Ok, I think I’ve been using the organizer pretty well so far, for even some wierd items….
Starting this summer I’m going to be using a little Kindergarten program for my Daughter. It is from a CM type website, that uses Montessori ideas too – although this little program is almost a Letter Unit-study.
Each week there is a focus on a Letter. So there is a story, Letter writing practice (including molding the letter in clay or playdough), copywork for kids that can already write, nature study ideas, music, scripture to memorize, suggested science books, suggested literature, suggested geography, and suggested handicrafts (sewing, cooking, service projects, etc.)
I’m just not sure how to schedule this all so that I know what I want to do each day in the organizer. I’d want to do the story for the letter at the start of the week, work on the letter formation each day during the week, probably do a science read 1 day a week, etc. But I’m looking – ok, what if we miss a day (say we are sick on the Monday…) – the organizer would move those items to the next monday (assuming it was assigned once a week…) – but then we might miss reading the letter story before doing the activities etc….
So – if I put all the different activities as dfferent resources, I’m worried that they will get out-of-sync so to speak. If I put it in as once resource, either I am putting it in with no real detail, or if I put in all the detail, then I am stuck as to the order that we are doing it based on what order I put it in there.
Oh, and to make it just a touch more complicated, I’m figuring on doing 1 letter over 2 weeks instead of just 1 – so some items wouldn’t happen every week!
Here’s an idea: you could add a resource with each letter as a division. Maybe you could call the divisions “Letter” and put in 26 divisions, one for each letter (e.g., Letter 1: A, Letter 2: B — or whatever order you are doing the letters in).
Then when you schedule it, you could add a custom Method with the activities you want to do, either in order or just as a list for you to choose from. For example, “Select from these activities: book, activity 1, science book, activity 2, etc.”
That way you can mark the letter as Worked On each day you do an activity and Finished when you’re done with that letter. You could schedule it for each day of the week, so it would always show up, but you would have flexibility.
And if you wanted to, you could add a note to each letter, detailing which activities you did in the order you did them.
Then when you schedule it, you could add a custom Method with the activities you want to do, either in order or just as a list for you to choose from. For example, “Select from these activities: book, activity 1, science book, activity 2, etc.”
Oops, sorry. I might have been making a false assumption that you have the same activity options for each letter. I was thinking that if you have a set list of activities to select from for each letter, you could put that list in as a custom Method and refer to it each day that way.
Do you know how to add a custom Method? Or is that where I lost you?
I know how to put in a custom method – but I thought there was only 1 method for the resource when I schedule it….
Are you saying I can schedule a resource more than once (kind of concurrently) with different methods on different days or something? Or are you suggesting a very long named custom method?
The activities available do vary from letter to letter. ie, B has a suggested service project (making a Baby Blanket), but A, if I recall correctly, did not….. but that said, a lot of it is pretty similar from letter to letter….
So – for letter B, we have
Intro story for letter B, which includes a B based scripture story inside the intro story. and also within the intro story, there is a picture from a museum to look at and describe… and a few related colouring pages. Student can attempt a drawing of the story.
Then for copywork (depending on skill of child), there are “Sunshine Letters, Sandpaper Letters, molding the lette in clay or bee’s wax – OR, there is a related song to write as copywork. Any outside writing program you would work on that letter too. This would be worked on throughout the week…
Music includes learning the song in the story, as well as outside music stuff.
Memorization – memorize the song, and the B verse from ABC Bible Verses.
Nature Study – There is about 3-4 options, besides getting outside daily
Storybook Science – Birds / Blueberries – there is a list of several bird books that the student might like (pick and choose) and same for Blueberry Stories
Art – List of 4 options to choose from
Author Study – a list of several books by Jan Brett – pick and choose.
Geography – 3 books to choose from, and related maping
Homecrafts – this is the area that can REALLY vary from letter to letter.
Cooking – Banana Bread, Blueberry Smoothies
Sewing – Wee Felt Figure (this is for each letter)…. and Embroider B and b on felt or othr….
Service – Baby Blanket (No Sew fleece Blanket)
Construction – Build a Walnut Shell Boat
A lot of the stuff is similar for letter to letter. There is a lot covered here, and a lot of different topics. I want to be able to keep track of everything, and have everything recorded too… instead of just having one thing on the report at the end of the year, like “Milestones Academy Beta-Kindergarten Program”….
Just thinking outloud – maybe I need to have a sequence of resources for each subject area…. Kind of a
MA K Year – Letter Story (divisions A-Z)
MA K Year – Letter Formation (A-Z)
MA K Year – Cooking Projects (A-Z)
MA K Year – Service Projects (A-Z)
I guess the only one I have to worry about doing out of order if we get behind (and we can always skip things) is the intro story to the letter……