Three years in, I'm still learning every single day. We are navigating every messy and beautiful step of this at home learning journey together. Homeschooling gives us the chance for our experience and simplicity loving family to do life together in a way that feels intentional and best right now. We believe that opportunities for learning abound, and we want to be ready to make the most of them.
Rigid schedules are just not this momma's friend. Yes, I have a weekly plan taped to my fridge, but make me actually follow-it, and I'll break into a sweat! This team mixes up organized planning, non-conforming, and living in the moment. Rhythm and routine are much preferable to a schedule. The times that I am sharing are very much on the "ish" side. Rarely does the clock drive our day.
We had a nice rhythm going in the fall, with both girls settled into our days, enjoying our learning time. Then in November, as expected, when we travelled to China to adopt Evie and Eli, the homeschooling bottom fell out. Learning was less workbooks and more real life. We travelled all of November, slept for the next weeks, holiday-ed and introduced, then started wading through medical appointments and scrambling for our new normal. Life had been turned upside down in really good and really hard ways, so we spooned ourselves a heavy dose of homeschooling grace.
Now, we are back at, trying to meet the needs of four little people under six, two of which would prefer that we'd switch the family language over to Mandarin. We try to do all of our schooling in the morning through early afternoon, but sometimes find ourselves schooling on Wednesday nights or Saturday mornings.
It's messy right now, and all very "ish" in terms of curriculum, routine and rhythm, but good family transitioning is molding hearts, right? Let's hope so.
So, here is our day, in a very "ish' kind of way...
Between 6:30 and 7ish, I wake up and mentally organize the day around an afternoon nap that I'll never actually take. Then I force myself to don tennis shoes and hit the treadmill for 45 minutes of exercise while I read a book, listen to a podcast or catch up on texts.
7:30 Day prep, write, respond to emails.
8:00-8:30ish Kids start coming downstairs. I know it's going to be a smoother one when the big kids come downstairs dressed with beds made. The littles' clothes are laid out downstairs the night before.
8:30ish Breakfast One of the bigs takes a "breakfast helper" turn, emptying the dishwasher, setting the table, helping cook and pouring drinks. Good connection and life skills are high value in our home learning.
9:00-10:00ish Day Prep: Bath, make beds, get dressed, fuss, play, and prep for learning. A basket system works for us, laid out across our dining room table. Each big has a side of the table lined with baskets filled with tasks and all the materials that they need for each.
10-1:30ish Learning Time
Sophia attends a hybrid school with a "creative classical education" curriculum. T/Th are actual school days, and we are given assignments for the other three days. Claire does Pre-K with me, using
Five in a Row for reading, science & social studies and
Explode the Code for phonics. Both curriculums need to be added to, so we blend them together and add some to it based on interest and need.
We make sure the toys are put away, put on some softer music, grab some books and head to the couch to start with reading. We'll read the book we are rowing, a nonfiction science/history book and a couple books of their choice. The littles are usually on and off the couch, alternating between listening and totally distracting us!
During this reading time, I prefer to read more classical literature, but we are very "ish" with that as well, often just pulling in some fun books. Lots of talking, teaching and question asking goes on from the comfort of our couch.
After reading, we go in to the dining room table to talk through the baskets I've laid out for them. The baskets include all their work, journals, workbooks, books to read to me, plus they'll each get a basket with the fun things like the iPad with a timer,
Leapfrog Tag Readers, or
HotDots. They both use workbooks, but I try hard to give them as many hands on things as possible. To please the Montessori learning lover in me, the baskets can be worked through at their own pace in the order of their choosing.
They mostly work at the kitchen table, but work on the floor as well.
An occasional addition is a craft basket with some random crafty things to spark some creativity. I work hard at not controlling what they make and being OK with the ginormous mess.
While we work, I've set out some things for the little ones to do on the floor such as puzzles,
stacker pegs, and lots of
Melissa and Doug toys.
Eli LOVES to learn, so I plan a few things for him to do each week as well. The little people are uber needy right now, so we are struggling with keeping them occupied. I deal with my high guilt factor with them by heaping myself up some grace and remembering that they mostly need to play and be loved right now. In my dreams, I've hired a mother's helper to alternate between kids and dishes!
We are in an "ish" year, so remember that these pics are just snapshots of the times when we were rolling with our learning. There are no pics of times when I hid in the laundry room with a cup of tea, my iPhone and some chocolate!
Lunch is typically a nice break for us, before we come back and try hard to finish schoolwork before
quiet time from around 2:00-4:00.
The little people sleep, and the big girls play outside, read, color, play or watch a movie during quiet time. We work our booties off to try and have the house straightened up so that quiet time can be very chill for all of us. On a dreamy day, I sit on the couch with tea and do some organizing, writing/blogging or emailing.
Sometimes during nap, we work on an art project based on one of our books.
4:00-5:00 Errands, playing outside, watch a couple shows and dinner prep.
Mark returns home around 5:30, and we
eat by 6:00ish. :)
Our evenings are filled with playing outside, nursing Evie, crying, cleaning up messes, making lunches, begging for snacks, and playing.
Around 8:00ish, we drag the sometimes resistant little people to the couch for a Bible story and family prayer time. Perfection is non-existent here, as we are usually pulling Eli and Evie on and off the couch and reminding bigs to not giggle during prayer.
Once the littlest are in bed, I do a read aloud and have Sophia read to me again.
Relaxation in sight, Mark and I wearily head downstairs for a couple hours of finishing up the day, catching up and chilling out.
Our days are "ish" right now, as we keep trying to find that new normal. We are working to step off the "on a mission to manage it all" pace, and trying to find more time for silly, more time for riding bikes and more time to get out and make up some new memories.
