Keep track of your home school activities in minutes. Here are 3 tips to help.
Here's what you'll learn in this article:
- Track your home school activities to meet record requirements, notice patterns, and
- Three tips to help you track your home school activities with ease.
- Answers to common questions about tracking your homeschooling.
- Key takeaways for tracking your homeschooling activities.
- Where to learn more about home schooling with more ease and less overwhelm.
Don't Let Tracking Your Home School Activities Cause Overwhelm
Regularly tracking home school activities isn't typically the most exciting aspect of home schooling, but it is necessary and helpful. While it might not be exciting, it doesn't have to be stressful. With a few simple processes you can readily keep track of homeschooling, without spending too much time.
In addition to often being a requirement, there are other benefits to tracking your home school activities. As a caregiver-educator, tracking can help you notice patterns in your children's learning. The moment of reflection can also give you new ideas for learning activities. For your children, tracking will help them build their writing skills and encourage a lifelong habit of noticing and reflecting on how they spend their time.
3 Tips for Easily Tracking Your Home School Activities
Building processes that suit you will help you track your home school activities with more ease and less stress. Here are three tips to get you started:
1. Know What You are Tracking
Record keeping can be thought of in two parts: 1) what your children did in the day and 2) what they made in the day. If there are record keeping requirements with your state, then work from there. The key is to know what you need to track and stick to that.
Generally, when you track what your children did in the day focus on high-level notes for key activities. For example, read The Wind in the Willows, square roots lesson, built a model windmill, etc. Anything tangible that they made in the day can be put in a designated spot for future digitizing.
2. Stick to Just What You Need
Don't let yourself get bogged down by unnecessary extras. If your state only requires samples of your children's work products, then don't overwhelm yourself by documenting each piece.
If you worry that high-level bullet style notes of what your children did in the day, isn't enough, then find a middle-ground for yourself. You can do longer form narrative weekly, monthly, or yearly, but you can give yourself the mental break of knowing that you have what you need covered.
3. Materials that Work
Know what materials work for you and your children for daily tracking. If you love the idea of a paper notebook with a variety of pen colors, but know that you inevitably never have those materials with you when you find a moment to do your daily tracking, then don't force it. Opt for materials that make it easy to track activities.
Be realistic about what materials work. If digital is always with you and your children then opt for that. If you always have a paper notebook at the end of the day as part of your wrap-up ritual, then go with that. Regardless of what format you choose, stick to recording the same information in a consistent way. A daily template is a great option to keep you on track.
FAQs: Track Key Parts of Your Homeschooling Day without Added Stress
How Much Should I Monitor What My Children Track?
It isn't likely that your children's records will ever be needed in an official capacity. With this in mind, their logs can largely remain their own. Make sure your children know that you may review them, and when you do keep the observations to yourself. If there is something you'd do differently, ask your child in an open-ended way about their approach. You can also show them what you do or how others approach it to give them additional ideas.
Why the Focus on Daily Tracking?
Tracking a week's worth of learning activities on recall is harder and takes longer. It is easier and faster to record what happened in that day when it is fresh in your mind. For your children, daily tracking gives them an anchor that the home school day is done, which will help them shift into "home" mode.
Key Takeaways
- Track your home school activities. Tracking is more than rote recording, it is also a way to reflect and see patterns in your home school day.
- Know what to track. Track what your children do and what they make.
- Track what you need. Track at the level of detail needed, so you don't add unnecessary extras to the process.
- Use the right materials. Use what material will actually work for you, not what you think you should use.
Where to Learn More
To keep getting organized with home school check out these 10 tips.
If you would like more information about building home school lessons and experiences that are custom-tailored to your children's needs, consider becoming a member of Crush Home School. With our membership plan, you get monthly guidance delivered to your inbox with downloadable resources and much more. Learn more about becoming a Crush Home School member.