When I first started homeschooling my olders, I bought 2 little student desks. It really helped set the tone to begin with. I know it was not neccesary, but it worked. I liked it and they liked it too. Plus, it gave a place to keep their things. BUT, unfortunately, I got rid of them when those children grew out of them. I regret that now as my younger children are ready for it. I really thought I would just be able to replace them when the time came if I wanted, but instead, I cannot find any just like those. I have, however, found a couple things that will work, just not what I wanted. Now, I do not want the children working at the kitchen table due to the way our new house is arranged. And our dining table, where my oldest works, is big and formal and so on. So that is not exactly practical for smaller sized children. SO, I want to get something else. Now I am wondering if I should just get a little table and put it upstairs. We have 2 playrooms basically..one is a loft area/game room and the other is a media room. I have seen smaller sized tables at IKEA and was thinking that maybe those would be more practical. I have a large built in desk area there with stand up folder holder things. But, the table option won't give each child their own assigned space. But, I am not sure that is so important...as they will sort of have their own space as they will have their own spots at the table. There are 2 of them. Not sure which to go with.
We started at the table.. bought a desk thinking it would help us focus.. instead it made us feel trapped and in school... definately not our style. Now we use the table, the sofa, the floor, the yard, a bed.. where ever we feel like being.
We didn't start with desks, we started with the dining room table. After awhile I decided to use our spare bedroom and I got desks for each of my kids and we had a "school room" with maps, art, bookshelves, white board and the works. It ended up not working so well for us. It seemed harder for the kids to focus. So after about 6 months, I sold the desks and we have been happily schooling at the dining room table. We move it outside if the weather is nice, but sometimes that can become too distracting, so I play it by ear.
Awww! The table vs desk dilemma! LOL Ems went through three desks total. One was very pretty and matched her room. She used it at first then stopped. So we sold it. Then I found a really cool, tattered old metal desk. Sold that one too. Then she had a simple desk that we bought at WalMart. We gave it away because she never used it. Finally it hit me, she likes doing school all over the place and not just at the desk. So we are offically desk free with the exception of the desk in my room that is used for bills and letter writing.
We had desks because I thought it would help create the Time to work mentality...it didn't work so well. We ended up getting a small child sized table and using that instead. The desks became too much of a hassle and the boys really hated it. They much prefered to have a table where they could sit together.
We have alternated between desks and kitchen table. I've finally given up on the desk/schoolroom idea for good (probably). My sister uses a desk and school room and loves it. They always start out their day there, but then spread all over the house. She likes it because it gives her a place to keep the school stuff so it doesn't overflow and take over the house. I like the kitchen table because we don't have room for a dediated school room in our house and because I like to wander and do my house work or read or blog and so on during school part of the time and it allows me to have more freedom of movement while still keeping an eye on my kids. My older kids, 10 and 12, do very little of their school work actuallly sitting at the table. The easiest thing if it is possible is to have cabinets or drawers right by the table or desk where your kids work to keep all their stuff handy, but put away. My dream would be a built in counter/desk area along one wall with overhead cabinets and a bulletin board on the wall: one study area for each kid.
Table for sure! And a bigger one at that. A desk is only good for independent work while a table is great for the and group activities, puzzles, crafts and most importantly, throwing a blanket over for an instant fort. If you want to make a table more desk-like there are some homeschoolers who set up minidesks - They buy or make those tri-fold science fair presentation boards to put up in front of a child. You can tape different things in it or attach envelopes for holding work, etc. When a child is done you just fold it up and stick it away. Another thing I was doing to give a table the advantages of a desk was to take a couple of those plastic drawers things on castors (my two are white with four see-through drawers) and put their supplies and work in that. On top I put a cheap dish rack to hold their daily work. The books stood up neatly and the utensil tray was perfect for pencils, rulers and other odds and ends. When the kids sat at the table I could roll those up beside them. I'll have to post pictures on my blog at some point. In the end even that was to formal and restrictive and we're back to just a kitchen table for some work but also the sofa and beds. Life of Fred for instance is best done lying on a bed with a glass of water and a bowl of party mix.
After reading all these posts about kids not liking desk, it makes me regret getting one for my daughter. LOL We'll have to try it out for awhile and see how she does. I have a feeling we'll be moving to the kitchen table, too.
Mine have a desk that has two sides. They sit facing each other and each has their own set of drawers. They keep their laptops on the desk and work there sometimes. Most of their work is done at the dining room table or anywhere else they like at the moment.
It is ok. My older children loved their desks. But I was thinking a table would be better. My daughter does not like her desk that is in her bedroom, but she loved her little desk that was in the classroom. My oldest loved both, but he is not homeschooled anymore and uses his desk in his room for lots of things..as far as I can tell..shoving things in to when he is told to clean his room.
We use our dining room table for days we do school work inside the house on nice days we have a huge covered patio that I have 4 tables on and the girls can pick one and get all set up. It's kind of nice to have that option.
hey ,i saw a really cute ,and functional setup at ikea .If you are like me (money is a little short )but you take a big desk and put chairs on each side and in betwen is a divider on which the kids can put their daily list of assignments on and be individual ,also decorate it with fabric as to their liking also some chairs with a back (that you can put their name on to make it theirs...momof5
We use a table so I can be near and easily work with all three. Otherwise I would be jumping from desk to desk. The kids are getting bigger though, so we might need a bigger table soon . . .
When I started HSing it was just DD here and she used a small, light drafting table (that tilted) to do school work. Then when DS started HSing I used my old dining room table for both of them. That worked for a bit but then they both decided the really need their own space. Now we have both the drafting table (which DD still uses) and the dining table (it is pretty small) for DS in our school area. I have a rolling cart that the kids use to store their notebooks, folders etc.
my 5 and 3 yo's LOVE their desks. :lol: i want to be at the kitchen table...i find the "room" restricts me a little bit, but my type A oldest daughter loves the desk/room thing, so we'll stick with it for now. i keep saying, "can we do school upstairs today?" to which she replies, "Pleeeease can we do it at our desks???"
TO replace the desk try looking at old schools.. they toss desks, we got ours that we had when we started from a school that was discarding it. we used them, then got some from a garage dale, for free as welL! then they grew too big for those and we tried the desks in the kids rooms kind of desks, and kitchent able, which works but face it kitchen tables are made Higher than desks from the chair. SO we kind of use whatever feels right now for the moment . so, go with the table for now!
I would love to do what we did when I was in first grade - we had the "open mouth" desks and four were pushed together for the "table" look, but each had his/her own desk. Maybe that set up would work better. . .
we had two like that and one off to the side so that one child could work independantly wwhile the other two were working on things that didn't matter or may need morehelp etc.
We started at the dining room table as well. Trying to teach 3 different grades at the same time, on the same table was just too much for us. We got far less done than planned so we moved to desks* and it has been soo, sooooo much better for us. We end up getting more done, and the kids have a desk to decorate and leave up as long as they want. I asked them, after about 2 weeks, which they preferred and it was a unanimous desk's vote. * They are really just a folding table for dd and 2 end tables for the boys
