Day 35

I find myself in the middle of a daily battle  between covering a little of everything and covering a few things in depth. I sat down over the weekend and pored over the school days between now and Christmas.

(Funny thing, the school year has always felt too long in the past. This year I am wishing for another month between now and Christmas to fit everything in!) I am attempting to plan more throughly in advance so as to facilitate alternating days where we cover a little bit of everything, and days where we go into depth in a few places.

Our writing curriculum has a "pecked to death by ducks" strategy that has worked so well I have adapted it for use across the disciplines. However, there are some things that simply need time every single day or the rust begins to spread. Speedy multiplication can be achieved with the duck philosophy. Learning and developing and applying new math skills takes a commitment of 60 minutes each day.

We spend quite a bit of time practicing music in a week, and I alternately justify this time as education (as valuable as his most important subjects) and question whether or not it is. Between violin and choir he is in lessons or practicing 9-10 hours in five weekdays. Besides his Messiah learning he has begun studying music theory: A Young Singer's Journey and he is learning A Ceremony of Carols for his Christmas concert mid-December.

All of this does take away from in-depth days. Mostly we are able to cover the basic subjects everyday: grammar, writing, spelling, reading, math, memorization (poems, math facts, parts of speech,etc.) and then we have to move on to afternoons of music practice and lessons and rehearsals. (That he actually has energy for these days!)

I have begun to worry constantly that I am not doing enough schoolwork... and I am not sure how I am supposed to know or gauge whether or not I am doing enough.