Hello there. It’s been quite awhile since I posted about schooling. We started homeschooling last year and it definitely takes up most of my time. This year I have a second grader, first grader, and a three year old. The two oldest will attend a two day tutorial this fall where they will cover bible, science, social studies, and art. We will focus mostly on English and math the other three days at home. However I wanted to add in a little something extra to round out our year. I’ve been researching different learning methods and listening to a variety of podcasts all summer. I keep coming back to Charlotte Mason. ❤ They use “living books” at their school and it’s definitely lead me towards a “living education” style of instruction. I found the materials to build a “living homeschool” planner on Etsy.
We have been doing a little school over the summer. I’ve been building up to our first official day of a new school year. We are also testing out new curriculum this year. Today we tried a more structured “morning time” hour. It went really well and we all loved it! It is such a relaxing way to ease into our day. Classical music and lit candies really help keep us all calm and focused …even when little one is not. 😬 Sharing my notes for those that may be interested:
1. Have children play outside and gather the little treasures they find. Prepare a snack and turn on classical music. 🍪🥛
2. Faith: scripture copy work, hymn practice, or bible story discussion. Today we chose the bible verse, “When I am afraid, I will put my trust in you”, to help with back to school jitters. 📖
3. Nature study: spread out and discuss their findings, and draw three items. When finished, we put everything in our “August jar”. I want them to see how life changes through the seasons. We will also be studying and drawing from a stack of nature books. 🍁
4. Picture study: We will be studying three artists this year. Since I’m still deciding and don’t have all our materials, I chose one from online to try. They each pointed out what they noticed. We will gradually add more info as we go. I’m hoping they will have the artist’s name and a little bio memorized and a greater appreciation for art. 🖌
5. Poetry: We will also be studying different poets from early American History to coordinate with the cycle their tutorial is in. Along with some fun or seasonal poems sprinkled in here and there. 📝
6. Composer: we will study three composers this year. Starting with Bach. They will have listened to his music for the hour and conclude with some history on the musician. We will be purchasing our composer and picture studies via Simply Charlotte Mason. 🎼
We spent an average of ten minutes on each topic. It was a little hard for the boys to sit still but they made it. I may order them some wobbly seats to help with the wiggles. I thought food and busy hands would help. This is the longest they will need to be still for the day. The other subjects will take 20-30 min each. We will have “morning time” three days a week. Probably mid morning after math and before English.
We will also have “tea time” mid afternoon. Though we are not big tea drinkers so more like reheated coffee for me and milk for them…or maybe hot cocoa in the winter. My kids get so hungry at about 3 in the afternoon so we will have a little treat as well. We enjoyed my daughter’s strawberry cake today. We will also use this time gathered together for a read-a-loud. I let them choose a stack of books today. But we will likely read our chapter books during this time or an audible book from Amazon.
Praying everyone has a great school year!
Little Seed Lane 