Elena 
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Lots of new homeschooling moms ask this very basic question –
How much time will this take and how can I get it all done?
The answer is very personal. A lot depends on the circumstances in the home such as does mom work? Does she work from home? How many hours a week does Mom work? How old are the children? What grades are they in? How do they learn best?
And here’s another surprise – homeschooling will look different from semester to semester as kids grow and change, and from year to year. I can only share what I have done and what I learned over the past 28 years.
- Do the hard stuff first. When I first started out, we saved math until after lunch. But there’s always that lull and drop in energy after lunch and it just made math lessons grueling. By moving them to the morning, we all were fresh and had lots of energy. For me and my family, it was better to do the things we enjoyed like literature after lunch.
- Your goal is to have independent learners so that they can do a lot of work on their own. Encourage this. Even a kindergartner can do a coloring page for 10 minutes, or listen to an educational podcast or watch a video. My 2nd grader could do a whole page of math facts in two minutes by herself. My high school students worked entirely on their own. This is great and it’s what you want to work for.
- Since this is HOME school, it’s good to include caring for the home as part of their training. They should all learn to make lunch, plan dinners, pick up their messes, and clean the floors. When that’s mastered they should learn to do their own laundry and help with younger siblings. This is all great for learning life skills.
- If you have toddlers and/or babies, schedule your other kids through baby playtime. Everyone takes a turn watching the little ones for a bit. This gives mom a chance to work with other students or do something else that needs to be done.
- Don’t be a slave to your schedule. It’s a guide, not a prison. Things won’t go perfectly every day. Be flexible.
- Be sure to schedule time for MOM, to read, exercise, pray and just do general self-care.
- Doing a four-day school week with something fun to do on Friday was always a blessing for my family. Doing school throughout the year including summer also took a lot of pressure off of all of us.
- If a kid is really into something – a project, a book, a particular subject like history or science – GO WITH IT! It’s okay to let them spend hours even weeks on something that really interests them. Let them become an expert in that thing they have passion for. You and your student can catch up on the other things later.
Nowadays my schedule looks something like this:
7:00 Get up, get ready to exercise. Work out until 8:30
8:30 shower and change
9:00 Prayer time, Rosie is practicing her piano.
10:00 Charlotte comes over. We start bible, catechism, reading, and spelling. Rosie goes to the classroom to work on Algebra and Science
11:30 Start Lunch.
12:00 Lunch break until 12:30. Start dinner prep.
12:30 start Math with Charlotte. Rosie in the classroom working on History and literature, finishing other assignments.
1:30. If Charlotte and I are done, we will read books together, or an art project. Maybe even a trip to the library.
3:00 School is done. Drive Rosie to running practice.
5:30 to 6:00 Dinner.
This is just a basic outline of what our day might look like. But when I had five kids to juggle, it looked more like this:
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Some Planners to Try!
