Sunday, January 11

Git 'er done

We've not perfected (and we never will) but we're hitting a semblance of routine and I wanted to share our progress.

#1: I consolidated all of the boys' independent subjects (stuff they do alone) to be worked on back-to-back, giving me mostly uninterrupted time with my adorable preschoolers.

#2: I've officially packed up all of the girls' toys and only pull out an item or two at a time. This week, we've pulled out all the Little People toys and the girls go to town with them when I'm working one-on-one with the boys. This has also cut out a HUGE amount of time with cleaning up.

#3: Schoolwork is written up on Sunday. Here's the handy-dandy form I use: Weekly Planner. I hole-punch it on the sides and use it as a two-page spread.

#4: The menu is made up ahead of time so I'm not scrambling anymore. Here's the other handy-dandy form I use: Menu Plan

#5: I have a general idea of the direction we're going in each subject by filling out a vague outline in a Year-at-a-glance form (also very handy-dandy).

#6: Now, this one is just weird, but after doing the Dave Ramsey thing and budgeting our money to the penny (ha, pennies are all we have) I thought I'd take a turn at budgeting my time. So my Time Budget form is handy, but not at all dandy. It's a page full of boxes. Any idiot can make it. But there are 48 boxes, each representing a half hour of my day. 16 of those boxes get labeled "Sleep" because I am pretending for example's sake that I get 8 hours sleep. I mark off each subject taught, meal prep/eat/clean-up, reading, blogging, and what-not. If I only have 24 hours in a day, I thought it would be nice to see what I'm doing for that time. After filling out what I plan on doing, I use them periodically to mark off what I'm actually doing. If I spend a half hour playing "bubble shooter", that's a half hour I have to "take" from something I had allotted on my boxes. I only have so many boxes, ya know? Does that make any sense?

#7: I laugh. A lot.

4 comments:

Denise Klop said...

Great ideas! I just might steal some of them.

I'd love to look at your forms, but Google Docs tells me the page requested is not available?

Denise in IN

The Classical Circus said...

A time budget? Jeepers. I think I'm supposed to be spending my time more wisely.

Two weeks ago, our Sunday School class on Revelation had a substiture teacher on "The Economy of Time".

Then our senior pastor didn't preach the sermon, but the youth pastor did. The subject? "Redeem the Time".

Then I ran out of library books, so I picked up a copy of Piper's "Don't Waste Your Life" that has been sitting on my nightstand for over a year.

Then I come here to tell you what I'm leaning towards in a writing curriculum, and you've got a Time Budget.

Hmmm...think the Lord's trying to tell me something?

Oh, yeah, writing: I think I'm going to do Imitations in Writing next year, and then move L & Z into Classical Writing Homer the following year (I'm pretending I'll have more time :P). Did you see this thread http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=75904?

Maritez said...

I love #2...I need to do that with my kids' toys. I also really like the menu planner. I plan our meals too, but never really take into account breakfast & lunch...this will be even more helpful. Thanks for sharing!

Anonymous said...

Even though you put me to SHAME...SHAME I am tellin ya... I went ahead and did a post about our school ;)

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