It’s Going to Be Wonderful

So, I may have mentioned before that we’ve been doing sort of half-time school for the months of July-September, and this October we’re starting more of a full time day.  I just needed a little grace during the garden harvest/canning season this year, so I pushed off the big kick off for the year until October this year.  I’m getting antsy, though, and since October starts on a Thursday, we are going to start the Monday of that week.

I finally sprawled out all the curricula purchased for this year, and started organizing.  You see, I don’t order a package deal anymore.  We’ve become very eclectic, based off of the Classical model, and it fits us well.  I make up my own book lists now, and I really customize it off the cuff for each kid.  Basically, I fill our school shelves with good stories of various reading levels about a certain age in history we are studying.  This year it’s the medieval age.  So I pulled down my collection of books on that age, and a few extra that aren’t historically based, but just really good fiction for the kids to read.

My excitement is building as I’m nearly in tears, wishing I had the time to read all of these wonderful books instead of just assign them.  I want to be a student again.  I now see what a luxury it is! I do read many of them for the purpose of discussing, but mostly I just assign them, or read them aloud to the kids and experience it for the first time with them.  The majority of homeschool moms just learn right alongside their kids.

I’ve written out the kids assignments for their first week coming up already, and we’ve discussed how to handle trips to town for orchestra, the understanding that if they don’t finish their assignments by Friday, they will have to finish up what didn’t get done over the weekend.  I’ve got their reading lists written down, and I just need to move around some books on the bookshelf so they aren’t so scattered.  I’m going to put together a Morning Hour basket in my kitchen, so I have all the stuff ready.  Once I have the kids’ attention, I won’t have to say “wait here while I find our poetry book” or something like that.

So do you want to know what I plan for our homeschool day to look like?  I’m going for more routine, less schedule this year.  With 5 kids, especially the little ones, it’s hard to put exact times on things.  I’m going to be flexible.  Screen time will be moved to weekends only.

 

Because I know I’m going to get questions asking what we use for curriculum, I’ll link up the company or books I bought for this subject.  Know that some of these books are just carrying over from last year as some of my kids move slower than others.  Some links are affiliates of mine, and some are not.  For reading time, our reading list is based heavily off of lists in the book Educating the Whole Hearted Child. I strongly recommend anyone thinking about homeschooling to start with that book.  The time, heartache, and money I would have saved had I started there is just enormous.

Breakfast

Chores

Morning Hour (as a family)

• Bible
• Memory Work (Scripture, poetry, classical conversation songs, spelling lists etc.)
• Shakespeare Unit (we will be reading children’s versions of the stories as well)
• Handwriting

Loop Scheduling these subjects (in other words, how ever much we can get done in time allotted)

• Grammar
• Koine Greek
• Geography/History discussion (various sources, loosely based off of Story of the World)

Tea Time with Read-Alouds geared toward younger kids

After Tea Time

• Silje and David rotate between instrument practice and math on computer
• Mom works with language arts with Elias and Solveig.  (I have various resources for this but linked what I’m going off of this year, as well as BOB books, etc.  They say the phonics program that works is always the 3rd one you try…because that’s the one you’re on when your kid is finally ready.)

Lunch

Lunch chores

Afternoon Hour (separate/independent, asking me questions only every 5.6 seconds)

• Silje works on reading, writing, and science
• David works on reading, writing and science
• Elias works on math, and does science with David

Free Time (but no screens)  Ideas:

• listen to Audiobooks
• read
• play outside
• art project
• service project
• science project
• computer programming elective
• quality play

I’m so excited.  This is going to be wonderful.  This is the year we will have good routine and good attitudes.  We are going to get SO. MUCH. DONE. and it’s going to be so fun!

This is the time of year where I’m committed to getting up early, but haven’t had to do it yet.  I assume my baby will have grown out of her clingy stage in the next week or so, and my preschoolers won’t scream I WANT A MOVIE ON!!! and even if they do, I’m not going to give in and stick on Curious George by 9:30am anymore.  I assume a magical fairy is going to show up everyday and make all the food for the family for each meal so I can fully focus on educating with a sweet, even-toned voice.

It’s just going to be wonderful.

I’ve got that just-about-to-start-a-new-school-year-glow about me.