Category: homeschooling

bookkeeping / books / budgeting / family / homeschooling / Kent / Montessori / works for me wednesday

Budgeting for Children: Learning Materials and Beyond

I’m not sure why but I feel led to write about this right now.  We’ll see if Kent sleep schedule agrees.  😉 In my post about our Montessori Inspired Kitchen Setup I shared some of the products we’ve purchased for Kent to use.  We are on a tight budget around here so it is important to pull together nice materials for him without spending a fortune. You can read more about our financial situation by clicking on “Our Money Story” up above.  We follow Dave Ramsey’s teachings and operate on a zero based budget by utilizing the envelope system. We have a line in our budget for “Kent”.  This line will eventually changed to “Children”.  As is stands right now the amount will not increase with the number of children.  Right now it is $60/month and we put that amount, in cash, in an envelope for him every month.  If he needs something, or there is something I feel we should have to aid his learning, I go to his envelope first.  Here are some examples of what I have purchased from his envelope: sunglasses sensory materials (water beads, etc.) puzzles story books books to aid me in teaching him

Continue reading
homeschooling / Tot School

Thinking About Tot School (Links to Reference)

I have been excited to start “Tot School” with Kent since I first read about it months ago.  If you’re not familiar with it yourself go check out the link for a full explanation.  It basically just involves being more intentional with our playtime and making a point to do a lot of fun, varied activities.  It’s perfect for someone like me who loves to plan everything.  Of course, things have to stay super flexible since we’re dealing with a toddler here!  Still, it is nice having a system in place that helps me pay better attention to what he’s learning. We have only done this type of playtime randomly for the past few months.  I’ve read about other parents starting regular sessions as early as 9 months but that just didn’t work out for us.  Instead, we have only just started making “Tot School” a part of our normal routine since Kent’s first birthday this month. For this post I just want to share some of the research I’ve been doing on education in general.  We haven’t decided what type of formal schooling we’ll opt for down the line (i.e. homeschool, public school, private school) but we are planning

Continue reading