Interested to know what a perfect day looks like at our house while we follow the awesome organized schedule I have set up for us? Yeah, me too. I’ll be sure to let you know what that looks like just as soon as we have one of those.
Want to know what a real day looks like at our house? Now that I can tell you about. Messy, loud, fun, frustrating, silly, scattered, satisfying…those are the kinds of days we usually have. Schedule? Yes we have one…just because we have to have SOMETHING to go by so that we can accomplish SOMETHING. But if I were to force us each day to stick to the exact schedule…I would make all of our lives miserable. Especially my own.
I’ve learned through these past eight years of homeschooling to keep our days flexible. To write down what I’d like a school day to look like and then to follow the plan loosely. Because just about the time I finally get all of my children in the room at the same time, settle them comfortably into their spots on the couches with pillows, wait for all of them to look up expectantly at me so that I can begin reading an enlightening chapter from our latest history book…someone is going to have to go to the bathroom.
And while that someone is in the bathroom, another someone will remember that he forgot his pencil but on his way to go get it he will see the Lego man on the steps that he had been missing and then he will accusingly ask which of his other brothers left the Lego man on the stairs when clearly Lego men are not allowed out of the Lego room because this is how we lose Lego people and the other brothers (the ones that are not in the bathroom) will run to see which Lego man it is and then they will all go to the Lego room, forget all about history and start to build a space ship.
In the meantime, the phone will ring with a call I can’t ignore and by the time I can corral them all back into the living room for history a good forty-five minutes will have passed and we’ll all finally get settled back down again…just in time for someone else to need to go to the bathroom.
These are the days of our lives.
I work very hard to keep our school days free of outside appointments, and I almost never answer the phone while we’re schooling…but sometimes things can come up that are out of my control. We have to roll with it. (No, boys! I did not say that you could roll and wrestle all over the art materials which are on the floor…I meant roll with the schedule! Get off the sketchbooks!!!)
Somehow our children are learning in spite of all of the “life” that is going on around us.
Hey, it would appear that “life” is what they need to be learning about anyway.
Well, I’m so glad I worked that into the schedule. ;)
Renae says
This is very encouraging to me as I plan to start school next week. Thank You!
Carla says
Thanks Laura! I don’t know whether to be terrified, or excited for school to start next week! I appreciate all of your insight. I really am fairly calm considering I am about to embark on a crazy educational adventure with 4 boys 11, 11, 2, and 5 months.
Laura Cherry says
I love that you mention this. I think as parents, we often have a skewed idea that everything must roll according to schedule or we’re not accomplishing anything, and they’re not learning anything. It’s just not true! Before I was home full-time I worked in the public school system as a Behavioral Specialist, and let me tell you, we had days JUST like the one you described there as well… too many of them. ; P
I found that if I really sat down with the students and asked them to tell me about a time they felt like they really connected with school or learning, it came from the impromptu day when a wise teacher had a “throw out the lesson plans” moment and carried on a conversation or held an experiment with a class about something that truly meant something to them – something they could get caught up in.
We have information days and we have application days. If we don’t have both, we’re in trouble!
Shannon says
Ah… well said. :)
Natalie says
This sounds like you were peeking in OUR windows! Around here though, there would have been Barbies involved too. ;)
Julia says
It is always so nice to hear an honest “day-in-the-life” story. I get so discouraged with people somehow making their days sound so wonderful and organized, etc (I don’t think they are out to make the rest of us feel bad…just not being totally forthcoming). I spent yesterday trying to get my 8, 6, 5 and 2 year old to SIT down long enough to read 2 pages (they were jumping on the old crib mattress), I thought I was going to go insane. BUT I am learning that perfection and being super organized is not the goal here. Take yesterday…they were happily playing together. We can talk about plant and animal niches another time. Course that is also easier to say 24 hours later!
Denise says
Wow, sounds familiar, only it’s usually me getting distracted by one of the hundreds of things I haven’t finished yet. I have a tough time putting off MY agenda long enough to focus on school. But I generally get to the point I’m able to mentally set aside all the stuff that’s staring me in the face and focus on school. Thankfully, I only have ONE boy to homeschool! LOL!
Jessica says
I love it Laura!!! With 2 active boys and a baby on the way, our days HAVE to be flexible. Thankfully, I’m not Type A so I don’t have a coronary every time something gets out of whack. But I definitely like somewhat of a plan so our “45 min.” doesn’t turn into a whole day!
Thanks again for all you share with us. You’re such an encouragement and I look forward to my dose of Heavenly Homemakers each day!
Pam says
Too funny! Especially because our sketch book is currently on the floor!
Briana says
I am sooooo glad to read this is someone else’s reality other than my own. Truly. I just needed to hear that. Thanks for writing about the reality of your world. Boy, does it look so similar over at our house.
reba says
YOU HAVE A LEGO ROOM??? I’m so glad my boys weren’t reading over my shoulder just then!!! ;) Oh, wait…was that not what I was supposed to get out of the post?! I just can’t get over it! How cool to have the legos contained to one room. I need me an extra room!
Laura says
Yeah, I KNOW. A room JUST for legos. The thing is, we live in a big old house with plenty of bedrooms. BUT, all four of our boys like sleeping in the same room. I keep wondering when our oldest will ask for a room of his own? We used to have them sleeping two and two, but every night they’d take turns all four sleeping in each others rooms and then the arguments began and one day I had enough and moved all the beds into one room!!
So then, the other bedroom became a room for all the legos. It really is nice!! :)
Shonda says
It’s good to hear that we don’t all have it together. I was a teacher and I ran a pretty good classroom, but I hope to homeschool and I know it will be different so thank you for the perspective. I just ordered the Learn to Serve and I plan to use bits and pieces with my 20 month old. It looks fabulous!
Laura says
Ha! Ha! Ha! Such a funny story! Thanks for being real with us and letting us have a peek into your “perfectly” scheduled homeschooling days. : )
Rhoda says
I’m with Reba–a LEGO ROOM!!!! We have you beat–we have a whole lego HOUSE. I’d love to be able to contain it all to ONE room. Maybe by the time they’re 20? But they are learning and growing, imagining and developing–what more could one ask for. Thanks for the peak into what’s “rolling” in your house.
Stephanie M says
It’s honest writings like these that help me see that maybe I CAN homeschool all three of my kids next year! When I used to lesson plan for my middle school LA classes, it would easily take me a couple of hours to just plan for one day. My lessons always contained too much for them to accomplish in one lesson, so they’d end up being a couple of days worth of learning. My style of lesson planning always led me to believe that there’d be NO WAY I could manage lesson planning for all the different subjects for all the different age groups at the same time for homeschooling, so I decided it wasn’t for me. But, with real descriptions like this, I can see that it’d be OK if we didn’t “get it all done” on the assigned lesson day. The perfectionist in me is letting out a huge sigh of relief. Aaaahhhhhhh. Thank you!
Shellie in Ar says
One way we saved money was to buy the Robinson Curriculum.
http://www.robinsoncurriculum.com
It is a full curriculum K-12 with the exception of math books. So we bought the curriculum one time and only have to buy math books as needed. That freed up our budget to be able to afford many of the extra books I’ve wanted to buy but could never afford plus gave us extra money as the years go by because we don’t have to buy new curriculum every year. It covers all of our 3 children (Senior, sophomore, and 5th grader) and I have all the books I’ll need for the last two as they get to later grades. Many of the books on it are the older more accurate textbooks that are no longer in print. We just print them off as we need them.
Another way we save money is to buy used and save the difference. If we can find something we need at a thrift store or yard sale in new condition we can often save 3/4 the cost. Of course reevaluating what needs really are helps too!
Some finds are just neat because they are a want and not a need but the deal makes them affordable unexpected blessings. We often find dresses for us girls and shirts for the guys on clearance at stores too. We buy off season or end of season. Just this week I bought I guys nice brand new button down shirts for $6.99 each at Tractor Supplies clearance rack. That beats paying $15 a shirt.
On groceries we are working toward affording more whole and natural foods. Every cut we can make in the budget allows another dollar or two toward some of the higher priced items at the health food store we might not have been able to afford before. I’m looking at information now on several co-op’s trying to find one that delivers in our area so we can see what I can order that way to maybe get some of these items at a lesser expense.
This website has been a blessing to me in that area for sure! I love learning something new every time I open my email from Heavenly Homemakers!
Blessings
Shellie