Planning a Homeschool Year with Pinterest

Are you on Pinterest?


How do you personally use Pinterest?

• Do you pin great ideas to later incorporate into your homeschool lessons?
• Have you pinned full lesson plans or resources?
• Do you pin all of the homeschool ideas onto one board?

Whatever way you use Pinterest, it can be a great organizing tool for homeschoolers. In fact, last year, Sam wrote an article listing ways homeschoolers can use Pinterest to help find and organize ideas. You can read it here. I'll wait.

Personally, I use several of her suggestions. Many of my boards are set up for subjects, units, and special days.

The more I use Pinterest, the more ways I find to use it. I have even started using it to plan our next school year.


Using Pinterest to Plan for an Upcoming School Year

I know it sounds a tad crazy. It is only February and I am planning next school year!

However, I keep running across some great ideas which I want to remember for subjects we will be studying next year.

Not only that, I opted to create curriculum boards for each grade I will be teaching and another for multiple grade classes. On these boards, I pin curriculum or ideas which will be helpful in planning the upcoming school year.

I consider these boards my brainstorming. I add to them when I come across an idea or book I could use. My goal is not to have a million pins, but actual useful-to-me pins.

My plan is to have one place to store all these great ideas. Then, when I do begin the hard work of making actual decisions for next year, I can weed through the pins and decide which ones to include and which ones will not be used.




A word of caution: Pinterest has a lot of ideas and resources. One can easily get swept up in all of it. I try to pin only ideas and resources that my family could actually use and do. Though that trip to Australia does look mighty nice...and it is summer there now...

When I Didn't Have the Motivation

I don't know about you, but sometimes, I simply don't have the motivation for lessons that we need to learn in our homeschool.  Sometimes, I put off teaching something simply because it just seems like too much work or I am not interested in it.

I had a very hard time getting into the Christmas spirit this year.  I think that it is the warm weather here in Africa and the fact that we did not have space to bring our tree or decorations when we moved. However, I know how much I loved Christmas as a little girl and I want my girls to love it too.  Plus, as a Christian, Christmas is such an important and wonderful holiday.  So, after a few weeks of not doing anything Christmas-related, I forced myself to start doing Christmas bible lessons and Christmas crafts with the girls.  And, I am so glad that I did!  They had a fabulous time having Christmas homeschooling and they learned a lot about God's love for them through discussing the Christmas story every day.  Plus, all of the fabulous art projects they made to decorate our house and the yummy snacks we created helped put me in the Christmas spirit.  

The next time that I have no motivation, I hope that I can remember how thankful I am for finding the motivation to teach my girls about Christmas!

Tuesdays in 2013: Charlotte Mason at Our House!

In 2013, I, Maureen, will be your Tuesday hostess.  I will be sharing with you how I use the Charlotte Mason philosophy and method in my home with my children, aged 9, 6, 3, and 5 months.  I hope that you will learn something new, find something to share, and maybe be inspired to see your children in new ways.

If you've always been curious about the Charlotte Mason method, but you've been too confused or overwhelmed to 'go there', I think you'll find some little jewels for meditation here!

Charlotte Mason was a British educator in the 19^th century who developed a system of education for governesses and mothers to use with their children.  It was also used in day schools, or cottage schools, for the working poor.  Relying heavily on the experience of the natural world and fine literature, Charlotte Mason’s philosophy was a revolution of gentleness in a harsh and dry educational climate.  She favored mothers keeping their children at home and not pushing early academics. 

 

There are many fine books on Charlotte Mason available on Amazon or at your local library.  Please see the reading list at the end of this post.

Charlotte Mason learning is unique.  It is not school-at-home.  The mainstays of a Charlotte Mason education are living books, narration, and short lessons.  Beyond that, there is a lot of variation in how modern home educators adapt the Charlotte Mason philosophy for their own use. 

So, what is a living book?  To begin, a living book is a book written by an individual.  In other words, NOT a textbook.  In edu-speak, that means a living book is a ‘primary source.’  It’s the difference between reading about  The Iliad, versus reading The Iliad.  Workbooks might be available over various subjects, but not required.  I will be sharing with you my family’s favorite living books for various subjects, focusing on some hidden gems I’ve never seen on other homeschool reading lists.  And believe me, I read lots of book lists!

Narration is another important concept in Charlotte Mason education.  And while I consider narration very important, I have never found the method Charlotte Mason originally used to adapt well to my real, modern family.  Nor have I found other modern CM homeschoolers’ methods to work very well.  So I have developed my own form of narration that I call ‘natural narration’ which I will be sharing in a series of posts this spring.

An while short lessons might seem self-explanatory, it can be tricky to apply the concept of short lessons with different children and with different curricula or books.  So I’ll be sharing some creative ways to break up tasks and exercises, especially for boys.      

Other Charlotte Mason topics on which I’ll be extrapolating include ideas for living math, nature study for the lazy mother, art and picture study for the lazy mother, and a Renaissance education on a shoestring.  Please do leave a comment if there is a topic you’re burning to hear about.  I am NOT a Charlotte Mason expert!  But I love Charlotte Mason and I love to see mothers discover how incorporating some CM ideas into their homeschool can make the days- not to mention the subject matter!- more enjoyable, less tedious, and *frankly* easier all around!!!

"Education is an atmosphere, a discipline, a life."
-Charlotte Mason

I hope you’ll join me on Tuesdays in 2013 here at Growing Your Homeschool!  Here are some quick reads to give you more background on Charlotte Mason and the Charlotte Mason method:

For the Children's Sake: Foundations of Education for Home and School  (By far the easiest to read, most inspiring CM book ever written.  In my humble opinion, obviously!)

Charlotte Mason's Original Homeschooling Series (May be a bit heavy reading, but this is the *original* CM 6 book series, by Charlotte herself!)

Charlotte Mason Study Guide  (Out of print, too bad, because this book is great, but definitely available through interlibrary loan.)