Finish Strong
Spring is in the air – the school year is almost done. My goals from the beginning of the school year seem a distant memory.
I need to find the strength to finish strong the race still ahead of me.
What do you do to push through these last few weeks of winter and school? Please share your advice, suggestions, or tips with us.
Let’s help one another to finish strong.
Molly Green gave me 5 copies of the book Molly Makes $7 Slow Cooker Suppers Quick and Easy to give away! I really enjoy this e-book. My favorite part is the test kitchen suggestions. Real moms tried each recipe and wrote about how it worked at their house and if they made any changes. I have to say nothing brings more calmness to my mind on a busy day than the smells of dinner cooking away in the crock pot.
Five lucky readers will win their own copy of Molly Makes $7 Slow Cooker Suppers Quick and Easy!
Leave a post in the comments section below – with your thoughts on finishing the school year strong and we’ll enter you into this random drawing – next Friday, March 17th.
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PS: Even if you don’t have any advice, just say “pick me” to be entered.
Comments (20)
Hi, here in the UK we don’t finish school until July, so more than a few weeks left. But getting through the weeks of Winter are tough wherever you are in your curriculum. What motivates us is looking for signs of Spring and New Life in our garden and out and about. There is life after the weeks of having to be indoors on grey days and only doing table/book work. How wonderful to be able to go out and and clear ground, and prepare the way for seeds to be planted. In the middle of our homeschooling year it breathes New Life into our studies and puts a new vigour in our step (and even more motivation to get book work done so we can go outside and relax in the great outdoors!)
This year, we have taken a week where we just play outside. It’s one of the 1st nice weeks since winter started and the kids are just ready to be outside. So, they’ve spent the week outside and I’ve worked on organizing/cleaning up the bookshelfs and making sure all the papers are in their proper folders and spending a little extra time sewing. Next week, we’ll be ready to go.
We school year round at our house so it gives us an excuse to enjoy the spring weather before the heat of a Texas summer hits. I think what keeps us going is that the children can see that they only have a small section of some of their workbooks left and it motivates them to finish. Well, that and the fact that if they get done their work quickly each day, they get more outside play time. I motivate myself by looking at new curriculum ideas for next year.
Finishing the school year strong. I feel as if since after the holiday break things are going well for us. It gets harder and harder with the warm weather calling us, ME outside. We even school out on the porch as much as we can. I am not worried about finishing every subject, but that they have a solid understanding of the materials covered like math. I am fine with spending lots of extra time on a concept as long as they understand. That is more important to me than “just finishing” a book to finish it.
Our children have their standardized tests in April. We work hard until them. This year after the tests, we will be focusing moreintensely on writing and stopping some subjects(Thinking skills and vocabulary)until next year.
I am realizing that I have tried for too long to do too much. So, what we are doing to finish strong is to leave out the “extras” that aren’t necessary and focusing on the core. We are all more relaxed and enjoying school a little more. Then, as we have additional time, we are adding the extras in. However, in our house, we need to work on math for my oldest and reading for my youngest year round…if not…they really struggle in the fall and we have many tears.
I also stay motivated by planning out curriculum for the next year. When the weather gets nice, we do try to get out more and take some field trips. It helps remedy the ‘cabin fever’ from staying inside so much through the winter!
We pretty much school year round. We recenlty got out of missions and moved twice, as we stayed with my MIL until we could find a house to purchase. We are pushing through by piecing together units. We actually still have most of our school supplies packed. The room the school supplies are in, needs to be finished with dry wall….hmmm..I wonder how long it will be till that drywall goes up? I’m trying to form a co-op in the area. We live in the country, when we meet with other homeshoolers it’s a long drive. One of our daughter’s is graduating college in May, she’s graduating with a 3.8GPA! We did homeschool her. She will be getting married in September too. We are excited, as they have decided to make a commitment not to kiss until their wedding day, which is unheard of nowadays. We will continue to piece our units together, as we have much traveling to do over the next few months.
This is our first year home schooling, coming from public school. It’s been tough at times transitioning back to everyone at home all the time. At times I just think if I can just get one page of math out of the kids a day then I am successful, even if laundry is spread throughout the house, dishes line the kitchen counter, and we’re in pajamas at 5pm when my husband gets home from work!
We’re now heading into the last 10 weeks or so of school. I’m finally figuring out some strategies that are getting us a little farther each day LOL! I’m a little less stressed, the kids are a little happier, and the house is a little more presentable (if you ignore the construction going on where my husband decided to knock out a wall!).
So as I finish up my first year of this adventure, it’s encouraging to see that we are indeed gaining ground. The kids have improved in their struggling areas from last year and we have survived! In my final attempt to end the year on a good note, I am trying to piece together a good two week Medieval Time unit study to throw ourselves into. I hope on that vein, we can end our first school year with some great home school memories.
This time of year Istart giving little breaks in assingments, such as “you may skip any 4 math problems on the page” or “you can take that quiz orally instead of written”. Small things, but they sound like a big deal. We all are getting tired of the same things, so I try to change it up just a little. I also offer the incentive of getting to start next year’s books if this year’s gets finished early. That seems to be a big motivator. Starting the next grade with a chapter under your belt already feels good!
I use workboxes, and the structure of that system keeps me from cutting corners. I can change up what we do if we need something fresh to inspire us, but it helps me make sure we continue to do all of our subjects. Another thing I do is start the year early so that we have more wiggle room throughout the year for days off. Then if the winter doldrums hit, we can do something fun for a day or a few days, be refreshed, and not be off track for finishing up when we want to (usually the end of May). Plus the shorter summer break means the kids don’t lose much proficiency and don’t need tons of review every fall (which we start mid-July when they are getting tired of the heat of summer!). One last thing that encourages our days is to play a game at lunchtime. We all look forward to it, and it encourages us to get our work done. Merry 🙂
This time of year is so difficult for us. The weather here is perfect for playing outside, by summertime it’s too hot, and though we’re over half way done there’s still a way to go. I love to look ahead to new curriculum, but finding ways to keep the girls going with any enjoyment is hard. Rewards come as books are finished or sections of curriculum are completed. This way they get motivation throughout the school year, and more rewards as each subject tends to come to an end at different times.
We take the fall off instead of the summer, so we’re not finishing up right now, but the spring is getting to the kids and there are days that getting through school is a chore. So what helps us is to be flexible. We might do school when we get up, or we might spend the morning outside and do school in the afternoon, and some days we skip and double up the next. If it keeps everybody working hard, the little break is not wasted time!
My daughter has been counting up on the calandar how many days until she finishes each of her books! Spring is in the air.
It’s still -30 C here and we’re all a bit nutsy from being cooped up in the house! I don’t feel like I have any great advice, but – pick me!
I am staying strong by reading others encouraging advice!
Oddly enough, we don’t take a summer break. I am not certain where we finish and where we begin. But what I DO know is that we take smaller breaks which require us to constantly seek moments of encouragement and excercise our dilligence. This has been a great practice for my children and mot importantly, for myself.
We’ve had sickness so it’s a struggle to get back on track. We did go to see Charlotte’s Web by Theater Works. We have raked a flower bed and plan to do some more soon. Plus it’s almost time to be thinking of the garden…to start seeds or not to start seeds???…that is the question.
This is important to me. In January and February we usually get in a slump. It is hard to want to do school some days, even for Mom’s. LOL In March we start to see the end of the tunnel. The kids know how many days of school we have left until summer break and we all seem to gather steam to push through to the end. We love taking walks and seeing the glory of God creation in the nature blooming and growing around us. It is good to be outside. We also plan on attending a homeschool convention, and for the first time we plan on taking the whole family. We are all looking forward to that.
I am making sure the boys finish all their work each day and checking that makes sure they don’t skip things they might “get away with” if I don’t check. Consistency is the key in our house along with having the computers and other electronics not available until all schoolwork is done and checked by Mom. Now that motivates my boys BIG time.
I hope I win. We love crockpot meals, especially on Sundays, so we can come home to dinner hot and yummy and waiting for us.
We WERE in a rut but then a few months ago I mapped out a major plan to get everything done before my husband comes home from his deployment in late May. It is a great motivator to be able to spend two weeks with Dad and NOT do school!!! 🙂