Homeschooling 101 Part 1

There is nothing more aggravating then not knowing where something is. Something you should make every effort to do is to train your children to put things back in their proper place. Instill this habit and life will go a bit smoother in the homeschool realm. If you yourself struggle with it start today to make it a habit.
I'm really excited about this year. I am going in a completely different direction from previous years. I used to be all about textbooks and curriculum, worksheets, testing etc. and I'm not saying those things are bad , if they work for you. They weren't working for me. So first of all I started out with prayer. I asked the Lord for guidance in the area of homeschooling and boy did he give it to me. I've never been so excited about starting a new school year. Here's what I've done so far.

• First, clear out. Get rid of all the stuff that's been sitting there unused for years. Either use it or get rid of it. I just sold tons of curriculum on ebay to make way for more readers.
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• Take inventory. I did this and man, I completely forgot half the stuff I had. Write every book you have down and keep it on the computer or in a notebook.This will take some time if your shelves are like mine but it will be worth it I promise. Refer to it often when planning your school year. Knowing what you have already is important. It will save you time and money. ( I bought a book I already had last year lol. So I'm speaking from experience.)
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• Make room. Make sure you have ample room to display your resources. They can't be used if they can't be seen. My husband built me more bookshelves inexpensively and I'm afraid I still need more lol. Get creative here. Any space can be storage. I recently saw on a website that they used rain gutters to house books. You can cut them to fit any size space and they are so inexpensive. I thought that was a cool idea and plan on trying that myself.
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• Supplies. Make sure you have supplies on hand. Some staples are as follows: binders for each child and yourself, page protectors, crayons, pencils, glue sticks, stickers, stapler, scissors, lined paper etc. You don't need a lot to homeschool. Just these essentials will get you through. Don't break the bank.

Ok I'll let you chew on that for awhile. Have a great day!