Our Schedule With Tips and Tricks (from a Stay at Home Mom)

Right now you’re probably on your fourth cup of coffee, or maybe you’ve moved to a glass of wine. No judgement y’all, but I am here to hopefully send some positive vibes your way.

America (actually most of the world ) has been thrown a curve ball and moms everywhere have been hit hard with a new profession: teacher. Many families have two working parents, or toddlers and babies running around as well, and suddenly the requirement of adding “school teacher” to your many hats seems completely overwhelming. Parents already do so much, it’s hard to imagine juggling another role. I get it…if homeschooling was never on your agenda or radar, then this is completely foreign and unknown to you.

One of the questions I have often received as a stay at home mother for many years now, is what our daily schedule looks like. And while we were not currently homeschooling, I have previously set aside time in the past to homeschool my three year old a bit and I also work from home — so our daily rhythm has a little of everything and can appeal to different families.

Additionally, I am here to motivate you. Homeschooling was actually where the Lord was leading us for this next school year, so getting hit with this wasn’t as much as a hit for us. In my husband’s words, “Well now you can see what it’s all about.” So while I am trying to figure out a lot of this just like you, I’ve embraced it with open arms and want to encourage you with some of the tips and tricks that I’ve found have so far worked, but mostly also share some things that we’ve learned from other homeschooling families that we follow and friends that we chat with. I want to reiterate that it’s okay to feel overwhelmed. I think all of America is there with you and IT IS OKAY.

So what does our daily schedule look like?

6-6:30 am — I wake before the children (unless it was a horrible night of sleep, I’m due any day now). Waking up before our children helps me have my quiet/prayer time, get breakfast started and just have a minute to gather myself. My days flow so much better with this start.
7 am - 8 am - The kids wake up. My oldest and youngest are always up between 7-7:30 but my middle child sleeps in. During this time they get morning television while I make breakfast, start laundry and tidy up anything. We then eat breakfast and soon after the TV goes off.
8 am - 9 am - Get dressed, brush teeth, make beds and clean rooms. I have purposely made sure the kids were all dressed and ready before 9 am this week so that I felt more accomplished and not lazy about this whole quarantine. #butpjsarelifetoo
9 am - 11 am - Start school. Here’s where I am sitting down at our kitchen table to do school work with my oldest two. Our first grader was provided school work and we are just adding to it with crafts, religion lessons and so on. My four year old wasn’t sent home with work, we so are focusing on basics — letter and number recognition, sight words, fun activities and more. Some days this may only take an hour for us, it truly just depends.
11 am - 12:15 pm - Outside play!
12:15 pm - 1 pm - Lunch time (we have always done lunch around 12:15). After lunch we either head back outside for a bit, have some quiet play time or even maybe a little 20 minute screen time.
1 pm - 3 pm - This has always been quiet time in our home. My toddler still naps during this time while our four and six year old girls have to either A) nap B) play independently in their rooms C) quietly play together. There is a no screen time rule during this and if you have older children who still need to complete work, this is a great time.
3 pm - 4:30/5 pm - Outside play! Some days we play longer and some days we come in sooner (mostly during normal "life” when we have extra curricular activities). Our evening outside time also depends on the dinner prep I have to do.
5 pm - 7:15 pm - Dinner prep/ Dinner/ Extra — the kids either do something like play dough, play in their rooms or watch a movie while I cook dinner (unless they can stay outside with daddy). We eat dinner around 6 pm and sometimes during this time of the year we will head back outside for more play time depending on the weather and our schedules.
7:15 pm - 8:15 pm - Dinner/Bath/Bed

Tips and Tricks

Have a toddler? If you’re trying to do school work with a toddler around, I’ve incorporated an idea that many homeschool families I follow do as well. Designate certain toys for school time and pack them up. Thankfully we already had boxes of toys put up just for different reasons, and then I went around with extra clear bins and put up more toys to save for school time. We have an animal box, wooden trains and blocks, shape sorter, wooden farm box and so on. Save puzzles and fun learning toys for this time. It helps alleviate toys from their room and makes things “exciting” again. Store them away and designate the toys as school toys!
Remember that homeschooling is not a typical 8 hour day. In our conversations recently with many homeschool families, and with the many I’ve followed on Instagram for years, many are done by lunch time or shortly after. Many homeschool families do not even have to work much on Fridays. Cut yourself some slack and remember that 8 hours at school makes up for helping 30 kids in a class, transitions to activities, recess and so on. We are supposed to be doing the best we can with what we have during this odd season of life. Give yourself grace!
You’re not supposed to replace your child’s teacher. Most students were sent home with packets or they will be doing school work online with their usual teacher. Don’t feel you have to pull out all the stops as your child’s teacher. If you want to add fun activities, crafts and more - then go for it. If you’re a working mama who is struggling to balance it, stick to the basics. You didn’t sign up to homeschool your children, you don’t have to replace the teacher completely.
Embrace this time. It sounds crazy I know. Everyone is going to be stuck together for a very long time. Every day, registered homeschoolers get to attend co-ops, sports, dance lessons and so on. Moms may get a break here and there on an average stay home mama/homeschool day. But here we are all stuck together — embrace it. Find the beauty in it and even when it’s hard, you don’t have to let them know that.
Remember their feelings. You never know how they feel about this. They may secretly LOVE this extra time and attention from you. They may be thriving without the pressures of every day life (sports, busy calendars, bullying, etc…). Or perhaps they really miss their sense of normalcy. Whatever it is, don’t show them your frustrations. Don’t tell them things that can leave an impact. Treasure the time together and make beauty from something that seems so hard!
Routines will fall into place. Things will get easier. Your toddler will come to understand that it’s quiet time during school work (I’m living on a prayer for this one). I firmly believe that if we stick to a rhythm, it will get easier each and every day.
Organization. If you suddenly feel overwhelmed by all of the extra papers and books, then find a place to organize things and all of the learning materials you may have gathered. For us, this is a bookshelf in our dining room that was already established as a “school shelf” and we have another storage area in the dining room for books and more as well.
Work from home. I squeeze in most of my work from home after the kids are in bed, during my morning quiet time, sometimes during nap time and periodically while they may have their free time.
Progress, not perfection. It’s about getting up daily and doing some work. Don’t shoot for perfection, especially during such a trying and emotional time for us all. Shoot for progress each day!