been doing his EPGY math and language arts and writing first thing in the morning, thus opening up the day for whatever […]
Hi Cait. I would love to know some of the helpful advice you used. We go through this on an almost daily basis. Just like Leo, my 7 year old son rages if he can’t instantly solve the problem, by also rages if I try to get him to leave it and come back later!!!
Jo, it’s the worst, isn’t it? What has worked for us is stepping away, waiting until he calms down, and then bringing it up in conversation. He’s a huge perfectionist, so I try to work with him on this. I tell him that NO ONE gets everything correct the first time. Practice and perserverance are important not only for success but also to learn resiliency. I will ask him how he wants to handle it next time and provide choices. Does he want me to help? His father? Does he want to watch a Khan video or some other that explains it? Does he want me to call a friend? But he has to choose something and try because trying is important. Leo likes to be able to do all the things all by himself and sometimes he forgets he’s six. You can’t do everything by yourself, you need a little help sometimes. All of these things have helped, but he’s a challenging kid to work with when he’s upset. If a certain subject is really giving us a hard time, I’ll often abandon that form of it entirely for a few days and go heavy on something else like science or art. I also sneak in math that’s fun, like games or a STEM project, etc., so I feel like we did something 🙂 Good luck and keep me posted!
We run into similar drama when my son doesn’t know something! He expects to be perfect at everything the first go round and when he isnt…oh my the melt down that insures! Thanks for your authenticity Cait! Its nice to know we are not alone 🙂
Keepin’ it real 🙂 You are definitely not alone, believe me! Perfectionism is a tricky beast!
Ugly, stressful, challenging…words that fit our daily struggle home schooling our 13 year old Asperger’s kid. He especially detests math. Fun times are had by all!
That’s why we need our sense of humor! My guy loves math but hates doing math work. Go figure.
My guy is only four so we only do life of Fred for our “formal” math learning. He dislikes using paper to even record answers but it helps if he can use any writing utensil (we did glittery math recently with glitter crayons) and any font. We also had a developmental problem recently. I was at my wits end so I discussed with him all the strategies I had tried that didn’t work and told him he had to figure it out. Well, he did figure it out by himself. 0 to 60 and independent thinker, oh my.
Hi Tracy,
We are huge LoF fans here. Fred is so quirky! Have you tried gel pens? Leo often balks at writing until I bring out my gel pens 🙂