Schedules & Plans for Little Miss

I am loving the workboxes. Better yet is how the system is all coming together for our kids. At first, Little Miss was highly resistant to even the idea of having a visual schedule. She wanted no part of it. The following day, I posted the schedule along with their individual chores. In our home, the kids already do some of the things that some families list on chore charts. One example if that Little Miss helps carry dishes to the sink after a meal. I don’t include those things on the chores list. I chose instead to list only a few things that are typically forgotten each day.

The daily schedule begins at 7am and ends with bedtime at 8pm. They have a couple of morning chores after breakfast. Little Miss feeds & gives water to the kittens while Pookie helps me to tend the dog. After morning chores, we begin homeschooling. They have a lunch break with an additional 30 minutes of rest period after. I have found that if they have that rest period the remainder of the day goes far easier. They can take a nap if needed, but most often they simply play quietly in their bedroom. It gives them (and Momma) a chance to relax before taking on the remainder of the day. After the rest period, any remaining homeschool work is done. After the homeschool assignments are completed, the kids have free time until supper. After supper, is another hour of play time before evening chores (picking up toys & books), then it is time to get ready for bed.

Little Miss has more workboxes now that she is in 1st grade. We are still finishing up the MFW-K materials, but have added supplemental materials that are 1st grade level to challenge Little Miss. I am adding centers this term. It will benefit both kids, I am sure. Science is always fun. I keep finding books that have science experiments using items we typically have at home. I also have a collection of file folder games that I have been making for a couple of years now. These, along with other interactive activities that I’ve put together, will make a nice change of pace during the day.

One request that Little Miss has asked was for more lapbooks. I am now finding some to add to our curriculum. We are going to wait and start the MFW – 1st grade materials about October. She simply needs a chance of routine. Bless her heart, she has homeschooled year round this year. While it was a benefit to help her over a couple of academic humps that had occurred, the child needs a break. She loves lapbooks and doesn’t see them as schoolwork. There are a couple that are literature based that she has really wanted to do. We are going to go ahead and make those.

One of the things that Little Miss is wanting to learn is to make herself a fairy outfit. She loves anything to do with fairies. So, with that in mind I am getting the instructions together to help her make a cute outfit. I found a couple of books at the library that show how to make the skirt, wings, wand, and headband with ribbon streamers hanging down. She loves it! This will be a fun project through September & October as we take 1 item of the outfit to make each week.

Making the fairy outfit will get Little Miss into the habit of making an item each week. With the holiday season quickly following her fairy outfit project, we will switch over from her outfit to making decorations for the holidays. We give homemade gifts each year, so that will be another set of projects to complete. Starting in November, we will be doing the crafting nearly every day so that she has plenty of time to complete all the gifts she is wanting to make. One gift in particular is a long term one that she has been working on as a Christmas gift. It is truly a labor of love. My little girl humbles me in this one. I can’t mention what it is as I don’t want to spoil the surprise, but will certainly be taking a picture of it to share after the gift has been given.

Our daughter amazes me. She is a typical kid in so many ways, yet she has many times shown a deeper concern for those around her. We are eagerly awaiting cooler weather to arrive so that we can resume our afternoon tea routine. She loves it! Her favorites are when I make fresh scones with jam and we have the little sandwiches. Once in a while though, she asks me to make a high tea. It is so fun to connect with her through our tea times. I never thought that I would have a 6 year old getting fun from going to a health food store to buy her own special box of tea. I feel very blessed to have a little girl who finds these times to be a special as I do. The tea time is our special time together. I am looking forward to autumn’s cooler temps as much as she is. I am seeing it is nearly time to start ordering our tea to stock up the pantry with before winter. Time to get the tea catalogs ordered so she and I can start making plans.

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Loving the Schedule

After a bumpy start, we are enjoying the new schedule. I simply wrote it out on small poster board for now. Once I have printed out images to go with each activity, I will remake the schedule and laminate it.  Little Miss wasn’t so sure that she wanted the schedule, but found that it gave her more free time to play.  Pookie is in his “hakuna matata” mood where the schedule is concerned.  I find it interesting that the child who resisted the change was the one who is not autistic.  For me, the schedule has made my day far easier.  I am able to accomplish more.  I am liking it more than I expected to.

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Making Adjustments for the Upcoming School Term

This week, I have been reading carefully through “Sue Patrick’s Workbox System: A User’s Guide” once again. It seems that ever since buying the book, I have taken it out and referred to it numerous times. I love the system, but have not felt that I have used it as effectively as I could be. There are so many ideas and tips throughout the book that I had either overlooked or thought to be unnecessary. I now understand why she states that people should try it her way first.

One of the aspects that I hadn’t given much thought to was the schedule. The workboxes alone were enough, were they not? Sigh. Evidently they were lacking in something. Now that Pookie is going to be officially homeschooling at the Pre-K level this autumn, I am revisiting this issue. He needs the schedule. That part was obvious. But, what was not so obvious was our daughter needing it. I just figured that the workboxes alone would make it easier. Remove contents from a workbox, complete that activity and put it into the “finished” bin. Sounds easy enough. Well, maybe that was so easy that it was working against us.

In the next school term, Little Miss will be doing more subjects than she had this term. A schedule will help greatly in keeping her more organized. She loves homeschooling, but hates missing out on play time or fun stuff. Put too many worksheets back to back in her workboxes and she get bored and frustrated. She loses her enthusiasm for learning. In Ms. Patrick’s book, she highly recommends having centers and other activities placed sporadically throughout the assignments each day. These give the child a chance to get up away from their desk at intervals & allow them to do hands-on activities that keep them motivated while learning. I have admittedly ignored that sage piece of advice. At first, we did a bit of it. Then we had my eldest daughter’s family move in for a time after a job loss. That disrupted our routine severely and the centers & interactive posters went to the wayside. Now, it is back down to Little Miss, Pookie, my husband and I at home. I am looking at the entire workbox system differently.

First thing to change is that the visual schedules are going to be used by both children. For Pookie, it will be essential for him to learn the structure of his day so that he knows what is expected. For Little Miss, it will help her to stay on task to get her work done more efficiently. Through use of the schedule, she can see at a glance what is left to be done. She will also be able to know what is ahead. If there is a particular activity that she is wanting to do, she will have to complete all the others ahead of it first. As we begin the new school term, this will become more important. The additional subjects, along with her Little Keepers program, will keep her busy. If she works her time properly, she will still have much free time to play or do activities that she wants.

One of the parts of homeschool that Little Miss loves the most is the lapbooks.. Today, she requested that we do more of them. I am going to be finding more lapbooks to accompany her lessons. If there is a topic that I cannot find a lapbook for, I will find one for one of her books. She loved the lapbooks for the Little House book series. There are many other children’s books that you can find lapbook materials for. Homeschool Share has many such lapbooks available for free on their website. You can often find free or inexpensive lapbooks available at Currclick. It is free to sign up for Currclick and the materials are all in a downloadable format such as pdf.

After talking with Little Miss, she is even more excited about the school days ahead. She has been doing so well already. Fine tuning the way we do our school days will only make the days go even better.

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