The first day of school is quickly approaching, so I have started our schedule two weeks in advance just to get ready for the onslaught of the first few days of distance learning. The new school schedule really wrecked havoc on our homeschool plans last school year. Since the teachers introduced a ton of electronic applications to complete school work, it was so easy for my kiddie to find herself on Netflix, or Disney plus. They also offered online books, instead of physical books. The problem with using electronics and only electronics was that everything would take hours to complete. That was torture for me. I don’t have anything against electronics, I love them! We embrace them and enjoy playing tons of games, audiobooks, and electronic books, as well. We just moved from 15 minute or less worksheets to 60 plus minutes of electronic work and that was tough. Once again, I am writing this blog right before the distance learning experience begins. I will make sure to post on how I work along with the electronic instruction.

The first thing I did was purchase the book: What your Second Grader Needs to Know. This book is available for each grade level. It explains Common Core and gives you a ton of information, stories and helpful strategies to instruct on the subject your child need to learn at their grade level. I also ordered different work books so that we could complete worksheets for grammar, spelling, math, reading comprehension and geography. I will share a picture of the books below.

Our schedule is all over the place. We can’t wake up as early as I would like, so we start the school work from 9am or 10am. On our bad days we start school at 2pm. We try to complete all of the subjects that are on the schedule, but it’s tough. This is our schedule:

Grammar: I use this YouTube Video Along with the grammar worksheet. I use the chalk board to add the definition of a grammar term, like this one:

Math – I have a ton of tools that I use for math. When my daughter was ten months old my husband and I made a learning tower. We followed this Plan. My dad had all of the tools we needed, so we only spent $50 on creating the tower. Because we had left over pieces we created some peg boards for counting. The peg boards were so easy to make. We just drilled the holes in the wood pieces, I sanded them, and painted them and then added little pegs. I purchased the pegs at Michaels.

We also use different geometric shapes to work on 3D shapes and shape name learning. We have a Hundred Board that I purchased from Lakeshore that we continue to use for skip counting and addition and subtraction. I use this Website to print out a free addition chart. They also have an addition and subtraction chart in the What your Second Grader needs to know book. Once they get those charts down, adding and subtraction will be easier. Second grade learns focus on learning their tenth, hundred and thousand places, so we are also working on that with different tools, like counting blocks.

ART– for art we use different media. We paint, color, watercolor, and draw. I use YouTube for most of the drawing and painting tutorials since I am not a good artist.

Geography and History– I am reading the subjects (World geography, American history and geography) in the What your Second Grader needs to know book and I also found a great bingo game at Target recently. It is so fun, and since we are learning about the states this month, it is useful. Here it is. I also found a dry erase USA Map sheet at Michaels and we are using that as well to fill in with the workbook as well.

Reading, Writing, Spelling and Reading Comprehension– We use the workbooks for these, and I will add the picture of all the books we use presently. We are using spelling lists to help with introduction to vocabulary and spelling tricks to help supplement the workbooks. Writing is a little tough for us, since it’s hard for me to carve out time for writing in our journals. My daughter chose a planner at Target. She really wanted it, but since it was $15, I told her that if she promises to write in it daily then we would purchase it. We did purchase it, but she has only written in it a few times. I have to remind her of her promise, which isn’t so bad because it will help to reinforce accountability and integrity. For reading we separated some books in a little book basket so we can make time to read. Although my daughter usually reads before bedtime.

Spanish- For Spanish we are meeting with a few neighbors while we practice distance learning to speak Spanish and practice our reading and vocabulary, introductions and common phrases.

Science- we are using the good and the beautiful. Right now we are working on the Space lesson plan.

This is not a perfect schedule. We don’t finish every single subject every day because THINGS happen. The best way I have found to get the work done is by playing. But, because I know school will start back up I don’t want to instill bad habits, I want the focus to be a primary habit that gets learned and practiced. It’s difficult, yet pretty awesome. I also ordered a special chair from Lakeshore to help with her energetic nature. It’s the flex chair, here is the Link.

Let me know if any of these books helped in the comments. Also, if you have any tools or tricks that you use that are helpful, I would appreciate those as well.