Trivium Academy Posted June 5, 2008 Share Posted June 5, 2008 I just posted about what I do to plan a year out. http://triviumacademy.blogspot.com/2008/06/how-i-plan-year.html I don't know if it will help anyone but I figured since there are so many new homeschoolers on the board, it just might. I'm not the authority on planning, this is just what I do, there are many talented hslers on this board that do things a little differently b/c it works for them. That is the key ingredient, to make it work for you. I hope other organizers and planners on the board will also link how they plan out their years to provide a great thread on the various ways this can be approached and how it works in their individual homeschools. Blessings, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trivium Academy Posted June 5, 2008 Author Share Posted June 5, 2008 Other fabulous planners I visit and their websites http://homeschoolblogger.com/karenciavo http://higherupandfurtherin.blogspot.com/search/label/Organization http://magnumopusacademy.blogspot.com/2008/02/pictures-of-notebook.html http://melissawiley.com/blog/category/day-planners/ (I love her blog, btw!!!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emmy Posted June 5, 2008 Share Posted June 5, 2008 thanks for pointing to it Jessica - I always enjoy your blog posts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MamaReese Posted June 5, 2008 Share Posted June 5, 2008 Wow, thanks, this was really helpful:) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frontier Mom Posted June 5, 2008 Share Posted June 5, 2008 Thanks. Do you use Excel or another program to lay out your plans? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MakingScrapbooks Posted June 5, 2008 Share Posted June 5, 2008 Thanks for sharing this! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
home4school Posted June 5, 2008 Share Posted June 5, 2008 Jessica, what is your projected last day of school? I was just wondering bc I like the idea of not starting til after Labor Day and I liked the breaks you scheduled to allow time for planning the next unit. Do you have up the scedule for the last two units? Thanks! Kim Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trivium Academy Posted June 5, 2008 Author Share Posted June 5, 2008 http://triviumacademy.blogspot.com/2008/04/year-at-glance-2008-2009.html The end of July so far and that includes 4 weeks of wiggle room so we could take 4 more weeks off during the year and still have the same end date. I plan to take 3 weeks in August off and start again in Sept of '09 for 4th grade/K. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trivium Academy Posted June 5, 2008 Author Share Posted June 5, 2008 Yes, I use Appleworks actually (I have a Mac) but Excel would do the same thing Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frontier Mom Posted June 5, 2008 Share Posted June 5, 2008 Thanks, I also have a Mac. This looks like a great plan and I also like your notebook idea for each quarter. I'm new to TOG and think this will help me stay on track so much better. BTW, love that haircut!! I see you live in Georgia. My whole family, except me, live in Georgia. My parents are in Kennesaw, brother in Woodstock and sister in Calhoun. Not sure if your close by but I'm about 5 hours north of them in NC. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trivium Academy Posted June 5, 2008 Author Share Posted June 5, 2008 We've moving back to the Savannah area. I tell you, if we moved to North Georgia, there would be tons of people I could meet! Y'all need to move South! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jenmomof3 Posted June 5, 2008 Share Posted June 5, 2008 Love the idea of pre-filling the notebooks. I may just have to give that a try. Thanks for sharing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Virginia Heather Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Hey, Jessica... tell me more about your daily folders, if you don't mind :o) I understand the quarterly notebooks-- great idea!-- but I don't understand why you pull out the pages each week. Is that just for ease of use?? And do you have a separate folder for each subject? How does that work? Thanks for sharing! You're inspiring me in my own efforts to reorganize! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frontier Mom Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Yep. My dh was from NC so when he finished seminary in Atlanta, where we met, we moved to NC. My family currently lives in Georgia but I am originally a Tennessee and Alabama girl. So, I get a kick out of people talking about having a Southern accent around here - they don't even sound southern compared to where I come from. LOL. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trivium Academy Posted June 6, 2008 Author Share Posted June 6, 2008 We have a wall hanging that holds folders (see picture here), there is a pocket for each day (and since I have 2 children and there are 10 pockets, 5 pockets per child). I put all of Monday's work in the Monday one, duh- right? Lol. I do this because it keeps dd7 on track and focused on the day's work without getting distracted by what's ahead and it makes the day's work seem manageable to her. Instead of seeing a filled notebook of work to be done, she only sees what she needs to accomplish that day. It goes from seeming overwhelming to easy in her eyes. I have to say, it helps me too. Not only that, the pockets allow her to work on one thing at a time instead of taking something out of a binder to work on and putting it back. The pockets are big enough to stick her independent reading book in there as well. 10 pockets (the one I have) A larger one for $12 I also love this but my son is too young yet for it, if you don't have wall space this would work great. http://www.discountschoolsupply.com/Product/ProductDetail.aspx?product=17043&keyword=pocket%20chart hth Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jan in SC Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 I've told you this before, but you really are my hero! Thanks for sharing all of your hard work.::001_smile: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trivium Academy Posted June 6, 2008 Author Share Posted June 6, 2008 Thank you Jan but I'm disappointed no one else sharing what they do. I was hoping this would be a very helpful thread with others chiming in on how they approaching planning their year. I learned from others on how to do it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jan in SC Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Well... I'll share... I buy every piece of curriculum I can find, then I question why I bought it. Frequently, I tear up a little and think they would be better off in school, then... I pull myself together and eat some ice cream. After that there are "serious" discussions about maids and tutors coming to live with us. Finally, I sigh and look through my purchases again, usually remembering that there is still a catalog I haven't ordered from, yet! This is why people like you are so valuable to people like me! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Virginia Heather Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Having a light bulb moment here, lol! Your system makes perfect sense-- a thousand thanks, Jessica, for sharing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sahamamama Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 .... but right now, my husband says it's time to go to bed! He's right, of course. Good night, y'all! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMindy Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 This looks great, Jessica and is VERY similar to what I do also. This year I have worked everything into a 36 week schedule. We actually school year-round, but the 36 week schedule will be all the subjects and the summer will be fewer subjects or just a specialty area I want to focus on. How do you post documents on your blog like that? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frontier Mom Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Yes, I am working on mine too. I would also like to know how to post documents on my blog. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kim in SouthGa Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 there was a organizational disscussion on the general board that I thought some folks interested in this thread might like to read also... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swellmomma Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Well... I'll share... I buy every piece of curriculum I can find, then I question why I bought it. Frequently, I tear up a little and think they would be better off in school, then... I pull myself together and eat some ice cream. After that there are "serious" discussions about maids and tutors coming to live with us. Finally, I sigh and look through my purchases again, usually remembering that there is still a catalog I haven't ordered from, yet! This is why people like you are so valuable to people like me! lol have you been peeking in my windows? This sounds like me! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skimerinkydo Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Thank-you for sharing. I've bought some of the curriculum but haven't finished planning yet...the windows on my computer crashed and while I'm waiting for dh to fix it, I haven't been able to access the files I started or print anything. This year, for my 9yods, each day I write his list of assignments on a paper on his clipboard. Then he pretty much works through the assignments in whatever order he wants. Next year I will be going from one student to two and will have to figure out how to do things differently. When planning for the year, I start out making a list for each subject correlating the different books we will be using. For example, in Math ds is using Singapore 4A, the extra practice book, word problem book and Life of Fred. I created a table in word to show the order to do which assignment from which book. I refer to that list to decide what we will do each week. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trivium Academy Posted June 6, 2008 Author Share Posted June 6, 2008 In your spreadsheet program, save the file as a PDF, then open it and save each page as a .JPG or .GIF. Upload to photo storage and voila! You also get a free screenshot software from your favorite freeware software website and just take screenshots of your open document. But if you're just starting out I recommend doing the PDF to JPG or GIF above. hth Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emmy Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 How the other half lives LOL. Ok Jessica you said you wanted to hear how others plan - I'll share with you how I approached our schooling the last 2 years. To me planning has been deciding what curriculum to use (do I want sonlight core 1 or winterpromise?, do I want math u see or singapore? etc) ordering it and then just starting and seeing how it goes. :D Last fall I looked up the amounts of time SWB recommends kids spend on each subject and just loosely made up a schedule (in my mind, and later on paper) that followed that. My oldest son Alex was 7 and somewhere between a 1st and a 2nd grader. My second son Henry was 5 1/2 and in K. So I looked at the grammar stage in WTM and came up with these numbers for my 7yo: spelling - 10-15 minutes FLL 15-20 minutes writing 5-20 minutes math 30-40 minutes history 3 hours a week science 2 hours a week And that's what we did. We would have breakfast, get dressed - brush teeth, make beds and the kids would play while I got myself together and then when my dh left for work we started school. We did seatwork and usually took a break at a natural stopping point halfway through the morning. My kinder guy would start his stuff at the same time as my oldest but would of course finish sooner so he would go off to do legos in between or sometimes worked on art projects, dot to dot books, or kumon cutting books. The kids typically got crackers to eat while they did math. ;) Lunch was a long break for us in the day because it just takes forever to do anything with 4 kids....plus I liked to get the baby down for nap before we started afternoon stuff (last year my kids were 7, 5 1/2, 3 1/2, and 14 months when we started school). Afternoon stuff was the non-seatwork goodies and the stuff we did together. Read alouds, history, science, crafts, notebooking, fun stuff like that. We schooled 4 days a week and occasionally would not school on a regular school day because we went to the library or there was a fun field trip to do. It never occurred to me to plan what to do each week, we always just did the next thing. Some days my son would get half a chapter of math done in a day, sometimes a whole chapter. That would ebb and flow depending on if we hit a difficult part for him. As we finished subjects or workbooks I just put an eye to the calendar to decide if I wanted them to start the next year's book or just wait. For instance my kinder guy finished his handwriting book (RFH-K) in less than 3 months so I felt like he needed to move on to the 1st grade book rather than wait. But then when he finished his math 3 weeks before the end of our year we didn't start a new math book. It feels foolish typing it out honestly because compared to your precise planning it hardly seems like a plan at all! I wonder if perhaps that's why you haven't had many responses on how people plan but I'll buck up and share my non-planning planning with you! :D We all have something to learn from each other though (ok you probably don't have anything to learn from me lol) and as I look at your plan it gives me a lot to think about. I wonder if I'm pushing my kids too hard on seatwork - they haven't been complaining but they typically do 3-4 pages a day, 4 days a week. Looking at your schedule I think - wow, we totally could slow it down to a chapter a week and maybe we'd have more time for fun reading. Stuff like that is really helpful to me. And I do think it might be helpful if I planned our history out a bit more thoroughly. Our first year homeschooling we did a set curriculum (winterpromise's American Story) and it told me what to do each week, plus I had all the books on hand. Our second year we did SOTW and I had some issues with ordered library books not coming at the right time and me not sitting down to choose resources soon enough. So I will be looking to your ideas on how to plan my history better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
home4school Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Emmy, I know what you mean! I have an IRL friend that always talking about "doing lesson plans" and planning for school. I'm thinking, "Ok, open the book, do the next lesson. Today you do lesson 23, soooo tomorrow you do lesson 24!" Then I started realizing we miss a day here and there, sickness, fun day, whatever, and get to the end of the year and we're only 3/4 (if even! :( ) thru the book. Also history and science always fall by the wayside here due to my lack of planning and lack of ability to manage to get the dc to actually do a complete day of school work! Sooooooo, I'm hoping if I do lay out the year before me, it will keep me accountable. I know y'all probably don't have the trouble we have about getting our work done, but that is just the reason I'm trying to plan so far ahead to keep us accountable. No more do the next page (hopefully) here! Kim :001_smile: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emmy Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 LOL Kim - um yes, that is the risk you take when using my "method" (word used loosely...) Honestly I tend to be at the other side of it having the kids do too much a day, at least on the core subjects. I will admit we didn't finish our history this year or a program I bought for my Kinder guy (winterpromise animal worlds) but I think that has more to do with hsing with a baby and losing 3 months at the beginning of the year than my crazy ways. :) I am going to look to Jessica's ideas for planning my history for next year and see how that goes for me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMindy Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 In your spreadsheet program, save the file as a PDF, then open it and save each page as a .JPG or .GIF. Upload to photo storage and voila! You also get a free screenshot software from your favorite freeware software website and just take screenshots of your open document. But if you're just starting out I recommend doing the PDF to JPG or GIF above. hth Thanks, Jessica!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scrappyhappymama Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Thanks for sharing that! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jolash Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 My schedule isn't as complex as some because I only have one to school. I choose my curriculum, pick a start date (this year it's July 28), then divide the lessons/chapters into weeks and pencil them into my homeschool planner. I'll also schedule in breaks, holidays, vacations., etc. That's my master plan. For the past two years, I've kept all the worksheets/papers in a hanging file crate, separated by subject, and just gave J the sheets to be done that day. This year, I'm trying to figure out how to give him all the week's work at one time, but not overwhelm him. My goal is to begin the process of helping him work more independently. After I've got my rough schedule, I tweak it to add in the books I want to be sure to cover, pick projects we'll do (so I can gather all the stuff we'll need to do them), and fill in any gaps that pop up. We don't follow it to the letter of course, but it has helped me to at least know what comes next, as far as the schedule goes. This is working for me, but I will admit to looking at longing to Jessica's and others well thought out plans and being a little jealous that mine don't "look" so neat and organized! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMindy Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Jessica, you inspired me to put what I did up on my blog. It is really very similar to what you did, but if anyone wants to check it out....here. I'm such a planning nerd!:001_smile: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pink Fairy Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 I'm a great planner and organizer, but considerably less-great at execution. Here's what I (try to) do: Over the summer is when I plan out the year. I use Homeschool Easy Records (HER) to enter in my lesson plans for each subject. It's given me a great deal of flexibility to see what we've done, what we are going to do, and what needs tweeking as far as pacing, etc. If I choose to use the same curriculum for another child, I just import the lessons plans. Next year is the first time I'll be able to do this (my oldest is two years ahead of the next one), and it will save me some work with at least a couple of subjects. :thumbup: I spend about an hour on Fridays preparing for the following week--organizing assignments, updating my records, printing stuff out, etc. My kids each have a clipboard where I put their assignment sheets, and any printouts for the day. I have a folder where I keep the printouts for the week, and a clipboard with a copy of each kid's assignment sheet to check off as we complete things. I love lists, because I'm too scatterbrained to get things done without one. As far as where we keep our materials: we have a school room, and the kid's have four desks from IKEA that we have attached to eachother--it looks sort of like a boardroom conference table. I like this because it gives us a very large surface to do projects on (it's around 118"x60"). As part of the desk, each child has a large cupboard and 2 drawers. Here are our desk components: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/00109514 http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/40109512 http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/10071172 They keep their books inside the cupboards in two bins like this: http://www.lakeshorelearning.com/product/productImages.jsp?productItemID=845,524,441,761,192&imageAttribute=ATR_prd_cnt_image_large&FOLDER<>folder_id=2534374302090185&ASSORTMENT<>ast_id=1408474395181113&bmUID=1212770723494 The drawers are used for pencils and other odds and ends. I'm happy to share my planning and organizing ideas with you all--I glean so much from everyone here, it's nice when I have something that might help others! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Annie Laurie Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Well... I'll share... I buy every piece of curriculum I can find, then I question why I bought it. Frequently, I tear up a little and think they would be better off in school, then... I pull myself together and eat some ice cream. After that there are "serious" discussions about maids and tutors coming to live with us. Finally, I sigh and look through my purchases again, usually remembering that there is still a catalog I haven't ordered from, yet! :lol: I loved that, a kindred spirit! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Novafan Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 I absolutely love the planning advice threads. We dove into HS'ing very unprepared for the first time this past January. Needless to say I didn't plan anything and just hoped to keep things going. What have I learned? Math, grammar, phonics, spelling and handwriting: No planning needed. We can just do what's next and take as much time as we need to "do our work and do it well." (That's our homeschool motto! :) ) History, science, art and literature? I MUST plan if I want this to happen logically, if at all. I've also found that I must schedule the extras like nature walks/hikes and fitness (P.E.) or those will get tossed aside as well. I've been taking notes from Jessica for weeks now, as well as others who have posted their planning ideas and methods and I think I am well on my way to planning a very organized 2008-2009 school year. I am still not going to strictly schedule math, spelling, grammar and handwriting because we get those done no matter what each week. I also plan to add in foreign language and I do not plan to schedule that as well, as I want the children to master each lesson before we move on. So I guess I will end up with a half-and-half approach. Some subjects will be highly organized and planned and others we will just "do the next thing." Thank you all for sharing your tips and techniques. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
My2sons Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 consists of an Excel spreadsheet that I have the coursework plotted over 180 days (our state mandated # of days). I have one binder for my ds daily worksheets, etc. for the 1st 45 days. The front sheet for each day I have listed is reading lesson, books to pull for week or check out at library, art supplies needed. And I then have handwriting sheets, math worksheets, journal sheets with history reading assignments, journal sheets with science reading assignment, spanish lesson. On the journal sheets I have written at top name of book with pages that we are reading. In the front of my binder I have the qtr goals and the year goals and tenative daily schedule. I am going to have ds keep journal pages and certain math worksheets by subject in binder for record of 1st grade. I plan on setting up 2nd qtr during the break we have between 1st & 2nd qtr. I can then adjust daily work as needed. This is my first year hs and I think this is a good start, but am sure I'll tweak it as the year goes on. Amy PS on a side note like Jessica we are in the process of packing up and moving. 3 weeks till launch! So not only am I hs for the 1st time, but moving to a new state. Everyone thinks I'm crazy for taking this on, but we really feel led to HS. ~ DS 7 (starting 1st in July) and DS 3 1/2 (preschool) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frontier Mom Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 In your spreadsheet program, save the file as a PDF, then open it and save each page as a .JPG or .GIF. Upload to photo storage and voila! You also get a free screenshot software from your favorite freeware software website and just take screenshots of your open document. But if you're just starting out I recommend doing the PDF to JPG or GIF above. hth Yes, thanks!! Shame on you though, I was up until 3 am working on my lesson plans. I got started at a "good pace" and just kept on working. Don't feel too sorry for me though, I slept until 10!!:D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frontier Mom Posted June 6, 2008 Share Posted June 6, 2008 Good job!! I'm mostly putting mine in HST+ but the spreadsheets give a great visual! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mamagistra Posted June 7, 2008 Share Posted June 7, 2008 Here are our desk components: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/00109514 http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/40109512 http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/10071172 Oh, I would just love to have something like that! :001_tt1: Alas, we need a bigger house first. :( Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cin Posted June 7, 2008 Share Posted June 7, 2008 We do plan, somewhat. I worked through our curriculums for next year and did a bunch of planning, and am in the process of revising it. It boils down to what NovaFan said: Math, grammar, phonics, spelling and handwriting, do the next page, as well as thinking skills, logic and problem solving. History, science, art and literature take alot more planning. Our revamping has to do with changes in curriculums. I'm sure none of you have EVER gone through this before, right? :lol: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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