Not every day is the same in a homeschooling house. Schedules are a wonderful thing, but many families find homeschooling life requires flexibility. No matter whether you start on time every day, or find the schedule running late due to chores or errands, a stable routine to start school time is a great plan. Starting with a daily warm-up flexes and stretches the brain, allowing children to transition from home time to school time.
There is no one thing that work best for daily warm-ups, and in fact, variety can be a good thing. Have a shelf or section of warm-up activities available for your children to choose from. These also make good, quick refreshers from other assignments.
Wordsearches and Other Puzzles
Puzzles are a great way to wake up the brain, and have wonderful benefits for the mind. Logic problems, wordsearches, crossword puzzles, dot-to-dots for the younger crowd - these are all good choices. Many puzzle books and magazines are inexpensive to purchase. Also look for online, kid-friendly puzzle sites.
Journaling
Writing in a journal is a great way to start the day. Creative writing, copywork, and so forth helps the creative juices to flow and helps work on basic writing skills. Copywork can be anything, from the Bible to poems to sentences from books. Keep it short and make it clear that mistakes are not an option. Copying implies you are looking directly at the work, and the purpose is to copy exactly as it is written. Journaling is a free-er, more creative expression of writing. For older children, you can present a topic and let them write a paragraph or two. Younger children can complete sentences and/or draw pictures. Brightly Beaming Resources has a great section for Primary level journaling. The questions are creative and fun to answer.
Tongue Twisters
Wake up your brain, and your tongue, with some zany tongue-twisting action! Tongue twisters are challenging, and help to wake the brain.
- PBS's Between the Lions - Don't let the fact that this is a show for the young fool you. Tongue twisters know no age boundaries, and these will have your tongue in knots in no time! (Not to mention, leave you in giggles).
- The Tongue Twister Database - Not a kid's site, so be aware, but there are many, many tongue twisters listed here.
There are many ways to start the day, but a consistent warm-up time brings order to the beginning of the school day. Find ways that work for you and your child.
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