Mar. 26, 2007 - Relaxed Mondays
What are Relaxed Mondays? This is the day each week that I set aside to allow us to get back into the routine of school. We sleep in a little later, start school a little later, eat an unhealthy breakfast of doughnuts and milk, and just basically don't stress over school. Now I know there are lots of folks who do this each day, maybe not the doughnuts and milk, and they are very happy with their relaxed schedule. I, however, am the type of person that if I don't have some semblance of a plan, I will let it all fall through the cracks.
So my idea of a Relaxed Monday is a God-send to me. Normally on Mondays, I am yelling and barking out orders because we have all slept too late, exhausted from the weekend. Then no one wants to get into the normal routine. So Relaxed Mondays are an official way for me to "let go" and just let it flow naturally.
Each morning when my kids wake, they have a few minutes before they need to begin their chores. These chores are, of course, in their index card chore organizer. So they can go right away and begin these. They also have independent studies right after their chores, things like copywork, math, reading a book. One of their chores is also Bible reading for 15 minutes, so even before we start our work together, they have already knocked out a lot of my "minimum requirements" for their day.
The relaxed portion for me comes in the fact that I am ok with a slower pace on Mondays. I guess this is a beginning for me. I want to be a homeschooler of the heart, so taking this slower pace on Monday really eliminates a lot of anger and yelling. It has worked wonders for us these last few weeks, so I thought I should share this small tip with you all today!
Let me know how you incorporate realxed principles into your homeschool.
