The first week in review

Overall, it was a good week. Up until this year, we have done a lot of school all together. The 3 girls and me. We've done lots of read alouds and discussions. This year I want my oldest especially to take more responsibility for her school work. One idea I had was to print out a chart of our schedule for each day. It has worked brilliantly. My older 2 can read the chart and know exactly what is expected of them each day. I can't believe I didn't come up with this idea earlier. It includes a special chart for morning chores that I expect them to get done before we start school at 10 am which includes:

Get dressed AND put away pj's and put yesterday's clothes in the laundry basket

eat breakfast AND put dishes in the sink

brush teeth AND put away toothbrush and wipe out sink

Make bed NEATLY

Brush hair

It was so nice to be able to refer to the chart to make sure they had done everything. Then once we started school the girls helped me stay on schedule using the chart.

10am - Topic Read Alouds - next week we are learning about weather
11am - break
11:15am - spelling or grammar, alternating days, Kali and Sierra together
11:30am - Writing - alternating copywork, dictation, freewriting, etc.
12:00pm - Lunch
12:30pm - break
1:00pm - Math
1:30pm - Reading
2pm - freetime
4pm - Practice Piano, Violin (Kali), Typing (Sierra)
5pm - Clean up


This is the schedule for Monday and Tuesday. Tuesday we do our weekly chores, so free time doesn 't start until 2:30pm.

Wednesday and Friday we have afternoon activities so we have to shorten our school day. I haven't exactly figured out how to do that, yet. Something will have to be skipped.

Thursdays, I have the girls signed up for a choir that meets in the morning. I don't generally like morning activities because it messes up our whole day. None of us feel like doing school in the afternoon after getting home from a morning activity. But this year I have a plan. My dh had an idea to do stations like his favorite second grade teacher. At first I thought, "How am I going to fit this into my already super full schedule?" but then I realized it would be a perfect thing to do on Thursday afternoons. Arwen was feeling a bit sick, but the older girls did the following stations this week.

1. Do math wrap ups. Multiplication for Sierra, Addition for Kali
2. Practice spelling words
3. Do a Mad Lib
4. Draw a picture and write a short story
5. Silent reading

It worked out really well. The idea was to spend 15 minutes at each station, but some didn't take as long. I helped keep time while I got the dishes done. And right now the girls think it is great fun.

It was a busy week. I had meetings Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday evenings, a homeschool planning meeting on Wednesday afternoon, and a Homeschool Potluck on Friday. And I am now feeling the repercussions of it. I am defintely sick today Of course, it didn't help that poor sick Arwen was breathing in my face all week because sick kids alway need lots of snuggles... I am hoping to feel better by tomorrow, so we can a a good first full week of school next week.