Sarah and I decided to take off most of the Spring from any sort of structured learning, because we've just been so busy with limited-time-only homeschool opportunities -- swimming, bowling, soccer, etc. The plan is to start up again the week after her birthday, and I'll be writing more about that over on the Sarah-homeschool blog at some point this weekend.
For us, summer starts the day after her birthday celebrations finish up, and runs until September 23 -- for people who love the cooler weather of Autumn and early Spring, we sure do stretch summer out for as long as we possibly can!
So my summer session runs about 16 weeks, which can be further broken down into four 4-week segments.
I'm breaking down my plans for this season into 4 main categories: alt ed, music, science, and what I'm thinking of as my distribution requirement, which will be a catch-all sort of category.
Alt Ed:
* read 4 books on alternative ed, write a synopsis/analysis of each one, and discuss them with various alt ed colleagues
* read 4 articles on alt ed, write a synopsis/analysis of each one, and discuss with various alt ed colleagues
Music:
* prep for homeschool music gatherings, family music gatherings, sacred song
* practice each instrument on a regular basis (tentatively 3 times a week each)
* find mentors for each instrument
* do one small research project on music theory
* do one small research project on the history of each type of music I'm drawn to
* find one musician in each musical genre and familiarize myself with their repertoire
Science:
* read 4 books on basic/general science
* finish watching the series on physics I've been watching
* read 3 articles a week from my backlog of science magazines
* keep nature journal with Sarah
* build one thing
Misc:
* finish the books I've got out of the library (intro to blues, prehistory, archaeology, congress, american presidency)
* read 5 newspaper articles a week (or equivalent)
* each week look into one topic in further detail inspired by the above assignment
* read one book (or equivalent) on basic polisci
* prep for the civics class I'll be offering in the fall
* work my way through the New Testament
* watch one program a week related to one of my educational goals
That comes out to just about:
* 1 book a week
* 8 articles a week
* 2 small research projects a week
* 3 videos a week
* 9 music sessions a week
* finishing one misc project every 4 weeks or so
It'll be interesting to see whether that's feasible.
Wow. Um, that's a lot! Good luck :-)
ReplyDelete*grin* Yeah, it is a lot, especially looking at it all written down together
ReplyDeletelike that!
But I find that I go through phases, and I try to be flexible and respond to
what my needs are in that particular phase. There are times when I'm in a
domestic, introverted, contemplative phase, and then I thrive on long, quiet
days at home, crafting and baking and being mostly non-verbal, and a schedule
like the one above would have me feeling anxious, rushed, and sick to my stomach
just looking at it. But right now I seem to be moving into a productive,
take-charge, verbal, intellectual sort of phase, when those long, meandering
days just leave me feeling depressed and antsy. Last time I was in one of these
phases was when I was at TMcAFS, and it lasted around a year, where I was
thriving, balancing a dozen different projects at any given time. And then, of
course, it ended with me trying to keep the school going under impossible
circumstances, and making myself ill in the process -- and until I got sick I
hadn't even noticed how stressed I'd gotten, trying to meet the commitments I'd
made when I was in the midst of a more productive phase.
One of the reasons I'm keeping a separate blog for my current self-education
project is to help me stay more conscious of how I'm feeling and of whether I'm
balanced and gentle enough with myself, this time around. I'm glad to know
you're reading along -- definitely let me know, please, if it ever looks like
I've stopped thriving and started making myself nuts.
And thanks for the luck! :) I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to
Monday!