[milkmommy]

Our orginal intentions were to school fully through this week then take off a long winter Break till the end of January.. However Cecilia started complaining that all her friends were out at the end of last week.. (the 12th) since we were alread a head in most things and well on tract with the rest I made an agreement...
She had to complete her daily grammar page and a math page and she had to finish the book she was reading and not let her instruments jsut go completely but other that that we'd go ahead and break "now" were taking she maybe had 30 of written work a day this week... No writing no history science religion geography etc...
Yet this week I feel soo frustrated. It is too much freedom she stalls and squawks and complains.. When she does the work its rushed and sloppy.. I feel like when we have structured "full" days then we end up not only getting much more done but we have more fun and have time for fun things or exploring other areas or expanding in areas we like or need to dig deeper into.

---------- Post added at 05:41 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:23 PM ----------

Originally Posted by mamahammer

I have a clipboard for each kid that hangs on the wall. Every Sunday, I put a new weekly plan on each clipboard that has everything they need to get done that week, divided up into daily chunks. They can do it daily, or they can do all of it on like Monday and Tuesday. They can't save it all until the end of the week because that just hasn't worked out for us in the past. I also hang a new daily chore list every Sunday. The only requirement is that they do at least that day's assignments and chore before they go play with friends after public school lets out.

We're super eclectic. I change things up in any subject at any given time for any given kid if it's just not working for any reason. Some workbooks, some computer, some dvd, some living books.

I do somewhat similar as your clip board. I keep a "lesson plan" that is always at least complete for the week which she can always look at and follow if she wants to work ahead or just see what is comming.
Each day I put the days expected assignments on a dry erase. We do blocks
An independent block
A "structured" block *where I'm sitting and actively teaching"
A light structured block
evening independent block

I limit each block to no more than 3-4 tasks and try to keep each block total work time at around an hour with the exception of our structured block with comes closer to 90 minutes but that is because of the teaching part. We take 30 minute breaks between blocks 1/2 and 3/4 and an hours lunch between 2/3.. I require outside time for at LEAST 1 full break and another 30 of her free time for at least an hour of outside tiem a day.. block but encourage much more. Depending on the time of year they JUST get in the 60 other dasy they are outside 8 hours...
In addition we do one daily chore "block" and clean as a family..
SO for us while on "paper" its looks like she schools from 8:30am-3pm with another 1.5-2 hours of "homework" each night much like her "PS" peers in reality its more like..
4-4.5 hours of school work total including "HW time"
2 hours of scheduled school breaks during a set aside structured school time
1 hour for chores and other for meal times
pretty much free range freedom for the rest including plenty of time to explore area of interest.