help on going on teaching!!!

[msocorro]

I found thise site about a year ago, just after reading a Glenn Doman book, ofcourse, I just loved the idea of teaching my children and jumped in to the task, with not much organitation and a lot that I wanted to start doing.... I stoped for a long period , becuase of the birth of my third child, and restarted not log ago... I fell everything I did before was of no use, I fell I´m going to have to start all three up again, I have tried and the result, is: mommuy tired and mad, children fooling arownd... no succes at all, I know they are really smart, but I have been sowing little math and reader for over  ayer now every day except on weekends, and my D is still not reading one word, is like nothing is hapendig, so I want to start he ron flash cards just as I started with my son, and see if it will stick, but she wont sit and look, she tries to take them out of my hand, and things like taht so I just get mad.. wich of couse is not waht you are soposed to do...
I really donñt know if it is woth the efert, if anything is stiking, I see all the babys doing just fine, math, EK, reading, ...
what to do? and when to do it, becuse I just have a hard time finishing my house work, and meals, and taking care of them, to add on all the earling learning.
I tried a good recomendation a mom gave my in thise forum, but... it doesent work, working with each child sepertaly, they are really close together and love doing everything together, the problem is thaat they distract each other... if I have little math going and the older doesnt want to see it, he will put things in front of the computer, or if the girl dosent want to see it she will try swiching it off, and now with the baby... well they just dont like for soo much atention to go ust to him. if they all three what to do the same thing , then is great, but you can imagin how often that hapens.
well, any help you could give me would be great.
I can tell you what I´m doing with them and you can tell me where I´m going well ,and where I have to change.

we do:

LR, and sort stories with the three, then I do some reading (just I read, he listens, for the most part) with the older when the junger are having their nap.
LM for math, havent found any thing that they like for math better than taht, but again, I donñt know how much it has done in a year...
music, play it on the computer, and I´m trying to teach them to use a recorder, then again I get a bit frusrtated when they just want to blow it as a horn....
EK, power points a down load forn all over.youtove videos, books, ...
phisical: we boult them a jungel gym in what was the dining room, they love it, lots of head standing and sumer salts, and climing, They love anything that has to do with gimnastics, but I really don´t know how to teach the, and there is no place I can take them, because my oldest is tree... any ideas?
we satarted swimming, but as a need two more adults.. things avent gone great, because no one wants to spende their saturday (wich is not enough to get any good and fasht progress) at the pool, specially in winter. I would love to take all three and I think I could, but my husband is afraid something could hapen... any expirience with three infants at the time in a pool?

so as you can see I have starte d alot, but I havent see much progress in anything, so I restart , cut everything down, and start just with the reading program? or sold I try keeping them intersted in all ...
I´m rereading the book, and felling a bit more confused and sad, becuse I fell I just didnñt do it well for some reason.
tanks again for any advise

[hypatia]

How old are your children?

My advice to keep you motivated: keep a list of the things you do throughout the day.
I feel like we don't do anything at all. Yet it helps me to see that we did some writing on that day or listened to an audio book or played Maths on the Ipad etc... It also helps to see the 'lacking' area, for example I concentrated a lot on writing but we didn't do anything on Geography for the past weeks.

[msocorro]

they are 3, 2 and 11 months old.
yes really close together :-), wich is great and I love to see how they all play together and help each other, but then, dificult ages to get to sit and listen, and dificult to pleess all at the same time...

yes I will do that, it sounds great, I do something every day... but just not able to get in to a "doman" rithm...

how old are your kids? how are they doing at math, reading, etc?

thanks for the coment

[hypatia]

Hi!

My daughter is 4. I raise her entirely on my own and teach full time.
Most of the time I'm with her I have to run the household and prepare classes and it's sometimes impossible to sit down with her and play/teach/read.
Although it's that stage now when she agrees to sit still for a worksheet or two. Currently we do very simple maths (she doesn't grasp additions yet) and writing/mazes...
Little Musician is a life saver and I have to say she enjoys LR a lot more at 4 than she did at 2!
I'm sure other members will have advice for you on teaching more than one littles!
Good luck :-)

[waterdreamer]

OMG Hypatia, How is is 4 already!!!

[Mandabplus3]

Three in the pool! It's possible, I did it but I can't say I reccomend it. It was very stressful however they could all swim well before they started school. So to make it work here is my recommendation. Teach them to stay upright with arm bands on first.  Then you can have two kicking and practicing water confidence with floaties on and one gets a floatie free lesson. Then swap them around. This way each gets more time in the water and each gets time without floatation devises. I also reduced the air in the armbands gradually as they got more confident. it'll take a few times before they can all stay upright with armbands on confidently. And your baby may or may not manage it at all.
As for the rest of it.....wow I give you credit for even managing as much as you are with three kids so close together at those ages! Give your self some credit, that tribe is hard work even without EL. Three kids is much harder than 2!
So I would consider doing their LR while they are eating breakfast or just before or after. Set it up as an every day routine. At least one will be contained in a high chair then too  I think to get it to work with three kids this age you are going to have to be a master at gaining attention and act like a complete fool. I use LR with 24 3-4 year olds and boy some days it takes my best acting performance to drum up enthusiasm for the sight words! But your enthusiasm is contagious so give it your best 10 minutes of the day. 
For other activities like Math and encyclopedic knowledge I would add it to their games and play time. math is so easy to teach during play time. Fractions, counting, skip counting, addition, all the basics can be covered easily. Do you have Marshmellow math? I think it would be great for your family. For LM I would focus on just the youngest 2 kids and tell your oldest that only absolutely silent kids are aloud to watch with them. Send him out if he is disruptive. It'll only take a couple of times to set the idea in his brain and if he chooses not to watch then use Marshmellow math to cover his concepts anyway.
Encyropedic knowledge is where I focussed my efforts. We learnt a lot from story books and non fiction. I read out loud and reinforced facts by repeating them. Then at the end of a book I would sometimes question myself out loud..." oh that was interesting, how the giraffes don't like the rain and refuse to move when it's raining, wasn't it? Or " oh I forgot which order did the planets go in...I shall look it up again now" thatwayt hey get the same info three different ways. If they really liked a topic we made a home made book of it during craft time and I added the words/ facts to it.
During your little ones nap time I would focus on handwriting ( beginners tracing) and phonics if possible. Any of the more advanced fine motor skills. Colouring, threading, cutting, drawing, even small lego.
Read stories to all of them. Even if only one listens actively all are hearing the way words are written down.
Also consider a few DVDs for education. It' ll give you a quick break and your kids will love it too. Also remember you have plenty of time ahead. Don't stress if you can't be superwoman. My middle child got much less EL than the other two, but she has learnt by Osmosis because she is at the same level as the others now,   

[lzp11]

I have two kids, not three (aged 15 months and 3.5 years).  I definitely agree with Manda that doing early learning during breakfast is best for us.  During breakfast, I start with the older one reading me 1-2 books, whilst the little one feeds himself his breakfast in a highchair (but able to see what we are doing).  He listens to us talking about the story and reading the words (which I think is as important as anything as he will learn that it is normal to read).  We use a mixture of physical books and e-books (starfall and the oxford owl website).

Then we do LMs all together.  Everyone joins in this with clapping and singing (the older one obviously more than the younger, but he loves it and waves his hands / dances to the music).  I use a laptop positioned so that everyone can see and the older one is in charge of pressing the button to move between sessions. 

Finally, I do LR and LM with the youngest.  I tell the older that it's time for his reading now.  Mostly she chooses to stay and watch with us but she has the option to go and play as well.  If she stays, I put her in charge of the mouse and that keeps her quite occupied and feeling important!  It's been great for her to see the pattern phonics as despite having been through LR at least twice over the years, I think she still finds new things to learn from it, and it can teach at different levels at the same time.  To keep her interested, I also try to expand the educational aspect of LR.  So I provide facts or we discuss the images.  With shapes, I had her searching around the kitchen for shapes to show the baby (she found a book for a rectangle, a cup for a circle etc).  She gets very excited about this.

I repeat LR / LM to the younger one just after dinner while he is still in his highchair.  His sister is allowed to watch a TV programme at this time or might be having a bath with daddy if he is home.

I also use the baby's nap time to give me some high quality one to one time with the 3.5 year old, and we do some simple maths (we use Rightstart and the Eurotalk maths app), or spelling (Montessori crossword app), or do 5-10 minutes of piano with soft mozart. 

I would say that anything you can fit in is fantastic and don't worry about doing everything.  Pick a few key areas and build a routine that suits you.  You can then add to this if you are able to.  We literally only do 5-10 minutes (or less) on each activity.  There are many days that I don't manage to do all the activities that I planned, but we are making slow and steady progress.  It amazes me how much can be picked up in a tiny amount of time.  I know that Doman recommends flashing multiple times, but this really was never an option for us, so doing LR once or twice a day is much more achievable.

One great physical activity for us is that I have found a local soft play that is run at a gymnastics centre, which we all go into together.  The older one can practice walking on beams, doing forward rolls, jumping and lots of activities and the younger one can also roll, balance, hang and generally build his motor skills.  They both love to jump on the trampoline and into foam pits!

Good luck!

[msocorro]

thanks a lot, great tip on the pool!!! I will try it today!!! the two older ones can go with the arm floters and stay up just fine, the only one that has never had them on him is the baby, but he loves watter dosen´t minde at all to get his face in it, and holds his breth really well, all tree do!!!
Now that I know that some one did it, I fell confident in trying it out, I will go with my mom, and if it get out of control, them we will just have to have grandma in the pool ;-) , wich of couse they will love becuase grandma is still jung, pacient, and in really good sape!!

I will give a look at masmelow math, actually, the ones that like LM the most are the big boy and the baby, my midle one is the one that tries to stop LM, because she wants to go one to little reader, she loves that one!!!
are your children reading?any math? I have tested them a couple of times on math, and they have gest it the fisth time, no problem, but if I insist they will get it wrong the second time, wich makes me think that the do know the answer, but are not sure why I am asking again ( may be I did it wrong...so may be is the other card).

Ek the love in books and videos, especially the 3 year old, just can sit with you for hours at a time, but then my dougter looses interes and I have to get up and make sure she is not getting in to any truble ;-).

which DVDs would you recomend?
I have dowloded YBCR, but after the fisht 30 views, they got sick of it, (I did too, it was just to borring)
I have them do starfall , alphablooks and readingbear, on their own, just to get meals cooked and house cleand, they love it I actually have to get a kichen timer to time the tiem they are on the program, so that they know they cant just be all morning on the computer.
but then again I don´t know how much good it is doing to them, I know reading bear is great and teaches them really good, but then it is the one the like less, :-///

yes he loves painting and cuting, and LEGO...he loves it, and creats really nice veicles ( we have a specill veicles set, still loooking for more legos at a good price), my D loves it as well and really can put then together, the bay is still not aloud to play with them... but he does put the Lego Duplo ones together. We have mecano as well, undoing things is their forte , so making them in mummys job.

do you teache them any art lessons? I have no idea how to start them, I give them paper and let them do as they plees, but... I dont think that will do much good... any ideas?

yes I have to get him on wrigting, I have a set of work books that were given to me, so I just have to make that fun (problem is, I finde them really borring)

thanks for the info, and the great tips!
all the moms on thise site are super moms to me!!!

[msocorro]

I have two kids, not three (aged 15 months and 3.5 years).  I definitely agree with Manda that doing early learning during breakfast is best for us.  During breakfast, I start with the older one reading me 1-2 books, whilst the little one feeds himself his breakfast in a highchair (but able to see what we are doing).  He listens to us talking about the story and reading the words (which I think is as important as anything as he will learn that it is normal to read).  We use a mixture of physical books and e-books (starfall and the oxford owl website).

Then we do LMs all together.  Everyone joins in this with clapping and singing (the older one obviously more than the younger, but he loves it and waves his hands / dances to the music).  I use a laptop positioned so that everyone can see and the older one is in charge of pressing the button to move between sessions. 

Finally, I do LR and LM with the youngest.  I tell the older that it's time for his reading now.  Mostly she chooses to stay and watch with us but she has the option to go and play as well.  If she stays, I put her in charge of the mouse and that keeps her quite occupied and feeling important!  It's been great for her to see the pattern phonics as despite having been through LR at least twice over the years, I think she still finds new things to learn from it, and it can teach at different levels at the same time.  To keep her interested, I also try to expand the educational aspect of LR.  So I provide facts or we discuss the images.  With shapes, I had her searching around the kitchen for shapes to show the baby (she found a book for a rectangle, a cup for a circle etc).  She gets very excited about this.

I repeat LR / LM to the younger one just after dinner while he is still in his highchair.  His sister is allowed to watch a TV programme at this time or might be having a bath with daddy if he is home.

I also use the baby's nap time to give me some high quality one to one time with the 3.5 year old, and we do some simple maths (we use Rightstart and the Eurotalk maths app), or spelling (Montessori crossword app), or do 5-10 minutes of piano with soft mozart. 

I would say that anything you can fit in is fantastic and don't worry about doing everything.  Pick a few key areas and build a routine that suits you.  You can then add to this if you are able to.  We literally only do 5-10 minutes (or less) on each activity.  There are many days that I don't manage to do all the activities that I planned, but we are making slow and steady progress.  It amazes me how much can be picked up in a tiny amount of time.  I know that Doman recommends flashing multiple times, but this really was never an option for us, so doing LR once or twice a day is much more achievable.

One great physical activity for us is that I have found a local soft play that is run at a gymnastics centre, which we all go into together.  The older one can practice walking on beams, doing forward rolls, jumping and lots of activities and the younger one can also roll, balance, hang and generally build his motor skills.  They both love to jump on the trampoline and into foam pits!

Good luck!

thanks a lot, I will look in to the sites you have given me, the math, rading (oxford owl website).

more or less I have been doing a stedy leson after brekfast, it can be 30 min or 3h depending on how interested they are... reading at night before bed, and then a lot diferent theings with the older.
but when I read the Doman aproch... I fell so far from achiving anything, if a dont get the tree times a day for everything... I did do it at the beging but it was just toooooo much, I was stress out and we just got to the 15 times in reading, so if to that I had to add the other 15 in math plus any Ek I wanted to do... I was going to go mad!! so then is when I found LR, and LM, but then I am not getting visible results as I didi with the flash cards, after the third day, he knew the 15 words, with no problem at all...
I think I might have over done the prasing and getting him to preform for the family, and that might have made him not want to demostart what he knows (every one was a bit against the home schooling, so I kinde of wanted to prove them wrong... I know, that sould not be the goal... but it is hard to try to have the time to do the things and have to explain to everyone whay I didn´t want them to pop in just when ever they wanted, but well that is another tipick;-))

yes I will look at the info, and thanks again for the help!

[lzp11]

Wow you are achieving a lot!!!!  Don't underestimate how valuable that is - well done 
I would never manage 3h teaching on any day - my oldest would never allow it 
I taught her reading via LR and YBCR starting at 5 months old.  She refused outright to demonstrate any of her learning until she was 3!  So i had 2.5 years of wondering if anything I was doing was worth it.  We carried on regardless, although at times I felt very very demoralised.  Everyone else seemed to be making amazing progress and we were not.  Was it my fault????  Anyway, after 3, she suddenly turned a corner and was happy to read to me and now to others.  At her nursery they were astonished when she started reading books to them.  we are building up confidence using simple readers but she is steadily improving her concentration, and ability to read more complex books, and is also getting happier to read to herself, which I am really happy about.

My tip is to follow the motto from Mandab which is "focus on input not output".  As soon as they think you are starting to test or get them to prove what they know to others then many children will shut down.  Others love to show off of course, so it depends on the child.  But for the parent as teacher, I strongly feel that focusing on input and scaffolding learning (trying to choose achievable learning activities that extend their knowledge just a little bit each time and build on what they already know) are the most important.  Then allow your child to amaze you with what they have learned!!

[msocorro]

thanks that is a good advise, I will focuse oninput not on out put!

[msocorro]

Three in the pool! It's possible, I did it but I can't say I reccomend it. It was very stressful however they could all swim well before they started school. So to make it work here is my recommendation. Teach them to stay upright with arm bands on first.  Then you can have two kicking and practicing water confidence with floaties on and one gets a floatie free lesson. Then swap them around. This way each gets more time in the water and each gets time without floatation devises. I also reduced the air in the armbands gradually as they got more confident. it'll take a few times before they can all stay upright with armbands on confidently. And your baby may or may not manage it at all.
 great time in the pool yesterday!!! my older just started to swim on his own, I wa so imprest!!! totaly worth all the tiem spent on taking them to the pool event when I tought we were going back, because he sarted not wanting to go in summer, taking him yesterday just confimed that children are amazing!
muy D love it as well, and te baby belive it or not, was back flooting, some thing I tougth him when he was 5 months old, and hadn´t been able to keep doing form a long time... just amazing, I will defenetly try to get them to the pool as much as posible... lest see if in a sort time I can maneg all tree :-)
thanks for the post, it really got me to go to the pool.

[Mandabplus3]

Wonderful news! So pleased to hear you had success already, it confirms that you are doing a great job! You will have no trouble now. Once you have one swimming it makes the whole experience of three kids in the pool so much easier. Rmember to keep the swimming time fun as well as a lesson so they always want to go swimming.
IMPUT is definately the way to focus your teaching. When kids are under 5 what they remember is less important than what you expose them to. Don't test them at all. Testing them by asking what they know causes them to switch to their left logic brain and closes of their ability to take in imput rapidly. There are plenty of years ahead where retention of facts and testing will be apart of their lives don't start it any earlier than nessesary.
My children under 5 rarely showed me what they knew. Often I was shocked when they piped up with some relevant fact during a story read but if I tested them only one of the three would ever answer. I just keep teaching anyway. It obviously makes a difference long term as all my kids are well above grade level with incredible general knowledge. They can join in any conversation, read beautifully and have math skills I struggle to keep ahead of! Anyway my point is your job isn't to test your job is to teach, so just squeeze in anything you can when you can. Keep it light and fun and don't stress if you arnt perfect. None of us are 

[Jenene]

I understand where you are coming from with feeling like you are not doing enough.  I think we all feel like that   As much as I love this forum and all the great ideas/advice sometimes it is a bit depressing to see how much everyone else is doing but there aren't many families on here (who post at least) who have 3 kids - especially so young and close together and it is hard to try and do it all for 3 kids plus have the house look somewhat reasonable and feed them/clothe them/run chores etc... and have some time to actually do something for yourself.  Let me rephrase that - quite honestly it is impossible.  I am always lamenting the fact that I'm not organised enough and if only I was the kids would be so much further along etc.. I do have 3 kids.  Mine are 5 1/2 years, 2 1/2 years and I have a child with autism who is developmentally a very young 2 years.  So when my 3rd was born I had an about to turn 3 year old, a developmentally late 1/early 2 year old and a new born.  I know how hard it is.  Do what you can.  Decide what is important to you and focus on that.  For me it is reading and math.  I also try to get a bit of music and french in but it is not my focus.  It is easier as they get older and can start getting a bit more independent. My 5 1/2 year old is starting to get to this point though still likes me to sit with him.

I would also suggest some good quality DVDs and get rid of anything that isn't quality.  One of my pet peevs is that I have allowed a few DVDs such as Barney or Bob the Builder into the house and then the kids want to watch them.  Only allow DVDs (and youtube!) that is educational in some way.  We have Your Baby Can Read, Bindi (Australian), Backyard Science (another Australian one), Maisy which we only play in French, Little Pim, David Attenborough and various other ones.  I do wish I had spent some more money and bought other DVDs when they were younger like Signing Time. 

Also play classical music throughout the day.  Play audio stories at bedtime and in the car (again quality literature).  There were a couple of threads on here recently about audio stories and one had great links to some classic literature that was free to download.  I can't find it at the moment to link to.  I'll see if I can find it later. 

Also, some magnetic letters/numbers/words on the fridge.  We have a LeapFrog Word Whammer which has been well used over the last 7 years and is still going strong.  Posters on the wall or under plastic on the table to talk about at meal times etc...  Posters/words (whatever you are focusing on) near the bath/toilet/change table/high chair or where ever you regularly are.  I always planned to do some flash cards with one of those rings that open up so that you can change them and attach them to their car seats so that every time you put them in/out you can spend 20 sec showing each child their f/cards. 

My biggest problem is finding the time to make everything.  If I did it over again I would spend more money.  I'm really cheap and don't like to spend the money (and my husband was studying for the first few years and neither of us working) unless I'm certain that I want the product but that means I spend lots of time researching/looking for a cheaper one etc... and then I've lost 6 months or more that the kids could have been learning. 

Also some of the recent threads on here have helped me as well.  Especially the We Can Do thread and another recent one about acceleration vs depth.  In these were mentioned some kids/families who have succeeded and whose children have (or will) graduated at a high level and a young age.  A common theme in these families is a strong math program and secondly a strong literature program.  So I have redecided to make sure that I focus on those 2 areas (and whatever other area my child is particularly interested in) and don't get overwhelmed with everything else that it is possible to focus on.

That was a bit longer than planned    Hope something in there is useful even if just to know that it is hard with 3 little kids and not to beat yourself up over what you aren't doing but celebrate what you are doing and know that every little bit is helping.  Also, I would agree with Manda that focusing on input is what it is all about and don't worry about output at this stage.  Also, don't be scared of exposing them to things which are too hard or considered outside their age level even if you aren't seeing any sign that they understand.  Better stop before I keep going on 

[Mandabplus3]

  A common theme in these families is a strong math program and secondly a strong literature program.  So I have redecided to make sure that I focus on those 2 areas (and whatever other area my child is particularly interested in) and don't get overwhelmed with everything else that it is possible to focus on.

That's a great summary of the incredibly long posts! Very well worded. I agree if you are time poor, choose your focus and work on those as a priority. Your priority may not be English and math. Language or music or art may be more important to your family. Also consider the age at which you want to focus on each activity. Your children have years ahead of them. Some things can be taught at any age, some are better started young. Have a plan and it will be easier to find the time amidst to kaos that is family life 

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