Logan's First Grade Schedule

I love reading about what others are doing with their students during their homeschooling hours, so I thought I would post a bit about what our almost-six-year old will be doing this school year. 


I have written out somewhat of a schedule for us this year, which I will post below, but it is held to very loosely.  My husband is around in the mornings and I do not want my morning hours to be spent hounding him to be quiet and the children to ignore their fun-loving, playful father.  One of the biggest perks of homeschooling Logan is that he gets to spend the morning hours with his hero.  If he were to be shipped off to school, the two of them would hold opposite schedules and, perhaps, see each other on the weekends.  I always want to give myself permission to stop when frustration is setting in or when the tree trimmers up the road provide more entertainment than my best-laid lesson plans or when the baby's third breakfast or fussy times don't coincide with their allotted time slots.  Being a former school teacher and someone who loves structure and schedules, this new approach is a big step for me.  And mornings at our house are a lot more fun and relaxed these days.

This year's program for Logan is going to be another year of me kind of pulling things together from here and there and trying to keep it light for my competitive, eager-to-please, perfectionist son.  I also like the idea of schooling frugally and doing my own thing. So, even though I was very tempted by My Father's World this year (mfwbooks.com), I am excited that I can do it my way for one more year. 

I have set my schedule up by priority level.  That way, if our day gets interrupted early on I will have gotten through the "must-do" items.

Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday Schedule

7:30 - Devotions and Scripture Memory.  For devotions we are using a variety of books and devotionals,
          along with a good amount of scripture reading and memory. 
8:00 - Breakfast, chores and free play.
9:00 - Logan's basics are covered by doing 10 minutes of reading (Alpha Phonics, Bob books, and other
          easy readers), 5 minutes of handwriting (a variety of Kumon products and very light copy work), and
          20 minutes of math.  For math we are using the rather detailed scope and sequence provided by            theheadoftheclass.com.  I am hoping to present the concepts using a variety of books (like those provided
          by livingmath.net), games, and hands-on activities.
9:45 - Logan's younger sister, Sierra, joins us for calendar work, weather graphing, some daily math
          activities that include things like 100's chart, predicting, etc., First Language Lessons (which I tweak
          quite a bit to make it a little more concrete and less rote memory), and basic conversational Spanish.
10:00 - Snack, read-aloud and map work, and free play.  If the weather is nice
            enough we go outside, otherwise I assign some type of indoor-appropriate
            physical activity.
10:45 - Logan completes  2 pages in his Explode the Code book 2 and then has free time for the rest of the half hour that his sister gets one-on-one school time with me.
11:15 - Monday and Tuesday: history using History for Little
            Pilgrims. 
We often do a related project or mapwork to go along with the section being read.
Thursday - Science:  random topics.  We chose books from the library or our shelves at home, read up on the topic and create a notebook page for our portfolios.

Afternoon classes only happen if we want them to.  These include arts and crafts (a "subject" often covered in conjunction with our other subjects), music (this is mostly done by listening informally to a variety of music and allowing them to dance and sing or play along as they desire), and nature walks (these seems to pretty much be a consistent "want to" around our house).

One Thursday morning a month will be dedicated to visiting the local nursing home with our pastor.

Wednesdays we will do devotions and Logan will do his reading and math right away in the morning before heading off to gym class at our local homeschool co-op. 

Friday - Science class with some fellow homeschool families in the morning and then reading and math in the
             afternoon.