4 Benefits of Having a Flexible Homeschool Plan
4 Benefits of Having a Flexible Homeschool Plan
Having a flexible homeschool plan has been one of the greatest decisions we’ve made as a homeschooling family. When we initially starting homeschooling our first child in 2004, I was very uptight and scheduled everything to the second. My intense planning coupled with my Type-A personality was a force to be reckoned with.
Although our homeschool was a well-oiled machine, I saw very quickly the strain it was causing between my precious daughter and I. And I knew something had to change. After a lot of prayer and reflection, I realized that I needed to loosen up and tried creating a flexible homeschool plan. And guess what? It worked wonders for our homeschool!
As our family ends our 15th official year (from a legal perspective) of homeschooling, we wanted to share how having a flexible homeschool plan has been a blessing in our homeschooling adventures.
1. The Ability To Change Plans To Fit Our Life
This component alone has saved our homeschool time and time again. By nature I am a very organized person that loves to plan far ahead. But life has taught me that one cannot always “stick to the plan.” So to appease the planner in me and still have the ability to remain flexible, a weekly plan has served well in our homeschool. It gives the children and I the structure and direction we crave without the legalistic ritual of being controlled by the “plan.” And it allows us to live life and learn along the way, rather than trying to fit our life within the context of school. There is such freedom in this!
2. More Peaceful Atmosphere In Our Homeschool
I have found out over the last 15 years of homeschooling our three children, that our homeschool is full of peace. Perfection? Um, no. But peace? Yes! And I know that a large part of this is due to the fact that I allow for flexibility in our day. While having a plan is beneficial, I can’t stress the equal importance of allowing budge room in your homeschool day. This especially comes in handy when you run a business and homeschool.
3. Helps Teach Our Children Real-Life Coping Skills
It’s true. Those of us who have made it into adulthood really grasp the concept that we do not control our lives. I have witnessed how flexibility in our homeschool has given each of our children the ability to cope with many different circumstances in life. From dealing with year-long deployments to international moves to celebrating birthdays – flexibility has given my children the real-life ability to cope and adapt to many unique situations. This will serve them well and carry them through challenges they’ll face in life.
4. Because Learning Can’t Always Be Planned
It’s true. As much as I’d love a perfectly planned homeschool year where each subject and assignment I planned went exactly as I had written out – it simply does not. And that’s okay. As a matter of fact, it’s better that way. I love seeing how uniquely each one of my precious children learn, and when they organically find something that sets their spirit on fire! Being flexible with my planning helps to ignite those fires, and allows them to remain lit and stoked as long as possible. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.
How to Create A Weekly Flexible Homeschool Plan
For us, we put all of our weekly plans into a binder and take a look back over what we did that year. Because our plans are by week, we don’t see a lot of crossed-out items or shifting, but rather an accurate portrait of what we did in our homeschool. And even better, The Organized Homeschool Planner™ I created is a fully editable PDF. I am able to type in what we are doing and edit it as we go along! It is a fabulous way to see our life in action over the homeschool year.
Type your lesson plans into the form and print them off or simply save them to your computer; the choice is up to you! You can edit your plans any time and even save your planner to your computer to have a digital copy each year. Use the ‘save as’ feature in Adobe Acrobat to rename the file and you will have a digital record of your lesson plans for years to come! Awesomeness at it’s finest!
the planner we crated for our flexible homeschool plan:
I like some help i am from Romania we live in London and they not give a place to my son i am obligate to do home schooll with him it will be a chalenge my houseband is seek and i am working suport our familly my daughter is at school if you could help me advice me please contact me thank you
I am so glad to know that I am not the only one who plans this way! I don’t understand how anybody plans months in advance, because if I plan even 2 weeks ahead, I usually have to shift something. I use a planner that my husband made for me on Excel. Thank you for such a wonderful post. 😀
Hugs,
Melinda
Melinda, YAY! Another weekly planner 🙂 In the very beginning of our journey I did the whole year in advance thing. It just ended it lots of scribbled out mess on my calendar and a lot of guilt for “not” getting it all done. That’s awesome your husband made you a planner, he rocks! Have a great day!
When do you plan? I guess weekly planning needs to be in the plan, too. Right now, I pray that we make it to Friday alive and hope for the best. Hopefully next year (8 weeks!) I can be better about making a plan and sticking to it. I really do like the idea of weekly planning though, it makes sense.
I typically write up the next week’s plan on either Friday night or Saturday morning. But then again, that varies as well. And there are times that I will make the plan on Monday, but never Tuesday 😉