Back To School!

It is that time of year again when most start to back to school.  Which means that most homeschoolers are in the process of ordering new curriculum, organizing their homeschooling area and preparing lesson plans.  I am no different from others as we will begin our 9th year of homeschooling this year.

I have already mentioned in an early blog post our curriculum choices for this coming year.  The choices that I have made are totally different than what we did last year.  That my friend, is the joy of homeschooling!  If it isn’t working, you are able to choose something else to fit your child’s learning style.  There are so many different curriculum’s out there that you can look at that will accommodate the different types of learning styles.  I recommend researching your children’s learning styles first and then search for a curriculum that will fit that learning style.

Now that I have chosen our new curriculum, the time has come to organize our area that we use for our homeschooling materials.  While some families are blessed with an extra room to have an actual school room, I use a corner in my living room.  At this time, I have two bookshelves that store all of our books.  On top, I have organizing containers that hold our writing utensils and art supplies that we will need access on a daily need.  For the books and other materials that we don’t use on a daily basis, I store those on bookshelves in our hallway.  Daily, we will take the books that we need and come to the dining room table and sit together to get our work completed.  This is another joy of homeschooling.  You can school wherever you have room.  Some older children, who are more independent with their schooling can even go to their bedrooms to complete their work. Every family is different and must make the choice to do what is best for their family!  Again, what might work for me, may not work for you and that is okay.

Since, I don’t have all of my curriculum just yet, I have started with what I do have.  It has been a lot easier starting out slow and just doing a couple of subjects each day.  It has also helped us ease back into a routine. We will work another couple of weeks at this pace and then add in the rest of our book learning.

Once all of our curriculum has arrived, I will then sit down and begin to prepare the lessons. I make sure I have a great calendar and lesson planning book.  Don’t fret if you can’t find one that you think will work for you and your schedule. You can make one very easily by using an excel spreadsheet.  I just use a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon to sit down and plan for the upcoming week. I look at our calendar to see any extra curricular activities that are planned and I make sure the core of our work is completed before the fun begins.

Always remember that the joy of homeschooling is being able to choose what will work for you and your family. I would love to hear some ideas and suggestions that you might have for the homeschoolers that are just now starting their journey with their family!