Our Summer Schedule :: 2016

Let's talk a bit about summer school!  We are not year-round schoolers, but we do arrange a bit of schoolwork into a light summer term each year.

Our summer vacation runs from the beginning of April through the beginning of July.  This shifted school calendar originally began when my Big Kids were in Year 1; I had a baby due in September and wanted to get a head start on our school year in case I needed to take time off.  Since then, I have had a baby due in April and a baby due in May, and both times I was grateful to be finished with our year before their arrival.  This past year, I had a baby in November, and we were several weeks into Term 2 before he arrived, which made the rest of our school year much easier.  All that to say: our adjusted schedule is mostly baby-related and specific to our family's crazy needs. :)

But since then, I've uncovered enough good reasons for our family that I didn't expect:

:: We start up the year when there are no outside activities, so we aren't starting everything new at once.  Piano and art lessons pick back up when we're already adjusted to the new routine and have ironed out the kinks in our lessons.

:: There is a lot of margin in our year's plans.  You moms schooling with littles know that margins and flexibility are absolutely essential when you're managing babies and toddlers alongside your homeschool.  I have had a new baby just about every year I have been schooling!  That means I like to allow myself LOTS of margin time.  I like to know that I can take as much time as I need and not feel the pressure of finishing before the next school year rolls around.

:: Similarly, if I have to take off for illness, family visit, some difficulty, or a particularly busy week of outside activities, I know I have that wiggle room and can take as much time as needed stress-and-guilt-free.

:: I start my school planning before our charter school's year ends, so I have time to order next year's necessities while I still have funds available.

:: We can do day trips and vacations when the beaches aren't crowded.

:: And for my own mental well-being: I like to feel like I'm "ahead."  When everyone else hits the February blahs, we're looking at the last half of our last term and I'm getting year-end exams ready and considering "summer" plans!  This is one way I de-stress our years.  It's totally a mental game (we still school for just as long as everyone else!) but it works for me.

Obviously there are some cons too, but so far this is working for us!

~~~

So that's the why.  Here's the what!  First, our Morning Basket:

Our Morning Basket continues during the summer with some books we didn't have a chance to get to during the school year.  Here's what's on our shelf right now:

:: Poetry - The Golden Treasury of Poetry, A Small Child's Book of Verse, A Child's Book of Poems, The Jessie Wilcox Mother Goose (not pictured)
:: Religion - Leading the Little Ones to Mary (finishing up), The King of the Golden City (we have the oop edition put out by CHC, I believe -- the one is the same but doesn't have illustrations), the Bible (we like the Douay-Rheims)
:: Nature Study - The Laws Guide to Nature Drawing and Journaling, The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady, Botany in a Day, The Big Book of Animals Every Child Should Know
:: Folk Songs - The Battle of the Kegs
:: Stories - My Naughty Little Sister, The Big Alfie Out-of-Doors Storybook, Pinocchio, Kindergarten Gems (I'm aiming this read-aloud slot at my littles.  We save the books aimed at the Big Kids for naptime and audiobooks in the car.)

~~~

I also printed out a simple weekly checklist for my Big Kids.  As usual, in addition to daily piano practice and chores, they spend a bit of time each day (about 30-45 minutes) working toward these weekly tasks:

:: Math. Currently the Big Kids do three days of math a week, each session taking about 20 minutes.  One day, they do a lesson from RightStart Level G (their hands-on geometry drawing program).  One day they do a page from Math Olympiad (this is a new addition to our schedule and they love it!).  And one day they work from their current math book, Jacobs' Algebra.  (Cate also does some math, but with me.  We aim for a RightStart lesson twice a week.)  Including math through the summer is what allows us to do math 3-4 times a week during the school year with no guilt. ;)

:: Map drill.  They choose a region they have already learned to quiz themselves on by filling out a blank map.  Then they check their work and make note of any errors to keep in mind for next time.

:: Italian.  They play an Italian game twice a week together with their younger siblings, and once a week I also give my Big Kids a short written activity to complete.

:: Latin and Grammar.  They do one exercise from Getting Started with Latin and one from Winston's Grammar a week.  (Gianna moved ahead in grammar and finished the next couple months of lessons, so she actually doesn't have that on her list for summer.)

:: Free reading.  The kids asked if we could do some scheduled free reads like we do during the school year.  So we're doing Anne of Green Gables (three chapters a week) and books from the One Small Square series (their choice, a few pages a week).  We're also continuing our Sunday reading from this past school year, Treasure and Tradition.

:: Penmanship.  Once a week, they spend ten minutes with their Prose and Poetry Notebooks.

:: Typing.  We used Typing Club this past year, and I'm now letting them work on their typing speed for ten minutes a week.

:: Recitation.  This is something we do together.  We review the memory work we have already learned in a once-weekly session, usually while driving to the beach. ;)  At the beginning of the summer, I move everything from the daily, weekly, and even/odd notes to day-of-the-month notes for ease of use.  Then I open up Evernote and go through our Memory Work "notebook" for the dates of each week all at one time.  So for example, on last week's drive to the aquarium, we reviewed all the memory work for the 23rd through the 29th (that whole week).  We aren't learning anything new -- just keeping those items fresh.  And enjoying them! :)

~~~

So that's the school-ish stuff.  But of course our plans involve lots of summertime fun too!  The rest of their day is free time, which they spend in a variety of ways...

Audiobooks + Legos.  Almost every day at naptime, I start an audiobook and my oldest four play with Legos for a couple hours while I tend to the baby and listen in.  If he ends up falling asleep too (not often but occasionally), I even get to lie down with a book! :)

Chess.  Gianna gets out the chess book and sets up the various exercises for herself.  I'm not entirely sure that it's helping her chess game, but she enjoys it!

Time outside.  I'm sprucing up the backyard this week with new toys

Outings.  I'm not a big outing person, so I choose when we leave the house pretty selectively.  But based on my kids' request, we've got going a weekly park day and a weekly nature study outing (both with friends) and a weekly trip to the beach (with Daddy).

Shakespeare.  Since seeing The Winter's Tale last month, the kids have been memorizing bits of scenes, casting parts, and thinking about how they would stage it all.  I have a feeling there will be some performances here over the next couple months!

Writing stories.  Gianna has two stories in the works: "Charity, the Duke's Daughter" and "A Gift for George Washington."  She dutifully writes every day. :)

Handicrafts.  They are still busy with origami (last year's handicraft focus), and Gianna has been digging into Fun with Paper.  Summer always means more opportunities for the girls to cook, and the boys have been busy with beeswax.  Handicrafts is one of my weak points, so I usually take the summer to ease into something they can then continue into the coming year (with an eye toward handmade Christmas presents too).  This summer, we'll be doing some felting kits they got for Easter and I hope we'll continue felting through school year.  (Wish me luck because I don't know what I'm doing! LOL)

And lots of drawing and reading, of course!

~~~

And what's Mommy got going on this summer?  I always make for myself way too many a few goals, some fun and some necessary.  

:: Develop a simple programme for The Laws' Guide to Nature Drawing and Journaling.  I want to use this in our home to its full potential, so I'm breaking the book into reading assignments and accompanying challenges.

:: Work on some calligraphy -- alongside Gianna!

:: Read.  I have a few monthly live online discussions I'm hoping to keep up with this summer, including a new one on CM's Volume 2 and one on Circe's Restful Teaching video series. Our local study group is reading through When Children Love to Learn, and some friends and I have a monthly fiction book club too. And I've got some book goals of my own: The Story of Charlotte Mason and some novels.  And some pre-reading!  All good stuff.

:: Run. Trying to improve my time for a race I'm planning to run this fall. (Not aiming for anything remarkable -- just hoping to increase my current pace which has not bounced back since Justin arrived!)

:: Mount wildflowers. I have a backlog of pressed wildflowers to add to our collection.

:: Blog projects. I've got a whole list of posts in progress that I would love to start ticking off and getting up here!

:: Get Italian materials ready for next year.  I also want to reorganize the way I store my Italian supplies and preview some written resources for the Big Kids.

:: Re-read Nurture by Nature as I consider my kids' "types" and the best way to present this coming school year to them. (I did this last summer too.)  Managing all the personalities in my home requires me to be constantly mindful and I consider it one of my biggest challenges. This book has been a help!  It pegged my most difficult child to a T. ;)
:: And plan our coming school year, probably the most important task of all!  I've got Years 5, 2, and 1 next year.  Thankfully AmblesideOnline does most of the work for me, but I still have a lot of prep work ahead of me if I want our days to run on smooth rails this fall.

And if you'd like to see our plans from the past, here's last year's and the year before's.  (You'll note they look very similar. :))

What are you up to this summer?