Planning Ambleside Online + Favorite Planner

Finding a planner is not easy. In high school we would receive a planner at the beginning of the year. I would always start out strong, but I would quickly fail and not use it anymore. This is how I have been with planners ever since. Then in came a planner that actually stuck, that I look at every day, and I am already purchasing a second one.

Before I found Tree House School House I was using my own brain as my mental planner with random notes and ideas written on various pieces of paper. This obviously failed me and was not going to work. I needed something to write down our Ambleside Online schedule, our Wild + Free co-op days, and to jot down ideas.

I started to see Tree House planner on Instagram and thought that it could be something that worked. There is a full calendar page, a habit tracker, a place for morning time, a place for formal lessons, and a place for outings. It hit all the areas I needed most in a planner. It’s beautiful and simple design was exactly what I needed to stay successful and follow through with our daily rhythm and routines.

Here is how I plan:

First, I start with a big picture of the entire year. I go into this prayerfully and have ton as much research as possible before choosing a curriculum. I look at my child and where they are and think about what they want to learn based on their interest. Here is what we have been working our way through this year:

Curriculum choices

Ambleside Online

Good and Beautiful math

All About Reading

Tree House School House Nature Study and Holiday

Preschool (A Year of Playing Skillfully or Let Them Be Little)

Wild + Free Co-op (hikes, art day, holiday, field trips)

Awana for memory verse

Second, I put pencil (never a pen) to planner. I can only plan out about a month or two at a time. We want to stay flexible and leave room for travel, sickness, or the math curriculum might change again. After all, that’s why we homeschool, right?

I divide up what I want to complete during the day. I like to begin the day with Morning Time. This includes Bible, Hymn, Poem, Folk Song, Literature/Tales, Memory Work, Artist, and Composer. I have five days to spread each of these subjects out. Then I move on to Lessons and this includes Math, Reading, Copywork/Language Arts, Geography, History, and a foreign language. Again, I have five days to spread this over. We don’t do each subject every day.

Ok, now that I have the subjects we want to cover, I pull out our Ambleside Online schedule and start to plug it in. (See picture below)

When I am putting our subjects down to paper I tend to go heavier on Monday through Wednesday, because Thursdays are typically co-op days. I leave Friday blank and fill it in during the week of we didn’t complete something and to review. I also like to leave Friday for Preschool days, where we paint, craft, count in a play-based learning environment. This is also a great day to take school at the dining table and have a tea time or outside with a picnic.

We keep each lesson short. Morning time only takes about an hour or less depending on the day. This is where a majority of where we are reading out loud and narrating. Our formal lesson take about 10-15 minutes to complete. I save some of the reading for bedtime, but I like to leave this time open for our free reads.

I also keep in mind the weather and other outings that may need to happen that week. If we are going to be on the road traveling for a field trip or running errands I like to plan for Morning Time on the go. I can elaborate more on that in another blog post.

Lastly, my favorite part, I check off what we complete. Why is checking things off so much fun? Checking it off doesn’t mean we don’t come back to it, but we will always be reviewing and slowly building on top of what we learned.

And that is how I plan. It really is simple and does not have to be complicated. This planner is the number one reason I stay consistent and follow through with our curriculums and outings. Without it I would truly fall apart and likely switch gears much too often.

Grab your planner here! I can guarantee this will help you stay on track and you and your children will have a great year of learning.

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