Thursday, March 3, 2011

We've hit a wall

I know it's almost been a month since my last posting, but boy have we been super busy! I know, I know, that's no excuse.... honestly, it's lack of motivation all around. I feel like we've been hitting walls left and right, and loosing momentum, so we took a week off, while I brainstormed what the causes could be.

The first issue we were facing was the testing with the neurologist for dyslexia for Orion. I received a call from our insurance, stating that the neurologist was out of network. That means we would have a huge deductible to pay, and 50% of the services rendered. That's just not in our budget right now, so I've been having to call every child neurologist in our network. It's a slow process, because I call when I have time, and not every neurologist offers the testing. Orion also went for his yearly physical with his pediatrician, and is now officially diagnosed with ADHD, so that makes both boys. He's doing well with his weekly psychiatry visits, and we recently started including his siblings (family therapy) to help with his negative feelings/self esteem issues. Hopefully soon he'll have a better outlook on things, because I hate seeing my 7 year old so down about life :(

The next issue is boredom. Lately Raymond has been really bored with his schoolwork, and I think it's because it's become repetitive for him. We use math mammoth for math, and the concepts are getting harder, but it's boring to him since he's already mastered multiplication and division. He's just doing harder/longer problems, but he gets it. The same thing for his reading material (magic tree house/ diary of a wimpy kid), and language arts (Abeka). My thinking is that I can skip ahead a few chapters/lessons, and see if that helps; or skip him ahead a few months into 5th grade (since were year rounders). For now, I'm skipping a few lessons/chapters, finding more advanced reading material, and hoping that helps. If anyone has any suggestions, I'd love to hear them!

The last issue is that some of our curriculum just doesn't fit anymore. We bought Abeka for science and history, and it was fine in the beginning of the year, not so much now. Orion's books were more pictures, than substance, and we flew through them because of that. Raymond's books were more in depth, but more about God (which is fine), but I want them to learn more about history and science in a history and science book. I think I just chose the wrong curriculum for us. So I set these books aside. Now were happy, because were just doing our thing with history and science, based on the kids interests, and making reports/projects/lap books out of them (pics and posts on them to come soon).

This part isn't an issue, but more of a "hey this is why we've been so super busy" section. We signed Olivia up for gymnastics and ballet again, and she just started back up. That's been keeping us on the go, running from class to class, and in April the boys start Capoeira, so even more running around! We also joined a facebook homeschool swapping group, where we get to exchange flat stanleys, and state boxes. We plan on using those to learn about U.S. geography, so look for posts about that soon. Were loving all the new friends were making though, and hope that with all these new changes, life will start settling into a bit of a schedule for us.

4 comments:

MommyKuehner said...

I understand. We have 4. Our oldest is diagnosed Aspergers, Visual Perception Delay, Severe ADHD with impulse issues, Severe OCD (even meds do not help with the issues most days). Our next guy is diagnosed with Autism and ADHD. Our 5 year old daughter is in the process of being diagnosed ADHD because she is showing the same symptoms the boys did and so does our 3 year old already. So I know in the future what will happen there. Everyday is a new challenge:)
www.krazykuehnerdays.com

Karen said...

We have had the same problem with science and history. My daughter has used Abeka her entire schooling except for the one year she went to public school. I started homeschooling her last year for 4th grade. A few weeks ago, we both reached our limit. I stopped both science and history and began our search for something different. We have switched to Apologia for science. She loves it. She is very hands on and it works perfect for her. She has even done stuff in her notebook on her own. Now it could be because it is still new to her but I am really impressed with their set up. We are still searching for something for history.

Wmoon said...

I too totally understand your feelings. When you have hit a wall stand back up and climb over it. Our children count on us! I have decided to live life a bit different...that is just taking one day at a time and enjoy it for it isn't the the end of the world.

Carol
Homeschooling one child with ADD and one that is a visual learner.

Jessica said...

This is what I love about the internet! There's always someone who understands what your going through.

Karen for history, you should look into History Odyssey from Pandia Press. It's very hands on, and you can download the first 11 lessons from the website for free to see if you like it or not. We downloaded the free lessons, and I just started buying the books it recommends so we can get started. Once we start I plan on doing a post about it, because I found a great blog that uses story of the world alone, and uses great additional resources.