Routines

June 20th, 2011

This week Kristin, Kathi and I are sharing about our routines.  Specifically if those routines will look any different now that it is summertime.

Well, first of all, lemme say I tried to figure out routines according to other people (kinda like you might be doing right now, with pen and paper in hand readin’ this link up, right?  You know you are, admit it!) I would get my notes ready, scour  homeschooling moms’ blogs, books, and large family sites and make my well-laid plans.  And then I would be so frustrated and aggravated and think I was a failure when it didn’t work.  And it never worked.  Because their family wasn’t my family.  And hey, ready for this?  You might find some tips that will help you here, but really the best suggestion I can give you is “Your family is not my family.  Your quirks and emergencies and husband’s work schedule is not ours.  Go with your flow.”  Yo?  So take a deep breath, know that you don’t have to achieve anything, therefore you won’t fail.  Now, you may continue reading with absolutely no pressure whatsoever.

When I quit trying to force us into a fake schedule and started just watching our natural rhythm of our days I had a lot more success.  And that rhythm changes.  I do what works until it doesn’t work anymore.  And then I do something else.  But I’m learning my kids, myself, and my husband enough that making those changes is much easier than it used to be.

Being year rounders we don’t actually take the summer off.  We work right on through.  But it’s hot outside (in case you hadn’t noticed the 3 digit numbers in the van recently) and the kids don’t really want to hang out outside anyway.  Add to that thought that I am an anti-social homeschooler and I don’t like hanging out with a bazillion barely supervised kids everywhere (that’s right, I said it) then it makes summer the perfect time to stick our noses in our books and keep on keepin’ on.  Winter’s similar for us (at least after Christmas, we usually take a good bit of time off then) otherwise we work hard through the winter months.  Because spring and fall are just so marvelous to soak in the outside fun, that we take more smaller breaks then.

I did mention to Matt recently that I was ready to change things up a bit.  School’s been going along great for months now, but I just kinda want to mix it up, do a unit study, drop our books for a bit.  But then when we also discussed trying to have another baby before too long I started to think about how sick I got last time.  And how that morning sickness didn’t just last a couple of months.  And how, if I just kept right on going through summer (like I like to do anyway) then if I were to get pregnant I could switch up the humdrum routine and do some fun activities (lapbooks, read-alouds, unit studies) from the couch more.  And feel a whole lot less guilt.  So, no, we won’t be changing our schedule for the summer anytime soon.

But I would offer this.  If you do keep going through the summer (or if you’re new to homeschooling and just can’t wait to jump in early to that new curriculum!) adjust your schedule not only to the kids’ needs (who’s hungry when, who got enough sleep and who didn’t, when will the toddler sleep so we can read out loud already?!), and not just to your hubby’s schedule (you do know you’re going to need to work around what time he leaves for work – the kids will want to stop their studies to see Dad off – and there’s lunches to consider if he can come home and do you want to have all the schoolwork done by the time he gets off work or will he be helping with certain subjects?  all things to consider) but also consider the weather.  Seriously.  If it’s going to be so very hot by noon then why don’t you think about playing outside first thing in the morning and doing your schoolwork in the middle of the day.  If there’s going to be a rainy day, maybe you could hit the books hard that day and plan to take the afternoon off the next day when it’s going to be much prettier out.  Monitor and adjust.

If you’re interested in the nearly minute by minute way our day plays out you can check out this post I wrote a year or so ago (be sure to read through the comments there as well, I get real with what my house looked like at the time and not just our “this is what I try to do in a day” plan).  It still reflects the ebb and flow of our days pretty well, except the Baby is now a toddler who destroys everything he can get his hands on, you know.

If all of that is just as clear as mud please feel free to ask me any questions you may have.