This morning I sat with most of my planning tools together – trying to get a clearer picture of what next week is going to look like.  We have company today – Hubby is off til Friday – then – well, we seldom do schoolish activities on the weekend –

I have started and stopped planning using several tools – Google Calendar, Homeschool Tracker, Homeschool Planner from This Old Schoolhouse and recently – the Homeschool Day Book. My favorite paper calendar is a school/college plain calendar – but it abruptly stops in December – and the nearest one is 40 miles away.

So – After spending a few days gathering and recording the resources we have on hand – inputting them into the Homeschool Tracker, I have a handy little list of “what we could be using”. I used a couple of post it notes to pick a few items for Nathan and Jonathan’s workboxes.

I looked at the items I had prepared in September to plan our Geography – It looks like for January our Geography Terms Tour will take us to the Dunes. The largest being the Sechura Desert in Peru or Mount Tepest in Austraila, or Moretown Bay in Brisbain. We’ll have to have a field trip to the beach of course. . . .

I used the Homeschool Tracker to make the form to the right.

Next stop is a trip to the Menu Planning section of This Old Schoolhouse Homeschool Planner – I need to print some blank forms. We are going to go on a soup and stirfry binge for January. Fudge, Chicken Fried Steak, Twice Baked Stuffed Potatoes, Fudge, Fries and Fudge will Not be on the list.

A few other forms with a relook to see if we are on track are the Educational Objectives and the Unschooling Records. It is nice to have these types of forms on the ready to see what I might be overlooking – or to see – like I did today – that we are right on track for our goals for the year.

This is a testing year for Jonathan – so I took a quick look at the test prep pack that we use – I think he would be ready to test any time. I’ll look into having him test in March or April this year. We will have 3 months of concentrated Math and Grammar – it would be best for him I think. (Oregon – First Year of School is age 7 in September. This is his 3rd Year. Tests are 3rd, 5th, 8th and 10th year.)

I thought you might get a kick out of how organized we are with the End of Year Evaluation Form . . . .

Or our favorite – the TV Show Reminder List – We didn’t end up watching all of these – but it was fun know what was on!

So – now I will have the tools in place to know what direction we will go – and what we will not want to ignore – and each week I’ll put our plan in the Homeschool Day Book . I like the way it prints – here is how the Google Calendar was printing – I didn’t like it –

I like the list way that the Day Book prints:

We were at the Outlet Mall today and found a holiday shop where all the calendars are 50% off.  – I found a 24 month small Mom’s Plan-It Monthly planner – I think I’ll use this to write in a few dates so I can keep reminders in my purse and to use as a reference for activities on the fly. I’d like to be more committal when people ask if I can show up to activities. . . . .

So – How are you coming with planning January – March or June? Are you keeping on track with your goals? Have the goals change throughout the year? What have you found that you’d like to do more of?  With Lego League out of the way – we are looking forward to learning how to sketch using the Wacom Tablet. We put this off in the fall. What have you been putting off?