I took some time yesterday to set up our schedule for the next year, and more specifically, the next couple of weeks. Here is a look at how I organized our studies.
First, I actually got a planner this year, at the Homeschool Conference here in Winston Salem, back in May. I compared several different kinds, and went back and forth, and compared again, and finally settled on this one. In the past, I used a blank sheet of paper each day, but I would lose them and had no continuity to see all that we had accomplished over the year, because at the end of each week, they went in the trash.
This is what each undated week looks like. Lots of blank columns that I can do with as I will! It also has monthly spreads, but I haven't used those yet.
Here is how I organized my eight columns. The first two are stuff we do together - our morning devotions, Tapestry work, science, and language. Then, each child has two columns of their own. I've listed their assignments, with specific books and pages to read for Tapestry, in those columns (if you click on the picture, it will be larger and you can see it a bit better.) This will help a bunch this year, as we're expecting the oldest two to take more independent ownership of their work and check their assignments (6th and 4th grade) and because Mommy and Daddy will be switching out being the teacher as we each have a half day of language school ahead of us when we get to Kyrgyzstan. Our homework will need to be in the evening...who needs sleep?!
Krypto is officially in the Dialectic stage of learning...it is the stage of "arguing" and making connections, using logic to understand how things relate and why they happen. One of the things students tend to do in this learning phase is keep a timeline of History. I got him a blank timeline book at the Homeschool Conference and we'll use it for the next four years of school so he'll have a complete, chronological view of History to look back at.
I also went ahead and bought two more, so that when Gwangi and Sissi are ready, they can have the same timeline books.
I printed out pictures and figures from our Tapestry of Grace Yahoo! group so that each week he can see the highlights that I'm expecting him to remember and add them to his timeline. He'll also be free to add other events and people that he's interested in remembering their "place in History."
I also printed out all of our mapwork for the year for all three children. Each week we'll do our mapwork together, usually on Monday, so that they have a visual frame of reference for whatever reading they are doing that week.
Here is just one week's sample reading list from Tapestry of Grace. The 3 week "Egypt" mini-unit is available as a free download for you to check out on the Tapestry of Grace website. You can see that it is broken up by subject on the left side - History Core, History In-Depth, Literature, Fine Arts, and Worldview. There are separate pages for vocab, famous people and timeline entries, writing assignments, and a Government and Philosophy credit for those at the Rhetoric/High School level.
On the bottom of the page you can see the color coded levels of students. First, a Lower Grammar student is usually K-2nd grade. They are a student that cannot read independently for content and understanding. Most of their work is done as a read aloud. Then, you have an Upper Grammar Student, anywhere from 2nd-5th grade. This student can read independently for comprehension of their material. A Dialectic student is next, the traditional Middle School years are covered here, and finally a Rhetoric student is what we know as High School and can start in the 9th or 10th grade depending on a students ability to make cohesive arguments and analyze their reading assignments.
If you need a more detailed "How to Plan out and Use Tapestry of Grace," I have a 4 part Review and Planning guide that I wrote 2 years ago. You can check out the first of the four parts here -
Leaving Tapestry now....
How I set up each student's notebooks.
There are dividers for each subject and we'll clean them out each Unit and begin again.
The first tab is their new King Fu materials - King Fu
This is a program where they will be memorizing all kinds of "catechism" and theological type questions (over 500 of them) and as each student progresses to different "belts" the questions get harder and are associated with a memory verse(s). By the end of the program there will be 575 questions memorized along with 98 verses.
This is specifically Krypto's binder, and I have the DE (digital edition) of Tapestry and I print off his Accountability and Thinking Questions (AQs and TQs) for him each week so he can read them before he reads his assignment so he know what he is looking for in the material. Then, he has paper behind the questions so he can write his answers, take notes, etc. and we can use that each week when we have our History and Literature discussions.
Finally, I put a cute, personalized note in front of each binder for them to find on the first day of school.
The tabs, in order, are - King Fu, Bible journal (for them to write a quick, one line synopsis of whatever their Bible reading is for the day. The two older ones will be reading through the Bible chronologically this year with their studies.), AQs and TQs, Writing Assignments, Maps, History (I have the kids draw pictures when I'm doing the Lower Grammar read alouds with Sissi. It gives them a neat visual reminder of all we've covered through the year.), Science (we also draw, journal, and do lab reports for our science studies), and finally Language. We'll be starting the year off with reviewing what we learned last year in Russian and when we arrive in country, I believe we'll be switching to learning Kyrgyz.
Such fun! I hope this has helped and I would love to hear your organizational ideas as well. Each year looks a bit different and it's always great to have new ideas!
My most recent update, after adding in a Rhetoric student, can be found here.
