Hello & Intro

[balanced]

Hello all, I’m a newbie! Just googled homeschooling forums and this one caught my eye. I’m not truly homeschooling long term but have been pushed into this due to covid. Please let me know if this is not an appropriate place for my post. I haven’t had a chance to go through many yet and wanted to introduce myself.

I have an only child, 6th grade girl. I’m curios if others are in the same situation as I am or have any input. Since I practically have no life now post COVID, I have become borderline obsessed with my daughters education. We are staying home 98% of the time so she has more time to focus on academics too. I used to be the type of parent who thought C grades were totally acceptable. Not a high achiever obviously. A B grade wound be exceptional to me. Again, pre- covid. Now that we are home, I’ve had a complete change of heart and seem to expect 100 on everything. I admit part of it may be all the high achieving moms talking more about how competitive they are and they expect all A’s. I’m spending a lot of time going over work with my daughter. She is smart but it doesn’t come easy to her. I believe she works a lot harder and longer to achieve good grades that other kids might just get naturally. I currently spend about 2-3 hours most weekdays going over work and helping her re-learn when needed. I monitor grades much more closely (every assignment, quiz, test).

Overall my daughter is improving greatly at academics because of all this. Her grades are higher than pre-covid. She seems receptive and never gets frustrated with me or the studies. So should I continue this? Or back off some? It feels a little weird I put so much time and effort into it when she’s a middle schooler now. Curious on what others think.

[hawkward]

Hi and welcome, balanced!

My kids are a bit younger than middle school, but IMO, I would consider this as a time to take advantage of your ability to be more involved in what she’s doing to lay down some really strong study habits. Especially if she’s receptive. This time you’re spending on her school work will help her go into higher level courses later with the mindset that this is part of learning.

[bunnyfungo]

Hi balanced! It’s always great to add other homeschoolers to our board.

I want to comment that kids are often asynchronous learners. Meaning they aren’t always on the same grade level in all subjects. As a long term homeschool mom, that works for me to be able to tailor their learning to their distinct levels and there are no such things as grades. It’s possible that the extra one-on-one attention that your daughter is getting with you is the push she needed to get up to grade level on a subject she might have previously struggled with. Which is great. But I would encourage you to make sure that the learning is fun and low stress for her. I don’t want you to be focused on perfection just because of covid. Focus on understanding rather than what grades that produces. Mastery of the information will mean she has the building blocks to move to the next step and be successful.

We aren’t a super active board. But we’re all very helpful and knowledgeable! I hope you stick around.

[violajack]

Welcome! The great thing about having only one student is that you can really take the time to teach to her. She gets all the answers and help she needs all the time. And that's okay. It doesn't have to be micromanaged forever, but you get to decide when to give her a little less guidance. It sounds like she's doing really well with the extra attention for now, so go for it. Don't stop doing what's working. But also, you're in charge, so if it's ever not working anymore, or if you think she should be doing more on her own, you can do that too. She has a lot of years of school left to gain the independence in learning though, so I wouldn't stress about how closely you work with her this year.

[balanced]

Thank you all for the warm welcome and advice! This all is very new to me. I am trying to find a good balance (hence my screen name lol). I don’t want to be a helicopter mom. Sometimes I need to remind myself of that.