Posted in Educational Pursuits
It's that time of year again when home educating mothers both dread their job and delight in it. For while there's nothing better than planning your next school year, there's nothing worse at times than planning your next school year. Looking through each carefully selected tome, counting chapters, making notes to yourself that you hope you'll remember to look at, and trying to fit everything in while all the while having a relaxed schooling atmosphere so that you can be "That Mom." You know, "That Mom" - the one that actually follows her schedule, doing every experiment and hands-on activity, having her children smile their way through their lessons, beginning each day on time and with a meal cooked from scratch, ending her lessons with enough time to spend on her sewing before starting dinner and completing her day with baths for the children amidst laughter, love, and bedtime stories.
Well, "That Mom" doesn't live in my house, but I do try each year to do a little more, be a little more. Because without a fresh slate each year, you can get caught up in stinkin' thinkin' that just never ends. It's like the New Year, when suddenly everything is fresh again, and the possibilities are endless on what you can achieve.
So, to get back to lesson planning, yesterday I began (drop your voice and draw out the word began, and think dunh-dunh-duuuuuuunh). Due in part because you *have* to begin sometime, but due mostly to the fact that Mary accepted my challenge to spend just one hour doing something that we both have apparently become quite good at avoiding.
Rabbit trail: So yesterday about 9-9.30ish a.m., I challenged Mary to one hour of planning. After I did that, I got sidetracked what with four boys in the house needing breakfast, no less than 10 phone calls, four unexpected visitors at the door (can you tell we're on school break? I can!), laundry, cleaning the kitchen, etc. By the time we were down to three boys and I had a chance to check back on my cbox, it was around 2.45 p.m. Imagine my surprise to see that Mary had indeed picked up the gauntlet of challenge, and had in fact already begun her hour! I was on the phone with Robyn at the time, who was laughing her bum off at me, and practically hung up on her in my bid to get my bum in gear. :End of Rabbit Trail
Mary amended the challenge to add that we had to post about what we had accomplished, thus explaining this long and winded post (like I need a reason - have you been reading me for any length of time?). So, without further ado (you're welcome), here are the results and conclusions of my hour yesterday:
I sketched out Jigger's week and began Piper's schedule as well. I like having an overview, however sketchy, of what their weeks will look like before I begin breaking down their books into lessons. I use the 3M Flags for their subjects, so that I can move things around without too much hassle. Here is Jigger's week:
Here is the beginning of Piper's:
At this point I got a little overwhelmed with Piper's schedule, so I shelved it and moved on to breaking down Jigger's books by weeks. I only have most of his catechism done, and will post the picture of that when it's finalized. I'm realizing that I have a *LOT* of planning to do before school begins in about a month, and so expect that most of my time, free or otherwise, will be spent in this pursuit. Expect regular updates, because this keeps me accountable. Who knows, maybe I'll talk Mary into a Thursday posting challenge where we update our planning progress for the previous week. What do you think, Mary? Ü
Well, that's it. I will be planning ad nauseum for awhile, now that I have assessed the mountain in front of me, and expect to feel all kinds of good when I'm finished. This is the year that I-am-prepared!! Who's with me?
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Posted by darcee from simplycatholic
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