So today was the start of a fresh new week and I came up with a new plan.
I have really not been doing much, at least not what I want to be doing, with Maeven lately for a variety of reasons…Tyren interrupting constantly, me not getting my act together, having too many other things going on, etc etc etc…every day its something…But still she’s doing her own thing and learning a tremendous amount on her own…Still calling it “unintentionally unschooling”…because while I believe in unschooling, I really didn’t ever mean to be not doing much of any focused work. It’s just sort of how things have been going.
But not today! Today I did some thinking and journaling in the morning and was again lamenting why I am so horrid at keeping any sort of a routine/schedule…and how A.D.D. I am and blah blah blah…then I thought of how I’ve been doing pretty good in the past few days with very flexible lists of things I need to get done. Nothing set to a schedule, but adding and subtracted as I thought of things…I’ve been using my dry erase board, splitting it in half to show things to do “Today” on the left, and “This week” on the right. It’s been really working well. I fill in the list each morning, tweaking as needed (leaving on what didn’t get done yet) and check off during the day as I get thing done, erasing the next morning when that chore is off the list again…And it occurred to me that this is sorta a routine but the routine isn’t a list of a zillion things I should get done every day consistantly in a certain order. The routine is that I make a list each morning of everything I can think of that needs to get done that day, and add to the list of things that need doing that week…and then sticking with checking that list consistantly.
That’s it!
The list always changes, as it would need to because I cannot keep consistant at anything for any length of time…but the fact that i MAKE the list and FOLLOW the list (for the most part) is what keeps me on task. I’m loving it! Dunno how long it will last…seems nothing works well for long with me, but for now its working.
So I decided to start a notebook of assignments for Maeven. Doing the same thing…things she needs to get done TODAY. (I don’t put anything about the week on her list, I’ll keep that on my own separate list). And so today I made a list of all the school work I would like her to accomplish that day…keeping it a manageable size.
I put it in a notebook she wasn’t using, and decided it would become her assignment book. Top of the page is her “Schoolwork for the Day” that she must complete. And bottom is her “Housework for the Day” that she must complete. About 7 or 8 small school assignments and 3 housework assignments.
Today’s School assignments were:
- Spelling Lesson #10
- Story of the World mapwork (catch-up work, we had listened to the chapters already and hadn’t done the mapwork yet)–Ch 38, 39, 40
- Story of the World–Ch 41 & 42
- Mapwork for Ch 41 & 42
- Journal–pick 1 prompt to write in journal
- Cursive–name sheet
- Handwriting–alphabet sheet
- Handwriting–number sheet
- Extra–SOTW coloring pages, read
She did all but the journal and the extras. I was really pleased! No real arguing about it either…
For her housework today:
- Put away all clean clothes (there were a couple stacks on her dresser, already folded).
- Pick up all trash in bedroom and bring bag to kitchen
- Help sort clean laundry into piles and take your laundry pile to your room and put away.
And she did it all, with no fuss!
I was SOOOO proud of her today!
Of course it helps that she has currency right now…which is Toontown.com She just discovered this game and is hooked! (So am I! It’s REALLY fun!) So I let her play for awhile in the morning while I figured out what we were going to do and then she had to stop and get her school work done. She was not allowed to play Toontown again until she finished. Well, it took awhile, and we had lunch in there too…and so I let her go with having finished all but the journal entry, and let her have an hour to play her game.
Then the agreement was that she turned it off without a fuss (because I let her play before she finished) after an hour, and do her housework without a fuss and then she could have more time to play again. It worked and she got it all done. I decided to let her go on the journal for today…baby steps.
So after a good day like that, I feel pretty good! Hope we can keep it up! Tomorrow will start EARLY with a dentist’s appt…(both kids…Tyren’s first) so we’ll see where the day leads after that.
Now I’m off to play some Toontown! 🙂
