I am re-vamping my weekly schedule to fit in line with a Charlotte Mason approach --- but am stuck on which subjects should be daily and which should be 2 times a week etc. HELP --- my brain is going to explode and I really want to nail this down before the end of the week!! :lol: So, here is a rundown on our household: I have a ds6 and a ds4. We live on a ranch and the boys are both outdoors many hours a day (usually unstructured time etc.). I work one day a week (1st semester I worked on Monday, so we schooled Tues.-Friday; but am contemplating changing my work day to Wednesday, so we can school Monday & Tuesday, have a break, and then Thursday & Friday --ANY OPINIONS about that??) I have been using the following curriculum: Math U See (*LOVE IT*) Bible Devotions for Boys Handwriting without Tears Explode the Code Ordinary Parents Guide to Reading Abeka Early Readers Story of The World Christian Kids Explore Earth and Space I just purchased Writing with Ease and 1st Language Lessons and started a few lessons prior to the holidays. Even though I have all this curriculum - I have still found it difficult to hit on each one each day (although it could be that I was trying to do too much of each subject - more than 20 minutes each). SO - my question is....what do I need to include each day and which ones do I need to include a few days a week....and which should I eliminate? I'm a bit of a scheduler - but his one has me perplexed. I don't want to make my life too hard bc I realize both kids are little -- but I don't want to slack off and not feel I am doing the best educationally. Realistically both of my kids get a lot of exposure to nature, and sometimes I feel they have TOO much free time to explore and play. Thanks for any advice.
There is a yahoo group for each year of the Amblesideonline.org curriculum, also look at www.simplycharlottemason.com for ideas. I know Tiffany likes www.charlottemasonhelp.com, they may have schedule ideas there as well.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AO_Year01_Notebook/ This is a yahoo group where they have formatted almost all the books you need to do Ambleside Online. With it they have a schedule of "week 1, week 2 etc" and then from there you can pick how to spread it out. From that schedule I would take a printed schedule I made in Excel and then fill it out each week for the kids. Of course yours would be mainly for you at this point But it could help you stay on track!!
HI, I have a 6 yo and 4 yo as well ( a 1 yo too now ) I would do math and reading ( one or the other of yours you have chosen ) every day. With free reading, as a required time if that needs to be encouraged. Then the others I would do once or twice a week. I try to let my kids spend at least 6 hours outside when the weather is nice. I feel like the more they are outside during "free play" they will learn more right now then inside with a book. I mean my boy is learning all about flight, gravity, nature etc all by observation then asking me questions and us looking up answers in the books we have. I spend about 1 hour doing school a day. Ds is reading on a very solid 2nd grade, and is doing well in math ( once I changed it, I think that it is funny we hated MUS and everything got way better once we changed. Isn't it great that we have so many to choose from !) We school more when the weather is bad. Like cold cold winter time, or 110+ summer days. Then play more when the weather is nice. I dont' know if that helps you any.
Thanks aggie01 - it does help to hear what someone is doing that has the same age children. When you say that you let your son play outside the majority of the day, are you interacting with him this entire time? I can only do so much outdoor boy-sy stuff before I am pulling my hair out and ready to do something else. Then I'll notice my ds6 meandering around looking for something to do...I don't know if he is bored, but my assumption is that he needs more to do - then come the feelings of guilt etc.
