Organizing Archives - as Jules is going

Rothacher Academy 2017/18: curriculum and organizing the entire Year

August 15, 2017 by Jules Leave a Comment

Yesterday I *started* the next steps in the process of planning, sorting, and organizing our entire school year.

One of the first and scariest questions people ask when they find out we homeschool is, "what curriculum do you use?" Sigh.
For some this might be an easy question but for me, it's untangled with guilt, defensiveness, weight, and a long pause.

We use ... whatever. Due to finances, too many options, different learning systems, and my tendency to over analyze things-

We use things people have given us and Recommended.
We use cheap, all-inclusive but sparse workbooks, usually from SAMs Club- great for getting an idea of what basics are expected at each grade level yet sometimes a little low on leveling.
We use free printable materials found online.
We use books, field trips, and life.
We use/create/do lots of unit studies.

I've pictured what I currently have for each child as well as what we [three oldest] will be doing together.

We just had our Vilonia Homeschool Coop planning meeting for the year. We brought all our ideas for field trips, educational tours, holiday parties, and seasonal meet-ups. The first thing I did in planning our Rothacher Academy school year was mark down in my planner when those coop meetings were likely happening.

Then I started on the first week in September and numbered out our weeks of school, skipping the weeks for holidays or busy weeks we'll need a break. That way I knew which folder to plan holiday until studies. I also add each child's activities {and times}. Everyone in the house has an assigned color so I just use that color pen to save space by eliminating the names. VHC field trips are penciled in until confirmed times/dates.

These are the workbooks I will tear the pages out of and divide up among the weeks. I make sure to include each subject each week but not necessarily for each page. We tend to do school work 3-4 days a week.

The Daily Language workbooks were found at Mardel's in the clearance section. The Comprehensive Curriculum workbooks was found at SAMs Club. Hooked on Phonics set was found on an online yard sale via Facebook.
The Multiplication Wipe-Clean Workbook was found on Rainbow Resource Center in the clearance section. Teaching Textbooks Math 5 {cd rom set only} was found NEW on Ebay.

Story of the World was found at a used homeschool book sale in South Carolina by my SIL. The audio cds {we have the entire set of 4} were found cheapest on Rainbow Resource Center along with the planets coloring workbook via their clearance section. Spelling Connections has an entire kit and came from a friend who did K12 online public school but no longer needed this. Just Write was either given to us or I found it on sale on Amazon.

Along with these, I also find lots of fun, often FREE printable materials online via blogs I've found on Facebook or Pinterest. I also utilize Teachers Pay Teachers, Typing.com, and only use educational FREE apps for the kids 20 minutes of iPad time each day.

I use these folders to always have something ready for the week. Ideally, I will lesson plan weekly, adding to each thing or preparing lessons but in case...life, I have a basic plan ready for each week. I pull it out and place it into their baskets where their history binders and other books are stored. They grab them each morning after morning chores, daily chores, breakfast, table chores, and activity classes at the public schools and get to work. Most days, we finish before lunch after a couple of hours of working.

How do you try to organize your homeschool to keep everything/one moving? Are you like me, modge podge curriculum or do you do a specific all-inclusive one?

Filed Under: as Jules is DIYing, Homemaker, Homeschool, Organizing, Parenting, The ones about the Rothacher Home

Using a Responsibility Chart for Multiple Children

August 26, 2016 by Jules Leave a Comment

I found this awesome Responsibility chart made by Melissa and Doug at a consignment event. It comes with all kinds of magnets to create a very unique chart.

How to Use a Responsibility Chart with Multiple Children

I think most families use it as a kind of "sticker chart" by rewarding kids with smilies when they do something. BUT you know I can use very few things for just their intended purpose. I use the magnets to assign jobs for the week. The kids rotate jobs each week so they learn to do all the household chores. I've also started assigning table chores to be done after eat meal. I paired the most difficult household chore with the simplest table chore.

I use the bottom dry erase part to group things they're all supposed to do daily- the ones they don't earn commission for doing.

Over the years, the commission pricing has changed a lot. I'm still a cheap mamma living on a tight budget but I understand the benefits of paying my children to do some chores so they are learning to manage money...even if its not a lot. These days, I pay based on the difficulty of the chore. I also use commission that can be visually seen in a single coin. They're learning the value of coins, and mamma can easily count it out on pay day. 😉

Laundry/clear the table earns $0.25
I load/start laundry every night and the children move the clean load into the drier the next morning and then sort it into each bedrooms' basket when its dry
Dishes/wash the table earns $0.10
I load/start the dishwasher [usually just] every night and the children unload/put away all the clean dishes the next morning; most dishes are down low for this reason
Trash/Dog/Sweep earns $0.05
Our dog sleeps in a kennel every night and the children let the dog out in the morning and feed the dog once in the morning and once at night
They empty the small bathroom trashcans every morning, occasionally help their daddy take out the big kitchen can, and the night before trash day they help take the outside cans to the street and bring them in after it's been picked up

Each child in our house is color coded meaning, they know based on the color on the chart which chore they're on that week. Color coding may seem odd, but with lots of littles its super helpful in lots of areas. {ie Cups: they get a single cup per day and we can always tell who lost theirs}

This chart is how I broke it down when my niece and nephew came for a week. THEY ask to be put on the chore chart for the record. And yes, it's in age order. We start "training" our children on chores around 2 or 3 years old and by 4, they "get to be on the chore chart".

This chart is very helpful for our family. Do you use anything similar? How does it work for your family?

Filed Under: as Jules is DIYing, Decorating, Homemaker, Organizing, Parenting, The ones about the Rothacher Home

DIY Built-In Bookshelf and Desk {Thoughtful Thursday}

June 9, 2016 by Jules Leave a Comment

Originally, I just wanted something in this awkward corner of my living room. It's the only thing in the room that causes it not to be completely square. This little joint out is created by the master closet and it's kinds fun, adding a little character to the room. Every week when our small group would come to our house, it bothered several friends. "What are you gonna put on that wall?" Ya know, since the rest of the room was covered in pictures and such.

Here was my attempt to decorate this space. A cute dresser friends gave me and I painted, my awesome clock I'd been ogling and my hubs got me fr Christmas, and some other random decor items I had around the house. It worked for a while but seemed so minimalism compared to the height of the room and the scale of everything else in the room.

I always loved the built-in shelves I've seen on Pinterest. But this wall is 12' tall and about 5' wide. I wasn't sure my hubs would be up for such a *big* change. I proposed the idea and when he didn't totally hate the idea, I sketched out what I was thinking and showed him several image ideas on Pinterest.

At the end of the summer last year, I suggested maybe it could be my birthday present. He agreed 😀

A friend of ours visited from out of town and agreed to help Matt build my monstrosity over the weekend he was staying with us. Eek

There were a couple things that came up throwing a wrench in my plans but we worked around them. The main one was the carpet. We have hardwoods in our living room but the former owner chose to put carpet down with with a tack strip and a one foot of hardwoods showing around the entire room. We had never taken up carpet and discovered the take strip was installed with huge nails leaving big holes in the floor. We weren't ready to deal with holes in the floor every few inches so we chose to build the shelve up to the height of the baseboard. We added [mostly decorative] feet to the front of the shelf that we had intended to use on the bottom of the girls' dresser.

In my mind I worked from the top shelves down. I knew I wanted bookshelves up top. Then I wanted a desk-like space for our printer and working on homeschool or other stuff. Below that, I wanted plenty of space to store paper, our laminater, and larger items like completed scrapbooks. Just recently, I caved and bought a cardboard paper divider to keep them sorted and from getting all torn up in a basket. Ideally, I wanted a wooden divider but I was never going to pay for one. After lots of finagling, the cardboard one fit perfect and does a perfect job.

Yes, I chose to sort our books by color. Most of these books are on the same or very similar topics and have already been read or are only used for reference. Plus, I like color and makes the shelves more decorative since I ended up with more books to fill it than first expected and less room for other cutesy things.

A year later, having never posted the original post, I'm still loving this built-in. It adds a decorative aspect to this otherwise odd corner of the living room, stores all our book that would be in the attic if not here, makes them easy to read and or lend, makes printing, laminating, and working on things in general so much more practical.

Recently, I gave up on finding an affordable wooden paper divider the size I wanted and went ahead and bought a cardboard one from Target. With 15 slots, it has enough space for the kids construction paper as well as my printer paper, card-stock, and laminate sheets.

I am a huge fan of when norms are thrown to the wind, thinking up what could make life easier, and doing what works for your family. This giant shelf may not be everyone's design dream but it works so well for us!

Filed Under: as Jules is DIYing, as Jules is living, Decorating, Homemaker, Organizing, The Ones about Link-Ups, The ones about the Rothacher Home, Thoughtful Thursdays

Foster Family Organization: Our Kitchen

May 2, 2016 by Jules Leave a Comment

Being ready for new fosters for me means having the essentials ready. Some things we can keep stocked are kitchen items.

We store all our dishes in lower cabinets to make it easier for our kids to do the dishes chore. we also make sure we have plenty of plastic plates and silverware for up to 6 kids. Although, some of them have disappeared...probably eaten by the trashcan. I would LOVE to have enough for 6 kids and 3 meals but we're not there yet.

I love the the Ikea kids' plastic tableware! 1. It's awesome bright colors. 2. Microwave and dishwasher safe. 3. There are 6 different colors! Why do the colors matter? I may or may not color code my children...and I have 4-6 kids at any given time.

I also found cheap water bottles in the Target dollar spot {they didn't have them this year but I found the same ones at the Dollar General for ~$.50 more}. My kids get milk for breakfast and watered down juice for lunch and dinner so water bottles are a must for any other time during the day. We have like 6 extras right now because water bottles are one of the things we send with our fosters when they get to leave.

I only let my kids have one cup a day. If they can't find it then they don't get a drink until they find it OR they get their water bottle. The next thing we started when we had 6 kids, most of whom were bigger, was "cup spots". My kids knew they were supposed to put their cups on the counter next to the fridge but if they weren't using "their color" that day, they could't remember which one was theirs. Soooo, I put scrapbook sticker letters on the counter. You can't see them from far away but they're easy for the kids to see up close.

I'm hoping to find more and more things that can help us function with more ease and be ready for what foster care may bring us.

Filed Under: as Jules is DIYing, as Jules is living, Foster Care and Adoption, Homemaker, Organizing, Parenting, The ones about the Rothacher Home

Foster Family Organization: Meal Time Essentials

April 28, 2016 by Jules Leave a Comment

One of the organizational systems in our house is this lazy susan on the table.

It helps makes keep essentials on the table so we don't have to locate them every meal time. The items we keep in the center of the table are napkins, hand sanitizer, salt and pepper, hot plates, and occasionally vitamins. I always loved this heavy wooden lazy susan but never bought one. We've used several different plates just sitting on top of the cheap plastic one we already had. It worked okay but the decorative plates I used weren't flat so you couldn't use the entire thing AND if kids turned it too quickly, everything flew off.

I found this awesome metal tray at Wal-Mart on sale. It was inexpensive, matched the look I liked, and was bigger than the plates I'd been using so it worked great. Well, except the part where it was bigger. That meant if things got off centered on the plastic lazy susan under it, it would tip OR it would slide around on it. Easy fit to make this the perfect decorative center piece and organization system for meal time essentials: hot glue! Permanent but not total permanent if I changed my mind later.