http://preschoolersandpeace.com/
I was sent the "Circle Time" ebook
What Is This? -
This is an ebook that instructs you how to put together your own 'circle time' with your family. It consist of 33 pages. This is a great way to bring your family together to do things that you need to get accomplished. You can use it in your homeschooling day to incorporate prayer, scriptures, stories, conversations, school work, etc. Circle time is a time where you would implement things that you want your family to do together or to do the things you run out of time for in your typical homeschool day and/or life. It isn't just for homeschoolers. Families can benefit from this ebook as well.
You may have children of all ages, toddler to teens, and that is ok. Kendra Fletcher teaches how to bring them all together for some family / learning time. To learn more about Kendra Fletcher, click HERE.
The e-book includes some great strategies for time together that is peaceful and productive, how to get your children interested and creating circle time that works for your family and you! She also included some helpful printable planner sheets. Don't you just get all gitty when it comes to free printables? I love them!
The printouts that are included give you a type of wish list, or check list as I call it, that will help you decide how your circle time should be used for your needs. Here is an example of one of the printables.
Kendra suggests that you name your circle time anything you want. You can have the name 'family time' or 'catch up hour', whatever fits your family or need. You can also choose how long your circle time is. If you have several little ones, your time may not be very long due to their attention span. If you have teens, you may want to incorporate some schooling in that time that you could do together. A subject like Bible would be great for a group/ family of all ages, then after the Bible time, you can have something for the little ones to do, like give the little ones 'special things' while the older ones continue with the circle time. Those special things can be new coloring books (only used at circle time), play dough, puzzles, etc.. Or if you have some children close to the same age, you may want to have Spelling or Science time. If you have several ages in there,
How I Used the product -
We kept the name 'circle time' and we used this at dinner time when we could. I know, it doesn't really sound like the ideal time to implement things, but for our family this was the only real time we had together. Through the homeschool year, we eat dinner together every night, but throughout the summertime, it gets pretty scarce. One of my boys was gone for a week long youth camp, off to see relatives for two weeks, then off to a different camp upon his return. My oldest son has a part time job over the summer so he was gone most nights. My youngest goes to a one week day camp as well which means he doesn't eat dinner with us as a family during that week. Of course the children are gone during some of the review time, but we were still able to sneak it in when we could and there were few nights where they were all three gone. So we implemented our circle time only twice a week on the weeks the boys were here. Honestly, that is all we could do at this time of the year.
What we did with our circle time is prayer requests, who we admired in our lives and why, a few things that we were thankful for, etc. We also used this time to discuss anything exciting or important going on in each of our lives and what our schedule is coming up over the next couple of days. We also discussed our agenda for the week so everyone was aware of what was going on and we were all on the same page. ;)
Because of the age difference in my two homeschooled sons, there really wasn't any subjects we can do together. Even our Bible is different now a days. I do plan to use this circle time though when we start our next homeschool year this fall to start our day. I plan to have us pray together, maybe read a few daily scriptures, go over the daily chore lists, discuss our daily homeschool expectations and agendas for that day and week.
I would also like to mention that this would be a great GIFT for a homeschooling mother to start out her homeschool year, a preschool teacher, or a stay-at-home mom with little ones!
Overall I found this to be a great idea. Honestly, we have done this before and it seemed to keep us all on track. But as the children grow, their interests grow so they have different subjects in their homeschooling, different daily schedules, etc. But we really need to get back into the groove of this. It is a great way for our family to stay close. So even if we have to do our 'circle time' two nights at week at the dinner table.......it's worth it.
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