I am wanted to find out what a typical homeschool day looks like for all of you. I am beginning my year here shortly with a 6th grader, 3rd grader and 1st grader. I typically have tried to have our day done by noon but I know that as my kids get older, things take more time and I need to readjust what I have been doing. So, I am trying to find out what your typical school day looks like. How long do you school? When do you start? What types of activities/subjects do you consider part of your homeschool day? How many days a week? Thanks so much for your help! Rhonda
I have 2 high schoolers and a 3rd grader. My older two can work independently for the most part so that allows me to work with the younger. Our days look like this: 9a Family Meeting which consists of Daily Bible Scripture & Discussion and hand out workplans 9:30a 15 min tidy time (straighten up house, feed pets) 9:45a Get to work! Older two kids get themselves going on whatever assignment they want to do first. My older like to HEAR me go over all her work with her for some reason, so some of my time is spent in discussion with her. My youngest starts out with cursive warmup activity and maybe a short "Martha Speaks" or PBS short if I'm tied up with the older two. But then we get to her assignments. 12p LUNCH 12:45p Back to work 2:30 younger is done so now I check the olders work. I know which jobs are a struggle for them so I might sit down and review certain topics. For instance, my son HATES history, so we'll discuss. Spanish this year will require me to do flash cards with the older two and check their progress on Rosetta Stone. 3:00 Older two are done and all are having free time til dinner. My older two will have a set amount of work to acomplish since they are with a charter school for high school. It's not as loose as I would like but my husband wants them to have an accredited diploma so here we are. They will both be using Rosetta Stone Spanish 1 this year and my older daughter will be doing ROP (work experience/health field). Son will continue with piano lessons and *maybe* a computer programming class. My youngers weekly schedule will look like this: Phonics/Lang Arts- daily Math- daily PE- daily Social Studies- 2 times a week Science- 2 times a week Meet the Masters or other specific Art instruction- 1 time a week Her assignments are sprinkled with games, DVD's, educational You Tube videos, art projects and storybooks. I try to do more fun, hands on stuff with her than textbooks. Hope this helps
We are in our second week of this new school year! I have a 6th grader, 4th grader, 3rd grader and Kinder/1st grader. We all get up around 8:30-9. Then showers, teeth, hair for everyone and get completely dressed. My husband had a slight issue with us all being in our PJs (kids in underwear) when he got home from work! Anyhow, we eat breakfast together and get started before 10. We also only work M-Th, and take Fridays for experiments, projects and outings. My older 2 have a cubby of workbooks that they know they have to complete daily (and a goal sheet weekly). I do go over each lesson with them before they start just to be sure they know what they are doing. If they know the material my time "teaching" is less than 5 min, but about once a week I expect to have to spend more time teaching something, especially for Math and Language. I am right there and available for questions. So far, its all been review. And, if they are ready to get started earlier, they can. Their daily subjects are: Language, Math, Writing (cursive and Creative Writing alternating), Reading comp wkbk, Spelling/Vocab (1 list per week, but review/activity daily), Religion. My younger 2 require more time with me so I pretty much go back and forth! My 3rd grader does Language, Math, Journal, Cursive, Spelling/Vocab (1 list per week, review daily), Letters&Sounds wkbk daily, plus a weekly reading comp. wkbk. Youngest: Math, Handwriting (Print), Spelling wkbk, Journal, Lettters&Sounds wkbk, Hooked on Phonics, Little Readers (books to read aloud) After all that is done, we break for lunch/free time. Its been between 12 and 1 for lunch beak. Then we get together and do group work (but I don't require my youngest, she comes and goes): Alternate Science (Apologia Astronomy) & History/Geography Alternate Latin/Spanish We've been getting done by 3. I'm hoping to start an hour earlier and finish by 1 or 1:30so I will be slowly tweaking our schedule until that happens! After we finish, they play together - art, board games, puzzles, Legos, read, play (indoor) soccer or do Spanish. They aren't allowed TV/video games, and since its been 106 and above in the afternoons, they have to stay inside until the sun goes down. Every night of the week we have at least 1 sport activity, so they do get their PE in!
Since I'm schooling Other People's Kids, my day is a bit different. We try to begin the morning routine at school by 830 with pledges to the US flag, Christian flag, and Bible, with a song for each, and followed by a prayer. If I have a "warm up" activity (this year I'm thinking math facts flash cards for everyone as a group), there's that, and collecting homework if any. Then everybody gets started on the work I've posted on the whiteboard. They're free to choose what they want to do when, as long as it all gets done, but if I find they're leaving the same thing until last (and maybe won't have time for it!) every day for a few days, I'll "suggest" they start with that subject. We break for lunch/free time about 1145, and try to get back to work about 1230 or so. When they finish an assignment, they put it on my desk (or DH's) and we try to get it checked and returned to them quickly so they can correct it before the day's out. Ideally, DH is there with us, and he's the go-to-guy for math and Bible and sometimes science and history, if they have any questions, and I'm there for English, reading, and other science and history (we divide S/SS up according to the kid and the level and my plans), and all the administrative stuff. We're supposed to end at 245, but we'll stay as long as it takes to get something finished - last year our end time oozed over to nearer 315. Whatever the kids don't get done, they may have to take home for homework.
