Organizing question- with binders

[Joyoflearning]

I can't seem to figure out how to be the most efficient with my organizing the schoolwork we plan to do this next year. I am NOT good about planning months in advance because I don't know how to change everything when we miss a day. We are using HOD and CC so it should be easy...but I just don't know what papers/manuals to put where and how to have it organized in way where I can plan (about a week) ahead. I know I'm over thinking it. We are using Phonics Road which has teacher/student manual, Rightstart-manual and manipulatives, some worksheets, Little Otters Science and Meet the Masters. None of our subjects have many worksheets (except PR) but are mostly lesson plans. I planned on putting all papers in a teacher's binder, but then I saw how much room each set of lesson plans took up. I thought I wanted to give my daughter her own binder, but wasn't sure what I would put in it. I thought maybe I would just put a couple weeks worth of each subject in her binder but then thought it should go in mine if that is where I am doing my planning. Then I thought maybe I should just give each subject (science, art, math, hod, CC) it's own binder since PR already had it's own. Then maybe put a weeks worth of plans for each subject in mine?? I'd love to hear what other people do. Or if anyone has any ideas to slap me out of this I would love to hear it. More than anything I wanted everything easy to grab so I could plan it all at one time for the next week.

[Lovemyblessings]

First I decide how many school weeks we should do. (36) Then I decide how many days a week I will commit (4). Then I go through each textbook/workbook individually and spread it out to fit in our time frame. Some subjects are seasonal, and I figure out when this should be done- with some relating to Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, etc. I plan the whole year at once. Because we do 4 days at a time, our schedule is flexible- we also start during the summer to take pressure off during the Fall/Winter.

[smillard00]

I have a little chart for the 36 weeks of school. At the top I list the child's name and the subject and the year. I do one chart for each subject we use. I go through the materials for that subject and determine how much we need to get done in a week in order to finish during the 36 weeks of our school year. Then I have a planning sheet to consolidate the plans into a weekly page where I can see everything. If I have the yearly subject sheets done in advance, then I can do the weekly assignment sheet each week as we go along. When I transfer assignments onto my weekly sheet, I can check that box off of my yearly plan for that subject. If we get behind in something, it isn't a problem. I'm only transferring one week at a time, so I can adjust. In my binder, I have a tab for each subject and put the yearly plan behind each tab. Then the weekly sheets go in the front of the binder with the newest week on top. Behind the subject tabs I also put anything else that is helpful for reference. For example, I have the table of contents printed out for some e-books we use. I don't print the whole book, but I find it helpful to have the TOC in my binder. Our science curriculum has a sheet where they have divided the work up into weekly segments, so I can keep a copy of that plan in my binder.

 

Hope this helps :)

[La Condessa]

There was an old post by Trivium Academy about how she put everything her kids were going to need into 9-week binders, which I found really helpful. She's not homeschooling anymore, but you can still go look at her old blog.

[Lily_Grace]

I work a week ahead in my planner. On Sunday nights I take the week's worth of work and transfer it to my son's binders. The rest of the week is spent refilling mine, one subject a day.

[llindseymomoffour]

Here is a website that has some organizing ideas on it. Hope it helps.

http://new-bintexas.webs.com/

[RahRah]

I have a running word document with each subject broken out into what needs to be done in the year, step by step to get to the end, in a list form.

 

Since sometimes we run ahead in some subjects and slightly behind in others, every two weeks I figure out the coming two weeks work for DS and that's the checklist we'll use, checked off as we go. Midway through the second week, I'll start to create the next two weeks list by looking at what we've done, where we got ahead, where we're lagging and make necessary adjustments, cut & paste off my master list what to add now, and by Saturday have the final next two weeks schedule setup to go on Monday.

 

If by Saturday anything remains on the lists from the previous two weeks, it gets added to the start of the new two weeks lists. Each week has its own page, but we might complete something in week one in week two, or from week two in week one - just depends on how much we're digging into something each day.

 

As each week checklist is completed, it gets filed into the planner where I keep track of subject hours only - the sheet serves to show what we did, but not necessarily on what day it was done in the week.

 

I keep a separate list of books read each week and that also goes into the planner so that I have a record of what we've read as a stand alone list.

[TXMary2]

I have a binder for each student. Each binder has tabs 1-36 and my lesson plan page has 5 days to a page. Instead of marking them Monday through Friday they are marked Day 1 - Day 5. That way if we do miss a day I don't have to move anything around - I am just picking up the binder and going right to where we left off. We school year round so I have 52 weeks to get through the 36 weeks of lesson plans. Since they don't have day names attached to them, Day 1 could fall on a Wednesday and I am not having to rearrange anything in the binder.

[2squared]

If your selections already have lesson plans, then I wouldn't create another set of lesson plans. I try to make everything into a do-the-next-thing type of material, and then I just grab the manual/binder/whatever when we do that thing.

 

For instance, your are using RightStart which is already divided into lessons. I think there are about 75 lessons in RS A. So, I would look at how many days we are doing school for the year - 180. Then I deduct 5 days for testing :glare:, 5 days for field trips, and 5 sick days. That leaves 165 seat-work days.

 

To complete the 75 RS A lessons, I would need to do 2-3 lessons/week. I have a bin for each dc's books. I would just put the manual and worksheets into my 5yo's bin and do the next lesson when it is math day.

 

Alternatively, I could decide to do 15 min of math/day every school day. So then I work with my dc for 15 min and put a sticky tab in the manual where we left off. The next day I start my 15 min right where the sticky tab is - irregardless of whether I completed a full lesson the day before.

 

I look at which materials I want to complete over the year and how much time I want to spend doing schoolwork, and I balance both components into a workable weekly time schedule and then we just do the next thing every day.

 

We have very few worksheets, so a binder system doesn't make sense for us.

[cam112198]

:bigear:

I'm just listening in. I'm still trying to figure the same thing out! We are also doing CC in the fall. :001_smile: