Fifth grade started today, and Henry was SO excited. I'm praying for a great year.
I think I'm also in some denial because we've had such a fun summer, and he's happy about school.
Remembering all of his struggles from last year, I've asked for a set of Science and Social Studies books to keep at home for the year. The VP said that was fine; I need to remember to get them tomorrow. I have plans to retype his study guides (or let him do it) and print them larger and color-code them. That really helped him last year. Plus I want to see if I can find some fun activities that go with the topics AND I want to pre-read the chapters with him.
However, someone told me that I should NOT pre-teach or help him at home. She said that if I want the school to provide any special assistance for him that I should let him fail so they can see what he needs.
That sounds CRAZY to me.
Also, Henry struggles but even without my help, he'd still pass--low C's probably but he'd pass. So then it would just be setting him up to make some bad grades and hate 5th grade.
Is she crazy or am I crazy?
I actually don't have any specific ideas in mind for assistance for him.
i think it is great you are such a dedicated and involved parent.
if you don't mind the extra work i think you should go for it...you know how henry learns best. why set him up for failure if you have the skills to assist him?
When you say pretech do you mean going over subjects before they are given?
I would not just let him struggle, but public schools do have a system. Do you want him to receive learning resource at school? If so, there is a fine line with helping to pass or actually helping retain and learn in my opinion.
Middle school will require totally different skills the 4/5. Most times organization is lacking in boys and a lot tends to come from the parents doing a lot for them.
I think as long as you are assisting and not doing then there is no problem. To methe biggest issue is not the grade, but is he learning the skills and is he learning the subject matter. If there is more to his learning issues it helps to have the school involved so he can receive the proper resources available to him. Sometime parents can cover for children in the early years and then wonder why they have a difficult time in MS.
I'm so no where near this yet, and since I'm planning on learning at home my opinion might not be helpful...but here it is anyway :)
I love that you want to be so involved. Having him type and helping him figure out a color coding system that makes sense to him sounds brilliant.
Getting the books so there is a set at home is so great (love that your school will do that). Having two sets so you can read out loud (if that is his learning style) is wonderful. I wouldn't pre-read though to be honest - mostly because I wouldn't want to confuse him by reading ahead but covering different material in class. I would probably keep up with whatever they are learning in class (and I would probably personally read them so I can encourage conversation, or help as questions come about).
Maybe that wasn't helpful, lol, but I don't think wanting to be involved is bad. One of ther greatest skills I think you can teach him is how to organize and find the answers himself :)
robin, my input is along the lines of what melissa + jenn said.
i think it's awesome you want to help him. but in 5th grade, i think you primarily have to be guiding him and be careful that you're teaching him SKILLS he needs to be a successful student as opposed to pre-teaching the material.
once he's covering a unit, i see no harm in going over the chapter questions with him or making up your own questions to go along with what he did in class this week. but i would be careful about pre-teaching. you never know which sections teachers are going to skip. plus, they might want to use a chapter to work on reading comp skills - if you pre-read that with him, he may not get as much out of it. kwim?
anyway, i love how involved you are. nice work momma!
