Ok, now that we're all caught up on what's been going on, I wanted to share a little bit about what homeschool looks like at our house.
First of all, we are pretty informal. We have a rhythm and a loose schedule, but we also tend to deviate for Good Things. So, here's the ideal (loosely based on today).
5:00am: I wake up to get a little bit of alone time. I haven't been doing that in about a month because of being sick, so I'm easing back into early rising rather than trying to go from waking up at 8:30 to waking up at 5:00. This morning, I got out of bed at 6:30. I spend the time before the family wakes up trying to get chores done. Right now, that means getting out in the garden (sadly neglected after being ignored for most of a month) before it gets too hot. Otherwise, it's often a time for laundry and listening to podcasts. It sounds terrible, perhaps, especially if you aren't a morning person, but it works well for me because I'm a morning person, and it's also an important part of being an introverted parent. I'm a better parent if I don't have to start parenting the moment I open my eyes. And I try to choose tasks that are more enjoyable either because of the task itself or because I can listen to podcasts/audiobooks. It's not a time when I scrub toilets, because who wants to do that immediately upon waking up?
7:00am: The kids were waking up at this time before July happened, so I'm trying to be prepared for them to wake up around this time. I don't wake them up unless we have to go somewhere. Sometimes I feed the animals during this time.
8:00am: Usually everyone is awake at this time. We head down to the kitchen to have breakfast (usually Himself cooks, which I love). We have a leisurely family breakfast and linger over coffee until 9:00.
9:00am: Himself heads upstairs to his office to start his workday. Sometimes everyone is already dressed, if not, we get dressed. If I haven't already done it, we head outside to take care of the animals. Whenever those two things are done, we have Morning Time. We sing the Days of the Week song, the Months song, recite two Unitarian pieces, sing a UU hymn, and read a book (or more!) together. Then, we get flexible. I usually have some activities planned, but I also go with the flow. Today, they wanted to make necklaces with beads and play with play-dough. Fine motor skills and sensory play, check! Play is their job right now. I try to do a little tidying up after morning time, depending on their involvement in their activities, and sometimes I give them tasks to help with. If we have a playdate, it usually starts around 10, so we will head out right after morning time. At some point, they usually head off to play independently. My biggest goal during this time is to keep it screen free for all three of us!
11:30am: Sometimes I make lunch, sometimes Himself does, and now, sometimes AW does! She's learned to make PB&J and egg salad sandwiches.
12:00pm: Family lunch. Himself joins us if he hasn't already and we linger until around 1:00 when he heads back to work.
1:00pm: This used to be DC's naptime, and we're working on finding a new sleep rhythm. They play, but I try to encourage quiet play or reading books together. Today, they did pattern blocks, color matching (DC) and ordering numbered blocks (AW). Then we read a few books. It worked out well today: he asked for nap in the middle of a book! It probably won't work tomorrow, but I'll take every victory I can get.
2:00pm: Naptime for DC and quiet time for AW. She gets to choose whether to hang out in the library/schoolroom doing projects on her own, or up in her bedroom.
3:00pm: Quiet time ends. DC is still napping if he has actually fallen asleep, and I do some one on one activities with AW. Today, we were working on activities from her Ivy Box (an educational subscription box that comes once a month). The Ivy Box theme this month is coral reefs. We started off observing a starfish (texture, hardness, color, etc) and reading about them. Then she painted the starfish. Then she used watercolors and stencils to create a coral reef scene. By then, DC was awake and joined us in using watercolors on a plain peace of paper. Then, we played Coral Reef Bingo. He did surprisingly well! We finished up by reading a couple of books about oceans. Eventually they wandered off to play.
5:00pm: If they haven't already wandered off to play, I send them off at this point so I can make dinner. It's also the time of day when I let them watch TV if they ask for it. I usually aim for something at least mildly educational. I'm a big fan of this YouTube channel that just has animated nursery rhymes because they learn to sing along, and end up singing them all the time. DC especially is really absorbing songs right now and trying to sing along.
6:00pm: Family dinner!
7:00pm: Bedtime for the kids. Right now, tag teaming works best. AW gets herself ready for bed and comes in my room to snuggle and read. We're currently reading Fairy Tales, a book that I had when I was four years old. We read until around 7:30 and then she heads off to bed. I take a couple of minutes to relax between when she is finally in bed and moving onto the next job.
8:00pm: I head down to my office in the laundry room (which sounds weird but I actually love it) to work for a couple of hours.
10:00pm: Work is over! I head upstairs. The goal is reading for a few minutes, then a little bit of meditation, and then sleep. Hopefully I fall asleep by 11:00. The trick is finding a book that I enjoy reading so I want to pick it up at the end of the day, but not getting so into it that I can't turn the lights out after 30-45 minutes of reading.
This is just an example of what the day looks like when we aren't running errands or getting together with friends or doing something with our homeschool group. When we run errands or have playdates, it's almost always in the morning. Our afternoons and evenings are fairly consistent, which is why I tend to do more focused "school" then. But again, it's only preschool, and AW's main job is play. Right now the goal is to keep her excited enough that she asks to do school.
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