Homeschooling Schedule?

Question

I am planning on homeschooling my children (ages 2&3) and I would like to get into a routine soon so I can be ready. Does anyone know any great resources of how to juggle cleaning, cooking, homeschooling, basically, being a stay at home mom and teaching her two children? I am in DIRE need of order in my life! On top of having 2 toddlers, I also am starting an at home business of running a greenhouse and raising plants. Any personal tips would be appreciated, as well as any resources on how to juggle my daily tasks.

Answer 1

I home schooled my oldest for a short time during a move and my good friends husband was also home schooled...his mom gave me lots of pointers...since your kiddos are so young, you can introduce anything into their day and they will adjust rather easily..just remember not to push them. You can start with some workbooks that you can find anywhere that sells coloring books, like walmart..some counting books and letter books...(story books) Miss Spider Tea Party is a good one that my 4 year old likes. Home schooling doesn't need to be the regular all day thing that regular schools are. As long as you have and agenda to follow and you keep to it and as long as you get through all the required curriculum the state requires you'll be fine. Most home schooled children end up graduating at a younger age (16 and 17 aren't uncommon ages) Days can be as short as 2 hours. Keep in mind that your kids are young and don't have much of an attention span so you have to keep your lessons short like 15 minutes each, then move on to something else.
If I were you, I would start my day like any other day, with breakfast, baths whatever your normal daily routine may be...then starting at 8 or 9 you can do things like talk about the weather (is it sunny or cloudy? what should the weather boy wear today (the weather boy can be a picture of a kid cut out of a magazine with some outfits from felt)....) this is science. talk about today's day/date etc..use a giant desk top calendar with a reusable star or other marker that can be moved from day to day...or you can use a cloud, sun, cloud/sun, rain cloud etc to mark the day and the weather together.
Pick a color and number for the day...have the kids put post-it notes with certain number on it on items of that number that you have preselected. For instance...put 2 cars together on the floor and have your kids find them and label them. Now you have a math lesson. For the letter of the day you can glue noodles or colorful cereal etc on construction paper in the shape of that letter...use play dough to make the shape of both letter and number of the day...of course, use every minute you can to introduce colors...what color is the paper you picked? what color is that leaf? etc. the kids should have some free play time now. And it's at this point in time that you can do up dishes or throw a load of wash in. If you started at 8, you should have a healthy snack around 930. If your kids take a morning nap, after am snack is a good time to get them settled into that. You now have that free time to work on you business. when nap time is over, have lunch and go on with outdoor play, using this time to identify things like green leaves and square sidewalk blocks and "ant" starts with "a"...At their ages, it's not so much that they know that it's schooling, they just think they are playing a game with mom. It gets them prepared for when it is time to get on the road of being homeschooled. You have to figure out what you want to teach them now, how long you want to spend on each lesson (15 minutes is a good time at their ages), what you want to get accomplished per day, and what time you want to start. After that, things will just fall into place....For example:
8am breakfast
815 talk about the weather/day
830 letter of the day with craft
9am morning move and groove session...use kiddie music to dance around
915 number of the day with game
945 morning snack (orange wedges and juice or cereal bar and milk)
10 clean up
1015-1115 nap/rest/story time...use this to just rest and relax, darken the room and have kids lay down. You now have some "you time"
1115-1145 lunch
1145 clean up
12noon outdoor play (explore the yard, take a walk on the bike trail etc, talk about what you see along the way)
etc etc...
200 should be the latest you lay them down for an afternoon nap..1 hour is they get am nap no more than 2 hours if they don't get rest time in am
Good luck!

Answer 2

I used the managers of their homes (MOTH) and really liked it. Primarily because it does not tell you what schedule to use, but helps you develop one that fits your family. The author, Teri Maxwell, also has several chapters of practical hints, and dozens of pages of sample schedules, which was really helpful to see. It also comes with all the forms, papers, etc, for actually laying out a visual schedule, which helps a lot with finding conflicts so that you aren't juggling lol! You can't find it in the bookstore, but order it from www.titus2.com.

I also like the website of Kim B, it's a blog about how to do it all, if you scroll down on the left you see lots and lots of ideas on housekeeping, easy and fast recipes, and homeschooling. I figured if she can do it with eight, anyone could do it ;-)
http://largefamilylogistics.lifewithchrist.org/index.html

The good news is that your children are so young that homeschooling still looks like play. I'd use the next few years to build your routine, making sure that housework is a routine, and fitting in floorplay with the children (to make it a habit) as they get older, if you choose to school at home, then that play time just adjusts slowly into table time. Even at five and six, it takes sooo little time to 'teach' because they are so willing to learn. I would say when we were doing kindie and even first grade we could do everything in less than an hour a day, and we still finished the curriculum in four months. Our basic schedule looks like this (our older kids sleep later and stay up later)
7am breakfast
8am dishes
8:30 learning
10am tidy
10:30 play
11:30 start lunch
noon eat
12:30 dishes
start dinner
1pm quiet time
2:30 play
3:30 tidy toys
4pm learning time
4:30 tidy all rooms
5:30 dad's home time to play!
6pm supper
7pm dishes/asst chores
8pm bath
9pm bedtime

We have seven kids so there is a lot going on in and around that, but that's our basic routine.

Answer 3

There isn't any average day. Every loved ones is exclusive. It relies on the quantity of kids, the style of homeschoolers you're, whether or not a curriculum is getting used or whether or not you're unschooling. A public tuition meets for 6 hours, however at dwelling there's no have to take that lengthy as there are not youngsters messing approximately, retaining matters up in view that they do not get it, shuffling from elegance to elegance, so there is not any have to spend that so much time in direct guideline. There's such importance in gambling video games, studying in combination, exploring an curiosity so long as it holds curiosity, finding out what you are interested by as a substitute than what any individual else deems exciting. So there simply is not a average day. Sometimes we learn a few of the day, often, we do plenty of artwork tasks, often we take an afternoon and pass to the park whilst no person else is approximately, however now we have best conversations approximately what used to be within the paper.

Answer 4

You have to get into a routhing that works for you! I have a homebased business and go to school fulltime, as well as, all the cooking, cleaning, homeschooling, shopping, etc etc. It takes me alot of trial and error and then alot of very late nights and early mornings to get my days done. I am very tired when I finally hit my pillow but it is worth every minute of being at home with my children.

Just try something then try something else. If your children are 2 & 3 then you should have naptime to get stuff accomplished. Good luck to you!

One more thing........invest in some sort of little notetaking materials! I have a index card on my desk and I just write down everything that is a NEED TO DO for the day or next day as I think of it. I even write down phone calls that need to be made because so much is always going on and I get too busy and forget! I also have a calendar hanging on my front door for appointments and such.

Answer 5

Check out the Fly Lady:

http://flylady.net/

Her site is overwhelming, as is her email list. I just read in bits and pieces on her site, and I've also read her book.

I would say teach your kids how to work independently of you for short periods so you can do your business work and/or any other "mom" work. This was the best thing I taught my son in toddlerhood. He was required to have some "room time" at least twice a day.

Learn NOW how to get true "mom time"....time away from the kids, the housework, the business, your spouse, etc. You need this for your sanity! It might be 15 minutes at night, an hour in the morning, or 3-4 hours on the weekend.

Make a list for a couple of weeks of *everything* you do - even if it's less than a minute. In doing so, you can see where your time wasters are, or where you're spending too much time in one area. Then you can prioritize. When you do start HS'ing, make yearly goals, and then smaller, obtainable goals with clear objectives. Don't get in over your head (there is so much to do when HS'ing) and learn how to say no to your family, your friends, your church, etc. Set clear times for business work, school work, chores, family time, etc. and try not to waver. Take baby steps. Make sure you have the support of your spouse as he has to be very involved also.

HTH!

Answer 6

There is an online group for those who work and homeschool. I am sure you will gain a lot of wisdom and insight from the group. The link is below:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/WORKandHOMESCHOOL/


I am nearing the end of my first year of homeschooling my first grade son, along with working from home. It has certainly had its challenges, but my son is learning at a phenomenal rate.

Also, with 2 and 3 year old children, it's not necessary to use a formal curriculum. So much learning goes on in the course of daily life. However, if you want to set aside 15 or 20 minutes a day to "teach," that would be fine also.

I hope this is helpful.

Answer 7

I have no sites for resources, only one piece of advice.. don't sweat the small stuff.

I started homescholing my oldest at age 4, he's now 7 and we will be starting this fall with him and my younger son who is now 4 y/o. Since your children are so young you won't need to spend very many hours per day educating them, for the past three years (pre-k, k and first grade) we have averaged no more than three hours a day. (Children as young as yours will probably have the attention span to do 1 maybe 2 hours of activities.)

Good luck!

Answer 8

Let them help you with those things. They are a part of the process.

You can put little signs on the plants with their names and then teach the letters and names (well, unfortunately most planted are named in Latin).

Answer 9

Try FlyLady http://www.flylady.com or MOTH http://www.titus2.com/ .

FlyLady focuses on routines and getting your house in order and all that. She even has a couple of lists you can be on where she will send you inspiring messages and reminders and tips on how to get things together. It's kind of all encompassing. MOTH, from what I can tell, is more just about scheduling.

Answer 10

I don't have any "personal tips" for you ( my home is chaos most of the time with 8 kids..LOL) but I have heard great things about MOTH ~ Managers of Their Home http://www.titus2.com/ecommerce/products/prod_listing.php/1100