Well, things were getting along much better and then double digit multiplication entered the picture. Today we spent 2+ hours doing this. I.want.to.rip.my.hair.out.
Mostly this is because all of the miserable little triplets (my new nickname for them- triplets, not the miserable part, except for today) decided to essentially go crazy. Yelling and screaming and clinging, to me, and to Ava. Which in turn caused both Ava and me to yell and become befuddled and basically halt all learning capabilities.
And here is my conclusion: I am 90% sure I will be enrolling her back into public school. I am giving myself to the end of this week to come to a decision so I don't do something stupid because of a bad day. What it boils down to is that while I like teaching Ava, and she does well with pretty much everything, unless it is a tough math concept she hasn't done before, the fact that the triplets wander around the home and cause all sorts of mayhem, plus the humongous distraction they are, coupled with the fact that unlike in reading where Ava can read and then do, in math I actually have to teach all these new concepts like division and fractions and word problems, etc. it is simply too much with the age of the littles.
Unfortunately, you cannot reason with two 2 year olds and a 1 year old. I have tried having them do constructive things while I teach Ava and they eat the crayons or throw them. Truitt mostly eats them and then decides to go and play in the toilet. While funny if it is not your own children, it absolutely sucks when you are being teacher and you have to pause the lesson to disinfect your child.
Probably if they were two 4 year olds and a 3 year old, I would think this would be much better suited to us. But I really don't think it is going to work. I feel bad about this for several reasons.
1. I don't mind it other than the crazy kids running amok, I actually really enjoy teaching her and as sadly, learning a lot of things I forgot.
2. I think it is a bad example to let Ava go back to school after she begged for years to be homeschooled (and now wants to go back, by the way), it is a much better lesson to make her stay until the end of first semester to drive home the point that you asked for this, so you need to see it through (sort of), but the benefits of this lesson aren't going to outweigh the negatives which is general craziness, a child upset because she can't concentrate, a mom upset because she can't teach, or really be with the babies, high levels of stress, and the fact that Ava may get behind in her fourth grade year
3. I look like a wuss for stopping. But I know that's just pride so I should probably nip that in the bud immediately.
Plus, I really want to punch Mario, who I talked to around 5 times and told him about our situation, the kids' ages, etc. to make sure the program would work well for us. He assured us it would because "4th grade is the year where the kids really work independently". Maybe if their name is Einstein. Not to mention that everyone I know who has done the program before said this year there are lots of crappy changes and requirements that have really messed with the program.
So, that's the update. Part of me really wanted it to work, and maybe it still will, although looking back I feel like I have already made up my mind about it and it's not even friday yet. But who knows, I could change, and Lord knows it's crazy enough all around for that to happen!
No comments:
Post a Comment