School prep

So, I'm finally ready to start thinking about homeschool again. I think I have now finished ordering all of our books. I had really intended to continue a few things through the summer, but I needed a break, and it lasted through the whole month of June and now into July. And I hope the girls will appreciate and enjoy it when we start our routine again. I'm using this post to gather my thoughts and make some concrete plans for the coming year.

I went to two homeschool conferences in May, and I learned a lot. I want to be a little more hands-on with my girls this year than I was last year. I think it has taken me a while to figure out how to eliminate distractions and really focus on school during the day. It is such a different mindset from having them in public school, and I hope I am starting to get it. I know Hannah and Nikki both need me to be a little bit more involved in certain subjects than I was last year. They are getting older and can do a lot of things on their own, but I need to do a better job of being readily available while they are working.

A couple of months ago I bought a kitchen table at a yard sale in our neighborhood, and we put that in the bonus room. The kids weren't really happy that we took up so much of their play space, but come on, they can play a game on the table! While they enjoy doing work on the couch and on their beds, there are some subjects (like math and grammar) that I cannot allow to be done anymore while laying on the couch complaining about how much they just don't want to do it. And since Nikki seems to not be able to complete a math problem without speaking (except I know she was silent in public school!!), we now have separate work spaces for important subjects. I believe that will be a big help.

I've never felt comfortable implementing a time frame for each subject, and that just has to do with the personalities of my girls. If I said that math was supposed to be finished by 10:00 each morning and Hannah wasn't done by then, there is a good possibility she would get really upset and be miserable for the rest of the day. If I set a specific time frame for Nikki she would get bored and frustrated because either she finished early or she just wanted to do spelling before math today. So, I decided to make a list of work that needs to be completed before lunch, and work that needs to be completed before it's time to clean up in the afternoon. For things that we do together, I just start those in the morning after our devotional and then we work together again right after lunch. So those items get completed first before they break off on their own. Hannah appreciates the order of the list, and Nikki appreciates the freedom to complete whatever subject on the list she wants. Hannah can take as much time as she wants on each subject, and Nikki can speed through however quickly she chooses (and then spend the rest of her time correcting it).

This is the schedule we're going to start with this year:

Morning jobs -- (bed, get dressed, hair, etc.)
Breakfast
8 am --devotional (includes prayer, hymn or primary song, scripture study, scripture memorization, and an article from the Friend) We usually read scriptures together as a family at breakfast, but I want to include Nate in our whole devotional as much as we can so we'll add in our scripture reading here too.
8:30 -- History/Science
Music (piano, violin)
Math
Spelling
Logic (Hannah)/Penmanship (Nikki)
Grammar
12 pm -- Lunch
Latin
Spanish
Reading (as a group and individually)
15 minute Room Rescue

I'm not sure if that's really going to work. Last year we did History and Science at the end of the day, and it was just too easy to not do it. So I want to do that in the morning before we separate, but I think I may need to move Spelling and Logic to after lunch. We'll just have to see how the timing works out. I like having them practice their music before starting their math because studies really show that music wakes up your brain. I heard Michael Ballam give a really cool talk on that once. Having reading time at the end of the day is a good motivator for Hannah to complete the other stuff, and then I don't have to tell her to quit reading (except to come clean up for a few minutes).

Now, where does Ryan fit into it all? Good question! :) I seriously considered putting him in preschool this coming year, but we are going to be participating in a homeschool co-op on Wednesday mornings where he will have a little bit of a preschool class, and then Hannah will be doing Classical Conversations on Friday afternoons. While she is there, Ryan and Nikki will be able to play with the other kids who have siblings in class. So, that gives him two days already that he will be involved in groups outside of home. He actually really loves "school work" and was even asking me today to go look in his book to see what he was supposed to learn today. Last year I used a book called Slow and Steady, Get Me Ready, which he loves. Here again, I hope to do a better job with him this year, and I need to do a little more research about some ideas for him. Pinterest is actually pretty amazing for this. My #1 main goal for him is to keep him off of Netflix during school hours. Yes, I admit to taking the awful, easy route last year and letting him watch WAY too many hours of Thomas the Train so I could help the girls. The fact that I can sing the theme song is pretty pathetic. Can I get a nomination for Mother-of-the-Year please?!