Form 1 Timetables for today

24 Comments

1. Thank you so much for this. I’ve struggled for a couple years to come up with a plan for our school days. This is the most straightforward I’ve seen!

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   1. You are very welcome! I”m so glad it was helpful to you.

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2. What is ment by writing on this chart?

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   1. Great question! I should clarify that in the post.

      Writing for this age was handwriting practice — copywork and some dictation. Dictation started with letters and words in the first year (Form 1B, approximate ages 6-7) and moved to words and short sentences in the second and third years (Form 1A, approx ages 7-9).

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3. Hello
   Thanks for this detailed post. It’s so helpful.

   What I don’t understand is how a homeschool mom with a baby can afford to just skip lessons because of tending to a baby. That would be neglectful of the older children’s education when one has a difficult baby. What we’ve been practicing is that older children know that things may change. We do have a set of things to accomplish but they may shift. And instead they may have free play, dancing, outdoors, movement activities and then when baby is tended to we may go back to doing work together. They also may pick up some of their more individual work like copywork or practicing reading or a handicraft or their instrument during this time.

   Could you clarify your comment that if the baby has a blowout the lesson is skipped? I find that hard to believe because CM didn’t have nurslings in her school. I do agree we shouldn’t let lessons drag. But if we simply change things around where they get free time, rest, or sometimes skip a lesson in the afternoon if we see they are tired, why not do this? If they are ok, why not have a reading, or repetition for example?

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   1. Hi Aleksandra! That’s a great question.

      The PNEU programmes were meant for both physical schools and homeschools. The programmes were originally created solely for mothers to do at home with their children. By the time of this publication of A Liberal Education for All, there were physical schools in the network also. But it always included homeschools, which were not just an afterthought.

      What this means is that there were multiple ages in the homes, and often nurslings.

      While A Liberal Education for All doesn’t specifically address diaper changes 🙂 that’s from my own experience. It is perfectly ok to skip a lesson. Just pick up next week, or the next time that lesson is scheduled. Once your kids have graduated and you look back at their education, you realize that you will never remember those small times that were skipped.

      If you are consistently missing a certain subject, then I would definitely look at the schedule and see where things could be adjusted. Maybe you need to add a snack at break time, or maybe buy diapers that will fit better if you’re having a half hour cleanup every day because the baby poop escaped and requires a complete change of clothes for whoever was holding the baby as well as some carpet cleanup (been there).

      And you definitely don’t want to throw all lessons out every day just to take care of baby. But the occasional, even weekly, missing of a random 10 minute lesson is not going to make a difference in the long run.

      It’s just not.

      I found that for my own kids, constantly changing things around wasn’t good for either them or for me. We always felt off balance, and they couldn’t know what was going to come by looking at the time table when it as constantly changing. I liken this to being in high school where you’re changing classes – if something happens that takes the teacher out of class, you don’t have all the other classes rearranged to accommodate it. Only if it’s *always* happening during the same period would the school consider making changes.

      As an example, if we had a therapy appointment from 9-9:30 every Tuesday, I would adjust our schedule on Tuesdays to accommodate that. But if the 4 yo throws a temper tantrum in the middle of math, or the baby has a blowout and it requires half an hour of cleanup during Natural History time, when it’s done I’d just pick up where we were according to the timetable.

      I guard our “lessons are done for the day” time very closely, because when I don’t it’s so easy for other things to encroach on morning lessons because “we’ll just do them later”. And then that happens more and more often, and the kids are never really sure if they can immerse in play or if they still have lessons hanging over them.

      I would, however, ask the older kids to do some quiet work that is easy to call them back from if they weren’t helping me with the blowout. We learned through trial and error what activities worked well and what didn’t for that.

      But honestly, no one is going to come to your house and tell you that you must stop doing what works for you. I give suggestions and recommendations based on my interpretations of the sources, and what I’ve found works in our own family and in other families that I know. But that doesn’t mean that that’s what will work for you.

      You do you 🙂

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4. Hi! Curious how music and music appreciation would be factored into the schedule? I know it’s listed as a subject in Form 1, but I don’t see it on the schedule… Thank you so much!!

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   1. It’s not on the schedule, which I also found interesting. I alternate composer study with picture study (opposite weeks) and do music lessons after lunch.

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5. Do you prefer this over block scheduling? My ADHD son has a hard time with transitions and, while the short lessons are great sometimes, I also find they constant “we have to move on” is not always great for him. He is also fairly independent and today, he woke up ready to dive in because he had a video game (he bought with his money) he wanted to try later. He wanted to get his school work done quickly (which meant he was ready to get started by 6:30! and was super sad and upset when I said I wouldn’t be ready until later. He started trying to do his work by himself, not waiting for me to meditate. So, I’m trying to figure out how to create more “self-directed” work for him. He is a “live in the moment” type of kid and when I introduce a time to things, we end up obsessing over the clock. He wast the entire 15-20 minutes sometimes and then says things like “times up.” “Oh well, now it’s time for our next lesson.” “what do you want me to do mom.” I’m more interested in having him enjoy the learning and the learning being more self directed. But, I do love a lot of the concepts of Charlotte Mason!!

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   1. Hi Evelyn!

      I do prefer this over block scheduling. We found that block scheduling works great for us for a week or so, then we get burned out on whatever subject we’re diving into and don’t want to see it again … sometimes ever.

      Charlotte Mason said that when the child’s attention has wandered, then the lesson should stop and a new one completely unlike the old should start, and the lessons should be engaging. If my daughter is spacing out during math, I’ll stop the lesson and tell her to go jump on the trampoline 10 times — and sometimes she’ll have a meltdown and yell “why not 15 times??” LOL

      Then the next lesson needs to be something that doesn’t engage her mind in the same way as math, so maybe drawing or art.

      If it happens more than 2x in a short period of time, say maybe 2 math lessons in one week I’ve lost her after just a few minutes, then I take a really hard look at the materials I’m using and the way I’m presenting it. How can I keep her engaged? What’s wrong with what we’re doing now that needs to change?

      I also make a habit of asking my kids every 3 weeks to evaluate with me. What’s working? What’s not? How can we make it better?

      I hope this helps some!

      Also, did you see the relaxed schedule? It’s another option for if you don’t want to stick to a strict timetable, and may work better for you. Easy & Relaxed Elementary Schedule

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      1. Thanks! I would be thrilled if my son would get up and take a break. He just plows through no matter what and argues when I ask him to pause and take a break. He gets so focused on “getting it done” that he melts down when I try and take a physical break. Then, when we do take a physical break he either puts in minimal effort and rushes back to finish up his school work or, gets into the break and whines and complains and is disappointed that it is not his personal choice time. Lol. Yes, I’ll take a look at the relaxed schedule. Thanks! 🙂

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         1. Oh, yes! My older daughter was like that. I found that having a schedule posted — or laying out on the table where we were working — really helped her. Nope, I don’t care how fast you rush through, we’re not finishing everything as fast as we can. This is how long the break is. And it took usually a solid 2 weeks at the beginning (of a year, of a break, whatever), to really get to where the schedule was “just what we did” and arguing lessened.

            But I’ll be honest — a big part of it I know is my own attitude. If I’m thinking, “Ugh, I really don’t want to do this” and let it slack, then it’s so hard to get it back because the kids know if they pester enough I’ll give up. Consistency.

            But I totally understand just not wanting to fight those battles, too! We only have so much bandwidth. In the end, we need to do what works for kiddo AND mom, and that won’t necessarily be what works for someone else.

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6. Is natural history the same as nature studies? I’m consider sciencethroughnature.com for my son this year and not sure exactly where this might fit in the above schedule.

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   1. Yes and no. It is the study of nature, but it’s not your random “nature study” that some people do.

      I would definitely do Science through Nature here! It looks like a wonderful program.

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7. We don’t sound a ton of time on school 2-3 hours 4 days a week. Butt I’m wondering if using a timer for subjects would help. My oldest will often sit and “think” for half an hour or more. Meanwhile, my youngest has worked through her task and is off and running. It’s hard to get her back to move onto another subject when her sister finally gets something done. What are your thoughts?

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8. Hi, Marjorie. I’m wondering where the slot for the “special study” is. I have read in other places that it was scheduled for the morning

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   1. Hi Angel,

      There was no slot for “special studies” in these timetables. It’s very possible that Charlotte Mason said to do them in the mornings, but I don’t recall reading that anywhere. I haven’t read everything she’s ever written, though, so I could very well have missed it.

      I tend to do them in the afternoons or during our Adventures (nature walks, which I never call nature walks because that sounds so boring).

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      1. Thank you, Marjorie.

         Another question. Isn’t handcrafts a afternoon schedule subject? A lot of people told me that.

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         1. Hi Angel,

            Handicrafts was in the afternoons in Form II and up. In Form I it was done during the morning lessons. You can always do more in the afternoons and on weekends, but it was scheduled during the mornings.

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9. Hi Marjorie! Your post is such a lifesaver! This is our first year doing Charlotte Mason and I couldn’t get my head around scheduling until I discovered your site 🙂

   I hope you can help me out. I plan to use The Good and the Beautiful language arts for my 3 kids (Form 1, 2 & 3 respectively) since it worked so well for us last year. I just can’t figure out how to fit it into your timetable since it combines a lot of the subjects like reading, spelling, writing, grammar, literature, geography, poetry and memorization, art appreciation and instruction. It’s an open and go course and I feel overwhelmed just thinking about cutting up the lessons to fit in the timetable. And I still want to use the resources in the Wildwood curriculum in addition to TGATB course, like your Living Geography book for example. How would you do it? Any suggestions would be soooo great!

   Thanks again!

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   1. Hi Tess,

      I’ve never used The Good and the Beautiful, but while there may be some common elements with Charlotte Mason’s method, it isn’t a CM curriculum and as such it would be very difficult (if not impossible) to fit it into the timetables.

      What I would do instead of trying to shoehorn TGTB into the timetables is to take the philosophy of the timetables and bring them to TGTB. Plan your schedule so that lesson times are short and varied. Vary the subjects so you’re not doing all “head work” back to back. Alternate subjects that work with the hands, the artsy ones (heart), and academics.

      As far as using WW resources with TGTB — do not add them. Replace, but don’t add. TGTB is complete as it is, adding more will just add more time on to your schoolday and detract from the masterly inactivity time (free time) that is so essential. If you want to use Living Geography, then take out a comparable resource or book from TGTB.

      Replace, don’t add.

      I hope this was helpful. Have a great day!
      Marjorie

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      1. This makes sense. Will adjust our timetable but will also substitute the Personal/Shared readers with the WW recommendations. Our next challenge: masterly inactivity time that does not involve gadgets!

         Thanks so much for your response 🙂

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10. What if you have multiple students in Form I? I have to do readings for all of them (the oldest one is going to attempt to do one of her readings on her own).

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    1. Combine as much as possible. The PNEU programmes say “In home schoolrooms where there are children in A as well as in B, both forms may work together, doing the work of A or B as they are able.”

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