We have decided to home school our grandchild with the support of the parents. He failed 4 of his subjects incl English and maths so far this year.His reading is POOR, is spelling non existent, his math is bad etc etc. I believe that if the child cannot read and does not have the vocabulary needed for his grade, he is NEVER going to catch up. How do I figure out when to START him off? He has missed too much (due to parental neglect and the failed school system). Do we start him at Gr 1 and let him work through it to see where he gets stuck and then take it from there? We were thinking about the Kenweb system, is there a comparable English system? ~ Mara Scholtz, Randburg
Answer to How do we Assess the Starting Level of the Child Already Behind
Hi Mara
I don’t know the age of your grandchild, but if you start at the beginning with Grade 1 materials, he should be able to progress quickly through them. Being more mature he should master learning to read, write and do maths a little quicker than a younger child.
Of course, you need to be sure that he is healing emotionally too and that he feels secure.
I would not start with a highly structured curriculum if I were you as this could make you and the child feel stressed and under pressure to ‘keep up’.
Take a look at some of the Curriculum Options that we recommend on our site. I would only focus on the 3R’s to begin with but read aloud a lot to him as well – reference books and story books.
From now on, you must allow him the freedom to progress at HIS OWN pace. When he feels ‘safe’ in his learning he will get ahead and is very likely to catch up with his age level, but even if he doesn’t, so what? He does not have to be an ‘average’ child that fits the one-size-fits-all cookie cutter mould that mainstream schooling offers.
There is a special place and purpose in this world for every child and your job is to help him discover that. Help him discover his passions and strong points, help him pursue his interests and help him become the individual that he was created to be.
I would encourage you to sign up for our free ecourse Tips for Starting Homeschooling so that you can re-educate yourself and discover how homeschooling differs from school so that you can enjoy the many benefits of this option.
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