What's working for our homeschool, anyhow . . . So far. . . . Two weeks in. Actually, most everything is working well so far but for today I'll just stick to a handful.
1. Checklists for the boys in cheap spiral bound notebooks (another idea from Sarah).
This simple idea goes a long way in streamlining our day and helping the boys become more independent. The main idea is to keep them on track with tasks that need to be accomplished for the day that require little oversight by me. I give them a block of time to work on their lists but they can also work on their lists during other chunks of time during the day.
2. Simple little schedule of the week on the fridge. Yes, I know this should be a no-brainer. I'm not sure if a schedule like this would have totally worked for us in the past but its working so far. I hope it sticks. I had it laminated and just taped it to the fridge. It's really helped me feel less stressed and on top of what we are doing hour to hour. I remember in elementary school having a rotating schedule and that is essentially what this is. It helps keep things fresh and interesting day-to-day. And this way we can use that prime time (first thing in the morning) on every subject once during the week. I used to always put Math in that slot but now writing, time with Nutmeg, history and science all get a chance in "prime time." **I intended to post the schedule here since its been so helpful but it occurred for me that it may be best not to share with the world when exactly we'll be out of the house. If you are curious, let me know and I can email it.
3. IEW (Institute for Excellence in Writing) Rockin' it with Mr. Pudewa again this year.
4. "Triangle flash cards" These are finally do it for us in terms of getting the math facts down. I'm so thankful for them! I love the concept of these. It has helped the boys understand the relationship between multiplication and division. **The boys are using the multiplication/division ones right now, so I can't locate them at the moment.
5. Botany with Apologia and herb study. We are enjoying alternating between our botany text and reading about various herbs. Usually we read about an herb/plant and then go find it. Often we draw it in our nature notebook. Right now we are drying plantain leaves to use this winter and have a tincture going in the cabinet. Wahoo!
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| Plantain: chew it up and put it on a bug bite or scrape. Sage tried it out on a bug bite of his and was happy to discover it really works. Budding little naturalist. |
6. Laid-back US geography. Each week we've been reading a few picture books about the United States. Last week we read about Alabama and this week we are reading about Alaska. We are memorizing the capitals as we go along and are also doing some map work. Yesterday we watched a youTube video about the Iditarod during lunch. This little endeavor has been super enjoyable so far. It's especially nice to have something to do at Nutmeg's level; so much is aimed at the boys.
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| Arkansas books |
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| Alaska |
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Love it! You are very smart and organized! the notebooks reminds me of what I did with third grade...they had to copy all the assignments/activities from the board (remember chalk?) each day in their assignment books...which were the spiral steno books. When something was done, they checked it off.
ReplyDeleteLove the triangle math cards ! Can't wait to see those! And Ms. Nutmeg looks so busy and cute...Can't wait to see her work too!!! So how is Mace doing during the morning time....