Teaching First Grader and Second Grader?
 

How do you do it with Multiple grades that are close together? Next school year I will possibly be homeschooling my First and Second Grader. I say possibly seeing as my Kindergartener loves PS right now and is a social butterfly.

Can I teach them the same things?

Do I have to do seperate "class" time for each?

Please give me some insight. I'm trying to prepare now since I will be moving soon and would like to get everything I need to done and organized at the new house.

TIA

Re: Teaching First Grader and Second Grader?
 

I would keep them together as much as possible. My two oldest are nineteen months apart and they learn all the same stuff at the same time. Of course you will have to take into account if one of yours is way ahead of the other, that may not work, but you could still combine some subjects. You could probably at least combined all but reading and math. I would also look into a curriculum that allows you to combine more easily. MFW lets you combine a large range of kids starting in second grade. I think HOD allows for a couple years combined as well. I'm not sure what other curriculums do that but it may be something you'd want to look into.

Re: Teaching First Grader and Second Grader?
 

I would definitely combine for everything except LA and math. Some boxed curricula are specifically for that, like MFW which we use. But, a lot of separate subjects can be used for multiple ages too, like Aplogia is for K-6th or something like that and would combine them in Science.

I've seen it recommended that even if children are on the same LA level they should be taught separately because it can be hard to tell how well they are both learning. It sometimes happens that one is actually just sliding along on the heals of the other and not really mastering all they should be. I've had this recommended to me by several people regarding my twins. My twins will probably be on the same level, but for phonics they will have separate teaching times.

Good Luck!

Thanks so much. My soon to be second grader belongs in 3rd grade but the PS failed him for being "distracted" and now is bored and distracting other children. He also has ADHD and the teacher just seems to not understand that he needs something stimulating to do. My soon to be 1st grader is really smart and she seems to catch on fast so I kind of like the idea of being "free" and not being stuck to one grade level.

Re: Teaching First Grader and Second Grader?
 

Yep. It depends where they are in the core subjects, but most people seem to try to combine at least for the content areas (history, science, art, etc.). None of my kids are that close together, but we still combine for history and science. For example, I have a fifth grader, second grader, and a pre-kindergartener all learning American history together. I assign each child reading and writing on his level. The pre-k'er is obviously not doing much other than listening to read alouds and doing easy craft projects, but he's learning a little, too.

I like that idea. Seems like a good way to keep ones sanity when homeschooling and being a mom to more than one :)