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Homeschool Planning . . . or not! How I (sort of) plan our days.

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Homeschool Planning. Let’s see if I can come up with anything to write about this topic . . .
 
Let me just be honest up front and say that homeschool planning is just not my thing. Actually, planning in general is not my thing! I’m pretty spontaneous and generally speaking, fly by the seat of my pants in most things.
 
Don’t get me wrong — I have tried to plan. I have set aside days to write extensive lesson plans for a quarter at a time. I have purchased curriculum that has lesson plans all laid out. I have dreamed about having a homeschool with such a great plan that every day goes smoothly, every subject gets accomplished as scheduled, and I never fall off the lesson plan.
 
There are few problems with this though:

Our homeschool is delight-directed

Because our homeschool operates on the assumption that I will follow Ben’s interests and passions, there’s just no way to plan ahead very far. He’s an 11-year-old boy. His interests change. Often. We do begin the year with a list of things Ben wants to learn about, but at some point, usually the first month, something not on the list piques his curiosity. If we were following a preset plan, it would be difficult to switch gears so easily.

Rabbit trails

You’ve heard of those, right? Let me give you an example. You’re going along, learning all about horses, when one day, you begin talking about how the Pharaohs in ancient Egypt used horses to pull their chariots. Suddenly, your son gets interested in mummies and the next thing you know you are mummifying a chicken. Chickens have little to do with horses in the grand scheme of things. That, my friend, is a rabbit trail. Or maybe it’s a chicken trail? Anyway, we would not be free to follow them, if we had a plan we had to follow. (that’s a lot of animals in one scenario, too!)

Life happens

I’ve blogged before about some chronic health problems I live with. There are just days I cannot do everything I’d like to be able to do. There are days when school depends on audio books, videos, our book basket, our plethora of (free) Kindle books, SchoolhouseTeachers.com, or iPad apps. There are times, these kinds of days become a week. Or two. I must have the flexibility to change things up, literally at a moment’s notice. Falling off the lesson plan all the time would be frustrating for the both of us.

I know some of you are shaking your heads, rolling your eyes, maybe even gasping as you read. But some of  you just sighed in relief, because now you know you aren’t the only one. And guess what? It’s all good. Whether you are an uber planner, who can’t live without colorful pens, pages and pages of calendars and planning sheets for each subject, or a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants homeschooler who would rather have your toenails removed than plan, it is okay. There’s room in the homeschool universe for all of us!
 
Homeschool Planning . . . or not. How I (sort of) plan our days  
Now that I have shared that little secret with you, let me share with you some items that are a must-have for me, not necessarily for planning, but for record-keeping. I plan to keep a record of our homeschool. I think that counts.
 
The first thing has to be the Schoolhouse Planner. It’s available for free with a membership to SchoolhouseTeachers.com, which you can join for just $5. Seriously, go pay the $5, get the Planners, and check out the site. It’s cool. Inside the Planner, you will find the usual interactive calendars and planning forms (interactive meaning you can type write on them). But I don’t use those. What I do use are some of the Homeschool Forms — unit study planning pages, field trip record, reading record, attendance record, and several awesome “must know” forms that I can print and put into Ben’s notebooks. Perfection.
 
DonnaYoung.org has these fabulous daily lesson plan timer sheets. I do print these off so that Ben has a guide for what we’re doing each day. They usually get filled out the night before we use them, though on occasion, I’ve been know to get a week’s worth prepared on Sunday. That’s almost planning, I think.
 
I also do have a physical July to July calendar I picked up for under $10 at Target that is purse-sized, where I can jot down field trips, and other “appointments” that come up. Sometimes, I actually do plan field trips.
 
One more thing I want to share is that I often do plan my own unit studies. Hey, that’s more planning for me. Whew! I knew I had it in me!
 
As you can imagine, there’s not always a ready-made unit study for everything Ben might be interested in. Putting together (planning) your own unit studies is very simple, and will enable you to really let your child’s passions be the focus of learning. As long as you have access to the internet (which, obviously, you do!) and a library card, you can do it. I wrote a blog post about the steps to take already, so rather than re-write all of that, just click over to read about how to plan your own unit studies.
 
Finally, lest you think there is absolutely zero organization to our homeschool, we do have a daily schedule that we attempt to stick to. I had 3 goals in mind when I developed this schedule:
  1. Begin my day with quiet time
  2. Get school done in a timely manner
  3. Find a way NOT to be on the computer all day.

I work from home 20 hours a week, and my job requires that I be online the entire time. Part of my job involves social media, which we all know can sneak in and take over your life. Some advanced planning (see, there’s that word again!) is necessary to keep that from happening. So, here is the design of our school days:

8am — I wake up, have quiet time and check email
9am — Ben wakes up, eats breakfast and does a couple of morning chores
10am — school begins
2pm — school is done, afternoon chores
3pm — Mom’s office hours, Ben’s free time
6pm –dinner, family time until bedtime
9pm — bedtime routine for Ben
10pm — Ben to bed, Mom’s free time
12mn — Mom to bed

Now, this is a work in progress. Always. When we follow it, we have our best days. The toughest parts are the waking up and going to bed times. For both of us. Like I said, the computer can sneak in and take over. I plan to be more diligent about implementing and sticking to this schedule for the coming year. I’m even planning to take off the month of September from blogging and writing reviews, just so I can concentrate on getting our school year off to the right start. I am planning on having the best year ever!

Whew! I did it! I wrote a blog post about homeschool planning. Look at all that planning I’ve done already and it’s just the first day of August! And I didn’t think I would have anything to write on this topic!

Are you a planner? 
 

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If you enjoyed this article, you might also like to read Homeschool Planning for Middle School (goals and curriculum for grade 7).

Homeschool Planning for Middle School

 
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