Covid-19 has shaken every single one of our routines in one way or another and many parents are turning to homeschooling during this time.
I’ve been homeschooling my kids since before the Corona virus came, so I thought I’d share our daily routine, curriculum, and tips that have helped us in our homeschooling journey.
You have probably already had to make many changes with this crisis going on. I’d like to make the homeschooling thing one last burden on you. It can actually be a really great thing for your family!
I always start our year out with some really exciting tools and manipulatives to get the kids excited to begin learning. I call this my “Busy With Me Bag”.
This bag comes in handy when I need to get work accomplished for Munkins Studio. My littlest ones sit with me as I work and they play with their items in the busy bag which are great for hands on learning.
Here’s a list of what’s inside the Busy With Me Bag:
- Rainbow Playdough
- Learning Monster with a place to add calming essential oil blends.
- Outside play potion kit for their mud kitchen.
- Rainbow play silk for dress up, comfort or anything they can imagine. (Play silks are part of the Waldorf Philosophy)
- Rainbow loose parts play mix.
- Doll house rainbow bear.
- Essential oil scented Rainbow Rice for sensory play.
- Mushroom essential oil diffuser necklace.
- Mineral rock to add to our nature table.
- Rainbow acorns
- Wild child essential oil roller blend
- Wild child oil blend to add to necklaces and the learning monster.
I will try to pack as much information about a normal homeschooling day for us into this blog for you. We start our mornings off with circle time. We begin with singing a song or going over a poem about the current season.
Then we have story time with handmade play pieces that my teenage daughter crochets for us. You can see our story time setup in the picture above.
After circle time, we work on reading and math. I like to do these activities first while they are most engaged in the morning.
On Tuesdays and Thursdays, they do a craft that goes along with the storytime curriculum. On Wednesday, my oldest bakes the recipe that goes along with their curriculum.
On Mondays and Fridays, my teenager focuses solely on her schoolwork and the little ones get a break.
I spend all day Fridays working on my business. This is when we really utilize the Busy With Me Bag to keep the littles busy without needing to be on screens all day.
Below is what my schedule looks like for the month. This helps us stay organized and on task.
Essential oils are a huge part of our day. My Wild Child blend helps keep the kids focused and calm through the day. We use it on their mushroom necklaces and their bear.
I also use different fall blends which is a part of the Waldorf Philosophy to help them recognize the seasons. You can purchase your essential oils, necklaces, and teddies here!
I will continue the conversation about homeschooling and working from home in future blogs. There is so much I could talk about!
If you have any questions about what I covered here, please let me know! Don’t get overwhelmed, just take it a day at a time. Once you find a routine that works for your family it’ll get much easier.