{Homeschool Planning} The Importance of Starting with your OWN Bookshelves
Are you familiar with Scotia Bank’s slogan?
You know, the whole, ‘You’re Richer Than You Think’ thing?
They say it is one of the most successful branding strategies any bank has ever launched. Maybe its because we all want to be richer than we think. I never understood it personally, because I’m almost always poorer than I thought. *chuckle*
Anyways, I digress. The point I’m getting at is this – think of your personal bookshelves with this slogan in mind.
You may not think you have what you need for next year – or that you have to research and order a whole pile of new curriculum, books, etc… but do you? Really?
If you’re anything like me you might already have most of the books and ‘curriculum’ you need for next year right on your own bookshelves.
When it comes to books – you just might be ‘richer than you think’.
Let’s be honest, us homeschoolers LOVE to buy books. (If you’ve hung around here for any amount of time, you know I’m as guilty as any!) I love to add great books to our growing bookshelves and I do this periodically throughout the year and usually in the Spring at Used Book Fairs.
Here’s the challenging thing though – I need to make sure we actually READ the books (or USE the resources) that I buy. One great way to be sure you use the stuff you’ve already got is to start with your own bookshelves every year. That’s right – when you are planning your ‘curriculum’, look to see what you’ve already got.
It sounds so simple, but for a long time I didn’t do this. I would buy stuff, use some and abandon most, pile it up and buy more stuff. When I started really looking at my own shelves, it made a HUGE difference in our homeschool (and in my bank account). We actually use the cool stuff I’ve already purchased and we save on buying things we don’t really need.
Since Charlotte Mason was ALL about books – I thought I’d share these tid-bits for Charlotte Mason Monday…
Some Thoughts for Starting with your own Bookshelves:
Start with prayer.
I shared my heart about this with regard to planning a few days ago.
I just think, when you are choosing books and resources that will be read and used in the home – asking the One who knows our family best is a powerful starting point.
Start where you left off.
Start by searching for books that fit the time periods you’ll be covering.
. We especially enjoy following their guides for family study through history, bible, and read-alounds. Last year we used
Early Modern History and Epistles
, and this year we are using
Modern Times, Epistles, and Revelation
. What I do to make these really work for us is that I approach them in a relaxed manor. We leave room for flexibility and we add a lot of our own read-alouds. We love the Simply Charlotte Mason yearly programs because they are so gentle and focus on family learning.
Start by looking for books you may want to revisit.
Michelle at Delightful Learning has rowed nearly all of BFIAR twice
!)
Start with books you purchased a while ago for ‘when the kids were older’.
Start with the curriculum resources you already have.
Learning to Spell through Copywork
on our Language Arts shelf for over a year before we ever used it. I just kind of forgot it was there and we also started using a different program. In the past few months I was reminded of it and pulled it out for my daughter and she actually LOVES it. The funny thing is, we are not using it for copywork but for dictation. So, that’s another thing – sometimes resources can be used in a another way as well.
. When our kiddos were young (I think my eldest was 5, second was 3 and littlest was 1), I purchased
. It was WAY too much for them at that time. I got frustrated because it wasn’t ‘working’ and had spent so much on it. I almost sold the whole thing but felt led to just hang on to the books and teacher’s guide. It wasn’t until nearly 2 years later that we returned to Core A and used it as a family and absolutely LOVED IT. I realize now that the program was not the problem – the kids just weren’t ready for that level at that time. (IF you wanted to use Sonlight with kids that age, I would start them in
.) We even went on to complete the next level of Sonlight all together and both years were very rich!
Also – don’t forget about non-fiction!
Here are just a few of the titles I pulled off our shelf this week to use this coming year –
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| These are mostly books that were on our reading list this year but we didn’t get to – so, they will be put at the start of this year’s list. |
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| Examples of awesome resources I didn’t use this year but was easily able to pull off the shelf for use in the coming year. (I think I’ll have my eldest read from and narrate The Message…). |
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| A mish-mash of books we didn’t get to this year and books that fit in the coming year’s time period. |
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| More books that fit into the Early Modern to Modern History time period. |
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| More read-alouds from our shelves that fit in with the 1850-present day time frame. |
I hope this post inspires you to check out your own shelves and I also hope you find out you’re, ‘richer than you think’!
Blessings!!!
5 Comments
Unknown
Love this. I love it when I find great books for cheap at thrift stores. But I struggle with organizing so many books – there can be so many different categories, not only subjects but also the age that the books are appropriate for. It's overwhelming. Do you have any suggestions for that?
Cassandra
I wish I did… My books are not really organized in the best way, to be honest. There is one thing I do that really helps though. I move the books we plan to read (intentionally for part of our 'program') that year to a completely different shelf/shelves. This gives me a good look at what we are planning to cover. It doesn't mean other books won't make their way in – but it helps a bit… I also keep categories together… Poetry is all together. Five in a Row titles are together. and Nature Study books are somewhat together… hm. I should work on this, eh?
michelle
Wow, this really has had me thinking this past week. I might already have most of the books and curriculum I need to get my kids through high school right on my own bookshelves. But, I'm not sure I want to go through all these Sonlight cores again. I thought about selling them all and starting over. Am I crazy?
I don't think I could ever part with my FIAR books and manuals though. 🙂 I so enjoyed rowing through B4 a second time (thanks so much for the sweet mention!), and the older kids pull them off the shelf regularly. In fact, Malachi just pulled Down Down the Mountain to read again since we are planting turnips for Plum Creek. 🙂
Inspired as always!
Cassandra
Haha… yes. You are crazy, but aren't we all?! 🙂 I hear ya about 're-doing' things, we haven't gotten there at this point but I can definitely envision shaking things up if we ever do. My FIAR books and manuals are also keepers for me along with quite a few cherished novels and picture books… that is really neat that Malachi would make that connection – FIAR is so wonderful. I could never part with our FIAR books – not to mention, some of them were REALLY hard to find and cost a small fortune to get in my hands…. 😉 Loving your blog too and so happy you have a subscription option again. 😉 xo
emegren
This is such a great reminder. I often have this "use what ya got" mentality in the kitchen, why don't I have it with homeschool? Must have the biggest-best-easiest-prettiest-newest curriculum syndrome. We are in year six of homeschooling and I feel like I finally am getting into my groove. I feel like I can trust myself now. Love this. And your blog!