The Old Schoolhouse Magazine

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learn to read, I am much more concerned
about them having a “can-do” attitude
and developing a love of reading than the
exact skill level on which they are oper-
ating. By the early teen years, I find that
it is time to fill in any gaps, catch up in
any weak areas, and concentrate most on
the skills they are developing, as well as
the specific knowledge they are learning.
The type of knowledge that qualifies as
“wisdom” in the Bible is extremely im-
portant to me. Other kinds of knowledge
(such as knowing the capitals of all the
states) are less important to me, and can
be learned later if it becomes necessary.
Once you have established your goals,
it is important to write them down, and
review them at least once a year, assess-
ing where each of your children is on the
road to meeting these goals, and making
changes or adding new ones as necessary.
As the children become teenagers, it is
also important to help them set their own
goals and add those to the growing list.
Next, armed with an overall idea of
your goals for the coming year, most
of you will want to plan your activities
on a monthly basis. Some people will
feel more comfortable planning all the
months in advance, and others will be
content with just taking one at a time. In
keeping with the whole “relaxed family
homeschool environment,” it is impor-
tant to be flexible in the implementation
of these plans. I would encourage you to
pick a couple of topics in a number of ar-
eas for each month. As an example, let’s
pretend I have a third grader. My topics
might be birds and reptiles in science, the
Lewis and Clark expedition and a study
of the Plains Indians for social studies,
Monet/Impressionism in art, and the
work of Beethoven in music. However,
if we suddenly were to spot a really in-
teresting spider in the garden, I certainly
wouldn’t say, “Sorry, we’re not studying
spiders this month!” Obviously, while
some level of planning is always impor-
tant, the ability to change things when
appropriate is one of the main advan-
tages of teaching our children at home.
I also did a small amount of planning
on a daily basis. I called it my “card file
system”. Each morning I would take a
3x5 index card. On one side I would
write any external appointments or criti-
cal tasks (for example, dance lesson at
3:00). Then I would flip the card over
and write down several categories. For
me, these typically were 1) Housework,
2) Schoolwork, 3) Mom’s work, 4) Kid’s
recreation, and 5) Mom’s personal. Then
I would put down one or two of the most
important items, and, coordinating with
the list of critical things on the other side,
make a rough schedule of the order I
hoped to do them. For example, one day
I might list “clean the hall bathroom, and
go grocery shopping” under housework,
and “read to Steve, and help Sam with
his math” under schoolwork; “write an