- Based on what you've read so far, am I trying to do too much?
- If I only spend a short time on each of these subjects and not every single day for all of them, that's doable, right?
- How do you figure out your time management? I want to keep it simple and not overwhelming!
- I'm freaked out about committing to driving our son to band every day at the middle school, but hopefully that won't be too difficult, and hopefully just for a year. Do any of you do that for your kids?
- Robinson says just to focus on reading, writing, and math, and everything else can flow from that. He insists that too many homeschool moms burn out from trying to do it all, and that all the little things we try to sneak in are just sucking time away from the important basics.
- I love how independently he taught his kids to work! Is that dreamworld, or do some of you actually make that work, too?
Ann Marie @ CHEESESLAVE says
You can hire someone to drive your son to band practice every day.
We pay our nanny/personal assistant to:
Drive Kate to homeschooling park days, classes, the pool, etc.
Do grocery shopping
Run errands (post office, dry cleaning etc)
Light housekeeping
Cooking, including ongoing projects like making kombucha, broth, tortilla chips, crackers, etc.
Peggy says
Based on what you’ve read so far, am I trying to do too much?
YES!!! To be honest, we do about three classes at one time. We spend longer on each class each day, so they don’t take a full year. When we’re done with a subject, we move on to the next one. So, we might do geography for four months, then be done and move on to social studies.
If I only spend a short time on each of these subjects and not every single day for all of them, that’s doable, right?
Sure. Until there’s a super cool experiment that takes all day to set up and clean up in science, and the kids want to run it three times. Or there’s a book you’re reading aloud that they just WILL NOT LET YOU PUT DOWN. It works much better for us to do less and do it more intensively.
How do you figure out your time management? I want to keep it simple and not overwhelming!
Trial and error. What works for you won’t work for anyone else in your circle of friends or geographic location. Guaranteed.
I’m freaked out about committing to driving our son to band every day at the middle school, but hopefully that won’t be too difficult, and hopefully just for a year. Do any of you do that for your kids?
We have six kids, and everyone wanted to do something different, so no. At one point, everyone took Tae Kwon Do at the same time. That worked. But different stuff for different kids? That’s high school stuff. (And now that I have two in high school, maybe it’s college stuff. BOY is my car tired!!)
Robinson says just to focus on reading, writing, and math, and everything else can flow from that. He insists that too many homeschool moms burn out from trying to do it all, and that all the little things we try to sneak in are just sucking time away from the important basics.
I have to totally agree with this. Especially in the pre-6th group. Get the basics down SOLIDLY and let the rest of your day be playtime or play learning, but unstructured and comfortable, not structured. Once they get the hang of teaching themselves, they can expand into whatever their hearts desire. There’s a wonderful section on growing auto-didacts in the Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling (and the Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling Teens.) That was my goal: to work myself out of a job. Kinda like parenting. I’m an advisor, a facilitator and a taxi-driver. My kids are taught of the Lord.
RD Shugart says
One more thing – sorry about the long posting! We moved twice during this school year – horrible, I know, but we focused on American history during that time and watched “America – the Story of Us” – on Netflix. I can only think of a couple of instances where I had to fast forward b/c the content was not age appropriate. Then we read books aloud and independently about some of people / events we were most interested further researching. Just an unschooling idea if you ever have one of those days when you need a break!
RD Shugart says
I agree with scheduling – for us that means an idea of what is to be done everyday – I do have chore lists and there are plenty of on-line free resources for that. I recently downloaded a $20 re-usable planner, which makes the most sense for me b/c I can tailor it for each child, save it, then use it again next year. We have been homeschooling for 6 years – my oldest is going into 6th grade, middle – 4th and youngest is 1st & 1/2 grade. She has a late birthday! 🙂 I also 2nd the independent work – however you want to manage that. For us, the older 2 begin their independent work and I work with the youngest first. Then I move on to the other 2. Sometimes that means the oldest is listening to the youngest read while I work with the middle. It is truly a family effort b/c no one can do it all. We do primarily focus on the basics, but I love the arts, so our unschooling comes into play there. Most importantly, extend grace to yourself and your family. This is a huge change, especially if you are used to the structure of school, and you will figure it out. You don’t have to do everything, every day, all the time. One thing I have chosen to focus on is filling our personal library with good literature. There are lots of resources for this. If you have any questions, feel free to email me. I am an eclectic homeschooler at best and a frantic one at worst! Blessings to you & your family!
Our Small Hours says
Yes, our focus is reading, writing and math and we mainly unschool the rest. With my youngest at home now it’s been more difficult to school my older two together. I’m now spending about an hour with each child per day. Some days, when they are simply doing their “daily math operations” and I’m not teaching anything new, they just sit down, go to work and only need me if they have questions. I want them to be self-taught as much as possible because I never want them to stop seeking knowledge and learning. (Says the 33 year old grad student. Ha!)
Have a good daily schedule/routine. If they are not already doing chores, get them started. This is something I’ve only committed to recently. Because food prep, home school planning, blogging and writing, chauffeuring to and from activities, etc takes up so much of my time I don’t have time for dishes and laundry. But they do!
So, yes, spend enough time to introduce them to subjects and let them come to you with what they don’t grasp. Otherwise, step back and let them learn! Have goals for what they need to accomplish at the end of a term or a school year, but let them learn as independently as they are able and they will retain so much more!