Do you spend the TWM suggested time daily with Math & LA's?

[one l michele]

I never have been a "clock watcher". We have a flow chart, I have one assignment a day for each area and the boys are progressing. We easily do it in half the suggested time and have plenty of time to cover all subjects regularly. Why should we do math for 45 minutes to an hour daily, when they can complete a lesson in 15 minutes. Even with that my middle has already completed two books this year.

[Mama Lynx]

We go by lesson, not by time. For my younger kids, this usually meant that math took from 15-30 minutes a day. For my 6th grader in pre-algebra, it is taking 45 minutes - over an hour a day, depending.

[Wendy in ME]

We are using up the suggested time but my boys are very slow with math. Even my mathematically advanced ds takes a lot of time to do his math because he is so picky about setting up his paper. For language arts, we are spending about 2hrs a day but this includes Latin, WT and our narrations and Outlining from Remedia.

[cin]

Why should we do math for 45 minutes to an hour daily, when they can complete a lesson in 15 minutes. Even with that my middle has already completed two books this year.


I go by lesson. DD does math like your son. I have her doing 3 pages a day in her 2nd grade book so that she spends some time on it. This guarantees 15 minutes :rolleyes: Reading though, 1 lesson can take up to 30 minutes. Most things, she flies through. I do check for retention and it seems to be sticking. All that to say I go by amount of work, not by the clock.

[mcconnellboys]

I agree, but I think what I saw with my oldest was that we could have used at least some extra time to do drill work to make him stronger in his math facts instead of just completing the lessons in our book. Completing the books is one thing, but being able to do similar problems on your own, successfully, when testing, etc. might be another thing. For some kids it doesn't matter one bit, but I think others may need extra drill and review work and maybe that's where the extra time comes into play.

I don't recall now the exact time suggested for LA, but it generally only takes us about 5-10 minutes to do spelling, and only about 15 to cover grammar, both oral and written parts. Now writing can take longer, it just depends on what we're doing for the day, but I generally try to keep it to no more than 20-30 minute chunks, as my younger son still gets tired when writing and that leads to more mistakes.

Finishing this stuff more quickly gives us more time to do what we love, namely READ! And to talk about what we're reading, too....

Regena

[Lenora in MD]

You really need to do what is right for your child. For younger children, up to fourth grade, I think up to 30 minutes is fine. For my children, much longer than that seems to be beyond their attention ability. For my 6th grader, she has to do two singapore exercises a day and one miquon. She does so much because she is behind and she is motivated to catch up. So she might work for an hour, but she has the desire to do so. I would not force it one her, or else she would hate it and not learn much anymay. I do set the timer for my younger ones, but that helps them to work diligently and not dawdle. They know they are finished when the timer goes off. They are progressing just fine.
I think you are doing fine. They don't hate math and they are progressing quickly. As long as they are understanding what they are doing and retaining it, I don't think you need to worry.

[OhElizabeth]

Michele, I'm trying to think of the nicest way to put this, but is it possible that your LA or math isn't taking that long because you aren't requiring enough?? Singapore is not a standard american curriculum, does not contain all the components of a complete curriculum or meet state standards, so while some students could do it alone and be fine, I certainly wouldn't feel "confident" simply because my dc did a lesson in it quickly. As the others said, he should be doing drill, CWP, etc. You'll notice other users around here balance SM with Horizons, having come to the conclusion that their students need to do more written math than SM alone provides. I don't use SM, though I've dabbled with it in the past, and I'm not bashing it, just saying to consider it's weaknesses when making your plans. I think the times in WTM are WISE, because they're showing what it really takes, in general, to provide the proficiency you expect. If your dc is advanced and completing work readily, it's all the more reason to put in time. As they push into higher levels, they HAVE to put in enough time to become proficient. It means doing more problems even when they ARE easy, because that's what develops proficiency. I'm not saying you need to throw out all your math curriculum plans, but I would scratch your head and ask just a little bit. I would expect more time spent, simply on the principle of the thing. School is about more than the lesson, it's about diligence. I work my dd to tolerance each day. When the material was super easy, that was 4-5 lessons a day. Now it's 2 lessons a day. They take about the same amount of time btw.

For LA, I'll go out on a limb and say it's easy to not spend as much time as you need to. The dc need to write a LOT more than we realize to build proficiency in spelling and basic skills. One day you're saying the spelling isn't sticking, but the next you're saying he flies through his assignment. If you were to allocate the amount of time WTM suggests, divided into a couple sessions obviously, and do more LA, you might find some of those issues resolving. The more LA things I have my dd do (writing sentences for lit guides, writing narrations, writing in history, etc.), the more her LA skills solidify. One assignment won't cut it and it takes time. It doesn't have to be exactly the WTM amount of time, but it does take time.

[one l michele]

We are not using Singapore Math. We have used Horizons as our main program since July. Last year I supplemented Calvert with Singapore and thought about doing so this year, but after thinking decided at this stage Horizons fits our needs. The boys are doing it cover to cover, they are enjoying it, and doing well with it. I don't want to accelerate my boys, they are reaching new age appropriate math skills regularly and only missing a few on each worksheet, which IMO is good considering how many problems there are on each worksheet. They are corrected immediately and together we go over any they missed.

I am working with ds regularly on a variety of Language arts skills, I do not feel the need for him to spend an hour or more a day on language arts, he's 7 for goodness sake. Yes, language arts has been a learning process for me, but I don't regret anything we've done, it's all been a learning experience. I certainly do not think he's behind. He wasn't retaining the SWR words, but remember he was also at lists well past his age level, I don't feel he needs to know how to spell a grade level or so ahead. We are working through the 2nd grade lists, quizzing 10 words per day reviewing and he hasn't missed any yet. So there is retention, it's just that he is still working on connecting all those skills. I have him doing a variety of exercises, copywork, dictation, writing letters, writing paragraphs, oral and written narrations, I'm now sitting with him and guiding him when needed. He has made big leaps since switching to IEW.

I am happy with what we do in a day, we cover a lot, and yes I do feel all subjects are important, in addition to character and having time to collect rocks, dig in the dirt, and explore.

I've obviously have to be more selective with what I share, I really would have appreciated a pm instead.