Let’s prepare for homeschooling together! Here’s how I am planning our year of preschool at home.
This blog post is a bit out of the norm for me.
Typically I share easy art projects for kids or creative play ideas. However, today I am sharing how I have planned out our year of homeschool.
When I was teaching art in the public schools, I had the amazing privilege of mapping out my own curriculum. Here in Minnesota, there are state art standards that must be met. Yet what projects are done to achieve these standards is left up to the teacher.
Amazing having so much freedom, right?
Also-overwhelming.
Much like how I was feeling about planning out a year of preschool at home.
So, I took what I learned about curriculum mapping in the art room and applied it to homeschool planning.
These are the steps that I follow when mapping out a year’s worth of content:
- Start with the calendar
- Use the standards to build a framework
- Assign units of study to each month
- Plot out activities for each week that meet the standards, marking off as you go along
- Begin gathering your resources
Here are some more details regarding how I mapped out a year of homeschool curriculum.
Start with the calendar
I started by blocking off any important dates on our calendar. These included birthdays, holidays, and breaks.
I am totally a paper-and-pen kinda mom, so I went with a paper planner. I used this planner.
Use the standards to build a framework
Next in my planning, I used the state standards to build a framework of learning.
I began by printing off a copy of my state’s Early Childhood Education standards (state standards should be pretty easy to find on your state’s Department of Education web page).
From there, I determined what subjects we would need to cover over the course of the year to meet the standards.
For our subjects, we will be doing reading, writing, math, social studies, arts, science, foreign language, and physical activity. Sounds like a lot – and it is – but very manageable when you remember that you don’t need to teach every subject every day of the week.
Assign units of study for each month
Connection to nature is important to our family.
It’s crucial for my own health.
Going into homeschool planning, I knew that I wanted our units to align with what was happening in nature.
Assigning units of study month by month was key in achieving this seasonal alignment.
I divided each month into two different themes. For example, we will be studying leaves the first half of October. Then we will study pumpkins the second half of the month.
Having two themes keeps the month’s content from getting stale, but isn’t so fast that we are rushing through things.
Plot out activities for each week that meet the standards
Next in my planning, I used the state standards to plan out our learning activities for each week. I kept the descriptions in the planner short – so there is plenty of space to modify the activities as needed.
For more examples, view the photo I attached above.
Begin gathering your resources
This aspect of planning is still in progress! I have begun gathering resources for our learning.
I have been placing resources in manilla envelopes. I labeled one envelope per unit.
Some final notes
Of course, this is my first year homeschooling! I am not sure what is going to work best for our family, so I just did my best to plan as well as I could but know that all of my plans are in PENCIL.
Life ebbs and flows, so my homeschooling plans should too!
Do you have any tips or tricks for planning homeschool? Is this a topic you would like to read more about on the blog? I would love to hear! Connect with me on Instagram or Pinterest.
Thanks for being here!
