Scheduling.....
This was my first concern by far when I began researching How and If I could homeschool my girl.
I recall asking a few parents who were already homeschooling to tell me their secret.
I soon realized there is no secret.
Our homeschool days are scheduled into 4 days a week. Those four days can vary from Monday-Thrusday (ideally) or sometimes we add an extra day, Saturday to complete a specific project.
Most days we begin by 8:00 am. And we are completely done before 10:00 am. By that time we both get ready and I head out to take care of our businesses.
I have realized that I need to "back off" a bit when it comes to her lessons. She is only 5 years old and we are currently doing MFW K curricula.
I want her to have her afternoons off, to play and be a child. Most days she will have her quite time beginning at 2pm thru 3:30 and she can read, nap, or just be still.
This way I can "catch" up on house chores or finalize any paperwork that might be pending in my desk.
I usually set out lesson plans and activities on Sunday afternoons. I separate each lesson on a daily folder where I can just pull out on the morning of our lesson. This way, I feel more organized and prepared.
We usually start our day with Bible time. I choose as part of the lesson a verse to read and memorize and we continue from there. I don't time our lessons. I don't want restrictions when we are working on a particular subject just for the sake of getting the others done.
I only decide to "move on" when I see that she dwaddles on a particular material. I remove it and make a note to present it later on the week.
I take time off for sickness, as we did this week. She has only 2 "school" days. But we were able to complete all four days into 2. If that would not have been the case, well, there is always next week.
I have learned to follow God's lead when it comes to scheduling. You can plan and schedule all you want, but if you don't have God leading you, everything becomes a chaos.
Happy learning.
Blessings.
One of the challenges I have faced in homeschooling is the monotony that can come from week to week. There are times that I am preparing the lesson plans for the week, and I feel like "not this again...." And so when I do not make any changes and present my daughter with the daily plans, she exclaims; "but I already did this". So in order to just get over this phase I have for this week at least, put down the MFW lessons, and made my own. Adding "fun" stuff that will keep her entertained and focused. I believe that learning should be fun. I have also "relaxed" a bit and added the board game Boggle Jr. Even though we are playing a game, she is learning. I must say that breaking away from the norms or "un school" myself is very hard. On a good note is that I have an idea of what I want to teach for first grade. I emphasize "idea" because I know that the closer I get, my mind will tend to change. I guess I just need to take one-day-at a time. I am planning to school thru the summer so we can finish up our K curriculum. I will continue to do a 4 day week and enjoy the rest of the day outdoor (weather permitting). Have a great and productive learning week. Many blessings.
This week we are on Lesson 13 of our MFW Curriculum. What I enjoy so much of it is that I get to supplement on the math and add some fun stuff as well. We are studying the letter C. So she has five words to learn and memorize and they all start with the letter C. So what I did is I incorporated flash cards with the translation of those words in spanish. So she learns both words in english and in spanish simultaneously. I have also been generating a word search with the words of the week. She really enjoys it and it challenges her greatly. I have also added more bible devotionals. This is the part I enjoy the most. We both get to study and meditate on a verse a day. This week we have no big projects. I have been sick for a couple of days and my energy level is very low. I wish you all homeschoolers a successful learning week!
This week has been so much fun. We began we lesson 11 learning about the ants and their habitat. And the next day we celebrated Earth Day by doing our first lapbook. The Ants finally arrived on the second day and we deposit them into their new habitat as they searched and explored their way around. There is so much life lessons that we learned this week. My daughter has made a conscious effort to keep all the lights off in our home. "because we need to save electricity so we can save our planet Mommy." My hubby and I in turn have learned that Ants become lazy in the cold! Wow. This is one if the many reasons I love to homeschool. I feel as if I too get a chance to do it all over again. Learning and making it fun. She finished all her scheduled lessons in 4 days. We are planning to take today off. It has been a steady but intensive week. I think that I will probably carry on with the insect theme for next week's lesson. The ants will only survive at max for 2 more weeks. And I want us to take full advantage of learning a thing or two from them. I have seen first hand how much my girl has enjoyed this week. As I said, for being 5.5 she had intensive and long sitting lessons. But she never complained because she was totally enjoying what she was doing. I love to hear "I love homeschool Mommy". In the other hand, I am seeing first hand how her character is being shaped. I wish I can say that she always deserve a star for her behavior, but that is not the case. Well, that is for now. This post usually appears in my homeschool lounge homepage, in the event you would like to leave a comment. View the scroll bar to the right and you will find it there! Have a great weekend to all. Many blessings.
I am anxiously awaiting the arrival of 25 egg ants tommorrow. Hopefully, we will get a "queen" egg. We are doing Lesson 11 of MWFK curriculum.. An I have done my homework to prepare for the upcoming week. We already have the Anthill Habitat where we will deposit the ant eggs. We will learn and memorize and new verse this week. "Go to the ant, you sluggard; consider its way and be wise. Prov. 6:6. She will also memorize "I am a wise child, so I work hard." Which I will post in the front door of our fridge for daily memorization. The eager teacher in me wants her to recite, memorize, and do a copywork at the end of the week. But I will go slowly (sigh). I have prepared 6 new sight words both in english and spanish. I have slacked in this area. I need to be more consistant with teaching her spanish. So for lesson 11, we will study the Ant Anatomy. Hopefully the eggs will be here and will release them to their habitat later in the day. We will be reading "If Iwere an Ant" by Amy Moses. This book was in the rookie reader selection of our library. She will read 51 new words this week. I have also prepared 6 new 3-4 words sentences for letter recognition and memorization. For grammar, we will do a sentence a day. She is learned the proper use of upper and lower case and now is learning punctuation marks. Math and science will be an integral part of the anthill project. I need to remind myself that math is learned in many ways and not necessarily thru worksheets only. Hopefully we will be able to do an ant craft. I am hoping that we can do a lapbook. We will see. (sigh again.....) All this is my plan lessons for the week. But I know that I can plan, but I need God to help me execute. Without Him, I will be fustrated and overwhelmed. Almost forgot, Tuesday we celebrate Earth Day. I am planning something extra special that day. That is all for now. I wish you all a successful learning week! Many blessings.
My decision to homeschool was not by choice, but rather by calling. I remember struggling with the decision to move my daughter from the school she was attending after some personal mishaps. I searched and visited many reputable christian schools, and I found my self in a bind. I recall asking my Heavenly Father for guidance when the "idea" of homeschooling was placed in my heart. Without having much prior knowledge on what consisted to homeschool, I already had a few preconceived ideas about homeschooled children. In my life I only knew one hand full of children that had been homeschooled, and they seemed pretty "normal" to me.... I searched and investigated this topic further without consulting with my husband. I "thought" that perhaps he would not agree to homeschooling our daughter so I left it in God's hand. When we had the opportunity to sit and talk about this he was totally on-board to my surprise! Why to my surprise? Well, even though I was educated in the States, I was born in Cuba (same goes with my hubby) and homeschooling was never heard of! Now I can joyfully say that we have been doing this for a few months and I feel incredibly blessed. Not only has the Lord equipped me, but He has arranged for me to be involved in a homeschooling community both on line and in our local groups. And for this I am extremely thankful. Even though I appreciated and sympathized with my daughter's pre-K teachers, I knew that they could not lead her spiritually the way I can. I also took into consideration the time my daughter would actually spend learning in school and the time that is left for us to be involved as a family. Actual school time is 6 hrs. Actual learning time is 1.5 hours. This time does not include the time a child spends doing daily homework. I can not grasp why a child needs to have homework when they have already spent 6 hrs in school? Which she leads to confirm that they do not learn for the full 6 hours. Where does this leave family time? Weekends only? I did not have a child to spend only weekends with her. I am a hands on involved parent. It is a fact that with classrooms filled to limits, teachers can not give any child one-on-one attention and your child's needs are often overlooked. With a parent teacher, the child gets to enjoy full attention and his education is catered according to his needs. Many parents question about socialization issues. To me, this is a non issue. We have plenty of time during our day or week to socialize. My daughter not only gets to interact with adults with daily living experiences but she also attends extra curriculum activities several times a week with out counting weekly field trips and play dates. But the biggest factor I consider is why would I want my daughter to socialize in a school environment where children are exposed to inappropriate behavior and competitive demeanor. I want to set the environment where she will learn to live life in a Christian manner. I know that homeschooling is a path that not every christian family will under take. And I know that most families need a second income to sustain themselves. But I also know that with a few sacrificial financial adjustments and tight restrictions this task can be fulfilled. You need to consider what is best for your child and ultimately for your family. I have peace and joy to be my daughter's spiritual and academic teacher, guide, and leader. My daughter can be a child without the added stress that a regular "school" environment brings. She is able to learn real life lessons and we cherish our family time together. She is not looked on as a letter grade or a GPA. She is not looked on for her FCAT test results. This by any measure does not mean she will be dumbed down. She will not be academically challenged because there is wonderful and easily accessible curriculums out there that we have a strong academic base. All you need to do is research and see what works best for your learning/teaching style. Another misperception is that you need to have tons of patience. Well for starters we all have patience when we learn how to put it to practice. Again, depend on God for this. He will give you everything you need. This is a journey that is full filling and fun as we learn and bond together how to establish what works for us as a family. Just be obedient and follow God's lead. Many blessings.
When I started homeschooling I had this false idea that all days would be "wonderful". After my first week or so, I had a major wake up call. So far, I have learned that there will be days that will begin with a rough patch. Today, was no different. We began our day, the "wrong" way..... But the afternoon turned out to be wonderful. We had the opportunity to spend it together as a family at our local park. The weather has been beautiful for this time of the year. It was in the mid 60's. Very strange for this time of the year in our region. I am beginning to grasp that there will be happy days, and not so happy days. Another highlight of our day was when my girl asked me to soil (sew) her cat . And I asked her if she wanted to learn to do it on her on? To my surprise she was excited and curious to learn. So I took out the thread and the needle and after a brief demonstration she got it on her own! I am very sure that no 5 y/o is learning to sew in a regular school classroom today. So with good or rough days, I still feel blessed that I have the opportunity to homeschool her. And spend as much time as we do together as a family. Homeschooling is a wonderful journey! Many blessings.
