If you're anything like me, you enjoy reading over other homeschool families' schedules...hoping to get a glimpse of their day in order to tweak your own. I like to see how other families operate their normal daily tasks in addition to the homeschool routine...so I read and read and tweak and tweak.....
Not too long ago the Lord called us out. He told us that we would eventually be in the ministry but hasn't given many specific details. One thing I know for certain is that He told me to simplify our schooling schedule. I have had to let go of a lot of curriculum...most of it never really got used anyway...but I develop bonds with my books and it's hard to let go....
I sat down and through much prayer I developed a school routine that will be (hopefully) a whole lot easier for us to follow and will allow time for ministry....
We'll be sticking with the 3 R's: Reading, wRiting, and aRithmetic! I gleaned a bit from the Robinson Curriculum and tweaked it to fit our lifestyle.
Reading will be 2 hours per day split 1 hour in the am and 1 hour in the pm. I will read aloud from The Mystery of History (we're on Vol. 3) to all kids...hoping that Baby Number 7 will be able to sit still long enough to be a part of it. I may also require my older readers to read different lessons as well...just so I can stay on top of their reading skills! We will discuss what we read then I will have my older readers read their Bibles quietly to themselves. They will also be encouraged to keep a list of words they come across that they have trouble with or that they don't understand and they will be required to research them so that they can fully understand what it is they are reading. This includes word studies with Strong's Exhaustive Concordance and our Webster's Dictionary from....well...it's the old one from a long time ago!! There will also be required reading that will be assigned by myself. These are books I've gotten off of the Robinson Curriculum reading list and others I've come across along the way. This will be how all other subjects outside of the 3 R's will be covered. Writing assignments will be derived from the required reading as well! I will work with my younger readers teaching phonics or just listening to them read aloud. I will also work with my pre-schooler just in learning his letter sounds and recognizing the letters. If he is ready I will begin teaching him to write his letters...but I won't push him...we'll take the gentle approach!
Writing will be 1 hour daily. I will have my older children fill out a writing assignment sheet where they choose the type of writing they will do each day for that week. The younger students will have simple sentences to copy and/or dictation. For my pre-schooler, again, I will start with simple letter writing if he's ready...
Math will also be 1 hour daily and will be done first thing while their minds are fresh! We have an array of curriculum we use for each student, basically because we're using what we have. I know that isn't very scientific or anything, but that's what we're doing. One will be doing Teaching Textbooks, 2 will be doing Math U See, 1 will be doing Christian Liberty Press, and my pre-schooler will be doing simple counting, number recognition and some adding and subtracting with manipulatives. They will all do flashcard drills and they will each have time where they do oral math with me. I downloaded the Ray's Arithmetic Series for free off the internet and have printed out lessons for each grade. I like the old books and encourage people to go snooping all over the internet to look for these old 19th century schoolbooks...they are great sources for word problems and I think they really exercise the brain!
So that's it. Simple. I will next work on a spreadsheet chore chart that will hopefully simplify chores and incorporate their lessons with it so they can mark off what they've accomplished. It will be divided into sections of AM CHORES, MATH, READING, WRITING, PM CHORES. Again...keeping with the "keep it simple this year" theme!!
I hope this helps someone just a little bit...especially if you are feeling overwhelmed and unprepared! The world says that luck favors the prepared, but I say when we feel the least adequate for the job and terribly unprepared we can take a moment to completely empty ourselves of our own strength and allow Abba to fill us up...even in our homeschooling journey! I believe by far that your worst day homeschooling is better than their best day at public school! Enjoy the journey!!!
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