During holiday breaks I take time to evaluate what is working in our yearly homeschool plan, what needs tweaking, and what I may need to add to our schooling. My steps to this begin with an evaluation/test time for my daughter and talking to her about things she has enjoyed in our school time and asking if she has anything she would like to learn.
Next, I evaluate my teaching plan based on goals I made at the beginning of the year. Then, I look for what I can change to make our schooling better in the next term. After my evaluation during winter break I decided to add some curriculum in order to enrich our literature and nature time.
During the fall, my youngest was having lots of sleep issues and it was a struggle for me to be as creative as I needed to be with the program I had built for the term. Adding in a new curriculum has allowed me to be able to teach the way I want to without having as much stress.
In January, we began our new term and after 4 weeks I am able see it how this is going to make our school time richer.
I have several go to materials to assist me in homeschool planning and evaluation. My favorite tool for evaluating a child, who is not yet in kindergarten, is The Kindergarten Toolkit. I am able to use the materials in lessons and track (there are provided instructions) where my student is in her learning. Another great resource is your states local guidelines and benchmarks. As homeschoolers we may deviate from these a bit. The guidelines are a great resource for planning core subjects.
Below I have included affiliate links to some of my favorites resources:
Dash Into Learning – A wonderful Phonics Program that starts with new readers to elementary levels. Easy to work with and use at your own pace
Preschool Math at Home – This makes planning math lessons so simple. Many evenings my husband will take over math lessons and all he needs is to quickly look over the provided lesson for a minute and then off they go.
Kindergarten Toolkit – My favorite resource for evaluation, but also great for lessons. I just began using the color and shape sections with my two year old.
