How do you start your school day?

[Stacy]

Everyone wakes up at a different time in the morning and I'm okay with that, as long as they meet me at 8am for our Bible study time ... most of the time, everyone has had their breakfast by then. Sometimes not. I'm the early riser and get more done before the kids. I like the quiet house in the morning. we have 6 kiddos, so once they are up, it is quite busy around here! :)

 

After Bible time, they start into the one-on-one tutor times with me and get their school work done. Tutor times are short, for the most part, as the kids are becoming more independent each year. Yeah for me. I do sit later in the morning or early afternoon with a couple of the younger kids to do science and/or history.

[Guest tinda]

Breakfast with Suzuki Book One (violin) playing in the background. Then math and handwriting. Then the rest of the day.

[profmom]

Instrument practice (dd -- piano, ds -- guitar) at 8:00

Bible memory passages (new + 1-2 review) together at 8:30

Prayer, especially for the person of the day (Mon-dh, Tues-me, Wed. dd#1, etc.)

History reading

Greek

Other subjects, usually math first with ds while dd begins her independent work

[St. Theophan Academy]

Fun Question!!!

 

I have slowly developed our routine, and it is finally beginning to feel very comfortable. Here is what we do:

 

First, I quit trying to start school at some ungodly hour like 8am! I realize it is impractical for us to get up, eat, straighten, nurse a baby and be ready that early and not loose my mind. This realization alone has made for much better days!

So, we start our morning with breakfast and chores - (I get up by 7 at the latest, but let the kids sleep til 7:30 - though often they are up earlier). After the kitchen is cleaned, we all head to the schoolroom. We begin at 9:00 with morning prayers, then Bible reading and usually a reading on a life of a saint or feast day reading. We do all of this on the couch together (prayers are done standing, then we sit to read). That takes about 20-30 minutes. Then we move to the table for calendar time (with the first grader she is working on months of year etc. and we review the saints we have commemorated for the month - with the 3rd grader we are working on the months/days/weather in Spanish) and recitation - which consists of Latin forms, Bible verses, poems we are memorizing, sometimes history facts or science (ex - we are learning the order of the planets and colors of the rainbow in science) - whatever we are memorizing at the time (I use the CM memory box system to organize this). All of that takes less than 10 minutes. Then we move on to the core subjects - Latin and math for 3rd grader, math. reading and spelling for 1st grader. I am trying to then let them take a break and go outside around 10:30 for about 30 minutes before we move on to our other studies and piano practice. So that is how we start our day!

[Mom0012]

I pull my Kindergarten daughter into bed with me and have her read to me for about 1/2 an hour out of a Pathway reader. I will be so sad when she doesn't need or want to do this anymore.

 

Lisa

[Melissa B]

Dh and spa sound like the ideal way to start each day. :D Sadly, my dh must leave for work at 3am and is happy if I have at least made it to bed before he gets up around 2.

 

We start with preschool for an hour - around 8am or so. Then we walk for an hour. The kids are free to play the rest of the morning - outside if the weather is good. We have lunch at 1:00 and start school around 2:00. The girls usually start with math, but it is not a requirement or anything.

[Hoggirl]

his piano practice first thing. He practices from 8:00 - 9:00 each morning. This has been a wonderful way to start our day. He gets to check it off, and I get an hour to start laundry, to start dinner, to check e-mails, to take a shower...whatever the need of the day is. After that we do stick to a regular schedule of grammar, latin, memory work, math, and writing before lunch, followed by history and science after lunch.