Our homeschool year is just about to begin and I’m looking forward to getting back to routine and normalcy again. This is my 10th year homeschooling and my last year homeschooling my oldest daughter – a senior 😭😍 I’ve made a few mistakes along the way and learned a bunch over these last ten years and I’m still learning all the time.
If there is one single piece of advice I could give you on how to have a successful homeschool year it would simply be this: figure out what is your most important (subject, chore, or lesson) and always do whatever that is FIRST – and always before lunch!
I’ve found that if I don’t get my core lessons done with my kids before lunch often they don’t happen. I get distracted or they get busy doing their own independent school work, then I’m putting a baby down for a nap and before I know it, it’s time to cook dinner.
Many years ago I decided to make my mornings sacred. I NEVER schedule play dates or dentist appointments or even answer my phone or texts (if I can help it) till after lunch and I use my mornings to be as intentional with my kids as I can. I found when I dedicated this time to be focused we could get more done in a few short hours than we could get done all day when we were all distracted. I also found if the homeschool day went south after lunch there was a lot of peace in knowing I’d already finished the core school work with my kids.
Take time to figure out what you need to do each morning to have a successful school year. Though some things changes between years these are the basics I do every morning:
1. Coffee: keeping it real friends 😂
2. Jesus: I don’t want any subject to take be more important than time with the Lord and the Bible so we spend time practicing a memory verse, reading a Psalm or Proverb and praying over our day. It doesn’t take a lot of time but it’s worth every minute we spend.
3. Artist Study/ Hymn Study/Poetry Study/Music Study: we only Study one of these a day rotating through the week. Monday- artist study, Tuesday – hymn study and so on
4. Chapter book: we are always reading a chapter book usually pertaining to the period of history we are in. I read the assigned pages for the day.
5. History
6. Science
If I have any extra tone I’ll spend it on individual kids working on English or writing.
The rest gets done after lunch most days, but if not I know I’ve already gotten a lot done and making up the rest won’t be hard. This is generally how our mornings go, but it has varied over the years and ages of my kids and I would guess your mornings will look different too! Perhaps you have a child learning to read this might be the most important thing to do first thing in the morning or if you have a child struggling in a subject the mornings could be a great time to work with him or her. I’ve also used mornings as a time to catch up on a subject that we have fallen behind on (cause that sure does happen sometimes doesn’t it 🤦♂️😂)
There it is, super simple advice. First things First! Take time to figure out what’s most important and do those in the morning. It’s a simple
way to set up your homeschool for a great year.
