Homeschool World Forum

Hi Im new here and thought this would be a great place to post this question

Im wanting to make a schedule to follow and Im not sure how to go about that.
My daughters will need one on one no doubt about it except for reading aloud and playing games.
I work evenings and dad works days. I will be the one teaching the girls
My work schedule is 1:00pm - 11:00 pm so basically I have from 7:00 to 12:00 to work with both the girls 5HOURS
here's what Im thinking

7:00/7:30, dressed,breakfast
7:30 Cartoons or education videos, any suggestions???
8:00 - 8 yr old text book work such as writing, drawing, reading spelling,math etc. Im not certain what all we will have to study.
9:30/10:30- 5 yr old text bookwork writing,drawing,letters,numbers,math,sounds,spelling ect

10:30/11:00 break for cat nap or snack/w tv or playtime which ever they prefer
11:00/11:15- Mom reads aloud
11:15/11:30- 8 yr old reads aloud
11:30/11:45 8 yr old game time
11:45/12:00 5 yr old read along
12:00/12:15 5 yr old game time
12:15/1:00 lunch time
Childcare from 1:30 to 6:00 or until dad picks them up. They have access to a computer whenever they need it so I was thinking if needed they could do extra work on the computer with cd rom and it can be saved for me to check at a later time
I was thinking for activities I could do the civic centers sports such as basketbal.soccer,softball,swimming, also library story time,meet with other parents that hs, dance,church, heck thats really more than we do at the current time
so what do you think to much or not enough
I was told to start out slow is this slow enough???
thanks for the advice

I am just finishing up my first month of homeschooling. I too have to have a schedule. But I have found that if I relax about the schedule, the day goes better, I am not stressed, the boys are less frustrated, and there are many more smiles.

I purposely plan for 'additional' activities. Since they are additional, I don't feel guilty if we don't get to them.

I try to start waking everyone around 7. It takes my middle child almost an hour to wake up. The goal is to start by 8:30 and finish up with required things by 11:30. I do the PreSchool in 30 mins a day with my daughter during lunch. We eat lunch, run a couple of errands and are back home to finish up the 'additional' activites from 1-2:30. If we have to hold over into the afternoon or if we have something else going on, fieldtrip, exhibit, house desperately needs cleaning, whatever, then we didn't miss out on anything and "I" am not stressed

Start out with a schedule you are comfortable with using, but be flexible. Learning should be fun for both the learner and the teacher.

It looks like a fairly heavy schedule to me. I wouldn't worry about videos from 7:30-8. My kids do much better when they haven't seen anything on-screen before their schoolwork in the morning (not to mention before trying to get along with each other and us all day).

An hour and a half seems like a long time for an 8-y-o to do bookwork with no break. An hour seems like a very long time for a 5-y-o. I would switch back and forth between the two of them each time one finishes doing a particular subject. This would also keep the one who's not doing bookwork from feeling abandoned by mom for such a long time.

I would also reduce the total time for each of them. We don't do things by times, but by lessons. Some days a lesson might actually take 45 minutes, but most lessons are only 10-15 minutes.

I would enforce playing (outdoors if possible) along with the snack/nap during the mid-morning break. TV would not be an option.

This sounds like a full-throttle school day. If you're wanting to start slow, I'd say scale this way back and work up to what I've suggested.

HTH,
Ramona
HS'ing mom for 12+ years