Having trouble fitting it all in

[heidip2p]

Our school days are rough to say the least. I feel like I can never get everything in. I am going crazy by early in the morning. I know there has to be a way to work this out but I just can't find a schedule that works. None of my kids are very independent at this point. The older ones need a good deal of prodding to get their work done. It's something we are working on but have a ways to go.

 

I have a very into everything 1 year old. A 2 year old that is,,,,,very two! A 4 year old that loves to do things but only for about 5 minutes. I feel like they all get pushed aside as I try to be there for everyone doing school. I need to plan things to do wth the little ones but it seems like there just aren't enough hours in the day.

 

I really like working one on one with my 1st grader. I am learning from my mistakes and I know the more time I spend with him the more independent he will become. I love this time with him so much.

 

The older 3 I have doing CLE LA and math, WWW and devotionals in the morning. We work from 8-11am. They always have work still to do. I spend so much time telling the 3 to cut the chatter, focus and what not.

 

My goal is to lay the 3 little ones down for naps. Then work for an hour with the first grader. Then do our MFW ECC with the older kids. But, my 4 year old is not taking naps. It makes it hard to work with anyone at this point. He is just hard to entertain for good amounts of time. Plus my lack of planning for him makes this worse.

 

We get the 3R's in everyday but most days that is it. My oldest does her science and lit as well.

 

Then the grading with CLE is so much. I have the older kids help sometimes but then I feel like I lose my grip on where they are at.

 

I know there are a lot of discipline issues as well. I know my days will be busy. I can handle that. They will be long which I know. I just wish we had more joy in our school. I don't want to endure our days I want to enjoy them. I don't know if it is the curriculum I am using or what. It is just not working. :(

[momsuz123]

Wow, you are a really busy lady. I thought my life was busy. So, I am not going to be of much help, except for some thoughts I have been thinking. Is there any possibility your 4 year old could do a preschool type child care? I have been thinking about having my very active 3 y/o boy go to a church preschool/child care nearby, for just 1 or 2 mornings a week. It would buy me some much needed time, and probably give him some of an outlet. I am also backing down with school on my dd's (mostly my younger one), my plan is ramp it up with her in the summer, when I turn it down a little for my older dd. It may not help you at all, but just a thought. Good luck!:grouphug:

[stm4him]

I don't have a 7th grader and my 10 year old is not on grade level so her work load isn't what your 5th or even 3rd grader may have but age-wise she is close. I have a 7 year old, 5 year old, 3 year old, 2 year old, and 8 month old. Here is what I would do:

 

-Join CC next year b/c your 7th grader will learn to work more independently doing his/her Challenge assignments. There should be consequences for not finishing and he/she should be allowed to work in a separate room as long as the work gets done. Even now I would let that child work in another room and have strict penalties for not finishing the assignments. First I would have a discussion about whether they think the workload is right for them and anything they want to talk to you about but ultimately you are the parent and you have to make the call about what you think his/her education should contain.

 

-I would write our a list of preschool activities you have in your house and then just rotate them every 20-30 minutes. Set a timer and don't allow the little ones to play with anything else or get out of their area or their chair or wherever you designate until the timer goes off. Let them watch a few short educational videos during one of the hours. If you have a fenced in yard take advantage of it as much as possible in the afternoons when you're doing projects with the older ones. Try to find half an hour to an hour while the others are practicing instruments or doing independent work to pay complete attention to your little ones. If they know they have Mommy time each day they will often be more willing to play alone or just with each other in the morning. If you have a playroom or bedroom let them play dress up or just with their toys for an hour a day together or separately.

 

-Start school at a certain time of the day and have them all do the same subject at the same time (not talking about the 7th grader) so you know who is doing what and can monitor them. Call each one to you for a few minutes every hour to check their work and answer questions. I sit in a big chair for this and they sit with me. I can see the others working independently or playing quietly with their activity at a glance. This is our order:

 

Math and Logic

Grammar and Writing

Spelling and Latin

Memory Work (do this mostly together and make it fun)

Lunch and break

Reading/Literature/Phonics

History, Science, Geography or Bible together (reading and projects)

Exercise and music practice and preschool

 

 

We start at 8:30 each day. We end at 4:30 b/c we do a 2 hour block for the history, science, Bible time. We do read alouds and family devotion at night after dinner and our chores are done. We do bare minimum chores in the morning so we can get started right away.

 

During Math little ones pick a preschool activity they can sit with. During Writing they color, cut, paste, etc. During Spelling and Latin they watch short movies. During memory work they play in a bedroom. During reading they nap or have quiet time in their bed with books. During history they play in the family room with blocks or quiet toys or go outside in our backyard. Have a regular routine and crack down on the discipline initially while you are instilling it and in a while it should flow pretty nicely.......

[Homeschooling6]

When there are toddlers, school is hard (a good hard ;)). I know when I had little ones it was hard to get what I wanted to do in school done, let alone try to clean one of the rooms.

 

I'm going to throw some ideas out there and maybe something will be helpful:D.

 

I see you are using ECC, so here are my thoughts. Do ECC first thing. Get all the combined subjects done first with the younger children close by. This is what I use to do. Even if they are making a mess :tongue_smilie:(one can always have a 15 minute pick-up with the older kids helping a few times a day).

 

Then get your two oldest working on their own and work with the 1st grader. Get your 1st grader started on a subject and if the little ones aren't napping at this time have some play time with them.

 

I would also start a loose schedule or a block schedule. Have the little ones take a nap at the sametime each day.

 

With your 7th grader, if you haven't already, I would get her a lesson planner and write her lessons for each subject, this way she can cross the subject off as she finishes.

Same with the 5th grader. Write what pages from math, CLE LA and anything that your 5th grader can do on his/her own.

 

For every subject that is done all the way, which means the books have to be put away too, I give a ticket. Once they reach 500 tickets, they can have an Amazon or CBD gift card for $30.00;).

 

Some seasons in Homeschooling6;

 

There were times when I would have some of my younger ones using Time4Learning because this was the only way some school would get done.

 

I had to let a formal history and science go with my children 4th grade and under. I used audio books (SOTW, MOH, Diana Waring and lots of great literature via audio).

 

So my two oldest were not always waiting for me we used textbooks. This was four years ago and my oldest two continue to use them. I am just now adding in HOD for history and science again.

 

Knowing I can't sit there for every lesson thus using the computer for math or grammar (TT, MUS, Analytical Grammar with dvds etc.).

 

Some of th changes above were not easy. I often felt like I was not doing a good job as a homeschooling mom. Two years ago I finally just started to relax. Not in the sense of hardly doing any academics but being able to let what 'I' thought homeschooling should look like. If we only did grammar a few times a week, then that was better than not doing it at all. I started seeing the things we were doing and not what we weren't doing.

 

What I'm doing with HOD is rotating. Meaning one week I skip something but I'm not skipping the samething every week, this way we are fitting things in. I call this 'skip and rotate' maybe you can do something similiar with ECC.

 

(((hugs)))

Linda<><

[PeterPan]

It's also the time of year. In her talks JW (Jessie Wise) always says that *February* is the worst month. Everything piles up on you and you feel overcommitted. Your vitamin D starts to drop, and you just get discouraged. So yeah, things probably aren't ideal. But it's also that time of year. Maybe cut everything in half for next week and see if you can get THAT done. Or cut it to 1/3. A little bit done consistently will add up. Maybe you need a week of something totally different, kwim?

[Lisa in the UP of MI]

My family is smaller and my kids are younger but here are some things that work for us:

 

The toddler plays with the other kids who are not currently doing schoolwork. When he wants to hang out with us, he plays with math manipulatives, play-doh, duplos, etc. I often buckle him into his booster seat if I don't want him to get in the middle of what we are doing. AAS tiles + toddler is not good. When he was a little younger I would sometimes put him in the play pen when he started getting into trouble.

 

The 4yo and 5yo have quiet time every day. It is NOT during the toddler's nap time, but luckily he's a pretty easy going guy. For your family, I'd start having the 4yo play quietly in his room while the other littles sleep.

 

Otherwise, just having a solid plan for how I want the day to go the night before really, really helps. It does not always work out exactly as I had planned, but I get so much more done this way. At the beginning of the school year we were only doing a few subjects, but as I got a better feel for how the days was running I rearranged things a few different times in order to add other subjects to our day while still maintaining other important things like outside time and read-alouds.

[AngelBee]

Taking notes...

[mommy5]

Taking notes...

 

Me, too! This could be us soon!

[heidip2p]

Thank you everyone for your help. I know being able to homeschool is such a precious opertunity. I want all of us to look back on these days with great memoires. Not of me wanting to pull my hair out. :confused: I am going to figure out some kind of point system for comepleted work. I know our kids will love that. We have a schoolroom set up which is great. But having every writing untensil out for my 1 or 2 year old may not be the answer. We have a 2 story with all bedrooms upstairs and all living space downstairs. I can't really let the little ones go play on their own upstairs just yet.

I know there is a way this will work I just need to figure it out.

[Homeschooling6]

Thank you everyone for your help. I know being able to homeschool is such a precious opertunity. I want all of us to look back on these days with great memoires. Not of me wanting to pull my hair out. :confused: I am going to figure out some kind of point system for comepleted work. I know our kids will love that. We have a schoolroom set up which is great. But having every writing untensil out for my 1 or 2 year old may not be the answer. We have a 2 story with all bedrooms upstairs and all living space downstairs. I can't really let the little ones go play on their own upstairs just yet.

I know there is a way this will work I just need to figure it out.

 

This was how the house we use to live in was set up, when Lance was crawling, Ethan was 2 and Brent was 3. We had a gameroom upstairs with all the bedrooms. My other three children were 4, 5 and 6. I know you have some older ones so this may not apply.

What I did was turn our formal living and dining area to a school room. My desk, some bookshelves and the little desks for the kids. In the gameroom is where we housed all the non daily homeschooling stuff.

 

My children were not allowed upstairs so I had some toys downstairs (not much though ;)). The little children were allowed to play in the garage (bikes and such) with the rolling garage door closed unless I was in the kitchen and could see them, then I would raise it 1/4 way up. I always wanted one of those nice gates that were extra long. It was safe otherwise I wouldn't have let them ride their toy bikes or play with their jumbo legos in there. The door from the kitchen to the garage was always open so I could see or hear them.

 

I would train your youngest dc to not go upstairs unless they asked or had an older sibling with them.

 

On days when we where all upstairs the little ones were not allowed out of the gameroom. Later I put a little gate in the upstairs hallway and they were allowed to play in thier room which reminds me, I used a gate for their room when I wanted them to stay in there but they could look out because the bedroom door was open.

 

We had a sandbox in the yard. A kiddie pool too.

 

I was a paranoid mama, so I always made sure the water was very low and gates were locked. I also opened up all the windows so I could see outside.

 

I kept diapers up stairs and downstairs so I didn't have to go far to change them (I had three in diapers at one time).

 

Just remember life gets crazy with toddlers. When I was exhausted and one of my dc flooded the toilet I remember saying to myself, I can laugh or cry, so I chose to laugh (not that it was always easy). When another dc wakes with no diaper and lets just say the room stinks really bad, again I had to choose to laugh.

 

One time while teaching Josh and Annette, in the kitchen I had this feeling that I should check on Ethan. He was in the formal dining room, so I walked on over just in time. He had the chandalier and was ready to run across the table and swing. As you can see, never a dull moment :tongue_smilie:

Edited February 3, 2012 by Homeschooling6

[farming_mum]

I have 4 kids (6, 5, 1, 4mths), I find strapping the 1yr old to my back stops her from running off with all our school work and I can still 'teach'. The baby gets fed and sleeps otherwise she is in the jolly jumper which really helps.

 

I also get young girls (20-25yrs) who are travelling and looking to experience a bit Australian homelife, through www.helpx.net, 4-6hrs work in exchange for food and accommodation. The girls are usually backpackers from all over the globe and my kids learn different phrases, where they are from on a map etc and they help me with the smaller ones so that I can have more one on one time with the older ones. It truely is a wonderful experience!