Monday, January 28, 2013

Goal Planning Monday (January 28)

I took a break from setting actual goals for the start of the new year.  We spent a lot of time getting our feet back under us after the break.  Slowly getting back to "normal" -- whatever that is!  Time to start planning things again, and writing them down.  Otherwise, I just spend my time thinking "I know there was something else..."  Lists are good.

 Things to do:

-Organize blogging.

I've set  up a new binder that is seems to be working -- so far.  I have a monthly calendar that I have organized by color:  red for my SCW reviews that have an absolute deadline, holidays/blog themes written in black, and meme/personal "I want to do this" in blue. Behind each month is a weekly "To do" with lists & prompts.  Now that I have some basics mapped out, I need to fill in the prompt/idea part -- ie, I know Valentine's Day is coming up in a couple weeks, so I need to figure out if we are doing a cooking project, or arts & crafts, or both, and plan accordingly.

-The never ending lesson plans.  

Jude -  needs his lesson plans for February updated, and I need to figure out what changes we are making.  I want to change his Bible study program, and I think we need to do something about Math.  Bible study is too much reading and I lose his attention; when you get straight 100s in Math, it's time to try something more challenging.
 
Damien - we have been testing out a curriculum, but I'm not convinced it is "right" for us.  I want to try to do some tweaking.  I also want to figure out a way to do side-by-side lesson plans - I think it will mean creating a template.  I have been using a monthly/weekly planner book for Jude, and I like the layout, but there isn't enough space for two kids' worth of plans. I'd also like to look at them side-by-side so I can see where things will overlap, and where we can do things "together" (like adaptable-task crafts, Bible/book reading, etc.)

Big kids - I also need to do a big kid Crew plan, because they are doing some of the reviews as well.  I need to plan things out on paper so they are in front of me, rather than being a nebulous idea in my head.  Probably ought to be a third or fourth column on that multi-kid planner, huh?  It probably wouldn't be a bad idea to also pencil in their big projects that they need my help on, so I can time things accordingly. (Matthew has the county college science fair coming up soon.  We're doing a chromatology study - "Which Skittle has the most colors in the candy shell?"  I'm not sure I want to know!! He will need help with the experiment - or at least an adult to provide a third hand - and then help prepping the accompanying paper.  Since he wants it turned in THIS year, yours truly will be playing the role of typist and proofreader.) 

-Send a few emails to other local homeschooling Moms.   Since it is time for general school admissions/registration, I need to start thinking about what I need to do for fall for Jude, as age 6 starts "mandatory education" here.  The original plan was for Jude to go back to school this fall, but I no longer think that's a viable option.  Even if we held him back a year, I don't think he would do well in kindergarten, and there's no way he could manage first grade. (I think Kindergarten would be a general struggle; for first grade - Math, yes. Everything else? Nope.)    I think I'm OK with that, too.   I keep putting it off, thinking there is plenty of time, but I know fall will be here quicker than a blink. I don't think there is a whole lot to do, but now is the time to find out, and then organize everything so that if there ever were any questions, I am not scrambling to pull records together.   I also want to try to figure out what "grade" he will be in, so that if his grade-level peers ever are the benchmark, we aren't doomed from the start because of what he is capable of.

I probably should also start contemplating our curriculum choices, too.   Regardless of what grade we call him, we're just going to work to his ability, so now it's a matter of figuring out what will fit.

I think that sounds ambitious enough for one week. 

Set your own goals and join the party over at Real Life: Unscripted.





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