Homeschool Organization Beyond Stacks

I’ve accepted it now. Organization is simply a huge part of homeschooling. I’ve reluctantly shared about my stacks before. Even how we have a Filing Fridays habit with Papers, Stacks and Hole Punches. And we’ve completely been through a homeschool makeover, making it more comfortable, creating natural easy learning spots.

I’ve used those IKEA baskets whole heartedly. I love them! But when I wrote about our homeschool enrichment last week, I also came across some stacks – as is my personal style. See, we’ve been chugging along since the end of July. Because of that we have many products of learning (e.g., papers, reports, sketches). You might remember I mentioned the three hole punch?

Insert yet another realization. More children homeschooling equals more papers. They multiple. Yes, this is a common sense sort of thing but I was in denial.

Well, this was the week. We decorated binders, updated, punched. And guess what? Everybody was happy! They made comments about the subjects we were working on the binders for.

Here’s how we did it. I placed the stack of papers needing filing into the center of the kitchen table. It’s the center of all homeschooling anyway, right? Then, as we went about our normal homeschool day, we worked on each subject’s binder. So, Math, we put all those graph papers into the child’s math binder. English/grammar completed? We pulled the binder and added fresh tabs, new lined paper. Practiced drama lines? Let’s make a cover for that drama folder. It surely needs lots of stickers! Then, because I was a little under the weather and just to simply motivate everyone…

…we employed Flylady’s “you can do anything for 15 minutes” and we tackled the paper stack.

But our favorite part – which makes sense because it is one of our very favorite parts of our school days – was creating an enrichment binder. Yes, we’d had artist and composer study binders before. But this giant binder we almost named One More Thing After Lunch. Because it houses those enriching studies we all enjoy together – during and immediately following lunch. We created one for each of the older four children. Little Buddy was most happy with his one binder full of fun creations along with a fresh stack of clean, white paper for future art.

Here’s a peek into our week with…

The little ones: 1. Before Five in a Row selection this week, If Jesus Came to My House. We have this older version. Love the sweet illustrations. Today, we are enjoying the wonderful, free printables at Homeschool Creations for this book. | 2. Littlest Girl in her Afternoon Quiet Time spot | 3. It’s fun to watch rain drops bounce on the bush outside the school room window | 4. Almost five-year-old loved starting Hey! I’m Reading | 5. Lil’ Buddy got to accompany me to the fair to enter his flowers and his sisters’ – and we saw baby chicks! | 6. Littlest Girl is looking up a Bible verse a day with her take home sheet from Sunday School.

Our older ones: A BIG birthday! 1. and 2. Our eldest celebrated a big birthday last weekend. Thanks to the World of Coca-Cola, we took her and several friends to visit the Vault of the Secret Formula. Plus we all tasted lots and lots of Coke! | 3. Her birthday afternoon, she and I went to Barnes & Noble. She spent some birthday money and we enjoyed some Starbucks too! | 4. We caught Eldest Boy (8th grader) with the Do Hard Things book several times. | 5. A cozy spot on couch for afternoon homeschool. | 6. The older ones helped with organizing binders.

All together now: 1. Tapestry of Grace all together after lunch – mostly the Mayflower Compact, reading Making Thirteen Colonies, The Church in History, Pilgrim’s Progress. We also enjoyed more of our artist study of Vermeer and composer Schumann with Harmony Fine Arts (Littlest Girl was excited to hear on the radio that one day last week was Clara Schumann’s birthday!) | 2. We took a tour around the continents with Ann Voskamp’s A Child’s Geography | 3. Slow Cooker Potato soup for a rainy, fall-like day | 4. A spider and her web right outside the classroom window makes for a fun nature study! The rain drops highlighted the web beautifully.

Features! 1. Please don’t miss Hodgepodgedad’s review of three iPad apps we’ve been enjoying. They compliment our science and nature studies well. SproutLabs HD Science Apps at Curriculum Choice | 2. Along the lines of organization, I shared our Bible Basket at Passionate Purposeful Parenting. It’s right smack in the middle of our family room table and helps keep His Word in the center of our day.

Happy homeschool moments: 1. Pause right here. The thick of our homeschool morning and everybody working! | 2. Eldest Girl took this photo of me reading If Jesus Came to Our House to our younger two. They are all freshly bathed and ready for bed. I so prefer to be behind the camera but since Phyllis shared about Aleida’s Challenge I’m a little more willing to be a subject.

Our exciting news? Middle Girl and Littlest Girl will be singing a duet in our children’s ministry Christmas special. Our two drama girls are practicing wonderful parts for the Drama Troupe Christmas production. And we heard that our fair flower entries earned: Lil Buddy 1st place for his althea, Middle Girl 2nd place for her hydrangea and Littlest Girl Best of Show – Youth for her red zinnia!!
Many thanks to our Friday hostesses!

• Homeschool Mother’s Journal at iHomeschool Network
• Collage Friday hostess Mary at Home Grown Learners
• iPhone Photo Dump at Passport Academy
• Jamerrill at Holy Spirit-Led Homeschooling
• Weekly Wrap-Up hostess Kris at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers
• No Fear Homeschool High School at The Daisy Head

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This started out as a short and sweet post and somehow ended up this long. Thanks for sticking with me! How was your week, friends?