VHC- Article002: A Day In The Life A typical homeschooling day in the Templeman household. by Lindy Templeman This is a quick and candid rundown of one Templeman homeschooling day. My youngest son got up around 7:30 or so which means so did I. We went into the kitchen and had breakfast waiting for the rest of the crew to get up. By 9:00 after our latest riser awoke the day officially began. We do not generally do any "school" until around 11:00. After the kids eat they get to have some play time which on this day not unlike every other day was Lego for the boys, tea time for the girl and annoying siblings for the toddler. On this particular day I called the kids into the kitchen at 10:45 am. We spent about 1 hour working on dictation and grammar. The 7 and 5 year old also did math while the 9 year old worked on a couple of phonics sheets (busy work - he actually likes them!). After the other two had completed their math they got a chance to go and play again while I sat down one on one with my 9 year old and did his math lesson. This takes about 15 minutes, providing the other kids especially the toddler doesn't bother me. Today my toddler actually gave me about an hour or so of quiet time while he played playdough, something he loves a lot and can stay focused on for long periods of time. This has helped "school time" a great deal. At 12:30 I start to make lunch while the kids play. We generally do not do anymore school until the toddler goes to bed. This is the time I try to tidy up and get some chores and phone calls done if I didn't get them done in the morning. Chores, despite the fact that veteran home schoolers say that you must not make them a priority, is still a struggle for me. I work better in a clean environment and I am much less cranky so I like to have things done. Well, lately I have been doing a much better job of battling this problem, just ask my husband. I must say that it is true, when I don't do the housework we get more schooling done. Back to my day. Today, the toddler went to bed at 2:00. I had time to get the dishes done and have a cup of tea! I called the kids back to school and we started on the fun stuff. Other than the 3r's most of my schooling is done through reading and discussion. On this day I read an article from national geographic about ancient Egypt as our history and geography is based on that right now. As I read the article all three of my children drew pictures of what they heard. There is always a lot of discussion during this time and it is never a problem keeping their attention. Once they finished the pictures I wrote notes on the children's pictures (sometimes I do the writing for the older child as well but usually the 9-year-old writes his own captions.) (Note: I do the same discussion system for science as well) when we were all done the kids put these great pieces in our history/geography book and then school is done, the only thing left is violin practice. The kids play and I practice one on one with each child for a total of 30 minutes all together. It is now 4:15, the toddler has woken up, perfect timing. We are not always so lucky. It's now time to make dinner, the most dreaded part of my day. I hate cooking. After story time (this is the time the children read to me as well) the kids are in bed and all is quiet in our house. After all is said and done it is probably 9:00pm. Well that's it. Generally our family does this routine 2 times/week. I guess you could say I am in the middle between a structured system and unschooling. Wednesdays are our extracurricular days, violin, gymnastics soccer, and Thursdays are our all day co-op. We have tried to take Fridays off as my husband is home that day but lately as he has had to work Fridays we have been trying to put in a bit more of the 3 r's. Lindy Templeman marlin-t@shaw.ca