I'm so frustrated! I can't get our schedule right. I mean, I planned one out and it wasn't working, so I decided to switch to a 4 day schedule with the 5th day as a small day just for art, music, and boy and girl studies (like scouts and sewing crafts, etc). Well, I tried out the new schedule today and it was still way too long! I know some say don't schedule but I have to or else it won't get done. I speak from experience as it often happened last year. I'm just so frustrated with the whole thing! :x Where they're so close in age, I've made most of their classes together except for math and of course they read aloud separately. I try to utilize those times to have the other do something else like handwriting. I was trying to do art daily (cuz my dd loves art) but that's not going to work so it's completely pushed to friday. What do you think works best for science and social studies? I like to do them both each day but it's taking a long time, especially science. Do you think a 30m history/ 30 minute science works best? or a 5 minute one subject/ 45 minutes one subject and rotating or just do one subject for two days and one for another? I'm just tired now from racking my brain over this! :| Thanks for listening to me rant.
I am trying something new this year, we have our schedule but we also have a sign out chart, each kid signs on thier own , dd will do computer timed log, and ds wil put a check mark as he finishes his work, After I check it I put a sticker in the spot.
btw.. I've re-arrange my grammar/ spelling/ weekly readers on different days. So far it's spelling on monday with 5 min. reviews on t-thur and test on friday. grammar (well trained mind) on tuesday-thurs and Monday weekly reader. I might change it to: mon-weekly reader tues-spelling work (w&th 5 min review/ test fri) wed & thurs- grammar. I just hate to cut grammar back to only two days. But there are only 100 lessons for each grade year so I guess I have some leeway there, right?
OH and in reply, to yoru question 30 mins for history and or science , one per day alternated for your kids ages for sure! this is how I personally would do it math-- give yourself an hour to teach and them to do a sheet of what you taught, or whatever... english related, ( Lang arts, spelling , reading ) give yourself an hour slot for that Science, History each get only 30 mins. WHatever else gets 30 min slot! You have young kidos so dont over load the teacher! heheh
I like that schedule...it would be 4 hours total. If I can just fit it all in. well, maybe 4 1/2 counting both kid's reading and choral. I'm just tired now!
You see though...that's what I do...'but we have to have this and we have to have that.' and before you know it.... (I got myself tickled when I re-read my last post and thinking of this). I think I'll go through our schedule again with your basic 4 hour outline in mind and see what I can do. Thanks
Just wanted to chime in that you are definitely not alone in the "frustration". Somedays we seem to go from 10-4 (less lunch) and other days, we go from 10-1 and I call it a day (no matter where we are). I try to remind myself that whether it takes 2 hours or 12 :lol:....they're still probably getting more than the would at the neighborhood school (and much less of the "junk".) Rhonda
I usually try to do the subjects that take the longest first. Science 2x a week. history 2x a week grammer every other day phonic 2x a week spelling 3x a week social study 1x a week math, reading daily. if they take longer time in any subject then they have to finish it as a homework later on that day.
This year I decided to try something different. I bought a teacher's class book and wrote one son's name on one side and one son's name on the other side. I then listed down the side (where you are supposed to list student's names) all of their subjects and daily activities. I also filled in the dates along the top for them to follow down. I am only doing this for my 5th and 6th graders as I still need to be right there with the 2nd and K. Right now the list is like this: Every Day: Language Arts Spelling Vocabulary Reading Science Social Studies Math 30 min Individual Reading 30 min Computers 30 min Wii Fit They also have some thing that are only done once or twice a week: Parts of Speech- M/W Sentence Structure- T/TH Capitalization and Punctuation- F Key to Fractions, Measurements, Geometry- M/W/F Key to Percents, Decimals, Algebra- T/TH (The Keys we alternate one week one set gets three days and the next week it gets two days.) For the subjects that are not every day I went ahead and Xd out those days on the attendence chart so the boys know that they do not have to do them. We also have some things that I do with them when we can work it in for all of us to do together. Sometimes this ends up being done at night or on the weekends. Those are: History Penmanship Testing Art and Music (they also do these on their own) Reading Aloud The boys are really liking the new schedule because they can see what they need to do and are accountable for it. It takes around 5-6 hours for them each day and they enjoy breaking up their days. They will usually do 90 min book work and then do computer, Wii Fit, or Reading, and repeat that pattern during the day. They can usually work on their own but I am available to them if they need me to help with anything. They can start when they want but the earlier they start in the morning, the sooner they are done. My oldest usually finishes up before the 2nd one so he will go back and work on a book that he did not need to do that day. This way he can work ahead in some things. This schedule seems to work well for us.
They check it off. We keep it open on a table so that they can see what they still have left and I can come check on their progress as well. This way we make sure nothing is skipped and we have documented days of work in case we ever have to produce records of school time.
By the way, you can get those teacher record books in the dollar spot at Target or at Dollar Tree. That is where I got mine.
I can't imagine having 4 or more hours at those ages! We had a kit for my ds when he was in 2nd grade---everything laid out, a full 2nd grade curriculum, and it took us MAYBE 2-2 1/2 hours. Maybe you can focus on History for part of the year, and science for part of the year? For the last couple of years I've used a template I made in WORD--very simple: lists each day of the week, and each subject. There's a box before each lesson that they can mark off when they're done, then when I'm done grading I mark a check mark with red ink. It's worked really well. I work on the scheduling on Sunday evenings. I see what did and what did not get accomplished, and schedule accordingly. We go to church on Saturday, so we use Sunday for make-up work, scheduling, etc. So on Monday morning, we start fresh. But sometimes the schedule gets messed up for one reason or another, so I just swing un-done things to the next week.
Keep in mind that the 4 hours I'm trying to meet isn't really 4 FULL HOURS for both kids....That includes ds's math, then dd's math, and later ds's reading, then dd's reading. You see, so it's not technically 4 full hours. If it were just one child, then it would only be taking me 3 hours each day. This tends to add about 1 or 1 1/2 hours to our daily schedule.
My kids are quite a bit younger, but at first I had a hard time with scheduling because I was trying to do to much each day. We now do a 4 day week, with friday as catch up with what ever doesn't get done. I also make up my schedule on Sunday so whatever doesn't get done during the week will be picked up on the next week. Another thing I did was try to combine as many things as I could. Our read alouds are books that are about our civics lesson. I am right now using bible and science together. Art is done in free time, because the kids like it so much, or comibned with another subject. Like this month we are studying families in civics, and a book about grandparents is what we are reading aloud, for art we made grandparents cards (next week a family tree). Sometimes we go outside and play tag, hide and go seek, hopscotch using the anwers to additon facts as the way to go which takes care of PE type stuf and math. Etc. That way we get more done in a little bit of time. There is no need to go over more bible stuff since we spent 30 minutes talking about creation. We don't have spend time on Civics because we read about firefighters during read alouds. That leaves math, phonics, and handwriting. Which all takes less then an hour. Usually we take about 2 hours total to do all of our school work. I don't know if that helps you our not, but just thought I would add in my two cents.
I will admit that it took a while for me to get a good schedule - and it wasn't until my oldest was in about 6th grade that it really started to work. Then he did a lot of stuff himself (I use a checklist for him) and it got better this year as all history and a lot of science overlaps with all three kids (WOW -- that does make a huge difference!) All three (even my 2nd grader) uses a check list and a lot of stuff she does on her own - spelling, even some math, handwriting. I just learned that you have to teach kids how to use the check list - it is not an instinctive thing! That was a fun learning experience for me (what do you mean you don't know what to do next? Did you look at your list? Why isn't anything checked off? HAHHAA)! It is most difficult to get a good schedule with littles, and you really have to just let some things slide and be OK with it. No one is perfect, no day is perfect (although some come close), and no schedule is perfect. Just do you best, get done what you can. I learned to have a "catch up day" which has now morphed to a "catch up week" at the end of each section we do (mostly unit study type work). That way they can review, finish projects, complete final drafts of essays, and the like. So far it has worked out really well.
We did 7 hours today...including lunch, p.e. (an exercise video since it is raining) and 5 minute breaks here and there. BUT that did include nearly an hour on our science work (the kids were enjoying it so we kept on). I'm still working on it. And we can't seem to start at 8 to save our lives. But I've figured out not to do all parts of language arts on the same day (we do weekly reader on mon, spelling on tuesd (with 5 minute reviews each day and then "test" on friday), and wed & thurs we do grammar. That seems to be helping a lot instead of trying to squeeze all of that into one day. We've also rotated science and history to a 2 day/2day/off schedule (his. his. sci.sci. off, etc) I've also been doing our choral reading during lunch (which just means I eat later, but oh well, lol). Our biggest time consumer right now is ds's math. Dd is getting hers done usually in 30 minutes but ds seems to be averaging an entire hour. Saxon has A LOT of work to do daily BUT where we had a bad math experience last year he needs it. He seems to be very behind, especially since we're still in the 'refresher' parts that he should already know. I did do something today that might help us in some way. DD is having problems reading again. I think she's lost her confidence. Especially because she is stumbling badly, asking me for help and reading so very quietly that I almost can't hear her. Today I chucked the book and put her on starfall. Ds played with her. I think I'm going to let her do starfall while ds is doing math for a little while until she gets secure in her reading again.
what is starfall? ANd it sounds like you are working th ings out well! I found today that I was the one who did not want to do work, I did bible then let them get their first lesson, Went over lessons then did laundry and picked up a book. Stopped to remind ds what I meant in decimal numbers, and dealth with that wonderful emotional upheival of "I was wrong!" then went back to the book I was reading... kids went from school to break to school as I read and encouraged occasionally but ds got me going with PE, or Id have stayed in my book hahah
You are definitely not alone! We are having some scheduling issues too. We are going way into the late afternoon when I've tried to do science and history (my kids are in 3rd & 6th). I like the idea of especially doing history daily so they can retain the information better but its not working so well. I even tried doing those subjects first but then it is just as crazy. The best I've come up with is maybe not doing language and writing strands everyday like I've been doing. That may help gain some time for science and history - who knows! I can hardly wait for music lessons and co-op to start!
tmom--starfall is a website (starfall.com) that has reading at various different levels...starting at the abc's of preschool to more difficult phonics stuff. We used it a lot last year because ds was so ANTI-READING (definitely not my child!) so the 'computer game' was fun to do ....and he didn't realize he was doing reading work. But we started back at the beginning to read pages with stories like "Zac the rat...Zac had a bat" etc. jomama- I'm like you, I want them to have science and history daily but the two times per week thing is working for now. We can't do them first because we usually take at least an hour in science, lol...we get carried away with the lapbooking. Let me know if you find anything that works for you! I'll do the same!
