First Day of School for My Son

My organization has seemed to pay off, okay for my oldest at least. As I type this I am waiting on my 10 year old to have his breakfast to start his first day of school. Why are my kids starting school on different days you ask? We trying to have a four day school week and each of the kids get to choose what day off they will have off (as long as they get all their work done in four days). My son chose Mondays as his day off, "Mondays are my bad days," was his reasoning and my daughter chose Fridays as her day off. This arrangement is going to make my life easier. I'll have one day for each of my kids a week to focus on just them and their projects.

Allowing my kids to be a part of the scheduling of their school days is one way I give my kids some control over their day, which seems to be an important part of the flow for them. They can choose to work hard and get their work done in four days or they can decide to stretch out their school week and go a bit slower. My hope is that they will feel motivated to have a three day weekend and if not they will know that the decision was theirs.

I also allow my kids to plan what days they will do each subject. I give them the guideline that math needs to be done three times per week, art two times per week, etc. and they choose which day they'll do math. I am usually pleasantly surprised by the thought process the kids take in planning their week, my son for instance was happy to do math on a Math Games class day, he thought it would be good to be warmed up for class.

So with breakfast done and the deadline for planning, organizing and decision making upon us, weither we're ready or not, we're off to our second first day of school. Wish me luck!

Homeschooler's Dreaded O-Word

Organization. Yep, organization. This word has become my mantra. Each year about this time this dreaded word hangs over my head, it follows me around, it calls my name. But this year I have embraced the homeschoolers o-word. It has taken some time to get here but I'm here. I have shrugged my shoulders at the voice telling me there are so many other things I could be doing besides going through my stuff and sorting and putting things were they should have put to begin with, donating the things I haven't touched in a year and packing away the curriculum I know I won't be using - - all this takes a lot of time and hey it's still summer!

But here's the deal, when I do all this my school year is 10 times better. I have more focus, all the books on my homeschool shelf support all the subjects we intend to learn this year. I save money; this year I located seven pairs of scissors, four composition notebooks, paper, pencils, working markers, drawing pencils the list goes on and on. And I return all those materials my fellow homeschoolers have generously shared with me over the previous year.

We are counting down to the school year here and each day embracing the o-word and I can honestly say that homeschooling gets easier each year. Okay, the organizing part at least . . . .