1. Homeschool planner. From the first day of our homeschool, I have used The Well Planned Day homeschool planner. It is all I have ever known and I love it! I keep track of their lesson plans for each day all in one place. Basically, I pencil in my plans for that week on Sunday evening, (more on that later) incorporating all projects, field trips and extra curricular activities. I also use it as a record to keep in case I should ever need it.
*This is the first place I go to see what we will be doing for the day.
2. Google calendar. I have learned to love Google calendar because it is online, so it is always accessible from my phone or computer and I can even share it with my husband. I use this to give myself reminders to get books at the library, field trips, and all extra curricular activities. It also gets utilized when I am meal planning. It is a great tool to see what our week will be looking like.
3. Homeschool binder. This was an invaluable idea I got for my friend Crissy. I purchased a 2-inch 3-ring binder (I prefer the slant rings, so papers lay flat), dividers, and plastic dividers with pockets. My tabs include: Bible/Character, Field Trips, Literature, Music/Hymn Study, Art/Poetry, Science, Math, History, Lauguage Arts and Resources. The very first page is my Curriculum Plan for each child, at a glance. It has everything that child will be covering for the year.
I keep my lesson plan for each subject behind each divider, with anything that will be helpful in planning. In the divider pockets I keep template printables for things like our About the Author page, Character Quality sheets, Scientific Speculation Sheets, lined report sheets and more.
4. Subject folders/bins. I have a teacher folder for each subject and I have all pages copied or printed off in advance in a filing cabinet. For instance, we are doing Draw To Learn Acts as our Bible curriculum this year. I purchased the PDF file, and I have a folder where I have already printed off 2 copies of each lesson so that I can easily pull them out and put them in our daily folders (mentioned next). Having each subjects activities assembled and printed off in advance, made for a very smooth year. The biggest help was with our art curriculum. We studied an artist each month and did 2-3 art projects reflecting their work. I have an art bin where I stored all materials we would need for each project, before the year started. I was probably not even going to do them if I waited until the week of! I did the same thing for our science experiments
*You can checkout all of our 2014-2015 Curriculum here.
5. Daily folders. I got this great idea from my friend Abby. Each of us (me included), has a portable file box (like this one here) with five hanging file folders, one for each day of the week. In those hanging folders, there are brightly colored file folders, with Monday thru Friday written on each tab. (I put a folder in the hanging file folders, because they can easily pull them out and keep their work with them for the day.) The weekend before a school week, I pull all the sheets or materials each child will need each day of the week for their independent work (my kindergartener doesn’t get a box yet). My 3rd grader would get the following in her Monday folder: Daily Paragraph Editing sheet, literature comprehension questions, writing prompt sheet, and character quality sheet. At the end of the day, she turns the folder into me with all completed work. I grade it and review it during our one-on-one time.
My box has folders with any printables or activities I will need for our work together, whether group time or one-on-one time. I also keep any books we will be using that week in the box, everything in one place. Each day folder has my Draw To Learn Acts sheets for both kids, daily math skills printables (each child does a quick math skills sheet before we start the day) and art/composer/hymn sheets I will need for our Circle Time that day. These folders are basically anything I will need for my lesson plan for the day. It makes it so easy for me to just pull the folder and keep it with me, instead of going back to my filing cabinet and finding the sheet I need for that day. I typically fill our file folders on Sunday afternoon, and it only takes me 15-20 minutes. That is seriously the key to a smooth week.
*More on How to Schedule Your Day here.
Be sure to checkout my other Homeschool Posts to help you out!
