HELP!! Home Schooling 9 y.o Sister in the summer?

Question

i need help with this.

my sister lives in the cayman islands and their school system is EXTREMELY slow. she is currently 9 years old and will be in year 5 in september.

i cant allow her to stay in this slow system so i will be taking her to jamaica in about 2 years so that she can pick up from there. even though that will be hard.

can i get some tips on home schooling a 9 year old! i get sort of frustrated sometimes...

can i get some sites to help me out with her math and language phonics science spelling etc.

i mean she is in year 4 and she hasnt even dun stage 2 multiplication or long division!! or cursive writing! in jamaica that is dun in years 2 - 4. if she approaches long division in year 5 when will she start FRACTIONS and RATIO and Probability!? its just freaks me out. the worst thing is the kid is extremely smart and her brain is like bored with the easy work.. she is notbeing challenged..!

Answer 1

1) What you describe for multplication and division sounds perfectly normal to me--I live in Canada. Large multiplication and long division start in grade 5, as does more serious work in fractions and ratio. Probability with fractions starts in gr. 7. I can assure you that our education system is considered quite good. You can stop freaking out. :) Especially since I just looked up the Cayman Islands government page and their school system is modelled off of the British system. You really have nothing to worry about that there is a year difference--at this point--in math.

2) If she's very smart and bored in school, then you teaching her more advanced things than she'll be learning in school for the next 2 years will only make her more bored.

3) Lots of places are ignoring cursive. How do you know that kids in Jamaica are still learning it in school?

4) Why is she going into a spelling bee that she doesn't want to be a part of? Don't let yourself be frustrated over her lack of motivation. She doesn't concentrate because she doesn't want to do it and you'll probably be hard-pressed to get her to want to do it. Let her experience the results of her lack of work.

Answer 2

If I understand correctly, you're taking her from the Caymans to Jamaica because the schools are better in Jamaica.  That means you're only tutoring her to catch up to the Jamaica schools.

I suggest that you google British National Curriculum, and look for the worksheets (there are tons!) that help parents assist their children, or help teachers with worksheets for classes.  You can print out the worksheets for free, well, just for the cost of the printing.

Answer 3

You can't force a student to sit at a desk and learn if they don't want to. You just can't.

It might be helpful to learn from her what she is interested in, then find ways to bring those things into her studies. My son hates math but put it in something he loves like a tennis game and the calculations are done fast!

Another thing that might help would be to find out her best learning styles and figure out how best she can be taught or self teach to those styles.

I personally found that when I did that with my kids by using POC4U, it absolutely made our homeschooling more than 100% better. Both of mine are highly kinesthetic learners.

Be sure you are seeing to her extra curricular interest too. Just be with her, listen, talk about the shape of the clouds one day, feel the earth actually move and smell the flowers.

If you look at learning as a natural thing, that can be helpful. It should be fun. It should be what she wants to do. If it's not, she might need to de-school a bit or you might need to change your learning plans to better fit her.

Answer 4

Good for you! You sound like a caring big sister. Aleks math is online and they have a one month free trial. Their program will asses what she needs to learn. And then she can move quickly. She won't be bored or have any busy work with Aleks. I would start there.

And the rest of the time I would read, read , read with her. Best of luck!

Warm Regards,

Jana

http://www.summerhouseliving.com

http://www.purehomeschooling.com