Back to Saxon

This week we started back to Saxon Math after taking a 4 month break. Ben just wasn't getting his times tables. He understood them, but didn't care if he knew them. When he started taking 4 Mom school classes in Utah we were just overwhelmed with school work, especially since Saxon Math was taking 2-3 hours per day. So I decided that since one of Mom school classes was Math Games that I'd just work on times tables with him for awhile. Well, in the course of that I realized that his fundamental math skills were not as sharp as I thought they should be. Of course he knew how to add, subtract, multiply & divide, but he just wasn't fast at it. I've struggled with Math my whole life and never learned my times tables. I want Ben to be able to worry about Algebra and Geometry without having to worry about his times tables and being slow in his basic fundamental arithmetic. So we just started back to Saxon Math this week. It's going well and only taking a little over an hour to complete a lesson. He is completing 2 timed tests a day: 100 addition facts and times tables. He's still not as fast with his times tables so he has 3 minutes to complete 1-4s. He's doing good and more importantly, he's happy with his progress. I love to see that self confidence. One of my greatest rewards as a homeschooling mother is seeing that amazing smile when he finally "gets it", whatever "it" might be that day.

I gave Ben the San Diego quick assesment for reading level. It's a list of words. Basically they are arranged into grade levels and based on how far down the list he can read or sound out that is the grade level he is at. It doesn't test comprehension, just reading ability. He tested at 10th grade! I knew that he was reading far above his 5th grade level, but I didn't know how far! I guess I need to find challenging reading material for him before he gets "lazy minded". I believe that if children don't have challenges in life and academics they get used to everything always being easy and then can't concieve of how to work for something. Thus becoming "lazy minded".