How Do I Create A Daily Schedule for Home School?

How do you create a daily schedule for home school? Here is a step-by-step approach. 

Here's what you'll learn in this article: 

• Learn how you can experience the ease and learning benefits of a daily schedule for home school.
• Three strategies to make a daily home school schedule work you and your family. 
• Answers to common questions to keep your home school schedule flexible and avoid too much structure.
• Key takeaways caregivers can use today to start or adjust their daily schedule for home school.
• How to learn more about approaches to get the most out of your home school days.

Create a Daily Schedule for Home School to Give Your Days Ease and Facilitate the Learning You Want to Happen

A daily schedule for home school provides your children with the comfort and security that comes from routine. It provides you with the confidence that you are giving your children a well-rounded home school experience that is filled with everything important to your family. 

The trick to an effective daily schedule is to tailor it to your needs and see it as more than a schedule but a ritual around school and learning. Your children will look back on this home school experience. What do you want them to remember? Do you want them to remember days at home with little distinction between home and school, weekdays and weekends, and chores and learning activities? Or, do you want them to remember days rich with experience—social adventures on the weekends, reading and discussing books during the day, and challenging practical life activities like converting measurements to double a recipe?

Creating a daily schedule for home school is a powerful way to achieve what you want from the home school experience.

3 Strategies for Creating a Daily Home School Schedule That Works for You

If you don’t have a daily home school schedule, or you are looking to adapt your daily home school schedule to get more of what you want, here are three strategies to try:

1. Let a Daily Schedule Set You Free by Using Anchors Across the Day

We all have the same amount of time each day, yet some of us seem to get more out of each day than others. While some of the reasons might be out of our control, there are strategies that you can employ to get what you want out of each day.

One strategy is to use a daily schedule for home school to anchor your days, so you have the space to be creative with how you fill them. Anchors are broad strokes to block your time, which gives you just enough structure, without becoming over scheduled (i.e., shifting tasks every 10-minutes for an entire home school day). The anchors you choose can be flexible to your needs. For example, morning ritual, lesson, free work cycle, lunch, lesson, free work cycle, and end of day ritual (see below for a sample daily home school schedule).

When you are first starting home school or recognize that you need a change, then experiment with your anchors. Maybe lessons work best consecutively? Maybe you want a lunch ritual? Spend a week trying out different options, and get input from your children.  

2. Make Conscious Decisions About What to Include in Your Daily Home School Schedule?

If you are starting home school or transitioning to a new grade, then chances are you need a daily schedule that fits your needs and desires for the home school experience that you want to provide your children. Meeting minimum educational requirements is one part of the home school experience.

There are numerous opportunities and approaches to learning across a range of topics to add to the home school day so you can make learning a valued skill that lasts a lifetime. What learning experiences do you want for your child beyond meeting minimum educational requirements? You might want to make space for art or building projects. How do you want each day to flow? You might want a mixture of time working together and independently. Make a list of the experiences and flow you want in in your home school experience. 

3.  Think Critically About How to Fit What You Want from Home School Into Your Daily Schedule

There is little benefit for your children or you in finishing the home school day as quickly as possible just to “be done”. The latter also does not value learning with a creative and curious mindset because it treats learning as a task, not a practice. It removes the intrinsic value from allowing your children to explore and wonder.

With that in mind, think expansively about what you want your children to learn about how they create their days and use their time. There is a tremendous opportunity in choosing to home school to create depth to each day that provokes critical thinking and creativity. Experiment with using fitting your desires for homeschool into your desired anchors each day. Try it and see what needs tweaking.

Reflect on what worked and ask your children for input too. Remember that you can always adapt and flex the daily home school schedule to meet your children’s evolving needs.

Sample Daily Home School Schedule

This is one of countless possible daily schedules for home school with 'anchors' as the top-level bullets and 'desired experiences' as bullets within each anchor. As you create what works for your family, keep in mind we are all unique and emphasize your strengths.

• Morning Ritual (8:00-8:30am): 
  • Share in a morning greeting that includes the hope for the day, a gratitude for the day, and anything that is worrying about the day
  • Spend time reading aloud from challenging reading material 
  • Select and complete one page from a work book that covers the common core of the grade
• Lesson (8:30-9:00am):
  • Give a prepared lesson in art, culture and geography, math, language arts, science, or practical life
• Independent reading (9:00-9:30am):
  • Student reads a book of their choice that isn’t mastered (e.g., a 6th grader does not read picture books for 30-minutes as part of home school)
• Independent work cycle (9:30am-12:00pm):
  • Student can select from many prepared activities across subjects
• Lunch (12:00-12:30pm):
  • Student prepares lunch
• Lesson (12:30-1:00pm):
  • Complete practice math equations
  • Give a prepared lesson in art, culture and geography, math, language arts, science, or practical life
• Independent work cycle (1:00-1:45pm):
  • Student can select from many prepared activities across subjects
• Afternoon Ritual (1:45-2:00pm):
  • Student completes log of activities for the day (this also allows easy meeting of any end-of-year state reporting requirements) 

FAQs: Overcoming Challenges When Using a Daily Home School Schedule

What if There Isn’t Enough to Fill a Whole Day?

If you have a long list of desires from strategy #2 above, but you only want to use the morning to anchor your home school day from strategy #1 above, then you might need to adjust expectations. If your current home school day is typically about meeting the minimum education requirements, then introduce trying more as an experiment to try. You’ll also likely get immediate buy-in if you ask them what they desire from home school (e.g., maybe they want more science experiments or reading from you).

What if There Is too Much for a Single Day?

If you are having the opposite problem where your days are too full, then consider spreading extra learning activities over the month (e.g., art on Friday) or combining learning activities (e.g., tracing historical artifacts to blend history and art). You can also consider expanding the day, but you do want to be cautious about burn-out.

This is a great opportunity to follow your child’s lead. If they want more, try an expanded schedule for a week. Alternatively, you can consider increasing the difficulty of the material. If they want to read all day, then maybe it is time for more challenging books.

What if There Is a Change in the Day that Interferes with the Usual Daily Home School Schedule?

The benefit of having a daily home school schedule is that it makes it easy to flex when the unexpected happens or you want to plan a special experience (e.g., traveling). Consider the minimum activities in each of your anchors and what is reasonable to still include.

For example, if your child is expected to write each day, can they write a review of the novel field trip experience? Alternatively, if reading is expected each day, can this still occur in the car on the way to the unexpected appointment?

If you are having challenges getting started each day, see this article on starting home school on time each morning.

Key Takeaways

• Use anchors. Break the day into anchors or chunks to make it easier to follow the same daily schedule for home school. 
• Focus on the experiences. Crushing home school is not about meeting the minimum educational requirements, it is about creating a day rich in learning activities.
• Set realistic expectations. Be open to experimenting with different anchors and experiences as you create your daily home school schedule.
• Get feedback and support. If your daily schedule for home school isn’t working, reflect on what needs to change and look to what others have tried, so you can make adjustments.

Where to Learn More