How do you structure your home-ed?

[pregnantncnc]

DS is only 18m, so I'm just starting to think about home ed, and the thing that makes it seem so ideal for us is that we can choose our schedule. We currently like the idea of year-round school and doing a little bit every day, but am aware that's probably an idealistic and uneducated view and I'll more than likely change my mind and want breaks!

I'd love to hear from people who HE, specifically in the early years/primary, but all ages really. Mainly about how you structure your/their time day to day, and also the academic year as a whole.

It isn't something we had considered until recently but the more I find out the more enticing it sounds. Any suggestions of blogs/fb groups/sites that I might find useful would be hugely appreciated as well! Thank you.

Hello! I've home educated my son all along, he's 8 now.

We do go all year round but declare a holiday when we feel like it i.e. this week it's miserably hot so we're doing outings instead.

Every week day we do one substantial "thing", we've recently been learning about weather, probably building Roblox games next. We also do a few skills type activities (spelling, tables, handwriting etc) and we use White Rose Maths and Khan Academy so we do a bit of that too. We do more sports and clubs than we'd do if he was in school I think - parkour, cricket, kickboxing, airgun shooting, parkrun plus a book club and various informal meetups.

I stressed about learning to read for several years and we ploughed through various phonics schemes and in the end he taught himself to read out of sheer boredom at the start of the first lockdown. But as that's a couple of years later than he would have learned in school we've ended up with a kid who's massively asynchronous between STEM and English. However my brother was the same and he went to school! Writing also a slog until he realised his older friends could message each other in Minecraft!

I plan very roughly yearly/quarterly/monthly/weekly but am open to change if it snows or whatever.

10-12 is reading and sitting at the table stuff, then clubs/outings/experiential stuff in the afternoon.

Also I'm going to be very cheeky and post a link to my brand new site www.homeedcentral.com where I just aggregate links relating to home ed 😁 hopefully you'll find some interesting stuff there.

.net!!! It's www.homeedcentral.net!!!

My two were home ed from the start, now aged 21 and 15. We do "unschooling" or child-led learning so I don't impose any structure on them. That doesn't mean there CAN'T be any structure; some kids thrive on a routine but if they are unschooled they would be involved in creating the routine and change it if it doesn't suit. So for example my eldest asked to be taught to read at 6.5 and (especially with a new baby in the house!) knew it might not happen if we didn't set aside time to work on it every day. So we agreed to do that at bedtime every night.

Mostly they have learned what they like when they like, and our routine is dictated entirely by any external activities we go to, with everything else done as and when.

Unlike school, home ed parents seldom say to their child, "Right, today is the first day of home education. Now we will be doing xyz." It doesn't have to be a big dramatic change when they turn 4/5/6/7. Usually the formal work is introduced gradually as the parent sees that the child is ready for it, or as the opportunity arises. You don't have to have it planned in advance. You can experiment, adding things in or removing them as you go.

Chatting with other home ed parents may give you some ideas for things you could try, but you'll find your own unique path over time. I suggest you make contact with a local home ed group. This will give you some examples of how HE can work in practice, and give both you and your child some potential friends. In most areas you can join in with home ed groups while your child is still a toddler. There may be park play days, or families getting together at soft play who plan to home educate, or who have older children as well as toddlers or babies.

We love it. It's one of the best decisions I've ever made.

We have lots of downtime. On Mondays each week we focus only on spelling, reading, speaking/listening and writing skills needed. On Thursdays we concentrate purely on developing basic first aid and number skills and on Friday, we tend to do fun cooking and music lessons.

On Wednesdays, we do a MFL (modern foreign language) plus weekly history and keep fit lessons. Tuesdays are wholly dedicated to either a outing or art and craft lessons. Saturdays are spent doing Christianity studies (this involves a Bible etc) mainly. Same applies to Sundays.

We school year and week round. Learning isn't a chore restricted monday-friday term time. We take breaks when it suits and go as slowly or as fast as through things as it suits.
It did originally unreasonably bother me not starting new resources at start of school year, wanting to wait to start new stuff until then or trying to rush through it by then, but quickly realised the freedom to move through things at our own pace is part of the perks of home ed. Nothing is compulsory until the term after they turn 5, so introduce if ready/ interested before then. Mine were.
We tend to do 4 'school' mornings a week, maths, English, science, history, Spanish. (Not all on the same day! Early years ans KS1 aged, it does not take the entire morning!! ). Art, crafts, learning keyboard and various other activities in afternoon. Although afternoon activities also extend into our week generally and of course free play, playing in garden etc. I only plan a week in advance, I put the following days school stuff in a magazine rack for the day in the evening.
Then there's clubs, home ed groups etc too.

Following! I’m going to home educate so I like seeing what people are doing. No advice yet obviously since I haven’t started but some other home Ed mums have said that it’s so much easier to buy a home ed curriculum which I might do when he is 7 or 8. Before then I’m just going to do early years stuff.