I never like to admit when I'm barely treading water, but it happens almost every year as Thanksgiving approaches. The moment the leftover turkey is put in the fridge, it seems that December and its giant to-do list overwhelm me. Besides the regular crazy that we call our day-to-day around here, December kicks it up more than a notch or two. We celebrate a birthday in December, practice for and attend several special Christmas programs and parades that my children and husband participate in, and the colder weather means daily feeding of the cattle on top of regular jobs. And of course, there's all the home decorating, shopping, and general memory making that December seems to ... Read More
Homeschooling Without a School Room? It Can Work!
When most of us begin homeschooling, we want (or even believe we need) a dedicated homeschool room. We see bloggers posting pictures of their Ikea-style rooms with desks and shelves, cubby holes and colorful decorations, and we envy them. For whatever reasons, we believe we need a room like that in order to be successful at homeschooling. But do we? Special thanks to Michelle Cannon from The Heart of Michelle for today's guest post here at Our Journey Westward! The first thing I've learned is that we need to be content with what we have. (That's an important lesson for our children, too!) What else have I learned? I've learned there are more important things in life than a ... Read More
How to Get the Most from Digital Curriculum
Have you noticed that more and more homeschooling curriculum is being offered digitally? I Love Two Things About Digital Curriculum Because the publishers have a lower overhead, I can often purchase digital products very inexpensively. (Don’t think the cheaper prices mean cheaper products! Overall, I’ve found reputable companies to offer really good curriculum via digital files.) I can store and organize digital curriculum easily without the need to keep adding more bookshelves to our schoolroom. Well, I do keep adding bookshelves…for living literature, but that’s a different post. It can be hard to USE digital curriculum, though. Getting into the file and scrolling to the correct lesson ... Read More
Elementary Charlotte Mason Weekly Planner
I've used a bazillion planners over the years. You, too? I needed something to keep me on task with our Charlotte Mason style of homeschooling for my 2nd grader. Something that "forced" me to remember things like poetry recitation, narration of various subjects, and memory verse practice. The Perfect Planner I needed a planner where I could lay out the basics for the week and just jot down quickly when we did them. I needed a planner where I could make definite plans for our poem of the week, our artist of the week , our memory verse of the week, etc. When Pinterest didn't come to the rescue, I decided it was time to create my own "perfect" planner. It's nothing fancy, but ... Read More
Weekly Lesson Notebooks
(This post contains affiliate links.) Better lesson organization is one of my main goals for the upcoming school year. Having a high school student, middle school student and a kindergartener, I have no choice but to be more organized - or feel flustered and fall behind too often like I did last year when I was less prepared. I have a newly organized planning notebook for myself and both of the big kids have their own weekly binder. Besides organization, the binders are going to help the kiddos work towards more work independence and responsibility. I'm so excited about these weekly lesson notebooks! Middle and High School Binders Basic Supplies The pocket pouch holds a ... Read More
Organizing E-Books
To Print Homeschooling E-books? I was giddy with excitement when I learned about keeping a visual organizer of all your e-book curriculum from Sheri of Homeschooling on a Wing and a Prayer. I have struggled much with the fact that it's entirely too expensive to offer my curriculum e-books in print. I know how many of you would much rather have a hand-held copy. Luckily, I've found it really doesn't take that much ink to print the studies from your own printer! Or Not To Print Homeschooling E-books? However, many people don't want to print entire e-books - and I understand! Like most of you, I've purchased PDF files from other homeschooling companies and stored them on my computer only ... Read More
Unit Studies Revisited
It's been well over a year since I posted anything about the nitty-gritty planning of my unit studies. I've had several email questions lately wondering how I plan, so I thought it might be time for a new post on the subject. The emails I've received have all been similar in the basic four questions I tend to be asked. How do you choose what you study each year? How do you plan your units? Is there any sort of curriculum you follow? How do you not overload? I'll take a few minutes to try to answer these questions in a way that makes sense. (Planning is a very personal thing, so I have a hard time articulating how I plan sometimes.) How do you choose what to study each ... Read More
Catching Up
I just wanted to share a few odds and ends this afternoon. Yesterday was Mahayla's piano recital. She did such a lovely job! I'm afraid her talent is stronger than her desire right now , though. We're taking a break over the summer to see if she might "get her want to fixed" before the fall. (That's a phrase Steve's grandma uses when she thinks people need to stop complaining! :) Here's what my two free birds have been doing EVERY SINGLE DAY since school's been out. Here's what I've been doing today. Can't tell what it is? It's our poor schoolroom!! I had the urge to reorganize the whole space (again), and this is what it looked like after a couple hours' work. ... Read More
Wrapping Up Homeschool for the Year
I've been asked before if I keep all my children's work from year to year. My answer - mercy, no! Wrapping Up Homeschool Work Pages Throughout the year, all of the children's work goes into subject folders or notebooks. For example, when a math lesson is completed and checked, it gets filed in the math folder. All maps, worksheets and projects from our Around the World studies went into a folder for that study. All stories, newsletters, spelling tests, grammar sheets, etc were filed in the language arts notebook. At the end of the year, we go through each folder and pull out 3-10 of the best samples for an end of the year portfolio. Each of the subjects is then put together ... Read More
Toy Jail
Our toys are in jail. They have visitation rights, but very limited. You see, since I couldn't lock the messy children up, the toys had to be the ones to suffer. They've been in jail for almost a month now and the time apart from the children seems to be doing everyone well. We took every toy in the house and put them all in their appropriate boxes, bags or containers (like they should've been to begin with.) Then, I carted an old bookshelf up to our bonus room space and started stacking toys. It didn't matter whether they were attractively placed or easily accessible because the kids weren't going to have "unsupervised visitiation rights". If they want a particular toy, they ... Read More