I know that there are several ways to go about scheduling your day, teaching your kids, running your classroom, and creating or buying your curriculum.  I’m NOT trying to say that my way is the RIGHT way to do it.  I’m just saying what works well for us right now.  This is what we do.

I Focus on the 5 R’s

• Reading
• wRiting
• aRt
• aRithmetic
• eaRth Sciences (OK, that last one is a stretch, I know, just go with it)

We do at least one activity in each of these every day, and I TRY to get a lot of them to go along with our themes.

Our Routine

(Not to be confused with a Strict Schedule… its really flexible)

8:00-9:00  –  Morning Work and Breakfast

Most of my schooling couldn’t be considered “classical” in any sense of the word, but we do morning work every day.  Its the same template that I just print off a bunch of at the beginning of the week (I’ve started doing them double sided) so that Zachary will get a chance to do Reading, Writing, Art, and Arithmetic EVERY SINGLE DAY WITHOUT FAIL!  The science part we do anyway because he is constantly wanting to read the books we get from the library and watch videos about whatever we’re studying.  But the 1st 4 R’s I have to make sure we do.

I put the Template Here for you to see.  I think its Pretty Good.  Its our Second Version.  The first just had Letter and Number of the day.

We do the morning work while he eats breakfast and I get Zoriah’s hair to look like someone actually cares for this child. (seriously crazy hair on this girl)

Zoriah’s Hair All Crazy in the Morning

(Only Clothed pic I could find)

 

 

Zoriah’s Hair AFTER I’ve Done It

(Naked, but I cropped it)

So much cuter after that.  And when her brother is doing his morning work, I don’t have him coming in and distracting her while I’m trying to get all those tiny little rubber bands to bend her hair to my will (insert maniacal laughter here).

9:00-11:30 – School Time

It goes like this: Worksheet- 10 minute break – Worksheet – 10 minute break Zoriah has a short Milk Break at 10:30 or 10:45 so Zachary spends some time either reading or running around outside.

11:30-12:30 – LUNCH!

Zachary likes to help make lunch so a lot of the times it ends up being a cooking lesson.  If I want him out of the way, it turns into ART TIME while I’m cooking.  Q tips and watercolors are generally the order of the day.  He also has a supply of art things in his room if he’s been especially annoying that day.  He’s five, so that happens sometimes.

12:30-1:30 – More School

We resume the “worksheet/craft/activity then a 10 minute break” thing until Zoriah’s nap.  While I’m putting her to bed, Zachary gets more time to play outside or read (depending on the weather).

1:30-2:00 – READING time

We do a formal reading lesson during this time and read our library books.  We get new books every Monday when we go to the library for story time.

That’s the end of our school day.  It might seem short, but they’re young and need plenty of time to play.  PLUS they’re ALWAYS learning, formal instruction is only about 1/4 of his learning opportunities.

During all of our breaks I’m either doing some housework, working with Zoriah on Colors, numbers, shapes, etc. Playing with the small people or reading MY OWN BOOKS!!!!!  I firmly believe that reading lots of YA and Adult fiction keeps me sane amidst the sea of Dr Seuss, Sandra Boynton, Anna Dewdney, and Fly Guy.

Weekly Activities

We also have a LONG list of weekly activities which mess up our schedule and make things awesome.

Monday – Gymnastics then the Library.  We get our books for the week and participate in any activities or story times they have going on.  We’re there so much that the library ladies know us by name and know the types of books Zachary likes.  He couldn’t find a recent book on Hummingbirds once and they actually BOUGHT one for the library just for him.  If you haven’t gotten to know your library workers, do so.  They’re awesome people (I used to be one… it was fun)

Tuesday – Chiropractor.  We see ours weekly to have everyone in the family adjusted.  It might seem hippy-ish, but we like it and I haven’t had back issues since we started.  This is only a mild distraction that takes about 1/2 hour from our school day.

Wednesday – The OTHER library has a story time that we sometimes go to.  Sometimes we skip it and do School in the Park.  Most of the time we do Frozen Yogurt to as a fun treat for the small people.

Thursday – There is a chess club that we’ve just joined at Yet ANOTHER library in the area (We spend an exorbitant amount of time at our local libraries).  Its mostly a bunch of older men who like to get together and play.  Zachary loves chess, and he always looses spectacularly, but its fun for everyone.

Friday – The only day Zachary is allowed to watch whatever he wants for however long he wants.  Lately its been Wild Kratts, My Little Pony, and BBC Biology Documentaries.  We also do our grocery shopping on this day and Zachary helps me plan the meals for the week.

Other regular things we do: 

Pen Pal Letter Writing– It was my first, second?, 57th attempt to get Zachary interested in actually writing… like with a pencil and paper.  He LOVES getting mail, so I figured that if he had a pen pal (he has 3 now) he might actually WANT to write things.  We will also write Thank You notes and Letters to people he likes.  Our next will probably be to the Kratt Brothers.  We wrote one recently to one of my friends from college who was skyping with us while we did our Octopus Toilet Paper Roll craft.

Calls to Great Grandma – My Grandmother has recently gotten Skype so we Skype with her every Thursday before our chess Club.

“What did You Learn from this Video“ – If I let Zachary watch a video during the week (Not friday) then he has to do a worksheet telling me what he learned from that video.  Its just a list of 4 things he learned from the video.

So, yeah, that’s our Day and our Week.  Sound like fun? It is to us.