Homeschooling is a big job. Choosing curriculum and programs for our students can be exciting but can also become overwhelming very quickly. Add to that the learning curve required to understand all the ins and outs of the workings of a charter school and suddenly getting started on your year can be daunting indeed. It is our sincere desire to help you, the Learning Coach (parent/guardian), feel confident in this worthwhile journey.

In this first article, we will guide you through a few simple steps to approach planning out your year. A school year has about 36 weeks (or 180 days). So, how many days a week should you do math? What science should you cover? How do you fit in field trips? How do you know if you’ve chosen too much?

I am the homeschool mom that wants to do “all the things.” My desire for well-educated and well-rounded kids leads to a long list of subjects to cover. After many years of schooling, I am finally accepting that I don’t have to do it all in one year. If you have this tendency, you might find it helpful to think hard about your goals. What are you working towards? Then, perhaps map out the next few years to see how some of those subjects and experiences can be spread out.

It’s very important that you have a plan to cover

• Math

• Social Studies/History

• Science

• Language Arts (including Reading/Phonics, Writing, Grammar)

Subjects to consider adding to these are:

• Handwriting/Typing

• Music (perhaps an instrument and Music Appreciation)

• Art (learning techniques as well as Art Appreciation)

• Physical Education

• Coding or robotics

• Foreign Language

When you’ve narrowed down what you will cover this school year, it’s time to sit down with a calendar. Take some time to consider the interruptions (aka “life”) throughout the year. Will you do a regular school day on birthdays, or close the math book for a field trip? What about holidays? Some families like to do themed lessons (unit studies) for a week or two before a specific holiday. Do you want to make sure to choose special read-alouds or picture books to teach your children about Martin Luther King Jr. as his day approaches? How about visiting a fish hatchery at the beginning of salmon spawning season?

As you’re looking at the calendar, consider the best way to break up your year. By month? Quarter? Learning Period? Looking at the year in smaller chunks can help you pace your curriculum, or if you get off track, it can be a new starting point to get you going again.

Unit studies are something to consider here. I love learning about art and classical music with my kids. It’s something we can all do together across grade levels. As I’m planning my year, I often consider focusing on a time period or style or a specific artist or composer for a section of our year. I can get books from the library, examples to study, and if I am really ambitious, an activity or video to go along with. Maybe you want to do unit studies on life skills for older kids—6 different topics for six weeks, like typing, health, cooking, budgeting, car maintenance—get creative! You can cover a lot of ground without doing it all at once.

Make a plan for your year that will work for you and your family. Do you need every day planned? Go for it. Like me, do you need a schedule written down so that you can get started before the coffee kicks in? Great! I always make a schedule or plan so that I can get going, but then deviate from it as I go. Having made the schedule in the first place, I know what needs to be done and can feel free to mix it up without throwing us off track. Maybe you like to wake up and see which way the wind is blowing. Consider making a checklist for the year or week of the skills, knowledge and standards you want and need to cover this year. Every month or so, you can make sure you’re making meaningful progress.

One hint to make your year flow more smoothly is to consider the school calendar as you plan. You can find the calendar here. Your teacher will let you know which samples are due each month. We’ll talk more about samples in another article but trust me when I tell you that your year will flow more smoothly if you anticipate the necessary samples, rather than trying to play catch-up every Learning Period. You can find the I Can statements (State standards for each grade) here. This can help guide what you choose for your samples.

Now it’s time to take a look at your curriculum. Some curriculum comes already paced—180 lessons (do 1 lesson a day) or a certain number of weeks (usually 30-36). If so, that’s paced for you. But some don’t provide that pacing. In that case it’s often helpful to gauge how much you’d need to get done each day or week to stay on track. I will be using Math Mammoth for my 3^rd grader this year. It comes in two books, so I know that finishing the first book by the end of the first semester is the goal. I can divide it up from there. For my junior high girls, we do Easy Grammar. I decided that trying to figure out how many lessons were in that slightly unwieldy book wasn’t worth my time, but doing 5-6 pages a week would be a good goal. On the other hand, they do BookShark for language arts, and that’s planned out for 4 days a week over 36 weeks. I don’t have to do much for that! Spend time looking through the curriculum you choose to get familiar with how to pace it out. Many websites will give you enough information online to be able to plan that out even if you are still waiting to order.

So now the hot topic—When will you get your curriculum and what if it hasn’t arrived in time? I know many of you are wondering and worrying about this. The fact is, many of you will have your curriculum trickle in over the first month or so of school. While this is disappointing initially, it doesn’t have to be a problem. If you think ahead and get creative, you can make this part of your plan. Children aren’t dependent upon a certain book or program to begin learning. They are learning every day. You can direct and enhance that in all kinds of creative ways. Feel free to start with some of those unit studies I mentioned. Brainstorm and think creatively, and the first month of school can be a lot of fun, rather than just a holding pattern, waiting for the UPS guy. The Family Liaison team has been brainstorming lots of ideas to help you with this. We will be coming out with a long list of great ideas for you soon. You may end up enjoying some of them so much, you won’t miss your curriculum!

We are here to help. Please reach out and let us know if you have concerns or need assistance. Do you have other ideas for those first few weeks? Share them with us!

Don’t forget that the purpose of planning out your year is to bring peace and calm to your homeschooling experience. Enjoy your kids! Have adventures together! Spend the time YOU need to plan out school in a way that will give you the freedom to relax into this journey.

-Rebecca LaSavio