New curriculum

Earlier I shared that Jordan is repeating second grade with a switch in curriculum.  Yesterday her new curriculum arrived.

As you can tell, I don't have it too organized yet beyond just separating her student textbooks and workbooks from the rest of it.  However, I have had a chance to look through the materials a bit and begin to get familiar with the layout.

I like it.  A lot.

When we enrolled with QDA, they suggested we use Calvert from the start with Lydia, Kim, and Jo.  I chose their other options though, thinking a little more independence would be a good thing for all of us.  That had Lydia and Kim doing their online curriculum, OdysseyWare, and Jo doing Little Lincoln.  Lydia has pretty decent grades in OdysseyWare and isn't doing too bad with it, despite the fact that she isn't a fan.  The other girls are a different story, however.

Kim is almost finished with the third grade curriculum, she just has a little language arts left to finish for the school year.  She rushes through the work and doesn't like my reminders to read the material, and her grades reflect that.  She is going to barely pass 3rd grade as a result.  The format of the online classes annoy her, and she's too young to be annoyed by curriculum and forced to do it anyway.  She needs something more interactive, and more interaction with me directly.

Jo just flat out wasn't ready for second grade curriculum, and I had a LOT of issues with her maturity matching up with her academic abilities.  Add in a curriculum that wasn't dependable about sending materials in a timely manner and all the materials at a time, and you have a disaster just waiting to happen.  Now that I know what I know about the shipping practices of Lincoln Interactive, they will never be used by my family.  Each quarter, I had to request materials at least once after the initial shipment.  Second quarter I had to request the teacher book and student workbooks, then once I got those I had to request a couple literature books and the cursive student book.  Yes, that was three separate shipments for just a single quarter (nine weeks) of lessons.  It took us close to 3 weeks to get all her materials, which didn't make things any easier with the maturity struggles we were already having.

So, both girls are switched and I'm still debating if I want to switch Lydia as well once she finishes her fifth grade curriculum.

Calvert sent everything for the year in one big box, and I didn't have to worry about it.  I just grabbed a pen and marked items off the packing list for each of the three smaller boxes within the big box.  It took me 10 minutes to unpack and check off everything I needed for the year with Jordan.

Within it, there is a lovely folder that says "READ ME FIRST" with information on where to start with it all.  Step one was to unpack and check the packing lists as I go.  In that folder was also a page with a list of basic school supplies I'll need for the school year, which will come in very handy when I go August 7th during "tax free day" to buy school supplies.  It actually has a list for each individual grade on it, so I'm going to use one list to cover all the kids who will be doing Calvert this school year to make shopping that much easier for me.

The guides are very well laid out, which is important for a busy mom with a bunch of kids.  I can see doing multiple levels on a daily basis going very well with how it is laid out.  There is even a suggested daily schedule with times and everything in the front of the book, which I may or may not use.  But having that visual really helped me to know how to expect the days to look since I do have several years of experience with doing this schooling at home thing.

The lessons to start are going to be pretty easy though, which will work to our benefit right now since Jordan's arm is still healing and hurting a lot.  I feel really positive about this switch in curriculum, and am sure that just restarting second grade with her was the right choice.

I wish I had just gone with the Calvert option for the girls from the start.  Live and learn, at least now we know a little more about what the kids need in a virtual academy program.  Now we just have to get the school year finished up for Kim so we can order her new materials, and I have to decide what we're doing about Lydia since she's doing pretty well but passionately hating the online curriculum.  I think that will be our next discussion with the school when she's closer to finished with the current grade.

Summer break stinks

I gotta say, summer vacation 2015 is not going so well for us here.  I mean, look at what all we had happen since we finished the "official" school year at the end of May.

Scott's car threw a rod in the engine
we replaced Scott's car and took on a payment that we didn't plan
Scott's hours at work got cut 3 times in 2 weeks right after we took on that car payment
our main computer quit working after someone spilled something that leaked into the tower
we replaced that computer
our kids' medical insurance got cancelled due to a computer glitch that took me a month to fix
I'm pregnant unexpectedly
my medical insurance got cancelled by that same computer glitch and after 6 weeks I'm still trying to get it fixed
Jordan found out she's repeating 2nd grade
Kim fell out of a tree and ended up with several bruised ribs and a concussion
Jordan went flying off a swing backwards and broke her arm just below the shoulder
our sweet puppy has a knee condition that will eventually require surgery

I'm ready for this summer to end now.  But first, here's Jordan showing off her newest fashion accessory with a huge grin because she knew she was going to get ice cream and she didn't have to share with anyone.  She sees the orthopedic surgeon tomorrow afternoon so we can get a better idea of what to expect with healing it and find out if it needs surgically repaired because of the location (hopefully not!)

Well that answered my "now what do I do?" question

Today is Wednesday, which means that Lydia has math tutoring.  This is one of my favorite parts of the cyber school.  I don't have to pay for the extra help she (or any of her siblings) needs in math.  She has really come a long way with the tutoring, and is regaining confidence in her skills after a really bad time with the math curriculum our local public school used when she was in 4th grade.

Today also meant that I spoke to QDA about a couple things.  We've been discussing switching the kids' curriculum from the online options to Calvert (for all but Melissa, she isn't eligible to do offline curriculum because of her IEP) and I sent the e-mail to our supervising teacher on Monday about doing that with Kim along with an issue I was noticing in a big way with Jordan.  Kim's all set to start 4th grade with the Calvert curriculum this fall, which makes her very happy.  Jordan, well let me dig into that now.

Jordan has a September birthday, and Ohio states that the cutoff date for school is September 30th.  That makes her the youngest in her class/grade each year.  She's always done pretty well with her schoolwork, but we've struggled sometimes with lessons that take longer than she is capable of sitting and focusing for.  We chose Little Lincoln 2nd grade when we enrolled her in QDA after they did placement testing to see where her skills were at.  They felt she'd be ok with 2nd grade this past school year based on her scores, but I was concerned about her maturity.  The maturity issues started about 5-6 weeks into the curriculum, and only got worse from there.  She started slowing down and struggling more each day, until we reached the 2nd nine weeks when the curriculum started cursive.  At that point, she screeched to a halt and it was taking us 4-6 weeks just to finish 1 week of assignments.  Her maturity had completely caught up with us at that point.

Academically, she absolutely is ready for more difficult work.  Emotionally, she's very much not at that place.  So, we discussed the issue at hand.  This has been something I've been in close contact with the school about, as we tried to find ways to keep her engaged and moving forward in her lessons with the hope of finishing within the 12 months.  We've watched her struggle with her inability to really sit still and complete longer assignments that are more complex, tiring with writing more each week.  She simply just wasn't ready for the level of work.

We made the decision together that she will repeat second grade this fall.  They also determined that we need to switch her curriculum (which I agree completely with this).  She no longer is using Little Lincoln as of right now, that order has been cancelled. They are now processing an order for Calvert second grade materials, and as soon as we get her materials and I've become familiar with it she will begin.

So far, she seems totally fine with the fact that she's repeating second grade.  Scott had to repeat third grade when he was in school, and she knows this.  He will be able to give her the encouragement that she needs to keep going instead of getting mad and giving up because she feels defeated.  He'll be able to help me combat any thoughts that she must be dumb for having to repeat a grade.  Scott is going to take her out for an ice cream cone this weekend to talk to her alone and make sure she's doing ok with this information.

So, looks like I get to spend time getting familiar with a new curriculum very soon.  That will eat up a good amount of my free time.