Goal Planning Monday - December 3

I can't believe it's December already!   Where did the year go?

It was lovely to have the week off!  This week's Blogging through the Alphabet letter is M - perfect to talk about what we did on our trip to where Mickey Mouse lives.  I'll post about that in the next few days.  The end of vacation means back to reality, and a slingshot into Christmas and the New Year.

This week's plans:

-Blog, blog, blog. 

I recently was accepted into the Homeschool Review Crew team, and my first "official" review is due this week.  I have a couple more items to follow up on, and then one (or two...ok, probably three) more reviews & rewrites and it will be ready to publish.

Other blog posts I'd like to do include the M for Mickey Mouse post, but also a "report card" type update,  and a "just for fun" post about something we've done.

-The ever popular lesson plans.

Someday they'll write themselves, right?  I wish. I want to change things up - rather than just being a plan of "this today, that tomorrow," I want to set more "goals" (short and long term) and the activities that go into the goals. I'm finding that our "scheduled" plans are getting tossed out the window often because of other stuff going on, and it's stressing me out.  We're not "behind" but I feel like we are, because the days are slipping by and I can't check off the day's activities.  I need to find a better middle ground.

-Finish this Math chapter.

Jude is blowing through the current unit, on positions - left/right, over/under/on, in/out, etc.  He did the first four sections in one day while we were on vacation. I forced him to wait a couple days to take the test -- and yes, he zoomed through that with a perfect score.  I'd like to get this unit finished quickly because I think the next one (number words -- "one" means "1", etc.) is going to be a struggle for him.  I know it's going to get crazy with Christmas in there, so I want to have the time to really focus on it and not feel like we're going to miss a week in the middle.

-Decide what kind of Christmas Break Jude is going to have. 

The big kids are off from the 21st until January 2nd.  I'm not certain that I want to plan a whole lot for during that time (I don't want to be beholden to the lesson plan!) but I will have to see how scheduling time off fits into things.  I'd rather take a few days off further into January when kids are back in school and we can do some fun things.

-Call some of the local kid-friendly places and find out when their 'quiet' times are.

Matthew and Celia's school was selling Kidstuff books -- similar to Entertainment books. There are some good coupons for field-trip friendly places, like the Academy of Natural Sciences, an Open Bounce place, and a few hands-on kids' museums.  Since Jude really struggles with huge groups, I want to give a few a call and try to find out if there are days that the places tend to be less attended.  Obviously, we're never going to have the whole place to ourselves, BUT if we're less likely to be run over by buses full of 3rd graders, maybe we will take a chance.

Have a great week everyone! 

Hope everybody has a good week!  Set your own goals and join the party over at Real Life: Unscripted.