how we homeschool: the stuff center

it is not-back-to-school blog hop time at life with my 3 boybarians!  the topic this week is school rooms, but as i mentioned before, we don't have a dedicated room, we have centers--scattered all over the house.  :D  today i'll show you the "stuff center"--the place where we keep the "stuff".

i had originally intended to start school next week--because ella still has one more week of preschool--but she was begging to start now, so we did!  that is why part of this center is still bare--i had all kinds of plans to decorate the bulletin board to make it special for the first day but all she wanted to do was get to work.

the stuff center is beside the front door.  i found a neat write/erase schedule sheet in the $1.00 section of target, so yesterday we filled it in according to the order ella thought she'd like for her day. 

as you can see, we had barely started our day when we rearranged our schedule!  that was so cool with me--that's part of the beauty of homeschool.  more about our schedule change in my next post.

the "cubby shelves" are where we keep worksheets, paper supplies, a pair of binoculars for nature walks, and now the "cubby box" that used to be in the book club.  ella even packed her backpack to bring to school--i didn't know what was in it until later--it had dora and a blanket for dora. 

  

we keep our crocs beside the door, so we can run outside when we hear the ice cream truck!

the area on top of the shelves is for charts.  we use the 100 chart (which i found in the dollar tree teacher's section) for things like skip counting, and the pitcher is where we are collecting "pon-pons".  we will drop in one pon-pon each day of school and when we have 100 we will have a party!  this pitcher is special, it belonged to rudi's grandmother, and it seems especially appropriate to put it to such important use.

 

the job chart is for ella's personal and household responsibilities--one responsibility for each year of her age--in a few weeks she'll GET to add another!  she gets a sticker each time she completes a job.  if she fills in her whole chart, she gets a reward.  each week we write in what the reward will be, and she signs and dates the chart.  the reward she chose for this week is to ride the kiddie train at oprymills mall.

on the window is our weather report.  these are some clingies i found at the dollar tree.  we will also keep a weather chart but i haven't made that yet--that's what happens when school starts before you expect it to!

and last but not least, on the bulletin board are a calendar to keep up with things like field trips and special events, a little cartoon that i laminated--it reminds me of one of the many reasons i've chosen to homeschool--and we pinned up some of her first day's work (the rest of the paperwork is in a spiral notebook).  the dollar is for when the ice cream truck comes!

 

things i still plan to add to this center over the course of this week are:  a weather chart--a day of the week tracker ("today is--yesterday was--tomorrow will be")--and some decorations related to the theme for the week which is, of course, APPLES!

we have other centers which i'll share with you over the next few days, but in the meantime i'd love to hear your ideas about how i can make the stuff center nicer.  i have visions of decorating this area for changes of season, for holidays, and of course to reflect our unit themes, but this whole decorating thing is not my strong suit. 

and if you're looking for ideas of your own, do check out the links on the school room post at life with my 3 boybarians!  as of this writing there are already over four dozen great links and there will be more to come over the course of the week. 

 

Comments

[Kiva, Farmstead Lady]

What a great idea for those preschool years. Learning truly does take place everywhere and love the weather clingies.

[Kim]

Our learning is spread through out the house as well. :-) I don't have room to set up a school room, although some times I wish I did. We normally end up in the living room or the deck.

[Tracy]

Cute! Thanks for sharing!

[Misty aka elvisgirl]

I love the Dollar Tree, too! So many fun school stuff there! We have a classroom, but we school all over the place, too.

[Nicole]

That all looks like so much fun! (Found you doing the school room blog hop).

[Mrs. C]

LOL love the "stuff center" idea.

[julie]

AWESOME!!!!

[julie]

fun, fun, fun! have a great year!!

[amy2boys]

Oh wow. My kid goes to Catholic school and I cna't keep a small homework center organized! This looks great.

[CPJoan]

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