Last summer, as I planned our 6th year of homeschooling, I got a little scared because I was putting together our first year of truly custom plans. I wasn’t using a boxed curriculum for our together subjects. I trusted myself to know what had worked over the previous 5 years of homeschool but I still doubted if what I planned would be exciting to the kids or cause a mutiny.
In our homeschool we have music that is part of our daily routine. I’m not talking about doing a composer study or learning about music. I’m talking about the ways music and audio are facilitating your learning environment, the soundtrack in our home. In our house we use audio to gather us to start our school day, to teach some of our subjects and to help us focus while we work. As teacher/mom I also listen to podcasts to grow as teacher and parent.
Our homeschool day officially starts at 9 am, when the Google Home plays our gathering song, “Good Morning” (from Singing in the Rain) and turns the classroom lights on. Gotta love customized Google Routines. Before Google tells us to gather, everyone is on their own to get dressed and eat breakfast. I am often the last one to come downstairs and usually eat while everyone plays LEGOs. Sometimes if the weather is suitable at least one child will go play outside before we start as well.
One of the bonus parts of homeschooling is that our back to school shopping is much less involved than heading back to a traditional classroom. We do our shopping on an as-needed basis, and keep a small supply of notebooks on hand for various projects that come up.
His birthday is the first week of school, and he would be one of the youngest in a traditional classroom, but that doesn’t matter in our classroom. We make lots of accommodations for his Autism and ADHD as part of our routine.
