Although I know that some people continue to formally school year round, we are one of those families that takes a long summer break. Of course, our summer still includes all of the learning that takes place normally throughout a day of discovery, as well as VBS and Art Camp, but we mostly put the school books away for the summer.
I had vowed before we finished our school year that I wanted to continue working on math for sure, and maybe even another subject or two. If I couldn’t do anything else though, I knew math had to be the one to focus on.
But, then summer felt nice. I started decluttering in my house and catching up on all of the things I really wanted to do, but just hadn’t had time for. Two weeks passed with no math books.
Finally, I knew we had to do it, so we sat down with our books. It was then that I realized why it was that we needed to have been working on it a couple of times a week as soon as summer started.
My boys both stared at their books when they got to the concepts that they were just becoming more fluent with. The youngest of the boys went through addition just fine, but froze in the face of subtraction, struggling through it. Even worse, my oldest completely forgot how to multiply. He got so flustered by it all that he wasn’t even able to do “2 x 10.” We had to talk about it a while (a long while) before he got back into the groove again. In fact, I finally had to tell him the answer to that one was 20. He just looked at me in amazement, and said, “Oh yeah! How did I forget that?”
So, my tip for those of you who have packed away all the books for the summer — maybe take those math books back out every so often. It will probably save you a lot of time reviewing in the fall.
Angie can be found writing about faith, family, household management, going green, and trying to live a more content life at Many Little Blessings.
photo by Old Shoe Woman
No related posts.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
We have just started to get the weather to enjoy summer, but our forecast calls for rain all week. I foresee more reading, math and writing to practice as we are sent back into the house. Thanks for the reminder. I do plan on this as I remember the struggle with all the kids every September of grumpily reviewing the "stuff they already knew" but I know they forgot or didn't utilize!
That's a very good point. I remember in regular school that the first month or so in the Fall was a review of the previous year.
Yep! I agree. We do Key To workbooks through the summer, and the little ones do Calculadders.
Since we began home schooling 9 years ago, we have always done math year – round. We have done this for 2 main reasons. First, no one is ever completely done their math book by the end of the traditional school year. Also, when they do complete a book and start the next one, they usually jump many lessons that have been written as review in the next book.
.-= Ellen´s last blog ..How many stores can one shop in a 2 hour time slot… =-.