How do you fit all the lessons in?

[Alicia64]

It amazes me that some homeschool moms say, "you can get done in an hour what it takes the ps all day to do."

 

Between writing, spelling, math u see, reading aloud, SOTW, blah, blah, blah, there's no way I can get it all done in one day. Let alone one hour!!

 

Don't get me wrong: I don't even try to do this all in one day along with Spanish class, karate, art class etc.

 

But I was reading in the Well Trained Mind that we should be doing math every day. And I happen to think writing should happen every day too.

 

SOTW often gets kicked to the bottom of the list.

 

Ahhh! Any suggestions for scheduling all of this in a week's time?

 

Unfortunately my 6 year olds somehow are under the impression that if they homeschool they should have nothing but fun all day long. (I keep explaining to them that, "no, when we homeschool, we're miserable at home instead of at school!") Kidding! :lol:

 

Any advice?

 

Alley

[Jean in Newcastle]

You schedule it all by making the lessons short.

 

For a 6 year old -

 

math should be about 15 (20 min. max).

 

writing - I'm assuming you mean copywork at this age would take 15 min. max and probably less in my opinion.

 

spelling - I don't do spelling with a 6 year old unless that 6 year old was doing 2nd grade work. But if I did that would be another 15 min. max.

 

reading aloud - I do at breakfast or lunch time. We do all our history reading then. They don't mind if I read while munching. And it keeps their hands busy.

 

I always scheduled 1/2 hour of fun reading later in the afternoon as a snuggly time.

 

Art is part of free time at that age. I put out some materials and let them go at it. I might do something more formal one day a week.

 

Music is once a week. And it takes 20 min. max.

 

Let's see - that adds up to 2 hours at the most (including one extra such as music or art).

Edited November 12, 2009 by Jean in Newcastle

[rwjx2khsmj]

I make my lesson plans in pencil and I erase... a lot.

 

I schedule four days of lessons, everything included and leave Friday totally blank for whatever we didn't get to during the M-Th time. If, by some miracle, we ever have it all done when Friday rolls around we'll go for ice cream and a movie!

[jujsky]

I'm homeschooling 2 1st graders -- one 5, the other 6 -- and we're using K-12 so my schedule is right on the computer. It takes me anywhere from 2-5 hours to school depending on how much we do, how willing my son is to work (dd is nearly always cooperative about school), and how difficult the subject matter is. We do phonics, language arts, and math every day. History, art, science, and music are done twice/week. Lately I've been starting with either history or science (depending on the day). I found I was a lot more likely not to get to those subjects if we left them for last. DS is usually so resistant to doing math or phonics that it's a huge battle if we start with those subjects. I find by starting with something he likes, the day goes better than it would otherwise.

 

I've also been very clear that if the work isn't done in time, ds doesn't go to his activities. So far I've only had to do that once, and he was not happy with me! He knows I'm serious now though, so the threat is more real to him.

 

I also found that with the curriculum I've been using, no one is really expected to do it all. It's a mastery approach, so there's no point in having them do (for example) 3-4 pages of math plus an assessment if they can do well on one page.

 

Adjusting the workload can be a real challenge! I'm still struggling to find a good balance.

Edited November 12, 2009 by jujsky

[katemary63]

We do this schedule below on M, W, F. We skip science and history on Tue and have co-op music class. We do only devos and math on Thur and have co-op PE, and other classes including art and later riding lessons. Daddy reads to her aloud every evening.

 

7:45 devotions

8:00 spelling

8:15 logic, Awana practice

8:30 math

9:30 silent reading

9:45 handwriting

10:00 break

10:15 grammar, lit, writing

11:30 lunch

12:00 science or history or both

1:00 Rosetta Stone

1:15 finish up anything left over

1:30 or so - done for the day

 

My DD is 8 and doing 4th grade. I used to think it was okay not to have a schedule. But not anymore. This is the only way we get things done in a timely fashion so we can have fun later. We love it!

[elise1mds]

It takes us - USUALLY - between 15-25 minutes for most lessons with more time spent on history or science, depending on the day.

 

Our schedule is a MWF/TTh schedule. MWF are math, writing, spelling, and history with Latin thrown in on Wednesdays. Sometimes he can get a spelling lesson done in two days and can skip a day of that. Tuesday and Thursday are math, writing, grammar, and science. He has a swimming lesson on Thursday mornings but everything else he does is after lunch. I try to get it all done before then. He is allowed to request science labs on non-science days after everything else is done. Of course, we read a ton of books, too, but that typically gets done after we get DD from preschool.

 

I say all this now. DD wants to come home next year, so my schedule will have to change. It'll be interesting!

[Ellie]

Short lessons; no outside activities before 1 or 2 in the afternoon, perferably later; alternate days for some subjects (science two days, history two days).

[Tam101]

It takes us 3+ hours to get it done. I start with Math and Spelling since that is workbook stuff and he has to sit at the table to do it. Then we move to the couch for FLL, WWE, SOTW. When it's time for copywork we head back to the table. We only do science and cursive once a week if we even get to it!! Cursive has been pushed way back lately. Thurs and Fri is resource class day so nothing gets done. Wed is hit and miss, he has piano and bible study then lunch with MIL. Wed is supposed to be our science and cursive day. HA! We school on the weekends since our weekdays are so busy. Dh works from home and often works weekends and has days off during the week so weekends are meaningless for us.

[mcconnellboys]

Well, I think you can get through most of the written work within a couple or three hours a day, but you really can't get any meaningful reading included in that time.

[rafiki]

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