What does your 1st grader's schedule look like?

I am not an expert, so hopefully someone else will post, but I’ll write what I’m planning for my first grader, he will be a newly turned six year old.

I’m open to suggestions if others have them.

Math- daily

Child reads aloud- daily

Sight words – daily

Narrate Aesop fable – daily ( as he improves add Bible narration)

Literature- daily

Copywork-3x week

Family work:

Scripture memory-daily

SCM module3- daily

Science-2x/ week

Composer 1x/week

Picture study-1x/week

Drawing-1x/week

Character-1x/ week

Poetry reading-1x/week

Nature study-1x/week

Our schedule plans with approximate times for my 6yo is as follows….

*Note:all is subject to change if the plan doesn’t flow well and I have only homeschooled for 2 years.

10-15 min– Start school day with a poem, song (either a folksong, hymn, or patriotic song), and look at the calendar/plan for the day.

Daily, In no particular order, but doing all these things in one block:

5-10 min-copywork using Draw.Write.Now or Hymns in Prose

30 min-MEP math (1/2 is an interactive lesson with mom and 1/2 is a short worksheet with some problems worked on together)

5-10 min- phonics lesson using Reading Made Easy with Blend Phonics by Hazel Loring

10 min-reading to me from a reader with help as needed, then review or learn sight words

10 min-Salsa Spanish lesson followed by 15-20 min Salsa Spanish video (snack during lesson) about 3x/week

20-30 min recess break with older brother (sometimes I do a read aloud while they are playing if they want to listen)

Group work with brother: 1 day artist study, 1 day composer study, 1-2 days memory work of a poem or scripture (about 10 min).

While ds does piano practice, I plan to read a short quality read aloud passage to dd (choosing from Aesop Fables, a Bible storybook, James Herriot treasury, Beatrix Potter, historical figure bio, or Winnie the Pooh) followed by narration by dd. (about 15 min).

Time and energy permitting, I would like to cover Outdoor Secrets, Paddle to the Sea with geography map, beginning music theory, weekly nature journal, handicrafts, and hands on art. We probably won’t get to all these things or if we do, all won’t happen at the same time (maybe change it up every 12 weeks). She does nature classes at a local nature center about 1-2x/month, a history enrichment program 1x/month, and will do some type of PE enrichment like swim lessons or group activity 1x/wk . She will likely tag along with older brother’s history read alouds and Considering God’s Creation science, but I won’t fret if she doesn’t.

At bedtime, dad will have a biography read aloud or a Bible reading going for everybody.

Before I give my just-finished-first grader’s schedule, I have to just say that after 4 years of homeschooling, I’ve learned to have a plan and a schedule, but not to be tied to it.  Things change that you don’t expect.  You will need to tweak and adjust as you go.  There really is no ‘right’ schedule, because every child, every family, every month in your life is different.  Try to spread a wonderful feast, but don’t stress about it.  Just like in a real feast, sometimes the turkey will be a bit dry, the potatoes a bit lumpy, and the croutons in the salad a bit soggy.  It’s the atmosphere and the relationships you are building and renewing that really matter.  Your kid might hate the history book you choose, complain about free reading unless he can read that one favourite book over and over, cry over math because her little brother does it better than she does, and you might forget to do poetry more than you remember it.  (Not that any of those things happened here at all )  In the long run, it really doesn’t matter.

So, here is what our current schedule looks like, after about 5 major changes since the beginning of the year.  We have DD8, DS6, DD4, and currently a 2 year old and 3 month old in our family dayhome (and a 7yo after school, but that doesn’t affect our school day).

Every morning we do most of our ‘family’ subjects. 

Prayer/Hymn,

Religion (5 minute reading),

Spanish Activity, Spanish Song,

Science (10 minutes max) Theoretically we try to do a nature walk once a week in place of science, but in reality it is more like once a month.

One of these: Habits, Drawing, Picture Study, Composer Study.   

All of that takes 30-45 minutes, so these are short activities.

Then the children split off to do their music practice, morning chores, Scripture Box, and personal Bible reading, with Mom assisting as needed.

Then we take a break.

At lunch I try to read some poetry and a fun family read aloud or some living math books or other fun stuff.  If the baby is fussy or toddler dumps his plate on the floor, it doesn’t always happen.

After lunch (nap time!) my first grader does:

Math (20 minutes),

Listens to and narrates a literature or history reading (10-15 minutes)

Copywork (10 minutes)

Spanish Worksheet (5 minutes)

Free Reading (10 minutes)  He was an early reader, so this is independent.

He then has a few minutes of break while Big Sister finishes up (she has a bit more work in grade 3).

Then we do two more readings together of History or Literature or Geography.  We put these at the end of the day and back to back because my kids like to colour or draw or do perler beads or handicrafts while they listen and narrate, and they were having trouble returning to work on things like math once they got their projects out.  Some of the readings are targeted more toward DD8, and she does the bulk of the narrations on those, but DS6 listens in and contributes some as well.

You’ll notice that DS6 doesn’t have any phonics instruction in there.  He is already reading fluently, so he just reads one passage per week aloud to me so I can catch any issues that might come up.

I haven’t worked up our schedule for this fall yet for the 8 kids (I will have a 1st grader again) but will try to remember to come share it when it is done.  I just wanted to insert a small note or challenge to moms when planning copywork.  PLEASE do not assign your child to more than 5 minutes of copywork at this age!  As a matter of fact, I challenge you to go grab a piece of paper and set your timer for 5-10 minutes, whatever you were thinking you would ask your child to do.  In your best handwriting (let’s make it cursive for fun) copy from this page until the timer rings. 

If you are like me, I quickly found how difficult it is for ME as an adult to give my best effort in handwriting when doing copywork for more than 5 minutes.  And that is the goal – best effort, not sloppy letters in jumbled lines. 

This was one activity on the new Learning and Living DVDs that was truly eye-opening for me. (Thank you Sonya and SCM!)  We are now spending no more than 5 minutes on copywork with the aim of best effort.  If a passage is not finished it is cheerfully put away for the next day of copywork. My younger students are given 3 minutes for copywork for now.

Interesting, someting they can read……? Well, taht wouldn’t be quality literature here. My soon to be 1st can only read Bob books, ect. So, copywork that?

with Mommy:

reading instruction (Pathway readers, currently on grade 2 reader)

Still working on the weekly frequency, but cursive writing, handicrafts (sewing), math games, Aesop’s Fables with narration

Family at Breakfast:

Scripture memory

Bible (Foundations 2)

poem (Favorite Poems Old and New)

picture study/character study/salsa spanish

Family at lunch:

Literature read aloud

Truthquest History AHFYS 1/science Outdoor Secrets with Companion (each twice a week)

Independent:

math (math mammoth 1)

copywork (Memoria Press copybook 2)

read CLP Nature Reader 1 and narrate (2/week)

make mail (1/week)

personal journal/history journal/Bible journal (each once a week)