Anyone else prep an entire year in advance?

[mama25angels]

Chelli, do you use the keyed or unkeyed sheets?

[kolamum]

I do a "pencil in" over the summer. That means I map out our terms {past few years have been 4, 10 week, terms. Then I can divide up what we want to accomplish over that time frame. I make a big ol' spread sheet of it after it's all penciled in. Then during our 2 week break between each term I set aside a few hours to crank out my objectives & firm plans for each 10 week term. Usually it consists of 9 solid weeks of academics & 1 week to catch up on anything we've fallen behind on, tie up lose ends, projects, etc.

 

Books, I try to order ALL at once, but if not I order 2 terms worth & then make a note in my calendar with an alarm to remind me of when I need to order the rest by. Everything for each term is ready to roll prior to starting because otherwise I limp.. badly.

[Reefgazer]

Yes and no.  I have a general framework for what I want to accomplish and when for the year, but I leave the specifics for month-to-month planning.  I do print off some things for the entire year (SOTW maps, copies of the Declaration of Independence for them to mark up with notes, math test answer sheets), but *when* I actually use them waits for my monthly planning session, which allows me to adjust our schedule as needed.  

I've learned that if I don't print off every worksheet and order all of my supplies in advance of the school year, I am doomed. I just can't do stuff week-to-week or even month-to-month.

 

Anyone else in the same boat?

 

[ereks mom]

I don't even know what kind of a planner I am. First, I plan out how many lessons or pages we need to do per week to finish all of my planned subjects/courses in 36 weeks. From that, I make a weekly schedule. Then, I only actually write down what we're going to do in my planner a week ahead of time. And then I write down some of what we do as we do it. So I'm a combination yearly planner, weekly planner and logger. :) I think.

 

I do, however, print stuff a week at a time. I use a lot of digital curricula and it would take ages and ages to print it all ahead of time.

 

I am like this too.  I make a broad yearly plan, and as much as possible, I plan the whole year week by week.  BUT I get SO tired of having to reconfigure my lesson plans when something unforeseen happens and we get a day behind, or someone completely bombs a math test and I have to go back and reteach for a couple of days.  I find that it works better for me to make a general plan for the year and then make more specific plans week by week. I made a weekly assignment sheet in Word to use as a template, and I try to plan some subjects 4 to 6 weeks ahead on the assignment sheets, filling in the rest week by week.

[Targhee]

I'm doomed if I DO prep the whole year like that in advanced. I have to be ready for a change in plans (which is put upon me more often than not), and I would be so frustrated and cranky if I had prepped everything and it all went to heck in a pencil box. I plan my year, but prep materials one week at a time.

[Targhee]

Dp

[ondreeuh]

Yes -- it is all done in the spring and summer. I typically separate every subject so that we can speed up/slow down as needed without ruining the whole plan. I started using Skedtrack in the middle of last year and it is perfect for my middle schooler! It gives him a daily checklist of what to do, but if something doesn't get done then it just gets bumped to the next day. I have already entered in every assignment in every subject, and have included hyperlinks for things like CNN Student News and math tutorials. This year I made a mash-up of Bookshark US history and MBTP 12-14 LA, and I put each "unit" in a magazine file together along with the novels and other materials. Those are all stored neatly on a bookshelf in the school room.

 

I will be using Calvert with my youngest this year (plus supplements) and I split everything into groups of 20 lessons. It was kind of a PITA to rip out, trim, punch & organize everything but now it's all clipped together so I can swap out the active group. Math is separate, though.

[aprilleigh]

I plan everything ahead of time in my own offline version of Homeschool Skedtrak (the online version is fabulous, but there are a few oddities in the way I schedule that it doesn't handle well, so I improvised). Everything except spelling and math are carefully scheduled by week and day. The reason those two aren't scheduled that way is our pace depends on DS. So far I've had no reason to be concerned for either subject because he seems to whip right through them.

 

The stuff I schedule carefully is laid out in weekly folders, with each page marked for the day it's scheduled for (in pencil, just in case). Books that aren't consumable have post-it tabs marking each week's work, which are removed after the week is completed (sort of a visual reminder to us both of how much we've accomplished that year). Our overall scheduling pattern tends to be fairly forgiving of outside interruptions because, instead of scheduling partial weeks around holidays, I school year round and either skip those weeks or stick to review and additional reading. It seems to work fairly well for the most part. Mom getting sick can put a kink in the works though, but thankfully that doesn't happen often.

 

The only thing I can't always plan (particularly now that we've moved and it's harder to get what we need in the new library system) is the additional reading, history, science, and other books we usually get from the library. For those I maintain a list of what I'd like for each week, along with a list of topics to search for if I can't find the specific books I want. In some cases, if it's a book a really, really want to use, I may just buy it on Amazon, but I try to limit that. DS loves books as much as I do, so I can't buy everything we want or the house would eventually collapse under the weight of them.

 

That said, I suspect things will change quite a bit after next year, because I'm planning to move into a more student-centered schedule, making DS responsible for getting his work done (asking me for assistance where needed, of course).

[Mystie]

I do get everything ready in the summer, but I do very little lesson planning at all. In the summer, I do all the work to set everything up as "do the next thing." 

 

We print out new weekly checklists on Monday (then I can tweak if necessary), but everything is written as "read the next chapter in history" or "do 5 lines of cursive practice." But all the books are bought, all the handwriting practice pages printed, all the memory work binder pages set up and ready to go (I swap out our new material and review pages between each 6-week term - but the material we'll do is already decided and prepped).

 

I leave a blank after "Latin pg ___" on the checklists, but we sit down together for Latin, I flip to the chapter we're in and hand him the book opened to the page I want him to do. Each morning for math, I open up the math book, tear out the page I want them to do, include a note if I think they need to watch the lesson, and their checklist says "math page 100%". So, we're never behind. We are where we are and we pick up and do the next thing each day, but everything is ready to grab so we aren't held up by needing to print pages. I don't do any planning or prep on weekends. 

 

However, we also don't use any curriculum except for Latin and math, and I don't care whether we do 1/2 a book, 3/4 of a book, or more than a book in a school year - we end when we end and we pick back up the next year with both Latin and math. All other subjects are read + narrate, or read + write or it's something I'm doing "at-elbow" with them (like phonics). I correct everything same day and they have to redo it to my satisfaction (for writing, they get several days after feedback, but math isn't done until it's 100%).

 

I'm about halfway done with our next school year planning.....time to buckle down and just get it all done and set up! We begin July 6th (we've been out since early May).

[Targhee]

I do get everything ready in the summer, but I do very little lesson planning at all. In the summer, I do all the work to set everything up as "do the next thing." 

 

We print out new weekly checklists on Monday (then I can tweak if necessary), but everything is written as "read the next chapter in history" or "do 5 lines of cursive practice." But all the books are bought, all the handwriting practice pages printed, all the memory work binder pages set up and ready to go (I swap out our new material and review pages between each 6-week term - but the material we'll do is already decided and prepped).

 

I leave a blank after "Latin pg ___" on the checklists, but we sit down together for Latin, I flip to the chapter we're in and hand him the book opened to the page I want him to do. Each morning for math, I open up the math book, tear out the page I want them to do, include a note if I think they need to watch the lesson, and their checklist says "math page 100%". So, we're never behind. We are where we are and we pick up and do the next thing each day, but everything is ready to grab so we aren't held up by needing to print pages. I don't do any planning or prep on weekends. 

 

However, we also don't use any curriculum except for Latin and math, and I don't care whether we do 1/2 a book, 3/4 of a book, or more than a book in a school year - we end when we end and we pick back up the next year with both Latin and math. All other subjects are read + narrate, or read + write or it's something I'm doing "at-elbow" with them (like phonics). I correct everything same day and they have to redo it to my satisfaction (for writing, they get several days after feedback, but math isn't done until it's 100%).

 

I'm about halfway done with our next school year planning.....time to buckle down and just get it all done and set up! We begin July 6th (we've been out since early May).

This is more along the lines of what we do.  Having page numbers, pre-printed week packets, etc. would only end in my frustration at them not being accurate and us having to punt anyway.  We have lots of interruptions to our HSing week because of DH's schedule.  

 

I also spend summers planning, revisiting my philosophy of education and the needs of my individual learners, then outlining goals, then enumerating skills to work on/towards, and then choosing curriculum that will help.  And most of my curriculum is "do the next thing."  The only class I have week by week is a biology class, because I am teaching the lab at co-op.

[FO4UR]

I plan each subject/book down to page numbers and have every bit of copywork printed, passages for dictation pulled and analyzed before September.  This year, I am Spiral-Binding-All-The-Things!!!  Filing and placing in binders is a grand idea, but this has resulted in lost items and messes for us.  Maybe I just have too many kids to make that work....for me.

 

 

That said, I leave the daily plans to fill in each weekend. I plan 36 weeks worth of school, and I print 40 weeks worth of daily planning pages.  That seems to be a good, happy medium of flexibility and consistency.  

[ScoutTN]

Yes and no.

I do figure out our weeks of school and tentative vacation or time off. I know our basic schedule for the school year, extracurriculars, tutorial, church etc. so I know more or less how a typical week will look. I know when some field trips will be since some schedules are published far ahead.

I do subject planning for content areas like history and science, similar to what Chelli described. Not tied to any schedule or dates, so I can adjust as needed. I like the Donna Young pages, but prefer lined paper to small boxes and small print.

This year for Dd I read through the math book and worked some of the problems since I am not strong in math and we have a new curriculum. I have thought (am thinking!) through writing and how writing across the curriculum will work.

I have planned out our Narnia unit for this year, but not everything is set in ink. I have the lit and Bible parts planned and the big projects, but have left my options open for other parts of the study.

I don't find that spelling, grammar, lower grades math, WWE, penmanship etc. need any planning. All open and go, just do the next thing. I do choose some of our memory work and RAs ahead of time, but these are certainly in pencil.

Our daily schedule is what is giving me trouble this year. Still haven't figured it out.