Organization and Lesson Planning
Organization is one of those things that you either love or hate! Well, I LOVE it! I love buying different containers and various things that make my life more organized. When I started homeschooling, my organizing bug came out and I started looking for various things that could work in our already small, cramped space. Side note, for those of you that don’t know, while we are building, we are living in my husband’s grandparents’ place. Our living room is also our bedroom, and the kids share a bedroom together. So, our space is limited.
I started with creating a space for the kids. I found these small folding desks on Amazon that could fold flat and be big enough for them to have their laptop on. The desks are a little small, they are not able to have their laptop and a workbook on them at the same time, but we make it work. Then I took the rolling carts that I had in my classroom and had my kids use those to store books and supplies. My son also 3D printed some desktop organizers for both of them to hold writing utensils. Lastly, I added a mini clothesline on the wall at each of their spots so they could hang up any work or pictures to personalize their area.
After the kids’ area was set up, I then worked on my spot. I added a large whiteboard/corkboard on the wall above our desk in the kitchen. I divided the whiteboard into 7 sections for each day of the week using wet erase markers. Each section has the day of the week and the subjects we do each day. If you haven’t used wet erase markers before I highly recommend them. You can use them to write things you want to stay on the whiteboard and be able to erase everything else. Then when you need to take it off you just use a damp cloth to get rid of it. I also added a paper organizer that hangs on the door next to the whiteboard that holds printed worksheets for each day of the week. Then I have another organizer that sits on the desk that holds books, and a variety of other things not related to school.
When I plan lessons, I do a week at a time just like I used to do when I was teaching 1st grade. I usually sit down on Sunday and figure out what we are going to be doing for the week in each subject and add in any activities that we are planning to do. I use a homeschool planner that I found on Amazon to record the assignments and then when I’m done I write it on the whiteboard. My kids know to check the board for what they need to do and they can do their work in any order they like with the exception of Science and Social Studies because we do those together.
I want to reiterate this is what works for my family and I. What is wonderful about homeschooling is that you can do what works for your family. How do you organize your homeschool materials?