Can we discuss a few points in our schedules?

[Jane]

I've been reviewing schedules that some of you post links to here. Here are some of my questions.

 

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

 

I'm looking to see if I can tighten my schedule or if it's as tight as I can make it.

 

Thank you for your help. :)

[Parrothead]

Our morning routine consists of me waking up enough to function. That takes up to an hour at times. I take a shower and get dressed. Dd only has to get dressed and brush teeth and hair. I tried to start school last year at 9:30 but 10:00 is more convenient for us.

 

Dd only has morning chores if I have an urge to clean. Usually during school weeks the house is cleaned up the night before. I do tend to take care of a the few chores I do in during the day during breaks or when dd is working independently.

 

Catechism is part of our school and not something specifically scheduled outside of school. Other than living our beliefs which is done all the time.

 

Lunch can be between 30 minutes to an hour depending on how diligently dd is working.

 

Since 10 am works best for our starting time we school from 10 am-2-2:30pm for one 4th grader

 

We school 4 days a week. The 5th day is for dance lessons, grocery and shopping, and library down river (3 hour round trip)

 

We have a 4 day schedule and have never had a problem completing anything but SOTW because it is 42 weeks instead of 36.

[elegantlion]

I've been reviewing schedules that some of you post links to here. Here are some of my questions.

 

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc. We start at 10am. Neither ds or I are morning people and that allows us time to wake up, clean up, get organized. Ds showers in the evening. We will start morning chores on some days, but not on a set schedule.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break? We read from 10am to a little after 11am. We take a break until 11:30. After Latin and Math we take a 30 minute break then finish school.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade. officially we start at 10am. Since we are on day 3, our ending time is not quite set. We go until subjects are completed. It has been about 3pm for the last two days.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.) We don't have a car during the day, so no outside activities are scheduled.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.) We school 5 days a week. 180 days is required by our state. So we do 36 weeks of formal school, light in the summer.

[Stacy in NJ]

I've been reviewing schedules that some of you post links to here. Here are some of my questions.

 

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

 

I'm looking to see if I can tighten my schedule or if it's as tight as I can make it.

 

Thank you for your help. :)

 

1. Currently (we're on a later summer schedule right now), we get up at 7:30 and begin school at 9:00. In September, we'll get up at 7 and start by 8:30. Our morning routine is really just wake, run and eat on M/W/F, on T/TH we don't run but just have extra time for play. We don't shower in the a.m. (I know, gross:glare:), but do that during break time. In September, I'll add in some type of additional exercise routine on T/TH. We don't do Bible study or chores during this time.

 

2. The length of our lunch break depends on our daily progress. If we're running ahead of schedule it's longer, behind schedule it's shorter (obviously). Anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour.

 

3. Our day will begin at 8:30 and run until 1:30, give or take 15 minutes. My dss are 9 and 11 (grades 4 and 6).

 

4. We have no scheduled activities during school time for the coming year. The last two prior years we did a co-op on Friday. I found, as my kiddos got older, that I needed more time at home to cover academic subjects. No co-op this year.

 

5. We'll do 5 days per week, this year. Other than assigned reading, we don't do any subjects 5 days per week. We do math 4x, composition 3x, grammar 3x, language 3x, you get the idea. We school about 42 weeks per year, taking off 6 weeks in the summer, 1 week at Christmas, and approximately 3 more weeks for travel vacations. Occationally, we travel and do part-time school at the same time (math, reading assignments, geography and language lessons).

 

This is my 5th year homeschooling. This schedule/routine has really been refined/developed over the years. It best meets our needs as a family. That could change as my kiddos get older. I try to adapt as we go.

 

Just adding, my kiddos do about an hour of homework each evening. Usually, this is a bit of math and history or science.

 

HTH, Stacy

[ABQmom]

But, here's how I have it so far.

 

1. 7:00-8:00 I get up, shower, and dress. Wake up older 2 at 7:30 and younger 2 at 8:00.

 

We start school at 8:30--my kids should be able to get dressed, make their beds, empty the dishwasher and eat breakfast by 8:30. We save other chores for other times, so that school gets going first thing. My dc shower at night when they have more time. We memorize Bible verses during breakfast.

 

2. We have an hour lunch break. That way, if we get started with school late, we can overflow into lunch and still get it all done. If we start on time, our reward is a longer lunch break. Lunch is from 12:00 to 1:00.

 

3. School starts at 8:30 for everyone and ends around 2 or 2:30 for the oldest. The others are finished by lunch on most days. They do Science 2 days a week from 1 to 1:30. My 3rd grader will also have some breaks in his day that the girls won't have--we try to work straight through.

 

4. We don't have any activities during school hours. All our extra activities are after 4:00.

 

5. I schedule a five day week, however, Fridays are light. We clean house on Friday morning after we've done those lessons that have to be done 5 days a week--like Math, and writing.

 

Good luck with tightening up your schedule!

[Jane]

Yikes. I'm quite lost now. How do you all do it? We start at 8:30, spend 30 minutes on lunch, and finish at 3:00. I do have one light day per week because we have an outside commitment once per week, but my children are diligent throughout the day. Their goal is to be done by 3pm w/out any homework.

 

Maybe it's my spelling and vocabulary programs? I'm thrilled that they are on the computer this year, but I do allow 30 minutes for each of those subjects. I figure the more they cover in those topics the better.

 

Hmmmm....I'll be be eager to hear from others. Our days were definitely shorter when they were younger, but by 5th grade I seem to need a full 6 hour day and I'm trying to figure out how to fit *one,* really only *one* more thing into my 7th grader's schedule. LOL.

[Trivium Academy]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

I'm up at 6:00, the kids are up at 6:30 and lessons start at 8:00 am. This allows: breakfast, making beds, brushing teeth, getting dressed, a few household chores for the kids (clean up breakfast dishes, feed dog).

 

I get into the shower immediately out of bed to prevent lazy bones then I get my coffee. After coffee, I empty the dishwasher and fix breakfast. Breakfast is at 7:00, so I give myself room to wake-up and do what I'd like between 6:00-7:00. Kids have from finishing breakfast until 8:00 to finish what they need to.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

1/2 hour but we start afternoon chores at 11:15 and lunch is scheduled until 12:30

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

3rd and PreK- only Core 8:00-10:30 but if you add in all our extras and fun stuff then it's 8:00-2:00 Mon-Fri.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

No co-ops, just us Mon-Thursday from 8-2, on Friday 8-9:30 am b/c the rest of the day is for a field trip or outing of our own accord. One piano lesson, one soccer practice/game a week, Wed. Youth at church.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

 

We use Horizons and I schedule it 4 days a week, our Fridays consist of: BIble, Latin, Independent Reading, Poetry and French. I will probably use some of the supplement worksheets from Horizons for on Friday, which won't take long at all to do.

 

http://i58.photobucket.com/albums/g270/triviumacademy/2008_2009Week.jpg

[ABQmom]

I've found I've had to drop some of my expectations in order to streamline my day. Maybe you should post your schedule and see if anyone has ideas for how you could better streamline.

[Peri]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

We wake at 6 am currently. The kids have breakfast and we start school at 8 am. I would like to start earlier but DS4 does go to school and the bus has been late. I do all my cleaning after dinner with the exception of laundry. I put loads in while we're schooling and in the afternoon, when school is over, I fold and put away. So after dinner DD clears the table and puts left overs away then she goes and puts stuff away around the house. I load the dishwasher, clean the kitchen, sweep, mop, and vacum. Then I take out the trash and clean the trash can. I lightly clean only 1 bathroom a day. Then I bathe the kids and put them to bed. The rest of the night is mine to do with as I please.:lol:

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

 

I think that 30 mins is plenty of time for lunch, but by then DD is tired of school and so I give her 1 hr not just for lunch, but also to rest.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

We start at 8 am but I would like to get started at 7 am. We finish around 3pm depending on well DD kept on task.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

I am currently looking for activities. I would love to get her piano lessons and have her involved with martial arts just so she can learn to be more disaplined(sp?). I would also love to see her get into a sport I think we'll try out softball this year.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

 

I do 5 days a week for the basics and 4 days for art, music appreciation, history, and science. I will totaly give her a break on Fridays if I see her keep up her work pace and not slack.

[Scarlett]

I've been reviewing schedules that some of you post links to here. Here are some of my questions.

 

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc. School starts for us on Monday. I've spent the last few days doing a practice run on our schedule. I exercise, make my bed, get dh out the door to work (coffe/lunch/our time together) shower myself, swipe out my bathroom start a load of laundry. After ds wakes (I hope by 7:00 he has to brush teeth/wash face/comb hair/make bed get dressed unload dishwasher/practice piano. Then we will eat by 8:15 and start school b y 8:30. I hope.

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?If I get started with school by 8:30, we can realistically be totally finished by 12:30. Then we have lunch. I we have to do more school after lunch, I allow about 45 minutes and then we hit the books again.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.DS is 8 and my goal is start at 8:30 and be finished by 12:30

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.). Ds8 and this year he will have swim 3 days a week from 4:15-5:00 with half hour set aside before and after for getting there and home. Piano one day a week for 30 minutes--close by. We also attend religious services 2 nights a week.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.) I set up a 5 day week with only math and LA on the 5th day which I can easily absorb into the other 4 days--which I often do.

 

There ya go!

[Jill- OK]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

Not much. :-) The latest rising time I have is between 7:30 and 8:00, and I finally decided to exercise at night and shower, so my routine is pretty quick. I have my personal devotions in the morning, eat, and get dressed.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

 

Well...that's hard to say. I feed the little kids when they're hungry, ask the big kids if they want some of what we're having, and then just let them eat when they come to a stopping place, or when they're hungry. It doesn't take too long to just sit down, take a breather, and eat a bowl of soup. :-) Clean up is quick; we usually have easy breakfasts and lunches.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

For the big kids, it officially begins at 9:00; for the younger kids, I'd say 10:00 or so. Big kids are done with their independent work at 1:30 or thereabouts, and we have an hour or so of discussion, so...2:30? (Little kids don't take more than an hour and a half or so to do core subjects.)

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

None during school hours.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

 

I do a four day week, but I also school year 'round. (With necessary breaks, of course.) Nothing I've planned so far for this year has a full 180 lessons. Spielvogel's Human Odyssey, Apologia Physical Science, R & S grammar, and what we're doing of Foerster's Algebra all fit into 36 weeks or less of four day weeks.

[Rhonda in WA]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

We wake up at around 7:30. My girls shower the night before so they make bed and brush teeth. We have till 8 to do chores and all that. Usually at 8:15 we start to eat. Then we try to have it all done and start Bible at 8:45 or so.

Chores are: bed, room, hair, teeth, and dressed. You can see their chore boards my dh made on my blog. Here

 

http://3girlsandoneboy.blogspot.com/2008/07/our-chore-chart.html

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

Usually about an hour.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

We begin at about 8:45 to 9. We end about 2pm. Dd 8 and dd4 start at the same time, but dd4 is done in 1 hour. Dd 8 is done about 2.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

Co-op on Mondays and gymnastics is Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 5:30 to 8:30.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

We do 4 days for everything except math. We try to do it everyday. Sometimes we don't.

[Stacy in NJ]

Yikes. I'm quite lost now. How do you all do it? We start at 8:30, spend 30 minutes on lunch, and finish at 3:00. I do have one light day per week because we have an outside commitment once per week, but my children are diligent throughout the day. Their goal is to be done by 3pm w/out any homework.

 

Maybe it's my spelling and vocabulary programs? I'm thrilled that they are on the computer this year, but I do allow 30 minutes for each of those subjects. I figure the more they cover in those topics the better.

 

Hmmmm....I'll be be eager to hear from others. Our days were definitely shorter when they were younger, but by 5th grade I seem to need a full 6 hour day and I'm trying to figure out how to fit *one,* really only *one* more thing into my 7th grader's schedule. LOL.

 

 

Honestly, *I* cannot stay on task for school for 6+ hours per day. I get tired and am pretty much fried by about 2 pm.

 

I think it really depends how quickly you and your dc tend to work. I notice some people plan for 45 minutes for math, others 1 1/2 hours. I see your family is pretty large. To get some teaching/directing time in with each kiddo, I think *I* would need a longer day, too.

[LaxMom]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc. They're all generally up by 7 (at the latest), eat breakfast shortly thereafter, get dressed, brush teeth and make beds before we start. We start at 8 and finish the morning session by 10:30 at the latest. This includes language arts, math, handwriting, piano practice and French for the 3rd grader, and phonics, circle time, and "school work" for the pre-K-ers. We do history, geography, science and Latin in the afternoon, generally while the boys are still sleeping, then they go back out to play, do art projects, watch a video, whatever. They bathe at night. "My" time - for yoga, meditation, uninterrupted thought and coffee - is between 5:30 and when they get up. By the time they go to bed at 8:30, the only thing I'm good for as a cup of tea and staring.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break? They go out to play after our morning schooling, until 12 or 12:30, then come in for lunch and nap/quiet reading time.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade. We officially start at 8 and finish when the work is done. I've budgeted time for each subject, but we generally don't use all the time allotted. The children are 7, 4, and 4.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.) We have piano lessons on Tuesday morning, co-op on Friday, book club one Wednesday a month.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.) We school all year, 5 days/week. Not all subjects are 5 days, though. I stretched out grammar to April by only doing that 3x/week, ditto math. History is "4 days", but one of those is additional reading, which can take several; science is 2. We do literature based on when the 3rd grader finishes a book (she doesn't drag her feet in reading, so I just don't schedule that) and read with the boys at various times of the day. I have no problem with finishing the grade level of a subject before our school year officially ends, but I'd like to not be ridiculously early.

[Jane]

I've found I've had to drop some of my expectations in order to streamline my day. Maybe you should post your schedule and see if anyone has ideas for how you could better streamline.

 

This format won't allow me to post my entire schedule. How about if I just post my 7th grader's schedule because she is the one who I need 30 minutes more for every day for foreign language. We may just have to start going till 3:30pm, but if you have any ideas I'm open!

 

6:30 bible study

7:00 chores

7:30 breakfast

8:00 personal care

8:30 math, including 5 minute drill

9:30 spelling

10:00 vocabulary

10:30 science

11:30 lunch

12:00 piano practice

12:30 memory work

1:00 history

2:00 grammar (m/w/f), assigned reading (t,th)

3:00 free or homework

 

Ideas?

[gardening momma]

I can't speak from homeschooling experience, but when I was in school, we had 1 hour for spelling/vocabulary/grammar/literature/etc. It varied from year to year what the focus was (for example, if we had literature for a semester, we didn't generally have grammar or speech, and vise-versa).

 

So you have scheduled a total of 2 hours for spelling, vocabulary, grammar and reading in each day. That's twice as much as I had in school, and usually homeschooling doesn't take as long as "real" school.

 

I'd cut grammar down to 1/2 hour, and fit your foreign language in there. If you want to keep your full hour of reading for the other days, then add 1/2 hour to your day on those days.

[Jane]

We use Horizons and I schedule it 4 days a week.

 

Do you just double up on some lessons? How do you schedule it 4 days per week? This is my first year using Horizons, and I only have one child using it.

[Jane]

I can't speak from homeschooling experience, but when I was in school, we had 1 hour for spelling/vocabulary/grammar/literature/etc. It varied from year to year what the focus was (for example, if we had literature for a semester, we didn't generally have grammar or speech, and vise-versa).

 

So you have scheduled a total of 2 hours for spelling, vocabulary, grammar and reading in each day. That's twice as much as I had in school, and usually homeschooling doesn't take as long as "real" school.

 

If I skip grammar for a semester, then we won't finish the R&S Grammar book. I don't think I'm the only one on these boards using this program. I agree my time frame for spelling and vocabulary is probably what's hurting me, but my daughter is doing these on the computer and I think it actually takes longer that way. Anyone else using Calvert Spelling and Root Words on CD? How much time do you schedule?

[Stacy in NJ]

This format won't allow me to post my entire schedule. How about if I just post my 7th grader's schedule since she is the one who I need 1/2 more for every day for foreign language. We may just have to start going till 3:30pm, but if you have any ideas I'm open!

 

6:30 bible study

7:00 chores

7:30 breakfast

8:00 personal care

8:30 math, including 5 minute drill

9:30 spelling

10:00 vocabulary

10:30 science

11:30 lunch

12:00 piano practice

12:30 memory work

1:00 history

2:00 grammar (m/w/f), assigned reading (t,th)

3:00 free or homework

 

Ideas?

 

 

You have both history and science scheduled for an hour every day? Are you doing history ala something like Sonlight or TOG that requires it everyday?

[Trivium Academy]

No, 4 lessons a week. 4 x 40 =160, it's 160 lessons not 180. 5 x36= 160 too. We have a 40 week year.

[Jane]

You have both history and science scheduled for an hour every day? Are you doing history ala something like Sonlight or TOG that requires it everyday?

 

Our goal is three PH Science books this year. One hour every day, four days per week will accomplish that goal. For history, again, it's scheduled 4 days per week. This is only one day more than the recommended. We will finish a tad early, but maybe I'll take a second look at that schedule.

 

I also reviewed my daughter's progress in vocabulary--which she is loving--and realized she has completed 30% of the program in only a week by doing 30 minutes a day! Hmmm. Maybe I can bump that to a twice a week activity or let her complete it all in the next month and then move on to foreign language lessons.

 

You all are really helping. Thank you!!

[Jane]

No, 4 lessons a week. 4 x 40 =160, it's 160 lessons not 180. 5 x36= 160 too. We have a 40 week year.

 

Well, then. Uh-hem. I had to go look at my books to make sure you are right. All I can say is HURRAY!! Thanks for correcting my error in thinking. I really thought it was 180 lessons. :party:

[Trivium Academy]

:) No biggie, I thought 180 was wrong but didn't catch it until I had to do the math and it wasn't coming out right. :blush:

[NicksMama-Zack's Mama Too]

Our goal is three PH Science books this year. One hour every day, four days per week will accomplish that goal. For history, again, it's scheduled 4 days per week. This is only one day more than the recommended. We will finish a tad early, but maybe I'll take a second look at that schedule.

 

I also reviewed my daughter's progress in vocabulary--which she is loving--and realized she has completed 30% of the program in only a week by doing 30 minutes a day! Hmmm. Maybe I can bump that to a twice a week activity or let her complete it all in the next month and then move on to foreign language lessons.

 

You all are really helping. Thank you!!

 

I am really struggling with my 6th grader's schedule. It looks much like yours!! My child is so upset about all the time allotted for school. If he wants to work for 6 hours - he could just jump on the bus, KWIM? He's not seeing the benefit of homeschooling - ugh.

[St. Theophan Academy]

1) I allow more time now than I used to - I have resigned myself to the fact that we will not begin school before 9 - and it has taken a lot of stress off of me - I don't feel behind like I used to when I tried to get us going by 8. As for routine before school - we get up, do chores (feed pets, straighten rooms, empty trash, empty dishwasher), eat breakfast, clean up kitchen, then begin.

 

2) We usually only break for 30 minutes for lunch - they don't need more than that to eat, and I usually combine lunch with reading or our composer listening.

 

3) don't have an "official" start and stop time - but I shoot for 9 am to begin school for everyone - we all start with Bible together. As for when do we finish - sometimes by lunch , sometimes not before 5pm. It all depends on what we are working on, and what the weather is like (they spend several hours outside each day, so I often let them have a long afternoon break then come back to finish, or a morning outdoor break in the summer and spend afternoons inside when it is too hot). My kids are 10 months, 4yrs, 7yrs, 9yr

 

4) activities - this is one I am really struggling with right now - we have piano on Monday (teacher comes to the house, so it is not really an interuption), and gymnastics on Thursday afternoon. We have the option for a co-op twice a month - 2 hours on Thursday afternoon, which I am still deciding how we will participate. Last, we have soccer for 8 weeks in the fall and spring which involves one practice and one game per week. I usually have them drop gymnastics during soccer season, it is just too much running otherwise.

 

 

5) I only schedule 4 days per week - my husband works long hours and often has a day off during the week, so I know that we will never manage a 5 day school week. That said, I stay very flexible - since his day off floats, we do not have a consistent weekly schedule. Instead, I look ahead for the week, determine what I feel we need to accomplish, and plan it out only a week ahead. I have a checklist of what has to be done for the year, but I do not try to schedule it out weekly - otherwise I will find myself very discouraged when we fall behind. We have not really had a hard time getting through lessons, but I do not use a lot of textbooks that are rigid with a set number of lessons. We will be using MOTL, so I have a list of all the concepts they need to learn, and we will move through one at a time and mark them off as they are accomplished. Mostly we just work at the pace of the kids, and manage to get through it fine.

[rjperez1]

It is great to see a bit of what everyone does. Very helpful. I will be more motivated to get started somewhat earlier knowing that some of you ladys are already in the trenches!

Julia

[Peri]

I can't speak from homeschooling experience, but when I was in school, we had 1 hour for spelling/vocabulary/grammar/literature/etc. It varied from year to year what the focus was (for example, if we had literature for a semester, we didn't generally have grammar or speech, and vise-versa).

 

So you have scheduled a total of 2 hours for spelling, vocabulary, grammar and reading in each day. That's twice as much as I had in school, and usually homeschooling doesn't take as long as "real" school.

 

I'd cut grammar down to 1/2 hour, and fit your foreign language in there. If you want to keep your full hour of reading for the other days, then add 1/2 hour to your day on those days.

 

We also had lots of homework in regular school which is why everything seemed so neatly compacted and fit into a day. If something wasn't finished in school you had to take it home and finish it for homework.

 

Here's my schedule:

30 mins - Religion

30 mins - Logic problems

1 hr - Math including a 5 min drill

20 mins - Spelling

1 hr - Grammer

15 min break

1 hr - Reading

30 mins - Writing

1 hr - Lunch

1 and a half hours - History or Science

1 hr - Art or Music appreciation

 

The time depends on how quickly she gets done. I have a timer that I set to the maximum time and she has to finish in that amount of time. Sometimes she gets done early and sometimes she needs an extra 10 mins but I notice she works better when I give her a time frame. With reading she does better when I give her a number of pages to read. For example, she has read to page 74 and today I asked her to read to page 84. Since she finished reading those 10 pages in 30 mins I added another 10 pages. I think she could actually handle reading 25 pages in 1 hr if she didn't allow herself to be distracted so easily.

[Ravin]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

Enough for us to both eat and me to get some coffee. No set time, though. Some mornings it's half an hour, others, more like an hour and a half.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

 

As long as it takes to eat

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

School day officially begins when we're ready to get started after breakfast, and usually ends at lunch. I'm disallowing entertainment TV during those hours, but we only spend about 20 minutes tops on seatwork, and around the same on read alouds.

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

DD is enrolled in an enrichment program on Mondays. Tuesdays I try to get us to the library or some other outing (museum, splash park, etc.) Fridays I babysit so "school" is mostly a playdate with the boys I babysit, usually still including read-alouds. Other days we usually do school, some for longer than others depending on how much I need sleep in the morning (I work nights 4 shifts/wk).

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

 

Usually about 3 day, not including the enrichment program (which is a full day for a K'er). We may still do read alouds any day, but at least three days a week I try to do copywork and a science or art project with her, play a game, do something math-related, etc. Since we're just in K things are pretty relaxed and while I have some overall goals for the year in math and phonics, we don't have a set curriculum schedule at all.

[Jane]

:) No biggie, I thought 180 was wrong but didn't catch it until I had to do the math and it wasn't coming out right. :blush:

 

What's funny though, is I initially missed that you have a 40 week schedule. I school on the traditional 36 week schedule. However, I started my dd w/Horizons last year just to see if I like the program and she covered just enough to make up the difference. :)

[Jenny in Florida]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

- We're not terribly regimented about morning routine. Generally, my son gets up around 8:00, showers and eats breakfast, and is ready for desk time by 9:00. No formal morning chores, although I often ask him to collect laundry or straighten up his room or similar quick tasks. Oh, he does clear his breakfast dishes, rinse them and put them in the dishwasher.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

 

- Again, no set rules, and it depends in part on whether he's combining lunch with anything else. For example, he frequently chooses to eat lunch while watching an educational video or DVD I've assigned. Other times, he does some of his assigned reading while eating. If he's been efficient and gotten a lot done before he breaks for lunch, I don't really worry about how long he takes. If he's been dawdling or got a late start and is just eating (not doing anything assigned), I'll try to nudge him along after 30 minutes or so.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

- He usually gets started about 9:00 and finishes up somewhere around 2:00, I guess. Some days, he is super focused and efficient and gets done earlier. Others, well, not.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

- None during school hours.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year?

 

- Last year, we went to a four-day week, and it was great. So, we'll do it again this year. Most of the materials we're using aren't divided into daily lessons. But, in general, I just take the total number of pages (or lessons or however it's set up) and divide it by the number of weeks in our academic year. My son knows he's responsible for getting that much done each week and has a fair amount of freedom in determining how to manage it. So, if he has five lessons of math to do in a given week, for example, he may choose to double up one day (and maybe do less of another subject) or to save one lesson to do on Wednesday (his usual day off) or to somehow break up the extra lesson over a couple of days (do the reading one day and the written work the next).

[sweetbaby]

I've been reviewing schedules that some of you post links to here. Here are some of my questions.

 

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc. I get up at 6am and my children get up at 7am. I bathe, pray, get coffee then make breakfast all while my toddler sleeps. My children take their baths at night right before bed so its a quick wash up and teeth brushing/grooming in the mornings. They usually make beds and complete morning chores while I prepare breakfast. Group Bible study is usually the first lesson of our school day when we start at 8am.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break? We allow 30 min. for lunch. I prepare as they wrap up a lesson. I'm usually nearby because we have an open floor plan and the dining room/school room is next to our kitchen.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade. We begin at 8am and end whenever we get done. LOL We usually end around 3. Fridays end around 1 or 1:30.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.). We aren't in any co-ops but we have field trips and nature studies on Fridays. Doctor's appts. and other appts are scheduled around school in the afternoons.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.) We keep Fridays a little shorter than Mon-Thurs. We do our core five days a week.

 

I'm looking to see if I can tighten my schedule or if it's as tight as I can make it.

 

Thank you for your help. :)

[Jenny in Florida]

6:30 bible study

7:00 chores

7:30 breakfast

8:00 personal care

8:30 math, including 5 minute drill

9:30 spelling

10:00 vocabulary

10:30 science

11:30 lunch

12:00 piano practice

12:30 memory work

1:00 history

2:00 grammar (m/w/f), assigned reading (t,th)

3:00 free or homework

 

Ideas?

 

Well, mine isn't doing memory work, bible study or a formal spelling program, and his vocabulary stuff normally doesn't take more than 10 or 15 minutes a couple of times a week (Word Roots software). Also, I don't count music practice as part of the school day. (My son usually practices while his lunch is cooking or while he's waiting for something else.) So, that's a total of about two hours that you have scheduled into your day that we don't do. And, as someone else, said, it seems like you have a lot of time scheduled for science and history.

 

On the other hand, my son is doing three languages (Spanish, Latin and intro to Greek), plus geography and art. So, it probably evens out.

 

All I can tell you is that we do a lot of doubling up, reading or watching assigned DVDs over meals, for example. And my son reads quickly and well. Plus, I have only one homeschooling these days, which means he never has to wait for my attention.

 

On the other hand, it's possible I'm just deluded and that we actually spend a lot more time than I remember . . . ?

[sagira]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

Just an hour. We wake up at 9, eat breakfast, clean up the kitchen, then start school at 11 AM. At least that's the plan.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

We are done with our school early, as ds is only in K, so everything will be ready before lunch prep at 1 PM and actual lunch at 2 PM.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

Oh, our school starts at 11 and ends at 12:30-1 PM.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

None, except the occasional playgroup that is exceptionally interesting enough for us to attend.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

We have a four-day week of the basics: Math, Poetry, Literature, Phonics, Reading and Penmanship. On the fifth day, Friday, we turn our attention towards Religion, Science, Spanish, Music and Art. We may add Geography to that mix in January, we'll see how it goes.

[Leila]

I've been reviewing schedules that some of you post links to here. Here are some of my questions.

 

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc. I am never really a morning person, so I get up at 7:30 and give myself half an hour to really wake up. My kids are up earlier than me and my husband watches over them and waits for me to get ready. Around 8, I cook breakfast and while eating, I read them a story and the Bible. Our school time usually starts at 9am. I make sure I make all the beds in our house and clean up a little bit before we start.

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break? We always have an hour for lunch break

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.Starts at 9am and after lunch,I give myself a break, we resume at 3pm and finish at 5pm, this is for my 8 yrs. old . My younger son (4yo) just starting reading, so after lunch I work with him a little bit.

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.). Monday to Thursday, we don't usually schedule any activity during the day or it should be after school time like Martial arts every Mon 615pm/AWANA Wed 7pm.

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.) We do light school during Fridays, we go to the library in the afternoon and spend time in the park and let them play

[Marilyn Joyce]

I have been having difficulty with scheduling. I am going to try Managers of their Homes and Managers of their Chores by Terri Maxwell. I have already made a schedule with her charts. I can see that this will help me greatly. She has many examples of schedules from others included in her book.

[Tree House Academy]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc. My kids get up between 8 and 8:30. They eat as soon as they get up and when they are finished, we start school. Usually between 9 and 9:30.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break? We don't have lunch break. We take a 20 minute recess after our 3rd subject (about two hours into the day) and he can have a snack if he likes...but heck, he ate breakfast less than 2 hours before that!). Then he does another 2 - 2.5 hours of work and then we have lunch between 1 and 2 pm.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade. My Kindergartener starts after I have gotten my older started on his Math, so around 9:30-10 depending. He finished in 1-2 hours (also depending on what he has to do that day. He is always done by the time my older gets his 20 minute break). My older starts between 9 and 9:30 and is done between 1 and 2pm

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.). My older takes Karate on Thursdays and my younger takes music at the same time.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.) We use the 5 day Calvert schedule.

[Academy of Jedi Arts]

1. Dd wakes up about 8AM. She has her breakfast and takes a shower. Depending on how long I take fixing her hair and whatnot, we usually try to start school by 9-9:30 AM.

 

2. Lunch break is usually about 30-45 minutes.

 

3. Dd is 7. We don't have an official start or end time. She has about 5-6 hours of actual work per day, not counting breaks. Some days it's more some days it's less.

 

4. Since we moved piano to 2:30, we now have no activities during the regular school day. We also do dance and soccer after school.

 

5. We do school 5 days per week, but we only do math and grammar 4 days right now. It really doesn't matter for us if the subjects work out to 180 calendar days or not since we don't follow the school calendar.

[Lydia]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

The kids wake up around 7 and usually read in bed for awhile. Then they shower and dress, and we have breakfast together. Their morning chores consist of setting and clearing the breakfast table, emptying the clean dishwasher, and tidying their room (making beds, etc). We begin school at 9am.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

 

One hour. 12-1.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

9am - 4pm with the hour break at lunch. They are 11 (beginning 6th grade).

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

Piano lessons and outside gym class once a week each. But piano lessons are not during school hours (piano practice is during school hours).

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

 

5 days.

 

I'm looking to see if I can tighten my schedule or if it's as tight as I can make it.

 

Best wishes,

Lydia

[Jane]

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

9am - 4pm with the hour break at lunch. They are 11 (beginning 6th grade).

 

Best wishes,

Lydia

 

Thank you. I'm starting to see that we're in the average for this age range. Lydia, your schedule is so similar to ours--even the two hour morning routine before school officially begins.

 

Wishing you all a glorious year!

[Jane]

On the other hand, it's possible I'm just deluded and that we actually spend a lot more time than I remember . . . ?

 

LOL! This cracked me up. :) Technically, I think your piano practice is happening at the same time as ours--around lunch time!

 

Also, I didn't mean to imply that we are neglecting art or geography. Geography is folded into memory work and history. Art occurs on Fridays. My Friday schedule is a little bit too difficult to explain in this format. A look at my master charts would reveal more. I got the help I needed here though by sharing my abbreviated version. I've over-scheduled my Word Roots software and can use that time for our *single* foreign language endeavor. <bwg>

 

Have a fantastic year!

[Peela]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

 

 

1. The kids are up at 7am, either voluntarily or because I wake them. Dd14 showers in the morning, ds12 showers in the evening.

This week: ds12 is taking care of the rabbits, all bins, own washing.

dd14 is doing the chickens, all dishes, and own washing. Some of these chores rotate.

 

2.&3. School starts with music practice at 8am, and then sit down work at 8.30. We work till we finish, with short breaks for snacks, usually around 1pm- sometimes they finish later with their independent reading, in their rooms after lunch, or in the evening.

No time for lunch unless the day is particularly dragging- lunch is usually after school finishes. If we do have lunch before school has finished, it is short, just enough time to eat usually. This way, we finish earlier and they have more free time. I didn't used to do it this way, but I think we all prefer it now.

 

4. Mondays, 12-3pm is our coop- drama and sport.

Fridays there are two science classes, one for each child- unfortunately this takes all day as one is from 9.30 till 11, the other from 12-1.30. Annoying, but the classes are very good and the kids get a really good social time in a park, and sometimes catch up on schoolwork, while they wait for their class.

 

5. I prefer a 5 day week but with our science on Fridays, and losing part of Monday, it ends up being more like a 4 day. However, I make sure we do 5 days of Maths at a minimum. I seem to be able to manage 4 days with everything but maths.

[rafiki]

.

[LoveBaby]

This thread has been extremely helful to me as I begin to plan our schedule! It's given me a good idea of the framework for our day and how I might be able to fit more of what I want to into our day.

[Narrow Gate Academy]

I've been reviewing schedules that some of you post links to here. Here are some of my questions.

 

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break?

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.)

 

I'm looking to see if I can tighten my schedule or if it's as tight as I can make it.

 

Thank you for your help. :)

 

 

1) My kids have one hour in the morning before school starts. They get up, dress, make their beds, brush their hair, and eat breakfast. Then we have our Bible time, and school starts at 8:00. I found it better to start right into school because they focus better. If they play or read before school, then they are sitting their thinking about what they were just doing instead of their school work.

 

2) This year we're only taking 30 minutes for lunch because my 4th grader still has some work to do after lunch. Last year, school took less time, and we would spend closer to an hour for lunch.

 

3) My 4th grader does school from 8-10, 10:30-12:30 (this includes her piano practice), 1-2, and then we read aloud from 3-3:30. My second grader does school from 8-9, 9:30-12, and then joins the read aloud from 3-3:30.

 

4) We don't have any activities scheduled during school time.

 

5) We work 5 days a week. For us, the days in a 4 day week were just too long.

[dcjlkplus3]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? Why have you established that much/little time? Do your children shower in the mornings? Have bible study? What kind of morning chores? Etc. My kids are little(3, 5, 7) and usually up by 7:30 or so. I try and get in the shower by 6:30 or 7:00 (depending on dh and when he is done.) All they have to do before we start are eat breakfast, get dressed and wake up enough to have a good attitude. We try to start by 9:00.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break? Lunch is around 12:00 or so regardless of what we get done in the mornings. After that is quiet time for about 2 hours or so. They can read, listen to audio books or stories, draw, and play quietly.

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade.

We have about 10-12 things on our daily list(including quick/fun things like piano, free reading, handwriting). Usually I let dd7 do 3 things and then have a play break (no more than 15-20 min.). Then repeat the process all day. We try to get at least half of our list done in the morning (math has to be done in the morning to prevent whining). We finish up with another hour or 2 after 3:00 and a snack. If they are really focusing well we can delay lunch a little (if we need to) and finish in the morning. We have a white board(4'x8') on the wall of our school room and she gets to put it in order, but I pick what goes on it (that way she has some control over her schedule). She loves being able to cross things off or erase them as she finishes.

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.).

Activites are on the list of things for the day. We go to CBS 1 day a week they have a great homeschool program for 1st grade and up (able to read and write - at least some). We will try to do dance class or something this year - depending on cost.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.) We do school five days for the most part. We are required to do only 172 days in CO, I will keep records for those days, but we will probably do more and try to finish the stuff for the year (history, math, writing and grammar)

[mcconnellboys]

1) How much time do you allow for your morning routine before you officially begin school? We try to get up an hour before we start. Sometimes it's less than that, but an hour gives us plenty of time to eat, dress, etc. My son does not shower in the morning at this time in his life. I do some chores during the hour before we start school, but I generally don't have them doing any. We do Bible study as our first lesson of the day in school.

 

2) How much time do you allow for lunch break? We generally take an hour out for lunch (sometimes it runs longer)....

 

3) At what time does your school day officially begin and officially end; this should include ages of children because it differs from grade to grade. I am only homeschooling one son now. We have always tried to do school from 8-3 (with an hour lunch break). We do many things outside of the house during the week during this time, as well, so it's not all sit-at-the-desk work.

 

4) How many activities per week are in your schedule during school hours (ie: co-op, special foreign language class, etc.). That varies quite a bit. Right now, we have piano scheduled on Mondays (30 mi.); Friday field trips which will be changing soon to Wednesday field trips (varies from an hour, in-town, to all day, out of town); soon-to-be Friday gym and swim (two hours); hopefully Friday art/science exploration is coming down the pike (I'm not sure how long that will be, maybe 2 hours); working on an hour long Spanish class on Thursdays. And we do miscellaneous other field trips scheduled by other people as they come up, too.

 

5) Do you schedule 4 or 5 day weeks? For those w/4 day schedules how do you complete all the math and grammar lessons in a year? (I realize programs differ, so maybe a mention of that is helpful. For example, Horizons Math has a full 180 lessons.) I count my pages in grammar and divide by the number of days I'll do that subject (144 if doing 4 days per week). Most years, it comes out to 2 pages of grammar per day in Abeka. I do the same with Singapore math and most of the time, I can cover all the lessons, exercises, reviews and tests by doing a lesson a day and the exercise(s) that go with it; review page(s) only on the days where those fall; and tests only on the days where those fall.

 

Regena