We’ve officially begun our first week of school, hooray. I have to say that I did enjoy our break, I was planning to school through the summer but once we had our first break we just didn’t get back into school. I’m very glad though because I felt so burnt out by the end of June.
Buying Curriculum:
I began to get things together very slowly and bit by bit for this year.
I start looking for used curriculum in March/April and bought my last book this week to spread out the costs.
I make my list usually in January since that’s when I know if that curricula is going to work for us again next year or if I need to find something new.
Planning:
I’m not a super planner and never have been but this year Mama’s pregnant and finishing up her thesis so I was forced to plan. I make a yearly plan by dividing up our books in chapters or doable chunks and fill it into my excel file. But I’m not rigid, if things don’t get done, it gets cut and paste to the next week. I made a chore list for M1 and it’s hanging on my fridge because Mama is too tired of repeating the same things over every. single. day. All I say now is look on the list. I also made a schedule for M1’s school work. I put it into a page protector and write in each week what he needs to do for the week, so that I don’t have to do anything planning-wise daily. An hour of reading constitutes 30 minutes from a mommy assigned book and 30 minutes from a book of his choice. M1 also wanted to know what we were doing each day or for the week so that really helped.
Task Card
I had to alternate writing intensive subjects with ones that weren’t since I have a boy who is a reluctant writer.
Weekly Plan2
M2 can choose what subjects to do in what order, he usually starts the day off reading. We may or may not head off to the park in the afternoon. We are not morning people at all so we start our work around 2ish sometimes 3ish which is why I don’t have a time frame on our schedule. As long as it gets done by the end of the day. There is no screen time for M2 until all his work is done, then he usually gets 20 minutes of computer time. M1 and M2 both watch 30 minutes of TV daily if the day has gone well. I’ve just subscribed to Brainpop and Discovery Streaming through G3 so I’m looking forward to adding those in. They love Brainpop so far, and $60 for the year is a bargain to me I’m glad they are enjoying it.
5th Grade
This is where M2 works, this is actually in my kitchen, so I can work with M2 while I’m cooking.
All of his books are stored under his desk in this diaper box.
Our All About Spelling tiles are stuck to the side of our fridge, I have no space for another whiteboard.
This is where I keep M2’s notebooks, folders, and lapbook mini books.
I have his history and science spiral books in there for their notebooking/lapbooking. There’s a french workbook, AAS teacher’s manual, notebook for dictation, cursive writing sheet, and writing folder for Paragraph Writing Made Easy printouts. English from the roots up flash cards, Singpore math textbook, and challenging word problem book are also in there, pretty compact I’d say.
Preschooler:
I also have a 3 year old running around who wants to be involved in everything so I have some activities ready for him to pull out. They were always fighting the whiteboard so I got M2 his own board to write on. The idea is that I need him to occupy himself while I’m working with M1.
He also has:
Foam letters/numbers
Bingo dabber with his name or other words written on construction paper for him to dab away at
Wipe off books about numbers and letters
Colouring books with big crayons
play dough and shape cutters
puzzles
clothes pin numbers
MUS blocks
Here is where all M2 things are to occupy him and hopefully keep him busy while mommy is working with M1
And that my friends is how you homeschool in a 2 bedroom apartment with no book shelves. Yeah we’ve move a lot and hubby refuses to carry large bookcases for me, therefore, I have no bookcases. My dream home consists of a whole wall of bookcases which he has promised to build for me.Â
We’ve officially begun our first week of school, hooray. I have to say that I did enjoy our break, I was planning to school through the summer but once we had our first break we just didn’t get back into school. I’m very glad though because I felt so burnt out by the end of June.
Buying Curriculum:
I began to get things together very slowly and bit by bit for this year.
I start looking for used curriculum in March/April and bought my last book this week to spread out the costs.
I make my list usually in January since that’s when I know if that curricula is going to work for us again next year or if I need to find something new.
Planning:
I’m not a super planner and never have been but this year Mama’s pregnant and finishing up her thesis so I was forced to plan. I make a yearly plan by dividing up our books in chapters or doable chunks and fill it into my excel file. But I’m not rigid, if things don’t get done, it gets cut and paste to the next week. I made a chore list for M1 and it’s hanging on my fridge because Mama is too tired of repeating the same things over every. single. day. All I say now is look on the list. I also made a schedule for M1’s school work. I put it into a page protector and write in each week what he needs to do for the week, so that I don’t have to do anything planning-wise daily. An hour of reading constitutes 30 minutes from a mommy assigned book and 30 minutes from a book of his choice. M1 also wanted to know what we were doing each day or for the week so that really helped.
Task Card
I had to alternate writing intensive subjects with ones that weren’t since I have a boy who is a reluctant writer.
Weekly Plan2
M2 can choose what subjects to do in what order, he usually starts the day off reading. We may or may not head off to the park in the afternoon. We are not morning people at all so we start our work around 2ish sometimes 3ish which is why I don’t have a time frame on our schedule. As long as it gets done by the end of the day. There is no screen time for M2 until all his work is done, then he usually gets 20 minutes of computer time. M1 and M2 both watch 30 minutes of TV daily if the day has gone well. I’ve just subscribed to Brainpop and Discovery Streaming through G3 so I’m looking forward to adding those in. They love Brainpop so far, and $60 for the year is a bargain to me I’m glad they are enjoying it.
5th Grade
This is where M2 works, this is actually in my kitchen, so I can work with M2 while I’m cooking.
