Jess (00:00)
Post-its, so many post-its, and I know that some of my friends have taken my post-it system and it has been successful for their children. basically visualizing a lot of things.

like if there wasn’t this incentive of meeting with their friends and having a book club and then a book party, maybe they would drop it after five chapters. kind of developing that stick with it-ness

So with Right Start, I really like that the teacher guide is essentially open and go. It’s scripted, they tell you what to do, and each lesson is essentially one, like two page spread.

I would say what most surprised me was…

how little you are home when homeschooling.

Della (00:52)
Hello, friend. This is Della from the Beauty of Play hosting a brand new podcast all about homeschooling. I’m interviewing people just like you, homeschoolers from all walks of life, finding out how they came to homeschool, how they choose curricula, what styles of homeschooling work for their family.

and how they navigate life.

This week we are hearing from Jess. Jess is a former interior designer turned homeschool mother. For her thesis, she studied play-based inclusive learning spaces and tries to carry that knowledge forward into the homeschooling of her two daughters and her greater community.

She enjoys quilting and other crafts, being in nature, all the books, and embracing the whimsy of childhood. She lives in Las Vegas, Nevada with her family.

Just a note for all the podcasts. Every family is different with different needs for each member of the family and the family itself. Remember to let these episodes be inspiration and information, not a comparison game or a mandate of, this is what I should be doing.

Find what works for your family. You can find the links, resources, and sometimes images of what we talk about in each episode at thebeautyofplay.com forward slash podcast.

Della (02:17)
This is a homeschool journey.

Della (03:18)
Hey Jess, welcome! I’m so glad you’re here.

Jess (03:21)
Thank you for having me. I always enjoy talking with you, so this should be fun.

Della (03:26)
let’s start where you’re located. It’s always interesting to me in the United States, all the different state requirements and what a huge range of accountability that they have.

So where are you located and what are the state requirements for your homeschooling?

Jess (03:46)
I am in Las Vegas, Nevada, and our requirements are to notify the state that you are

a notice of intent when the child is six years old. And that is the extent of it.

Della (04:02)
There’s no other requirements. You just have to let them know.

Jess (04:05)
It is a one time notice unless your address changes.

Della (04:08)
That’s wild.

establish proof of residency?

Jess (04:13)
⁓ You submit like your

in the form.

Della (04:16)
that’s funny. In the state of Florida, you do have to do a letter of intent. But then they also had me residency, which is wild to me because it’s the county I live in. So they already have several things from me for living in this county, like my voter registration and property taxes and various things.

but we still had to do proof of residency. in there are a few different options that we have. We can take a standardized test and send those results in every year, or we can have a portfolio evaluated annually by a certified teacher. That’s the one that we choose. And a lot of people get around those by

using what’s called an umbrella school where they are considered registered in a private school system.

but all that is required for that school is attendance.

there’s difference in how they perceive them. If you register through the county, Florida kind of has this attitude that anything in the school system is also available to all homeschoolers. But if you register under a private school, then those aren’t accessible. So we could pick a la carte, different classes. Say my child wanted to take art or Spanish or algebra at the high school. They could do that.

just take the one class and still be considered homeschooler. But if you register as student in a private school system, which umbrella schools are considered that, you don’t have access to the school system. does Nevada allow you to have access to anything within the school system or does it consider homeschoolers completely separate?

Jess (06:02)
are eligible to play public school sports and things like that, participate in those, but it is at the discretion of your zone to schools principal. are more willing or less willing to work with homeschoolers.

I do know some people that have joined sports teams and things like that at various public schools, but it just depends kind of

the relationship with homeschoolers is like with that particular school.

Della (06:33)
What was the path that led you to homeschooling?

Jess (06:37)
kids were much younger, between my husband’s work schedule

a little more unconventional, we kind of wanted flexibility husband was at work, we could school, if he was home, we could spend time with

That was definitely a big factor. And then also just being in Nevada, the public school system is not amazing here. And

I definitely strongly support public schools and teachers and things like that. But from my own experience, when I was high school and sleeping through every single one of my classes. But I had really great grade point average. I was getting straight A’s in all the honors classes.

but I knew that those habits were not going to serve life. And so one day I definitely came home and told my mom that I was not going 14 you’re kind of required to do. ended up school that I was able to attend and.

I ended up shifting, knowing my own experience in public schools and knowing the school system here, I felt that it probably would not be the best place for my kids.

just based on my own experience with the habits that.

I knew in the school system.

Della (08:04)
That is so fascinating to me the insightfulness that you had at 14 to understand that the habits that you were having accommodate your being in school or that particular school it sounds like were not healthy and reaching out for something that was going to provide more healthy habits that would

sustain you for your lifetime, what kind of habits and how did that influence how you chose to do homeschooling?

Jess (08:37)
I would say…

prioritizing from a very, very young age, sustained and growth mindset.

Time management, feel I’m definitely not always the best at all of those things, but I know that they would have been significantly worse had I developed worse habits. But

prioritizing teaching those specific things and allowing the space for those specific skills to develop in my kids from, you know, toddlerhood, essentially.

Della (09:09)
How did you go about teaching them? Particularly time management and executive function. How do you teach those?

Jess (09:11)
⁓

Post-its, so many post-its, and I know that some of my friends have taken my post-it system and it has been successful for their children. basically visualizing a lot of things. Time obviously is a really hard concept for children. And so making time more visible from

a younger had a clock. We still actually have it, but we had a clock from when they were young enough to start even talking about time, not necessarily telling time. it’s color coded. So every hour it’s filled in with like a different pie color so that we could really talk about, well, when the three hits the blue line, you

on this clock, how long that would take and, you know, kind of start to visualize time. But then also having, I mean, it’s kind of more of sometimes it’s the dining table, sometimes it’s the closet door. But I take Post-its and literally write down like everything that we are needing to do or remember or be at kind of putting those in a place. Like, here’s what Monday looks like.

Here’s what Tuesday looks like. So that they could see, yes, we have all day. It’s a beautiful 24 hours, but you’re gonna be asleep for like And then we have dance or piano lessons or, know, a park day. And we still have to fit in math

Depending on their ages, it was either like they were paper where I’d color it in based on the time frame, Like to visualize two hours versus 30 minutes and things like that. Now I just use Post-its where I just put the Post-its together and they kind of know how long math is going to take at this point. They know how long, you know, they’re at dance. So at this point, I don’t have to put it down and sort of like a

a blocked schedule where I color in each hour. But for a while I did do that and kind of visualize how time physically. You can see it if it’s written that way. And so they were able to kind of manage that, not independently, obviously.

but they could manage their expectations, right? if they were like, well, I really want to go to this other thing, you know, I would show them the schedule and be like, okay, where do you think that that fits in our week? You know, where do you think that fits into today? And, sometimes they would be like, ⁓ you really don’t have time for that. And other days, if it was a big priority for them,

they would kind of negotiate and be well, you know, I really do like doing this, but I could skip it for this week and then we can fit in this other thing that they really want to do. Just recently, actually, my co-ops book club for her age group actually meets at the same time that my oldest has a writing class. so we dropped it.

for a little bit because I was like, I can’t be in two places. And then it just occurred to me very recently, probably too late. But I asked one of the other moms, was like, can my youngest stay with you I take my oldest to this other class? And that way she can participate in the book club, but my oldest can get to her class.

She said that that was fine. So I’ve been leaving her there, but it’s an every other week thing. And I asked her, do you want to do that? I know you won’t be able to see your writing friends because there’s some kids in my oldest class who also have younger siblings that my youngest tends to play with, while my oldest is in class. And she was like, you know what? I think it’ll be okay. I could see them next week and then do book club this week.

and I could just see each group every other week and that way I could still see both. But she kind of managed that herself knowing kind of she had to pick and choose, know. She can’t be two places at once. So that’s kind of how we did it with a long winded explanation for that. I feel like I have

Della (13:14)
Right.

Jess (13:22)
struggled to manage time in understanding how long things would take, being prepared for them. So having those visuals helps me. doing that at whatever level they were at developmentally just made sense in my head since I kind of need that for my own self as a 42 year old woman.

Della (13:42)
Right. I was remembering as you were saying that in elementary school when I was homeschooling my daughter, we would have two blocks, a morning block that we were able to do things and then we would have lunch and some free time. Our breaks for lunch were pretty long and then we would come back and do another block of school. And I had subject cards

And these are free on my website, thebeautyofplay.com for anybody that wants them. But I would have these subject cards printed out that had everything that we were going to do that day. And it was like her physical checklist. And in the morning when we got together, we light a candle because we always lit a candle. Often we had a snack and a stuffed animal join us for school. And then she would go through and arrange the activity cards.

in the sequence that she wanted to do them in and we would split them between our morning block and the evening block. Sometimes things needed to be done before others. And so we’d make those kind of adjustments. I was keeping up with the time each would take to make sure that we could get through.

those subjects within the first morning block in the evening so that they weren’t wonky in timeframe. But I had forgotten that we did that until you started talking about your post-it notes.

Jess (15:09)
Yep. I also do post-it notes for prioritizing things too. we’re actually in the midst of planning our next academic year and our co-op has some great ideas of things that, they all sound interesting, right? And then they also have all those other extra things, like dance and piano and things like that. And so I will write them all.

on Post-it notes and have them put them in like order of priority. And you you could double up on some of them if you’re unsure, but kind of also visually prioritize what’s important to them so that if not all of it fits in our week, or our month, or however frequent those things are happening, kind of know.

what the thing is that we need to drop or do less of, because it’s not necessarily always that we can’t do the thing, but we might not make it a weekly thing if it’s lower on the priority list, So having them kind of map those priorities for themselves and then have that visually represented and manipulative

so that they can kind of manage those priorities and then frequency for their own activities.

Della (16:21)
Yeah, that makes sense.

So Jess, what did you do before children or homeschooling? What did you do?

Jess (16:29)
I worked in interior design. I went to school and had gotten my design degree after school. I worked for commercial architecture firms. So I did corporate offices here in the States and then later transitioned to an international division of a firm.

And there we did projects in the UAE. so generally I worked commercial, any residential that I did, did like, you know, we’re building an apartment complex, you know, we’re building. I never worked directly with like a homeowner.

Della (17:14)
Did any of that influence how you homeschool and if it did, how?

Jess (17:18)
I don’t think my commercial design experience influenced how I homeschooled significantly. But when I was in school, my thesis project actually, my senior year was inclusive play-based learning spaces. And we had to work and basically,

work on our project long term, design it, do the research about what those needs were, and then obviously it all had to be sustainably designed. And so when I was putting together my own design and research, I looked into how to make an inclusive environment. One of the reasons I went into design is I love how

spaces can change your person, how you feel. I don’t always feel like we talk about it in homeschooling communities.

We all want like a cozy home environment that will be something warm where our kids can learn, but knowing kind of more of the research and the science behind how spaces impact.

how you feel from a psychological and physiological standpoint. then using that in our homeschooling has been probably the biggest takeaway from like my past life to.

what I’ve applied it to as far as homeschooling goes. Back when I was doing all that research, I, when interviewed the director of an autistic play space and found what things worked for the autistic community and what things absolutely did not, right? And obviously,

every autistic person is different, but on the whole, are some things from a design standpoint that they shared with me that were, you know, not universal, but pretty prevalent. And so, you know, those preferences, researching more how other disabilities can be accommodated in a space was really helpful ⁓ knowing

If you are visually impaired, curved walls, although fun and fantastic from a design perspective, don’t really work. If you are visually impaired, having a corner and an edge is really beneficial to navigating around spaces. And so things like that that are small tweaks that can be made but make a significant impact.

to a space was one of the things I did my research on and then moving forward into homeschooling.

Knowing how those small things can impact how you use a space, how easily accommodated people can be in a space. I feel like I draw on that knowledge and kind of the thread of that knowledge, because not all of that knowledge applies to my own family.

or even our homeschooling community that we have locally. But knowing that if there is a challenge, how can we support those challenges with environmental changes and accommodate in that way is something that I probably have taken from my design experience into our homeschooling experience.

Della (20:34)
Is there anything in particular in your homeschooling space that falls into that?

Jess (20:40)
Overhead lighting. I mean, we do have overhead lights in our homeschooling space, but we particularly have our homeschooling space in the space in our home with the most natural light that is calming and having.

having a calm space without a ton of, like we don’t have a ton of stuff on our wall that has, you know, like the school vibe. And just generally, you know, if my child has something that is bothering them, you know, from a sensory perspective or a noise perspective and things like that.

to really take that feedback and make those accommodations. We’ve tried having one child practice piano with headphones while the other child was working on a lesson. And that actually still bothered them because they could hear the keys being pressed. And so not saying like, I’ll get over it, just moving the piano to further away from the child that was working.

and, things like that, when they can be accommodated, like making your space work for you, even if it seems rather unconventional, even if it isn’t Instagram worthy, but kind of having those things, and, hearing that feedback and taking it seriously and kind of adjusting as needed.

Della (22:00)
one of the things that I am most impressed with with your homeschooling, especially when your girls were both in elementary school, were your book clubs and your literature studies were so amazing. Can you talk about how you chose the books?

what activities and ideas and how you came up with those and what it looked like in creating it and then what it looked like through fruition because I know at the end of the book you had a book party that was themed around the book. Some of these ideas were so creative. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Jess (22:42)
Yeah, I mean I created it back when my oldest was I want to say she was in second grade And we were using a literature program that basically was transitioning from Shorter novels, you know into More middle grade level novels as read

knowing that that was going to be a kind of big jump and knowing that I needed to kind of

helped facilitate that sustained attention for those longer, harder, deeper novels. That’s what sort of prompted me to start our book clubs. And it was just a way to get my own kids and then other folks that joined us excited about reading.

books that maybe they wouldn’t give a chance.

Otherwise, if there wasn’t this incentive of meeting with their friends and having a book club and then a book party, maybe they would drop it after five chapters. Maybe they just wouldn’t stick with it. so kind of developing that stick with it-ness for not something that you’re not enjoying, right? But that’s harder. That was kind of the catalyst for starting the book clubs.

And so our format has been we break it up into two to three meets depending on the length of the book. And we break up the to stay accountable. know in my own personal book clubs when I do book clubs for myself, know, sometimes it’s reading at two times speed.

the night before the book club. And that’s because nobody is checking in with me to see if I read it, you know? I’m a grown person. I can manage that myself, but it doesn’t always work out, you know? So rather than have that happen and to really learn how to pace ourselves and have that kind of accountability,

we would have check-in chapters, like read chapters one to 15 for the first meet. And then we would do a small activity and then, maybe an art project. My oldest is really into movement games. So a lot of them had some sort of physical game element and…

So we would do that for the first meet. We would have a little discussion, which over the years went from, how did you like the book? What do you think about the characters? To talking about the narrative arc and the hero’s journey in the fourth or fifth grade years. So having that sort of academic piece within the book club so that there was accountability for that. There was also more discussion because it’s one thing to talk about books.

across the table from your another to have divergent voices from your about, how other people might have seen that character or, that the strength versus the weaknesses or the different plot points and how they affected other people and what they thought about them. having that small academic piece as part of it also

for those check-in meets basically. And then at the end, yeah, celebrate. we did the big book parties where it was, there were themed foods and there were.

games and art projects, and we would make a little book ornament that they could keep as like a memory of the so doing that when she was in like second grade, third grade, really built the momentum for reading those longer, tougher having some academic piece

But then also just really just having fun with it and building that love of reading and books and community.

Della (26:20)
Cultivating a community and love of reading really makes a difference in how a child thinks about reading as to whether they think of it as a chore or whether they think of it as something to enjoy and to read.

really makes a difference. had always had conversations with groups of people. We didn’t have the book clubs like you have, although that sounds absolutely amazing. But we would just always ask friends what are you reading right now? Or what are you doing? And that was really helpful in cultivating a love for reading.

I’m curious curricula you have used over the years for the girls. What for you? If you were to go down to a baseline and we’re only covering A, B, and C, what would your A, B, and C be?

Jess (27:22)
Definitely through this elementary, early middle school, right start math has been our go-to math. Michael Clay Thompson has been our go-to basically a writing grammar program.

Blossom and Root Language Arts has been the perfect fit for how we do literature and book studies. So I would say if I only could pick three curricula, that would probably be top three and also the ones that we have used most consistently over the years.

Della (27:54)
Let’s start with the math program. You chose Right Start for math. That’s your main math program, right? are the things that you really liked about Right Start and what are some things that you struggled with?

Jess (28:08)
So with Right Start, I really like that the teacher guide is essentially open and go. scripted, they tell you what to do, and each lesson is essentially one, two page spread. So I can very easily see what our day is gonna look like in math. I find that very easy to use from a visual.

perspective managing my own overwhelm, sometimes teacher guides, where you have to flip five pages to read a lesson become very overwhelming to me as a teacher. So I really do like that in the teacher guide. I that it’s scripted. And I like that it’s very hands-on. So in the younger years especially, very manipulative-based, ⁓ hands-on.

And so just like with other aspects of teaching, if you can take some abstract concept and make it a physical visual thing, I feel like it really just helps make it real and understood. So I really do like that about Right The biggest negatives, honestly, are not that huge.

Della (29:10)
Are you?

Jess (29:14)
which is why we’ve stuck with would say one is that in about every level, there’s one new concept that my kids just, they have the hugest struggle with. And it’s this hump that they just cannot get over and it’s causing so much frustration. I’ve learned to expect that we’re gonna have this hump every year.

⁓ for at least one of the concepts. what we do when that happens is we pivot. We have used your curriculum. We have used Beast Academy. I’ve put them on. There’s like a free math program online that I can’t even remember the name of anymore. But I’ve used them all over the years. Just like do two weeks of that. And then they come back and whatever block was happening and their brain goes away and it’s smooth sailing. But I have learned to not fight with

that and push up against it. we just have a little bit of a breather. Let whatever it is work themselves out in their brain and then come

Della (30:09)
Are you still using Right Start with your oldest?

Jess (30:12)
I am, this is our last year and then she’s gonna be moving to pre-algebra. So that has been a little bit nervous for me because we have done right start since the beginning. And so moving on to new curriculum, especially in math, I’m just, you know.

Della (30:29)
⁓

What are you going to use for pre-algebra? Do you know yet?

Jess (30:34)
⁓ I think we’re going to give Thinkwell a go. it’s definitely not a sure thing. She doesn’t love video based lessons. but also it will give her more autonomy. and they are relatively short. There are paper books that you can order alongside the online program for Thinkwell. So there could be a good blend to kind of

soften the switch from paper-based math to something online. we’re going to give it a shot.

Della (31:02)
Okay, and then for language arts, the grammar and writing, you used Michael Clay Thompson. Tell me about what you love about Michael Clay Thompson and what was challenging.

Jess (31:15)
I actually love the grammar workbook. It is so repetitive and boring, but it takes three minutes a day. and I find that that there’s like a hundred problems in the book that are all formatted the exact same way that just deepen the understanding. the repetitiveness of them cause it keeps those things of falling away,

from memory and then visually, it’s one sentence on a page. that whole having a cluttered page is not an issue. It’s one sentence per page. So it feels super calm and manageable from student’s perspective. And with the writing assignments and the grammar,

book, right? It’s kind of like a story. They just had fun with it. They’re kind of nonsensical and goofy with the talking ducks and the talking fish it’s a little bit playful, but like still serious enough that they learn the

They’re very, open pages. It’s not a lot of overwhelm. It’s not super dense text. So from a teaching and from a student perspective, it feels very calm and manageable. from a content perspective, I feel it teaches things.

they give a lot of examples. There’s ample practice problems and the writing assignments themselves.

tend to be open-ended can have fun with it, that they can make it nonsensical, they can fit in their fart jokes if that’s what they that you important writing concepts.

It really keeps their voice intact as a writer, but also teaches the technique and skill of writing.

Della (33:01)
For those that don’t know, Michael Clay Thompson does sentence analysis in a four step series as opposed to diagramming sentences. So he goes through and has you.

label all the parts of speech first and then label how that part of speech is being used as a subject subject compliment, et cetera. And then the third analysis is phrases, I believe, and the fourth is clauses.

Jess (33:30)
There is a literature component too.

Della (33:32)
Right. There’s literature as well. For me, I love Michael Clay Thompson’s work. I love the work of people who really enjoy the subject they are teaching. And it’s very clear that Michael Clay Thompson loves the English language.

I also enjoy Rooted in Language for the same reason. it can be like all things, a little overwhelming. I think if you tried to do all aspects of his curricula, his program, and you weren’t someone that excelled in the language arts, it would be challenging to do them all.

So

then I want you to also do the same for us with Blossom and Root. We did not use Blossom and Root, but I have heard you sing its praises. tell us how it works and what makes you love it so much and if there are any challenges with it.

Jess (34:32)
Blossom and Root, I really like it because basically if I were to write a literature program, would be the closest one that I have found to what I would actually create myself. And I don’t have to. The book selections have been excellent. The books…

generally tend to cover a wide variety of topics. There are a lot of own voices books built in. intentionally tries to have very inclusive titles and represent a lot of experiences her book selections. And in the younger years, it’s really, you you read the book and you do the

a few papers, there’s some narration work, vocab work, copy work, things like that. And that all feels fine in those younger years. And then when you get up into fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh grade, it kind of progresses in a deeper way. I know one of the things for reading comprehension is background knowledge.

you have phonics, you have all those things that really contribute to how well of a reader you are. But also for comprehending reading, getting background knowledge to understand the subject matter that you’re reading about is so important. the way that the program is set up is she provides

⁓ web links and videos and also additional reading materials. So you might be reading a book like Esperance rising paired with that, she’s mentioning books on the farm worker strikes and, some nonfiction titles and some picture books things on immigration.

so that you can have a deeper understanding of the novel that you’re reading. teaching literature, for it’s deeper than reading a book for pleasure. if my kids wanna read a book just on their own, go for it. But if we’re gonna be studying a book,

I want to take our time. I want to explain the background information. I want to have a deeper understanding of this book as opposed to one you would just read for pleasure. so having all of that information worked into the novel study itself. There’s geography components in several of the years. In the older years, there are social studies components. currently we’re reading

Blackbird Girls, which is about Chernobyl. when we’re reading that book, you’re learning about nuclear energy. You’re learning about that particular event in history. you’re learning about that period of time and the cultural

cultures represented, you’re learning so much more than just reading the novel and doing some copy work or reading the novel and doing some vocab. Story elements are woven in there. you’re going over the plot arc, you’re going over the different types of literature. There’s just a lot in there that I don’t see in

other novel studies. I really appreciate that about it because I like pulling all of those threads and kind of weaving them together into the literature study to deepen your understanding of the book, get background information, and then also connect things, you’re connecting the past and this, current

present time and using that history and gaining that knowledge while also, developing empathy and understanding by reading a fictionalized text. She has nonfiction books within the curriculum too, but generally, for a literature class, there’s a lot more fiction. so I feel like learning those things is

really how I would teach history. I really appreciate that it’s kind of all built up in there. She also has some hands-on projects. There’s art craft type things built into the study as well. And then in the older years, there’s usually a writing assignment in addition to the copywork and the journal entries and the narrations and things like that. There’s a broader

⁓ writing projects, so whether it’s doing a research thing and having an informational poster that you create or if you create a PowerPoint presentation or you write a personal narrative, that is also built in there. That kind of goes along with the theme of the book you’re reading. And so I just feel like it’s very deep and thoughtful as a curriculum.

Della (39:15)
What’s a challenge in using it?

Jess (39:18)
For me, it is definitely picking and choosing. I know that it is so deep and I want to get to all of it. And we just don’t have the time to get to every single thing in that guide. But it all is so lovely and rich and wonderful that like I do feel a little bit.

Like I have to pick and choose. that part is a challenge for me. I would say that that part is the challenge really. The rest of it I really enjoy. don’t always do all of the pages, We cover grammar with Michael Clay Thompson. when there’s copy work grammar to do in Blossom and Root, we just don’t do that piece.

So it’s not really a challenge for me. just skipped that piece. But the other things that are lovely and beautiful and I would love to do, knowing that I can’t do all of it is, yeah, get FOMO all the time.

Della (40:09)
Yeah, when I was listening to you talk about what you loved about it and the different pieces, I was thinking it would be really hard to pick and choose on those because you know you can’t do it all. that is a problem that I of our blocks. There’s so much I want to cover and you could go in depth, infinity. And it’s always hard.

to know that you have a limited amount of time that you can fit in and what you’re gonna keep and what you’re going to cut.

Della (40:46)
hi friend, it’s Della again, your favorite math and homeschool coach. I just wanted to let you know,

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what we should be teaching when.

in a hands-on and artsy way It also focuses on math play, giving you different projects that you can do with your kids even if they’re different ages and at different math skills. If you want to learn more about these subscriptions,

You can find them at thebeautyofplay.com forward slash membership. If you sign up for my newsletter, I’ll be sending out samples of the subscription.

Della (42:01)
has been the biggest challenge for you for homeschooling?

Jess (42:06)
I would say the lack of accountability. That has probably been one of our greatest challenges. I feel like work out the curriculum. I can work out how to teach. I can accommodate my kids. But having to…

Della (42:10)
Mm.

Jess (42:22)
of sort out accountability been probably the thing I’ve had to be the most intentional about. I am definitely one of those people who would totally throw out everything in the morning if something fun came up and just do that instead. But I know that that long term would not be the best course of action.

for my kids education. So staying on track, I’ve had to kind of built in support system and some accountability and measurable bits.

in various ways to maintain outside accountability

Della (43:03)
Can you give us some examples? What are some ways that you’ve set up goals? How do you set those goals and how do you keep yourself accountable to them?

Jess (43:13)
⁓ so one of the ways that I have, supplemented kind of accountability is some of the classes, like my oldest writing class, we know that we have it every Thursday. And so we have to actually incrementally work writing Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. So we’re prepared on Thursday. That that is happening and it is outside.

of our control. if it were me on my own, I might be ⁓ Tuesday was a wash. We’ll just finish writing on Friday. But now there’s a deadline. now we have writing on Thursday. that has to be completed by that day, and then also, having our

clubs with those check-ins keeps us accountable to reading the book and finishing the book and reading it at a pace that is generally appropriate. It’s not going to take us three months to get through a book. It’s not going to be binged in a week. it’s a decent pace where it’s manageable if we stay on task.

having that piece has been helpful. hiring hiring people that will look at our studies either midway through the year or at the end of the year and check those things. knowing that someone’s going to see what we did,

We have to finish this, you Somebody’s going to be looking at it. I don’t want to get to the end of the year and be we only did 50 math lessons in 200 days, that helps maintain some accountability. And the last thing I would say is

assessment where I can just see where they’re at and make sure that they are on grade level. And if they are not at grade level, know where they are so that we can prioritize, on those subjects and

having an understanding of where they are in relation peers, essentially. ⁓ I also sometimes will browse things like Teachers Pay Teachers and see what are people doing for sixth graders? What are they doing for third graders? Since those resources are primarily

aimed at schools. Sometimes that gives me a little bit of a reality check for my younger child, especially. I’m doing third and sixth grade and sometimes it gears a little closer to the sixth grader. when I go and look on there and see what is actually a unit for third grade, it can help put things in perspective

Della (45:42)
do some of those too, but I had not thought of them as accountability, but they definitely are. know with some of our writing assignments, I will say, do you think that would be clear to Laura, who was our evaluator? That’s interesting that you do that as well. And then I also look not at teachers paid teachers, but sometimes Khan Academy.

because they have a whole set of different classes that are geared towards school age children to help me fill in gaps and make sure we’re covering everything that’s on par for that age group.

one of the things that we have talked about before is time and homeschooling. part of what we had talked about was how in the younger years, it seems like you have more time. And then as you go along, there’s a step up in the amount of time that it takes for you. You want to talk a little bit about your experience with that?

Jess (46:44)
the timepiece has been eye-opening. I think when we chatted about it, you mentioned it was kind of like a bell curve and I was right at the top. basically, yeah, in those younger years, math lessons are done in 15 to 20 minutes and you have a quick phonics lesson, you read a couple books covered most of your bases, And then as

your child gets older. Something I notice a lot ⁓ is how a lot of homeschoolers talk about building in independence there was this preconceived notion in my head that my time was going to open up at this that is just completely not been the case where, I have one, she is currently wrapping up.

third grade. I’m still doing her math lessons with her. We’re still doing read alouds and, her reading lessons, we’re still doing all of those things together where I’m teaching they’re still at that pretty quick age where it’s not taking a ton of my time. But then I moved to

my older child who is wrapping up sixth grade this year. the science lessons get deeper, the language arts lessons take longer. the prep work on my end as a teacher facilitate teaching her the skills that will be necessary to foster that independence.

are also being added on top of all of that. with the longer length of the lessons and concepts that we haven’t really covered in those early elementary years, if you’re doing research, what is a good website? How can you spot, good information from bad? How can we compile this? How to write an essay?

how to do a lab report, are kind of happening in these middle grade years. the content is kind of deepening as well. it’s just a lot right now where amount of time that I am needed is significantly higher than in the younger years where could do a short lesson ⁓

I didn’t really have to prep it, You just open up the book and you’re I know how to add, I could teach this, Whereas these ages, I feel I definitely need like a teacher prep period workload just seems more in depth and fostering those skills takes time and patience. there’s just not really a way to outsource that,

Della (49:02)
No, and it’s a big jump. I think even with one child, there’s a bell curve. In the early years, it’s information that most of us know pretty well. And if we’re not, if it’s something like phonics and teaching to read, then most of the curricula is laid out for you pretty easily. But as you go up, it’s more information.

that’s more in there is a greater dependence on you when they’re young. But I some people to independent work is a lot slower than what they were expecting it to be. I know I have had more than one person ask me at what point are they supposed to be doing X, Y, and Z by themselves?

different people homeschooled differently, We homeschooled more together. gosh, I think late middle school, just now, she’s in her first year of high school. Are we looking at true independence where we’re not doing so much together and

I still have things that we still do together. And they’re the things that you kind of were talking about. They’re analytical things like media literacy and historical things or science experiments

In addition getting to a place with your oldest where you’re needed for the most time, you are throwing in your youngest into school for the first time. she is joining into formal lessons for the first time at that point.

Jess (50:39)
Yeah, and I would say when my oldest stepped up middle school age, my youngest kind of was entering that later elementary age bracket. Because you in kindergarten through second,

If you can do math and read, you’re probably fairly good. her tagging along with, my fourth graders lessons it was definitely over her head at times, but she was getting some of that information and it was doable. we could combine a little bit more at those early ages where all I wanted for my youngest was exposure, essentially.

now that my oldest is entering middle school, some of the content

isn’t actually content that my youngest is comfortable with. so I’m having to kind of juggle two different tracks. The family style sort of thing has kind of gone away. But she’s not young enough where I’m exposure would be just fine. It’s OK if we aren’t doing a

science program for you. in third, fourth grade, I’m like, hmm, that’s probably something we want to cover, And it’s not just whatever you absorb from your older sister’s lessons. doing something that’s specifically for her at her level that she is comfortable with because as I enter middle school and up for my oldest, some of that content just gets

A lot of the books that we have been reading for our literature and history blocks have dealt topics that are definitely necessary to cover, but a little for my eight-year-old. having to split off and do those things has been definitely

a lot more time and even promoting My oldest has actually mentioned that she would like to have more autonomy over her time, see what we’re doing every day have list and things accessible to her so she can take the reins on a lot of things. But even that front-end work of setting Google Classroom

where I have those things listed, also just takes time. even the facilitating of the independence is kind of a time management issue for me until she can do all of it her own, which is obviously what you work towards, but you can’t do it all at once.

Della (53:00)
Yeah, and even when they do have some of that, there’s still the accountability portion where you’re going behind them and making sure that they’re getting the things finished and done. So it still takes a little bit of time. It definitely gets on the family, but I feel beginning middle school is probably

maybe the most intense time wise for the parent. And talk a little bit about how that differs for your kids because your kids aren’t necessarily spending six to eight hours doing homeschooling, but you may be spending that amount of time between the homeschooling and the planning and facilitating. What does the time look

like for your kids now.

Jess (53:47)
I mean, the time for my kids, we normally on home days, right? not every day. But on our home days, we’re definitely doing a school day from about 8.30 till 3.30 or 4. But my kids are not doing school that entire time. or,

crafting or reading their own books when I’m doing the lessons with their sibling. we start our day together doing things together and then kind of break off because obviously they’re at very different levels for math and the skills-based language arts some things we can come together for and do.

all at once, but a lot of those skills-based things are obviously separate. if I can get them started and then have them do, their practice problems or write their paragraph or whatever, while I’m going back and forth, I’ll do the teaching portion and then give them their assignment and then they go off and do that.

then I flipped to the other child. whenever that kid that had the assignment is done, like they are free to do, their things. So my youngest is literally crafting 24 seven because that’s her thing. they’re not doing school from eight 30 until four 30 with no breaks. But, I am definitely, I feel like I’m on from.

those hours when we have those home days where we’re trying to pack in all of our meaty lessons.

Della (55:21)
So a day home for you, what does the schedule look like for a day home for you?

Jess (55:26)
So we start at 8.30 typically. From about 8.30 to 9.00, we do morning work, which we used to do morning time when they were younger. Now they watch CNN 10. They do one of Clay Thompson grammar pages. youngest is learning cursive, so she does some handwriting. All of those little incidental things that take about two minutes apiece.

We just knock all of those out in the morning, call it good and wrap that up pretty quickly. we move on to math where they do the shifty, you know, tag team lessons. And then we move on to skills-based language arts. once we kind of get through those core skills blocks, I will read history depending on

The book, my youngest will tag in for that. Some of the books, like I was saying, are a little too intense for her. she might run off and play. I’ll do history with my oldest. We have a little break where they can both have a little downtime together they can run around and worry about disturbing their sibling. They can kind of get their wiggles out.

then they come back and we do, generally that’s about lunchtime. in that little break, I can like make up a lunch real quick. They come back and we do literature at lunch. they usually eat while I read to them and we do our read aloud. then they can go off and play again for a little bit while I eat lunch my own self.

And then we come back to the table and we’ll either do, a science lesson or another hands-on project for either literature or a history block, we do that typically in the afternoons. That’s also when we would do art our afternoon is a little bit more, not quite a loop schedule, but it’s definitely.

kind of whatever lesson needs a larger block of time that day. So some days, I know we got to pack in science and then other days I’m like, well, we can fit in this extra thing for literature or whatever. So we’ll do that in our afternoons. then we try and wrap up by three, three 30. if our day kind of went sideways, I just call it at four.

⁓ we have to move on and do our chores and make dinner and, pick up for the day

That’s generally what our day looks like. We try and knock out all that core stuff in the morning since that’s when their brains are most on.

Della (57:48)
how much time do you think they spend on school throughout the day?

Jess (57:53)
youngest is She’s wrapping up third grade. She has a summer birthday, she’s a little young for her grade, but she’s keeping up. probably spends…

an hour on core assignments, writing, spelling, grammar, math, and then probably an hour on other stuff like science or literature.

It definitely depends since she sometimes will weave into my oldest lessons. I would say the things that are geared toward her probably take two to three hours. But then my oldest

She probably has about five hours of school her math takes about an hour, language arts takes longer. The readings just also take longer. it’s not chapter a day of a 200 page picture book, that I’d be reading aloud to my youngest.

Della (58:46)
This is

Jess (58:48)
I would say probably on our home days, she does about five hours of work and not all of that is necessarily with me. It’s me touching base, teaching the math concepts, sending her to do the problems. It’s me covering her writing assignment and then she goes and does the assignment and then I check in with her. I don’t have to be

Della (58:48)
And is she sitting?

Jess (59:10)
hands-on for the entire time, but she probably spends roughly that on her home days.

Della (59:16)
And how many home days do you have and how many days are you out and about? Or at least a portion of it are out and about.

Jess (59:25)
so we have three solid home days. And then on one day a week, we have

⁓ Our co-op we have some classes that my kids attend and so that whole day is more or less awash for us in terms of actual homeschooling content Not to say that at those things we aren’t getting Any educational stuff some of those classes are things that we use To assist with our homeschooling

So it’s not that they aren’t academic, but they aren’t home days where we’re table work at home. And then final fifth day of the week is kind of flexible. We try and at least be home for

our core lessons in that morning our homeschooling. But if a field trip comes up or if there’s a really cool educational opportunity happening in town, I allow extra basically half day to be flexible for us so that we can fit things.

Della (1:00:29)
So it sounds like you have three full days at home. Do I have that right? And then you have one day that you’re out and about. And then the last day is like half and half.

Jess (1:00:34)
Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, it totally depends on that last day, whether or not it’s a full day at home. Some days it’s a full day out. Sometimes, it’s half and half or two hours here. It’s definitely one that’s more flexible, depending on what’s going on around town and in our friend group and things like that.

Della (1:00:59)
my last question for you today is what most surprised you in your journey through homeschooling?

Jess (1:01:07)
I would say what most surprised me was…

how little you are home when homeschooling. having to, intentionally carving out those blocks of time when we are home. I didn’t expect to have to like really put those blocks, in place. I just was we’re homeschooling. I think a lot of introverts are,

Della (1:01:15)
How ironic.

Jess (1:01:29)
drawn to homeschooling and you’re it’s so cozy. We can be home and…

You’re on the go a lot. we kind of started homeschooling right before COVID. And that was her kindergarten year. in kindergarten, you don’t have to be out and about and doing all the things. they’re still at the age where like they do just want to kick around with some Lego at home and see their friends for a playdate every once in a while. But

you’re not into so many regularly scheduled things. then COVID hit, which wiped out all of our activities. slowly building our extra things now obviously in middle school where have

so many interests and they want to be involved in so many things and they have communities and friendships that they want to maintain in those communities. Just doing all of the things when they are not yet driving. it just ends up being quite a bit out of the house

when we were initially thinking of homeschooling, one of the reasons was so that we could be home and have more family time. ironically, now it feels very busy. so still trying to like block out those periods of time when we can have family time or when we’re doing our academics at home and like actually having to

forcefully protect that stuff has been unexpected for me.

Della (1:02:56)
the challenge for this generation is there’s just an overwhelming amount of everything, curricula, activities, classes available to homeschoolers, and it’s really hard to pick and choose. Jess, I really appreciate you spending today with me. Thank you so much. ⁓

Jess (1:03:17)
Thank you for

having me.

Della (1:03:19)
Do you want to share any places where be found

Jess (1:03:24)
I am at stitched underscore homeschool on Instagram, but that is pretty much the only place that I am virtually.

Della (1:03:33)
Okay, that sounds good. Well, thank you again. And I will leave the various links and information of the things that Jess and I talked about in the podcast posts that you can find on the beauty of play.com forward slash podcast. And thanks again, Jess.

Jess (1:03:53)
It’s so fun.