Mon:
math
memorization/cursive
art
phonogram flashcards
FHE

Tue:
math (CM)
reading (EM)
grammar (MB)
spelling
PE

Wed:
math (BE)
latin
typing
spelling enrichment
AD/Scouts

Thu:
math (CM)
reading (ME)
grammar (MB)
literature
PE

Fri:
math (BE)
history
spelling test
swimming

Sat:
reports (C)
science

Sun:
journals
letters

Those are my strangely solemn children in front of our dry erase board. It has days of the week, our “special” subject, and then any activities that day (therapy, playdates, doctor visits.) The last column is the dinner menu for the week.

The green half sheet is our routine and the small cards are each of the school age kids’ assignments for each day of the week. This is the wall in our kitchen leading to the hall so the kids know after breakfast/chores to grab their card and see what they need to do. It’s helping life be more organized!

I was all fired up about how we were going to get so much book work done during the cold, winter months. It’s been in the 70s. 🙂 We’re playing outside for hours on end, which is way more important than some math and grammar lessons! When the weather gets cold we’ll get back to that textbook stuff.

I try each semester to review and revise our schedule so here’s what we’ve got starting the end of this month when our activities resume post-“winter” break. We don’t actually have a “schedule” because most of these things aren’t tied to a specific time, except outside of the home activities. This just reminds me and the kids of the rhythm of our days.

* Get up, get dressed, make your bed, make sure your room is picked up.
* Breakfast, then chore time (and EVERYONE helps clean up for 15 minutes – breakfast dishes, start laundry, anything left from last night.)
(1)
* Kit leaves for work after family prayer, we start exercising (yoga, big muscle movement stretches) and then circle time.
* Lessons, with me usually nursing at some point in here. The little kids are doing various busy activities. They’ll snack on fruits and veggies while they’re working/playing. Lessons are maybe 2 hours between the four kids? Three if we’re distracted.
* Clean up from lessons, lunchtime, clean up meal stuff.
(2)
* Storytime (read book together, picture book for little kids and chapter from novel with all of them.) Then quiet time – they all have to be in their rooms for quiet reading. Miss O’s our only napper now so this is ideally when she naps and I get my scripture study and lunchtime.
* Specials – art, music, literature, history, science.
(3)
* Snack & playtime.
* Kit home! Dinner prep, clean up from play stuff.
* Dinner, dishes clean up.
(4)
* Family time
(5)
* Bedtime routine – snacks, pjs, teeth, scriptures and prayer, stories
* Bed for kids, grown up time!

(1) Fridays right after breakfast we head out for swimming for an hour, which bumps things back. Other days we have various therapies that may delay this.
(2) Monday through Thursday this is staggered depending on therapy schedules.
(3) Thursdays is co-op and Fridays we often have playdates in the afternoon. Other afternoons there may be special library activities.
(4) Tues, Wed, Thurs we have an early dinner because of PE, scouts, and activity days.
(5) Evenings can be changed due to meetings for various family members!

All of this can be changed if we have family we’re going to see, a doctor visit, etc. But whenever possible if we’re home we try to stick to this, and I can see what a difference in makes for the kids to have some sense of consistency and routine. Each of them has a card on the dry erase board that lists their school assignments for each day so when it’s time for lessons they already know what books to grab and where to get started. It’s still a learning process for us, but we’re getting the hang of it!

To give a rough timeline breakfast is around 7am, lessons start around 9:30am, lunch is noon, snack is 2:30ish, dinner is 5pm (earlier Tue/Thur), bedtime routine is 7pm and they’re all asleep (except C) by 8pm.

If it’s a nice day in the winter we ditch lessons and play outside instead. If we’ve got friends visiting, we just skip work for that day. We set it up so that we only need to really do lessons 3x a week so we get at least two freebies a week.

At least three times a year I write up a schedule for us, and it lasts usually about 36 hours before it gets tossed. I am giving up the schedule in favor of a routine. I realized we do have a routine, it just doesn’t follow a set time schedule! So here goes, our 2011-2012 school year “routine” (for at least the next 36 hours!)

– wake up, get dressed, make bed, clean room
– breakfast and morning chores
– dad to work, circle time, start lessons*
– snack, little kids play, big kids keep doing lessons
– lunch & clean up
– storytime as family, then quiet time in beds/rooms
– special lessons: art, music, history, literature, science
– snack & playtime**
– dad home from work, dinner prep
– dinner & chores
– family time***
– bedtime routine: stories, snacks, pajamas, teeth, scripture & prayer
– BED!

*MWF there are therapies from 8 to 10am depending on day/kid.
**MW is therapy at 2:30pm, Th it’s co-op.
***TWTH there’s PE, activity day & scouts all between 5 and 8:30pm.

I’m preparing for the addition of a fourth “student” at the end of this summer, adding Miss E into our lesson rotation as she’s turning FIVE. AAAAH! So I made these up with magnets on the back to hang on our dry erase board:

Since we school year round (and only need 180 days per year per Texas requirements) we don’t do an intensive week. We like the flexibility of adding field trips and play dates and days off when the weather is beautiful and we want to go explore outside. Here is our newest schedule and each child has a card with their work written on it. I’ll refer to the master plan but I told them each is responsible for completing their work on that card each day and I’m available to help/teach/instruct/answer questions between 9 and 11am. 🙂 Then I make lunch and we have quiet time and then in the afternoon we do specials (art, music/piano, literature, history, science) so they need to be done with the basics before lunch. (Which is absurdly easy, they can knock their lessons out quickly and get back to their fun reading and playing and adventures if they focus.)

I’m excited! I like that we’re passing more individual responsibility to kids (C & M) as they pick their own research topics per month and such. The middle ones (B & E) obviously I’m still sitting down with and giving lots-o-guidance but the big ones are really motivated to take more charge of their own studies and we’re here to help facilitate that.

In addition to the academics we do have therapy, OT, speech, PE, swimming, activity days, cub scouts, and co-op. Plus our various playdates or appointments that may throw things off, thus the beauty of a flexible schedule!

P.S. C and I are trying to figure out what grade he would be in if he attended school. If he started according to local guidelines he would have begun K in the fall of 2007 and would be entering the 4th grade. M would have started the next year and would be entering 3rd grade, B would be entering 1st and E entering K. So my boy-girl pairs are a year apart in grades and there’s 2 years between sets. J starts fall 2013 and O starts 2015 because of her fall birthday (but we’ll start her 2014 and keep them a year apart in grades, too. And because it’s easier for me to remember. Boy-girl grade apart, two years, boy-girl grade apart, two years, boy-girl grade apart. Which means when we start our next pairing we’ll have 7th, 6th, 4th, 3rd, 1st, K. When O starts.)

Not that ANY of these grades actually mean anything, it’s just we still get asked what “grade” our kids are in to give people a rough idea of development/skill level.