There is a form we used to keep track of the work expected, suggested and accomplished each week for the past 18 weeks of school here. It wasn't working because it was too easy just to mark off things that weren't accomplished (fudge the results a bit and hope that mom didn't pay attention EVERY time). In order to foster independence in their studies and easy communication about my expectations and their frustrations, I re-designed the weekly checklist to resemble a day/week planner page I saw online the other day. This attempt to organize them or teach themselves to organize on their own may take a while, but I can try to tweak this even though they like it so far. The old form is on the left, the history page that hasn't changed is in the middle and the new weekly checklist grouped in subject blocks and order of priority is on the right. For example, at the top of the new page on the right, I list the date, breakfast and Bible. Then on the next section down, I list math, spelling and grammar. This gives each child a place to right down that they did a math, their daily spelling or a grammar and what number of the lesson they accomplished in the book.
I'm trying to make it clearer what is expected and for them to communicate exactly what they did each week. These pages are front to back (checklist and history page) in the Story of the World chapter from which each week is built. Maybe in four years, if we look at the ancients again, we'll look back to see what was accomplished first in kindergarten/first grade then in fourth and fifth grade. So far, it's going better because I can see immediately who needs to do their math or grammar, or who hasn't even looked at history or science for the week!
I haven't heard, "What's next Mom?" And, that is a beautiful thing. They are doing so much work, and I want them to see all this clearly on one page that represents all their work!
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