I make an overall plan for each semester, the first I do over the summer and then I do our 2nd semester plans in December, adjusting for any subject we are behind/ahead in. Then, as we go along throughout they year, I make a weekly plan for me and I also write in the kids’ assignment notebooks each morning. It sounds like a lot, but the weekly plan and daily writing in the notebooks only takes a few minutes. It is the semester planning that takes up a big chunk of time.
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I plan over summer break as well for the whole year as a guideline. Each quarter I check my overall plan with where we are to see how we are doing. Somtimes we stick to the plan fairly well and others we drift off track. But if I set the guideline it helps me to at least have a point to compare to throughout the year. We are more relaxed so its not like a strict plan. I try to leave room for adjustment because of course as the year goes on sometimes we pick up a unit study or lapbook or other project to do that was not in the original plan. Or we take something out that wasn’t working all that great.
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I create a spreadsheet in which I list out topics to be covered each month of the school year. This is a template for us. As we progress through the school year, I get more detailed in my planning with actual lessons and activities each child will do each day. We go to the public library about every two weeks, so that’s how often I will sit down to do my more detailed planning.
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I like to plan. First, I make a yearly plan, than monthly, and after that weekly plans. My life is so much easier if I plan everything. I know, it takes time, but at the end I have way less stress than I would have without planning.
My planning starts in February when I pick curriculum for next school year. That gives me enough time to buy everything I need. After our school year is over, I go crazy with planning.
Once, my plans are done I make our schedule. Yes, we have a schedule. 
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I am still trying to figure all this out! This is our first year homeschooling and I am pregnant so it has been a bumpy one! But can’t wait to get some tips from some more seasoned homeschool mommys! 
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I try and plan weekly for preschool, but I end up doing a lot of stuff the morning I plan on doing the lesson. Next year for K I’m going to try and plan for either 3 or 6 months at a time.
Thank you for creating this thread because I am really not a very organized person. I think one reason that I’m still unsure whether I will do homeschooling or not is that I don’t want things to get off track and then feel frustrated all the time. I hope I can stick to the plan and really help the children rather than ruin their study.
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I start (try) in June when I go to the Homeschool Co-op. I figure out then what curriculum we are going to continue using, or what new curriculum we are going to try. Then in August, I sit down and look through the curriculums, and gauge how long we will need to finish each one. I then get out my COAH calendar and lay it all out - in pencil of course! I use the monthly calendar and pencil in for each day what subject, and lesson we are going to cover. I pencil in catch up days, days off, field trips days etc. As we get closer to each specific month, I can rearrange our lesson days if necessary, if an unexpected field trip opportunity came up, or there was a lesson plan change. The week of the lesson, I sit down on Sunday and open the calendar for the week, look at each specific lesson, and figure out what we are going to add to the lesson to make is more hands on and less book work if we can.
This is our first year of ‘organized’ schooling. We also have a Nanny that comes to our home two days per week and is our ‘substitute teacher’, so we have to be organized enough for her to have planned projects ready, and to be on the same homeschooling page as we are.
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I have a big picture idea in my head, but have found it works best for me to plan for each week Monday morning. In my big picture plan, I gather what I need before Monday morning which leaves me a bit of freedom to change things as needed. When I was homeschooling my daughter, I would plan months ahead & she would catch up if she needed to because plans changed.
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This year I finally found a planning solution that works for us. I used to plan each day out at least a couple weeks at a time but inevitably life would happen and we would get behind and I would get frustrated trying to catch up. Which made for tough school days at the end of the year we always made it through but I just had a tough time planning around interruptions.
So this year I planned our school by days. Instead of Monday - Friday I just numbered out days 1-150. That way if Monday we have appointments or someone is sick we can easily pick up where we left off. I just put goals in like by Feb. 28th we should be on day 110. If we get done sooner we have a couple days break.
It’s worked great for us! And less stress for mama.
I even used COAH planner Arrows for our days just changed the days to Numbers instead. But the rest looks much like Erica plans.
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I plan loosely for the year month by month in the summer. I purchase all my curriculum at that time. I do a three month in depth plan three times a year August, Christmas, March break.
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I am still getting my feet wet with my 3 and 4 year old. I try to plan a week in advance but they always ask for more than I prepared. Working 2 jobs and with 4 older kids in the house I am struggling to find anytime to plan or prepare. Something’s gotta give 
I like to plan for the entire school year over the summer, subject by subject. I break it down by number of school days we are planning to hold, and use the curriculum guides to pencil in page numbers, lesson numbers, etc. I usually use a local county school or private school calendar to rough in our school days. I think this comes from being a classroom teacher before we began homeschooling. I like to write out lesson plans by hand. This year I tried using the computer, but I didn’t finish before school started, so I am still planning as we go.
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This year I pretty much have been using Erica’s letter of the week and K4 curriculum, so the planning was already done for me! 
Looking for tips for planning for next year.
Since our primary schooling is officially called “school at home” I’ve had a hard time getting to the lessons ahead of time, but figured it out finally. With 4 kids it’s been hard to sit down to plan anything. So for the last semester it was more of letting the older 2 do 30 minutes of their 4 main courses. But I was noticing a drop in their grades and willingness to do the work. So I’m currently searching for a way to combine their lessons and cover the topics before they reach the online stuff.
All that to say I’m trying the week to week method.
I try to plan every six weeks for the traditional school year. I hate taking off weird days like labor day or only having two days in the Thanksgiving week so we do it almost exclusively by weeks. It has the potential to make our school year both longer and shorter than the public school’s calendar.
This year my son (who hates school with a passion) had several meltdowns because we weren’t starting the same time as the public school and all of his cousins, so this year I’ll probably start the same week and then we’ll just get the joy of ending sooner!
Still, I plan every six weeks so that we get something done (and because I’m a geek and love planning) but nearly every week something gets put off until the next week, or we do something early or not at all.I try to be both prepared and flexible.
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I plan weekly but it’s not really working for me. We end up skipping the “fun” activities a lot because I find I’m not prepared. I’m hoping to be more organized next year.
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I plan a quarter at a time. I use a planner for the kids so they (or me) can cross off lessons and assignments when they are done. Doing it a quarter at a time allows me time to kind of evaluate where we are at and adjust for the next quarter. I use my own little spread sheet system for tracking grades, attendance, hours, and my plans. I always write in the kids planners in pencil though … you all know why!
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Planning is very crucial for our family because of doctors appointments. For me, trying to have a routine is important. I take a day when I have some “free” time…and gather calendars and appointments and prepare my plans and school calendar based on that. Of course nothing is set in stone really as we have to be flexible because of my illness but if I don’t write appointments down I will forget and it will throw everything off.
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I plan in the summer as soon as we get our curriculum. I feel a little at a time in the summer is easier. That way when I get tired of doing it I can stop and pick it up another day without having such a time crunch. And I plan on giving my son a planner of his own this year so he can write down what we are doing weekly…especially since he always asks.