How I Plan My Homeschool Year Using Themes

How I Plan My Homeschool Year Using Themes

As summer winds down and we start scrambling to fit in a few last items from our "summer bucket list", it also comes time to get ready for fall and "back to school" time! For our family, that means planning another year of homeschool! This will be my third year of homeschooling (although the first two years were more of a "practice" school since my oldest is just now in 1st grade) and I am starting to get into a little bit of a "groove" with planning now. I was blessed with the opportunity to do a podcast with my sweet friend Marissa over at Raising Rices about preparing for the year of homeschooling, and I hope it will provide encouragement, ideas, and advice for anyone who is homeschooling or thinking about starting. You can listen to it here.

For those of you who learn or process better by reading/seeing things laid out, I wanted to include a few more "visual" things from some of what we shared in the podcast. Homeschooling is something that is very dear to me, both as a homeschool graduate myself and now also as a homeschool mama. I know it can be challenging, lonely, and downright overwhelming to get started, so I wanted to lay out my "method" of how I prepare for the year ahead, as well as my main purposes in schooling (AKA the things I try to turn back to when the school day is particularly hard and I feel like nobody is learning anything and I should just send everyone off to a more qualified professional!) 

Before reading ahead, two things I want to mention: First, I don't believe homeschooling is the perfect solution for every family, and I hope none of my readers will ever sense any kind of judgement or "holier than thou" messages from me just because our family has chosen to school at home for now. I tell everyone that we are taking the kids' schooling one year at a time, prayerfully thinking through and considering what is best for each child as well as our family unit. So far, the answer has been homeschooling, but someday that may change. God made every person and family unique, and it would be flat-out wrong to say that any one plan fits everyone. 

Along with that comes my second "disclaimer", that my way of doing things may not work for you, and that is totally ok! I want to share my thought process for those of you who do think like me and want to try a more theme-focused school year out, but I don't expect this to work for everyone. My prayer for this post, along with everything I write, is that it will encourage and inspire those that God intends it to. 

Ok. With all that said, let's get rolling.

Just What Are Themes, Anyway?

Simply put, using themes in homeschooling just means using different topics (animals, robots, spring, human body) to teach school subjects rather than, or in addition to, a typical curriculum. This coming year will be my first year with an elementary-school kiddo, so it is also the first year I've chosen a curriculum to use. I just didn't feel that my kids needed a lot of structured, sit-down-and-write learning before 1st grade (and I'm still keeping that part as light as possible for my oldest kiddo this year, using curriculum for his core subjects and themes for science and social studies). Instead, I chose to use a lot of hands-on and theme-based learning for preschool/kindergarten, and I was pleasantly surprised (and delighted!) by all that they picked up from it. Little kids need a lot of time to play and just be kids, and they are eager learners, so they soak information up no matter what they are doing. There are loads and loads of studies that back this up, and it's even been said that "play is the work of the child" (Maria Montessori). So if you have little kids (6 or 7 and under), try not to focus so much on seatwork (sitting down quietly and filling in worksheets) and instead just let them play! You'll be amazed at what they pick up!

 Now, I understand that some of us (*cough, cough* me) are too excited to wait for 1st or 2nd grade to start teaching. That's why I started using themes during school to make our mornings more purposeful and to get my kids in the "habit" of having a schooltime. Since I am more experienced with this kind of school planning, I'm going to spend my time in this post explaining that process rather than the process of choosing a curriculum and planning it out. For those of you with older students who need more information on that, you can listen to the podcast mentioned above (my friend Marissa does a great job of breaking down how to choose curriculum) or feel free to send me a message and I'm happy to share the process I did this year for picking the curriculum I am using for my oldest.

How I Plan for School:

1. Create Long-Term Goals and a Vision Statement (Do Once, Review Yearly)

• What do I want my kids to know by graduation?
• What do I want my school to look like?
• Why am I homeschooling?

Last year was my first "official" year of homeschool as my oldest son was in kindergarten, and because of that I wanted to figure out what my long-term goals were for him and my other kids. This goes beyond just the minimum requirements for graduation and goes more in-depth with what I want to impart to my kids before they leave my home. I think this is something any parent can do, regardless of if their kiddos are home-schooled or not. It can help to have a basic blueprint and purposeful plan for what we want our kids to learn, develop, and become while they are under our roofs. For example, here is what I came up with:

My Ultimate Goals for My Children 

1. I want my children to grow in their knowledge of and love for the Lord. I want them to come to salvation and to place God as the King of their lives, seeking to serve Him in all that they do.
2. I want them to love God’s Word and to be able to understand it and apply it to their lives. 
3. I want my children to grow in their character—to be honest, kind, generous, helpful, loving, and loyal.
4. I want them to learn how to treat others well and to seek to serve and put others before themselves.
5. I want them to appreciate and enjoy their family and to keep close bonds with each other and with their parents throughout their lives.
6. I want them to be able to understand, acknowledge, and control their emotions, as well as to grow in the skill of sharing their thoughts, feelings, and beliefs respectfully and well.
7. I want them to learn how to develop and nurture lasting friendships and relationships, gaining social skills, learning excellent manners, and growing in conflict resolution. 
8. Academically, I want my children to gain all of the skills they will need to be independent, wise, and responsible adults. I want them to be able to discover how they learn and to be able to use that knowledge to gain all of the understanding they need to survive and thrive as adults.
9.  I want them to not only understand basic learning skills (math, reading, writing), but to enjoy them! I want them to be lifelong learners, pursuing knowledge and wisdom in all of their passions. I want school to be something they enjoy and develop a passion for, not just something to endure and get through.
10. I want them to discover and nurture the gifts that God has given each of them so that they can use their talents to serve Him, help others, and impact their world for Christ.

By having this list in place, I can turn to it on even the hardest days and remember why I am doing this whole parenting "thing" in the first place. It enables me to stay purposeful in my parenting and in teaching my little school, and helps me not to get overwhelmed by the vague desire of wanting kids who turn out "right".

2. Research Requirements for Each Child and Create Year’s Goals (Yearly)

• Look up state requirements to stay within the law
• Research what each grade level should cover
• Find space to record learning progress as needed
• List learning goals to keep on track

Every state has different requirements and rules for homeschooling. At the beginning of each year, I like to check in and make sure nothing has changed and that I am still "within the law" in how I teach my kids. The Home School Legal Defense Association has a great tool for finding out what the law is in each state (and has a lot of good information in general on their site). 

Usually the state laws are far below what most parents actually expect from their kids academically, so the next thing I do is look up the basics of what each grade should learn before moving on to the next grade. This way I get an overall picture of what other students my kids' age are learning and can help my little ones stay on track. Something fun that I like to do with this info is make a little card for each student with each learning goal for the year listed. As we go through the school year, I let my kids mark off their goals as they accomplish them (usually with a dot marker. My kids just love those things!) Here is a picture of my kids' goals for last year:

Property of Raphah Mama

Property of Raphah Mama

3. Choose Which Subjects to Cover, and When to Do Them (Yearly)

• Daily subjects (math, reading, Bible, etc)
• Weekly  subjects (science, music, art, etc)

There are some subjects that need to be done each day (usually the typical reading, writing, and math) and others that would be fine to be done just once or twice a week (or even less). I think this can change with each family and even each year, so I like to review this at the beginning of each school year.

4. Prepare Planner and Schedule (Yearly)

• List any known days off (Holidays, Special Days, Etc)
• Choose weekly schedule (3 day, 4 day, 5 day)
• Create daily schedule for subjects/what each child does when

The next step for me is to buy a planner and start figuring out what I want our school time to look like this year. I mark off any days that I know we won't be doing school (Christmas break, birthdays, other special days) and decide if I want to do school Monday-Friday, or some other schedule. This year I am planning to do 4 days of school at home and then my son is attending a homeschool-supportive charter school one day a week to get in some PE time and the ever-important "socialization" (there are lots and lots of options for providing that time for home school kiddos, so be open and do some research!)

5. Choose Themes for Each Month/Week (Yearly, Semi-Annually, or Monthly)

• Interest-led themes (based on what child likes)
• Calendar-led themes (seasons or holidays)
• Life event themes (new baby, moving, vacation)

This has been one of my favorite parts of school planning. I love themes! There's just something about them that gets me excited to teach and also helps me to organize my thoughts into a fairly reasonable plan for what I want to teach my kids. I also like that I can get my kiddos involved in what we are going to learn, as it helps them to have a vested interest in their school and usually helps them want to do their schoolwork (usually...not always!) There are a myriad of themes you can choose from! For some ideas to get you started, you can check out my Pinterest Board for Early Learning Themes here.

6. Find Resources for Themes (Yearly or Semi-Annually)

• Pinterest ideas (save to a board)
• Library books (save to a “shelf”)
• Fun toys and games (make wishlist/shopping list)

Once you have settled on the themes you want to have for the year, you can start collecting ideas and resources for how you want to teach within those themes. Remember earlier when you decided which subjects you want to cover? This is the part where you tie your theme and subjects together. Confusing? Let's try an example. 

Say your theme is Space. The subjects/skills you want to cover this year are read-aloud time, fine motor skills, sensory time, and math/numbers. So you go through each subject and try to find things that match your theme, something like this:

• Read-Aloud: Search the library or your own books at home for any books on space you'd like to read to your kiddo and make a list (some libraries let you have a list of the books they have, so you can make a list for each theme if you want to!)

• Fine Motor Skills: Search pinterest for "space fine motor skills" and I guarantee you a myriad of fun ideas will pop up. One of the ones we used was to print out constellations and use a dull needle (or a plastic one for littler students) to poke the star pattern out. Then we held them up to the window and saw our constellations shining through!

• Sensory Time: Again, search on Pinterest and you'll find a boatload of ideas. Some that we have done are space playdough, galaxy slime, glow in the dark stars in water...

• Math/Numbers: Counting stars, adding/subtracting stars, measuring planets...More ideas on Pinterest. (Sensing a theme here?)

Since I've been doing themes for a few years now, I have been able to collect a pretty good selection of learning activities for all kinds of themes on my Pinterest boards. Feel free to check them out here (scroll down to the section that starts with "school themes") 

7. Begin Planning Each Week Out in Planner (Semi-Annually or Monthly)

• Note what the theme is
• Write out each subject
• List assignments/books under subjects

Once you have your resources all lined up, you can start plugging things into your planner! Yay! When I started out with homeschooling, I was planning my whole school year at once; and while that was handy to just have everything done, it ended up not working so well because I had to switch things up later in the year to accommodate some life changes and learning styles. I think a better plan might be to do anywhere from one to three months at a time so that you can get a feel for what is working and what isn't and can adjust accordingly as the year goes on.  

8. Collect Needed Resources (Semi-Annually, Ongoing throughout Year)

• Download printables and save to folders on computer
• Put library books on hold
• Purchase toys and games and/or ask for as gifts for birthdays and holidays

This is the last step in the actual planning stage! For me, it's a lot easier if I just have all of my resources ready to go. I like to make sure I download any games or worksheets I want to use and have them ready to go in a file on my computer (I have a folder for each theme I want to use for the year). I also try to put books on hold at the library at least a week in advance, and buy any toys or games that match my theme (or add them to my kiddos' wishlists for birthdays and Christmas. It's always super fun to get a gift that can also double as learning time!)

9. Set Up Lessons (Weekly/Bi-Weekly)

• Print out needed papers/books
• Pick up books from library
• Shop for any additional supplies (printer ink, paper, sensory materials)

With everything planned and ready to go, all that's left to do is to set up your lessons for the week (or day or month, whatever works better for you). I have one day a week that I do "computer work", so that is the day that I print out anything I need for school the next week, make sure my books are ready at the library, and make a shopping list for ongoing school needs (like printer ink or sensory materials). When I run my errands, I make a habit of stopping at the library for my books, and picking up whatever is on my school list while I do my regular shopping. 

10. Teach! (Every School Day)

• Remember your main goals/purpose statement to stay on-track
• Use your plan, but don't be a slave to it
• Have fun!

Now all that's left is to put all of your plans into action! When teaching, especially the littlest years, remember to have heaps and heaps of grace on yourself and your little students. Your kids are going to learn what they need to eventually! You have a good, long while to impart what you want to share, so having a bad day here or there is not going to ruin anything. Real life happens--sickness, grumpy attitudes, emergency shopping trips, surprise visitors... The beauty of homeschool is that you don't have to be tied down to a set schedule; you can mix it up as needed. Stay flexible, roll with the punches, and enjoy this time! Homeschooling is supposed to be fun; not constant fun, and maybe not even every day, but if you aren't enjoying it the majority of the time than there's something "off". Hold your plans loosely and remember the main purpose here: to raise up little people who love God, enjoy their family, and have at least the basic skills needed to be successful adults. 

That's about it! I know there's a lot to this; it takes time, effort, and creativity to plan school this way. It isn't for everyone! But for those of you who think it might be a fun way to start school with your little ones, I hope this is a helpful breakdown. Please feel free to ask me any questions! I am always happy to help however I can. Homeschoolers are all one big tribe, and we have to stick together!

Happy "Back To School" Season!