Planning

For school. It takes up much of my time these days. It seems no matter how many years I have been homeschooling, there are always thing to tweak, to improve upon, to do differently.

This year's planning has been an experience, to say the least. I was all ready to kind of try something new. Just a little bit different. Using Ambleside as my base but tailoring it a little bit more to my needs. Including teaching two kids.

Part of my goal was to teach as many "subjects" to the girls, together, as possible. I figure it would cut down a little on what I have to do during our school day. My original goal, when starting my planning process was to do Bible, habit training, history, science, some literature, Shakespeare, Spanish, and Latin (English from the Roots Up) together. (I am sure there are more, I just can't think at the moment.)

I made lists, looked up books, envisioned in my mind how it would all look. I wanted to start a new history program. Invest in a great foreign language program. Buy tons of books and then try to figure out how we would read them all. And where they would fit in our school day. Which, by the way, is about 3 hours.

I got myself into such a state of worry and confusion. There are SO many great books out there to use to teach with. And I just kept feeling we had to read all of them, this year! One draw back for homeschooling for me, is that I want to teach and read EVERYTHING. And, that just isn't possible, especially not in one year! Also, a fear I have, is that I will miss teaching something.

Anyway, as I was looking over our history program, it came to my attention that we hadn't studied the Ancients. That troubled me. How did I miss that? What do I do about it? What else did I miss? In other subjects as well?

So, I finally took a deep breath and developed some real life expectations, and realized, I can't do it all. And certainly not in one year. I also looked forward in the curriculum we use and saw that the Ancients are studied, just in later years. So, I looked through the rest of the curriculum, through high school, and really liked what I saw. It covered a lot of great stuff!

After all the lists and time I have taken, looking up books and figuring out who is going to do what, I am right back at the beginning of my original plan from a couple of years ago. Now, I have added personal quiet time and we will do science, foreign language, English From the Roots Up, Shakespeare and some literature together. But, I am going to continue on just the same as always with history (which was my biggest concern.)

One thing I will be more aware of, is to concentrate more on how the things we are learning connect to other stuff we are learning. And to take our time. Not be in a rush to get school done. We are reading really, really great stuff, packed with really great information. I want us to simmer over stories. Stew on them. Digest them and let them gel in our brains. (Like how I use "our", it isn't just about the kids learning!) I am sure there are other things we will do together once we get started. I am just making a basic plan.

Some advice I have taken from my homeschooling friend, who has graduated a son (and he is doing great), keep my expectations realistic. And, that is what I intend to do. . .