Our questions for the Blog Cruise this week are: "Do you separate your school area from your home area?  How do you keep from having your school materials from spreading out all over your home?" I did a post 3 weeks ago called Our Semi-Detached Home and School. That post has a lot of pictures of our home and may explain some things further... check it out if you missed reading it when I posted it.

Ok... this weeks questions.
The answer to the first question is No.
The answer to the second question is our workboxes help contain some of it, but we have school materials all over the house.

Thank you very much for reading.






Just kidding. You didn't really think I would just leave it at that did you???


First I want to say that our school started very differently than it ended up. I got my Elementary Education degree and was a teacher in a small Christian school for one year before I got married and had children. When my children were old enough for school and we decided to homeschool I set up a traditional classroom in our home... it was all I knew to do. I made bulletin boards, not that they are bad, and had a little desk for my daughter and it was to much school at home instead of homeschool.
We live in our "school". Our "school" is our home. Most of the education takes place at the dining room table. In order to do school we have to make sure the table is cleared off after breakfast. Then we get the books out and get going. Then to have lunch we clean up again... at least partly, then eat. Then clean up from lunch and finish up school. Then clean up from school so we can eat dinner together. That sounds like a lot of work... but it's not really.


Why? Because of our workboxes. The boys get one workbox out and do the work in it, take the workbox tag and flip it to the DONE side and put it on the floor next to me. I made the tags 2 sided recently to make it more convenient. I grade and record the stuff in the workbox, update it for the next day if needed and slide it on the floor over to the bookcase behind us. When it is lunch time we don't have a ton of stuff on the table. We put the finished boxes back on the bookcase with the tags turned over to the side that says DONE.

I also keep my own "workbox." It contains the teacher "stuff" that I use every day: the school log where I write down what the boys accomplish for school each day, the binders and folders with the teacher books, answer keys and such, and papers I need for the week. On the weekends I print out all the papers we need for the week and have them in folders then I can reload the workboxes as I update them each day. Then they are ready for the next day of school.



We have books in the hall upstairs that don't fit on the shelves... I am working on this problem by trying to store books we don't need right now. First though, I want to make sure the books are logged in to the book collector software I have so I know what books are in each box. We have books and bookcases everywhere.
Some times school takes place on the floor or on the living room furniture. Here the kids are exploring some new to us used books I brought home from a surplus store. On most Thursdays the boys and I do school in the living room when my daughter has sewing class. School takes place all over the house. The house is our school. The basement.. phys. ed. - the Wii and other exercise equipment when we can't get out to walk. The living room for all of school some days, we used the t.v. for our IEW writing dvd's this year... enjoying our classes with Andrew Pudewa, the pianos are in the living room for music practice as a family, the game closet and some bookcases can also be found there. The kitchen for the cooking and science classes a lot of days.

Sometimes school, and thus our home, is a little messy. Sometimes the science projects need to be left out. We often have books or other projects left out. But I would rather have these problems than send my children off to school to be taught by others and not have as much influence on their education or the chance for them to interact with their siblings. That is priceless to me... so I put up with a little mess. If we need to get the place cleaned up... we all pitch in and call it Home and Life Management (like home ec. but much more than that).

When school is done it is mostly packed away on the shelves or in my workbox and we can eat dinner together as a family and enjoy our evenings, which also take place all over the house.

We live in our "school". Our "school" is our home.

Thanks for reading. If you are interested in seeing what my other crew members have to say about this topic then click the button at the top of the post. The link will take you to the Blog Cruise label on the TOS Crew blog and will be updated with this topic sometime early tomorrow, Tuesday. Thanks and leave me a comment. I hope this has been a help and a peak into the reality of our homeschooling.



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I have been so busy I forgot to do my  School Room post. I was commenting on my friend and TOS Captain Heidi's blog at Reviews and Reflections.  It was seeing her post this afternoon that prompted me to work on this. This is part of what I said in the comment. "Not only do we not have a separate classroom but my dining room looks like a classroom. NO "House Beautiful" here. Our house looks like some I have seen in the homeschool blog world but definitely not like the homes in the magazines. I like pretty, too, but functional is much better. I am sure we are all doing the best we can with what we have to work with." No, our home is not perfect but I am thankful for it nonetheless. 12 years ago we were living in a 10 x 40 mobile home with 4 kids. Remembering that makes me thankful for our Habitat home.

We have books everywhere. These are the living room bookcases. We have 3 more like the large one on the left in our upstairs hallway. We also have one bookcase in every bedroom (our daughters actually have 2 in their bedroom), too. I also have books in boxes and tubs all over the house that don't fit on the shelves. They are under tables in my room, in front of the closet in my bedroom, stacked next to the bookshelves in the hallway and in the basement, too.

Below you see our dining room table being used for Science class. The boys are "playing" with our physics K'nex sets. Our table often looks like this. This is our primary place for doing school.



These are our workboxes. Not ideal. Not pretty. Not expensive. A mishmash of a few plastic containers we already had and a bunch of various sized boxes. They work for us though. They are easy and cheap to replace. With my husband out of work they will not be replaced with more expensive ones any time soon. But they do the job and keep us organized, especially me. I have our week planned out, the pages all printed that we will need, the resources gathered and I prep the boxes and have them all ready for the boys. 

When the boys are done their workboxes they set them on the floor next to the end of the table where I sit. I look them over, grade them if needed, write anything I need to write in my school log, and then prep the box for the next day.

One of the things we like about homeschooling though is that education can occur all over the house and outside the house also. In the recliner in the living room, in the kitchen for science experiments and cooking, all over the house for Home and Life Management, outside for Home and Life Management things like car and house repair as well as gardening, in the basement on our exercise equipment and at Winterthur where we do Nature study and get exercise walking in the lovely gardens.

This is our white board... this is now the little white board. I use this for writing the assignments for the day on that the boys do. I did move it from this wall to the wall over the workbox shelf. The large whiteboard below is now on this wall. This also shows how I display our art study. I print the art on 8x10 paper and put them on the wall in plastic pages. The art pages are also now on the wall over the workboxes.

This is our new whiteboard. It is 4' x 6'. I especially got it for our writing program, Institute for Excellence in Writing. They boys say they like writing now. That in itself is a miracle. Here you see it decorated for the arrival of my friend Becky. This is a piece of shower board we got at Lowes and had them make one cut for us to make it fit our wall. It works great and was cheaper than the small whiteboard I bought last year... about 1/2 the cost actually.



This is my workbox. Sort of. Here I keep the school log with the workbox plans for the week and the record of what we do each day, oh and our attendance charts. It also holds all the resources we will use this year on a regular basis. This includes my History unit study planner, my Science unit study planner, our lapbook information portions (in report covers), the teacher books for our writing curriculum, folders with resources for our Art, Music, Hymn, and Poetry study, the Great Science Adventures books for science, and a bunch of other stuff.

Well that is our School Room. I hope you enjoyed seeing it. Check out the other School Rooms by clicking the button at the top of the page or by clicking the calendar below.  Next week is Student Photo Week.

I hope you liked my review of how I plan my week and write assignments on the board.
Debbie

This was a productive week. After the week we had busy with my Mother and volunteering at NGA the week of the 12th (see my Blast from the Past this coming Tuesday to see what that is) I was anxious to get back to a regular schedule on the 19th. That did not happen due to the events of early Monday morning to see about that, if you have not read it, go to my post: A Rude Awakening. Thank goodness this week had no new surprises.

We made progress in Bible using our Grapevine O.T. Overview Level 4 books - finishing lesson 13 on Moses and doing lesson 14 on The Deliverance.

In History we have been working on lessons from American Heritage Education Foundation (a TOS Homeschool Review Crew product). We did The Declaration of Independence, and the United States Flag.

We finished our Historical Fiction Sarah's Wish: see the review here if you missed it TOS Homeschool Crew Review - Sarah's  Wish ... it was a great book!

In Science we did not accomplish as much as in some other subjects, but we read a library book called Elements, Compounds & Mixtures by Jim Patten and we did lesson 5 and the unit one wrap-up in Christian Kids Explore Chemistry

Four of 5 days we did Young Scholar's Guide to Composers. We are doing the Baroque Composers and we covered Handel and Bach this week. We like this product (another review product for TOS). This is one we will be doing all year, the boys are enjoying it so much they requested we do the whole curriculum. Watch for the review of the Bright Ideas Press items (due by next Friday).

On Monday we always do Art Appreciation and this week we did a page from the HOAC Art Appreciation - Activity 7 - Elements of Art shutterbook. For this lapbook mini you choose one work of art, Fra Angelico this time since we are finishing our study on him, and describe the work of art using the 7 elements of art used in the lapbook.

We also did Writers Workshop (also from Bright Ideas Press and also a TOS review product) two days last week. We did lesson 2 on Caldecott and Newberry award winning books and lesson 3 on Webbing.

Then the boys had their individual tasks - which I put in their workboxes each day:
Christopher has started his Saxon Algebra 1/2. He worked on his Daily Grams, and did his Wordsmith Apprentice on the days we did not do Writer's Workshop. He also did some pages from ABC Teach including: some pages on capitalization and Nursery News (yes, another TOS review product). Christopher also worked on a story he is writing.

Nathan was working on finishing his Geometry from last year but has now moved on to this year's math: Teaching Textbooks Alegbra II, which we are thankful to be able to borrow from a friend. He is using Easy Grammar and did that this week, he is doing Wordsmith and completed some lessons in that when we were not doing Writer's Workshop. He worked some on his website and he read some of a courtship book Old-fashioned courtship & how it works today by Jeff and Marge Barth, for the course we require in High School which we call Building Life Relationships. He also did a couple of day of Typing Tutor 10. Also Nathan worked on some pages for a TOS review product we are doing called DISCOVER: ACT's Career Planning Program there are worksheets and a web based inventory program (again, watch for the upcoming review).

I hope you enjoyed our Weekly Wrap-up - to join us and do your own or read about others homeschool weeks go here.

Debbie

Have you noticed, read about, tried the newest rage in homeschool organizing? Before I received this to review this year I had seen a number of homeschool blogs using this system and was interested. I decided that since it was fairly early on in the year that we would be reviewing this, that I would wait until I got the original e-book and could read it before trying the system out.

I like to support the small homeschoolers doing a good job and Sue has set up a system that has breathed new life into our homeschool. Since my daughters have graduated things in our home have deteriorated homeschool wise. I became more and more irresponsible, especially in the area of keeping up with the school log, writing down what we did each day for school. I am one of the many that have tried The Workbox System and found that it not only helped us get a lot more done each day but it helps me be more responsible to be prepared for each day of school and grade, correct, check their work to make sure it is all completed and then to write it in my log.

The system basically works like this. You put the curriculum/books you are using for homeschool into plastic tubs. As you can see from the picture of our workboxes and shelves I could not afford at this time to get the system set up like I would want. I would really prefer see-through drawers that will hold our books without bending them. but, I had to use what I had and so we have a mishmash of boxes from popcorn and Ziploc bags. I then put paper over the fronts so the boys could see their number/picture tags and the work with mom tags better. To make sure the paper did not rip from taking the tags off and on I put a strip of packing tape over the paper. I also used the packing tape to "laminate" the workbox numbers, pictures and other things to put in and on the boxes.  

These are the drawers I want: Sterilite 3 Drawer Wide Organizer You can get them at Walmart and maybe other places.



I also use note cards that I covered with packing tape so I can use a write on wipe off marker to leave the boys notes instead of using sticky notes. They are then reusable. I used note cards from ABCTeach (another TOS review item was a one month subscription), there are a few free ones to try such as:

• Notecard: A Note From Mom Two notecards per page, one with red hearts, one with blue stars. Both with the title, "A Note From Mom".
• Notecard: Reminder Notes "Don't Forget", "Remember to..." with colorful illustrations

Sorry to say the best ones are in the members only section. I like the ones I got with lines for writing on them and 4 on a page instead of only 2. Maybe you could find something like this on the internet for free. If I find any I will post about them in a new post later. I might ask my dh for a year's membership. The month was over way to fast to see all the things on there. I did download a bunch, but I missed a whole bunch more.

One thing to note: this system works with kids of all ages. My boys are 12 and 15 and it works great with them. If you go to the link at the bottom of the page and read some of the other TOS Crew reviews on this product you will see how they use it for their elementary and even pre-school children, but finish reading my review first. Also, this can work with any curriculum. We use quite a variety of things, textbooks for math, worksheets, workbooks, reading materials, games, and it works great with it all. It will really keep you organized and it will help you run around less each day looking for things if you have the workboxes all planned out ahead of time.

You can see, on the top shelf, a box for Nathan. This box is for papers that are completed, checked and need to be filed in his notebooks. Christopher has one too but he keeps his over by his school spot. They file their papers once a week on Friday's after school.

The use of the boxes makes it so that you cannot add things to their day and drag school time on and on and it makes it so the children can "see" what has to be done for the day. One of the other features I have found so useful and wonderful is the addition of "fun boxes". I can now use all those resources that I keep forgetting to use! I have a place for them in their workboxes and we are using the resources we already have on the shelves that have been sitting there for years.

When the boys are ready to start school they check in by moving their picture card with their name to the Homeschool 'Begin' envelope and when they are finished everything, they check out by moving it to the 'Finished' envelope. The boys like this and it helps them get mentally prepared for "school time." Time to settle down and learn and stop fooling around.

I used the "Clocking In Template", free when you purchase the e-book, from Sue's website... see the Extra Resources below. I printed the template on card stock and then glued the pictures of the houses to a pocket meant for lapbooks from Homeschool Share. You will need two pockets so I used this link: Library Pockets (2 on one page)

We do not have a white board yet. I had one years ago but it got lost in the move??? Thrown out?? I am not quite sure. I have some Staples reward $$ coming and I am going to spend that on a new white board for us. Until then we have a print out on the wall inside a plastic sleeve... it works!! This is for listing those things we do together before they start on their workboxes.


So they have their numbers on their boxes as they start their day and as they complete each box they remove the number and replace it with a picture. They put the number on the spaces in order on their wall chart which is "laminated." The boys each chose their own pictures. Nathan's is a ship he built with Lego Digital Designer online and Christopher's is a picture of Lego Indiana Jones.

• ALEKS Math 
• Quarter Mile Math
  

You can get more information regarding this system if you View the Video on Sue Patrick's Workbox System.

Purchase Sue Patrick's Workbox System User's Guide Ebook  
The e-book alone costs $19.

Click here to download a pdf of some sample pages from Sue's e-book on the workbox system. You get a 14 page document including the Table of Contents and part of chapter 1 and 2.

I highly recommend getting the e-book. You need to read about the system from it's original source as well as support small homeschooling companies that are developing new things to make our jobs as homeschool mom's more effective.

Extra Resources
When you buy the e-book, and register your copy online, you also get a bunch of extra resources you can download from Sue, including but not limited to:

• Schedule Strip Template  
• Workbox Numbers Template     
• Work with Mom Cards-white skin and brown skin 
• Clocking In Template  
• Curriculum Grid Template  
• Sample Log Grid (filled out) it was very helpful to see it all filled out  
• Log Grid Template  
• Typing Program Downloads
• Pages for Typing Program
• Typing Hands for Keyboard Visual  
• Running Goals Sample for Young/New Runners

Some of these resources can also be purchased as a kit already printed and laminated for you... see the packages she sells here these include the e-book. The prices vary depending on what you want included with the book. They run from $55 - $110.

If you already have the e-book you can buy the starter kits here and there are a few other things on this page as well. The extra suff and starter kits run from
$3.50 - $26

She has answered some FAQ's on this page. 

You can get some information from Sue herself in this recent Sue Patrick Interview. In the interview you can get some information about why Sue set up the workboxes in the first place and what her thoughts are on a few things concerning how to use workboxes

Out of five stars we give The Workbox System:





*** Sue Patrick provided me with the Workbox System pdf and other resources on her website so that I could do my review. Though I received this product for free I have given an honest review of it here in this post.

If you have any questions about the e-book or the extra resources just leave a comment. Since we will be continuing to use this system I will be posting weekly workbox updates with the things I put in my boys boxes.

Also, read the other post my my crew mates here and get some other opinions on this great system.

Debbie