In all honesty, I share my plans with a certain degree of apprehension for fear that it will discourage someone or create some sort of upheaval (especially in the social media realm). So, let me preface this with the realization that there are about a half-a-hundred thousand different ways to do Classical Conversations at home. Some like to keep it simple with just memory work & reading, writing, & arithmetic. Some like crafty stuff and online games. Some like unit studies and lapbooks. It’s perfectly okay to include the things you and your children enjoy as part of your homeschool. {If you are new to homeschooling, new to Classical Conversations, or new to this blog, please read this letter to a new CC Mom and this message about resting in the classical model.}
Within this homeschooling journey, I’ve grown to thrive off of reading great books with my children. I treasure sharing stories with them. Crazy mom-mom that I am, I also ask for feedback from my children to see what they would most like to learn. And so… this is how our plans have come into existence each year.
Please remember: I’m just a mom who is doing my best to teach my children. I also play with my children and enjoy simply hanging out with them. By God’s grace, my children learn and grow tremendously every year in spite of me. And I believe He will do the same for you, regardless of how you want to supplement or not supplement the memory work. There’s no one right way to do Classical Conversations at home. You have to tailor your homeschool experience to the needs of your family, not someone else’s.
So… before anything else, let me be the first to tell you, plan does not equal reality (especially in our home). It is not necessary to have a plan like this to be successful as a CC parent or a homeschooling parent in general. Although I offer these for those who wish to use them, if you just want to stick to memory work and not incorporate anything else but reading, writing, and arithmetic, that’s really quite super-fantastic! {Less is more!} If you’d like to tailor our plans to fit your own family’s needs, you can take whatever parts you like for your family and ignore the rest. If you have questions, please contact me directly at halfahundredacrewood @gmail.com. [I really do appreciate questions because it helps me to clarify my thoughts and communicate better. And, most importantly, it helps me to help others, which is the reason I have a blog in the first place.]
There are four major things I’m posting here…
Our Cycle 2 Reading Plan (the whole shebang)
Our Cycle 2 Reading Selections (Read Aloud and Picture Books) on a single page
Our Cycle 2 Loop Schedules (there are three – a storytime loop, a wonder-beauty loop, and a Western Civilization Study loop)
Our updated Cycle 2 Planners
Our Cycle 2 Reading Plans
Download our {free} Four Day Home Plan (Pictured above)
Explanation of Four Day Home Plan
This plan does not include the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic because we are constantly making adjustments to those plans based on my children’s mastery of those topics. For those particular subjects we use Spell to Write and Read, the Classical Conversations Essentials program, and Saxon Math. But for the other subjects, I’ve written a 4-day plan because we are in a Classical Conversations community one day per week. Although I use a planner with a 5-day schedule, I write my reading plans across 4 days for the sake of space, since we do not do anything extra on our community day. Below I’m detailing each section of the plan, although this information is included in the download.
History & Science Memory Work Reference: I’ve included a reading correlation, but our family uses this only as a reference because we do not concern ourselves with correlating reading directly with memory work unless we have specific questions. We have read through all four volumes of The Story of the World (SOTW) and the first two volumes of The Mystery of History (MOH). Both have advantages and disadvantages. (Note: We stopped listening to MOH audios because of the gossip-y nature of some of the content of MOH Volume 2 and 3. For now, we are taking a break from those and venturing over to a study that takes us through 5,000 years of history in 16 lessons, the Western Civilization Study by Brimwood Press.) When I made this reading correlation, we were using the 1997 edition of Everything You Need to Know About World History Homework (WHH) and Everything You Need to Know About Science Homework (SH), so the pages will not line up exactly if you have a newer edition.
Bible, Devotions & Prayer: As a springboard for character and Bible study, we are using Hero Tales by Dave & Neta Jackson (<– That’s an affiliate link, which means I receive a small commission if you decide to make a purchase through that link. Affiliate links are used in this post.) Each chapter is neatly divided into 4 readings about missionaries, along with a scripture to memorize, character traits to study, and thoughtful questions to discuss.
Reading Plan: You can find information about the read alouds and picture book selections by visiting: Cycle 2 Read Alouds and Cycle 2 Picture Books. We have a daily read aloud (indicated by RA), along with picture books for afternoon reading, and a science reading from Science in the Ancient World by Jay Wile, which covers science from the ancient Greeks/Romans to the Early Renaissance. After much consideration (I’ve been reading Answers in Genesis God’s Design… books and Jay Wile’s books and thinking and reading and thinking and reading… ad nauseam), I’ve finally made a decision. Because of its story-like nature, its hands-on activities, and the engaging way that the material is presented, we’re using Jay Wile’s Science in the Ancient World. This means that our science readings will cross over mutliple science subjects every year (which I actually prefer). Science in the Ancient World is the second book in this series, but we’re starting with it for multiple reasons. (You can download free pdf samples of the Jay Wile books at BereanBuilders and free pdf samples of God’s Design for Science at Answers in Genesis.)
Our Cycle 2 Read Alouds and Picture Book Selections
Are you just wanting a one-pager of our read alouds and picture books? If so, download our Single-Page Reading Schedule (Pictured above). After someone let me know that my book selections lean towards the boy-interest category, I decided to offer a couple of alternate suggestions for families with girls.
Our Cycle 2 Loop Schedules
Download the Storytime Loop Schedule. (Pictured above.)
Download the Wonder-Beauty Loop Schedule. (Pictured above.)
What is a loop schedule?
Loop scheduling is just a way of planning. In a loop schedule, you cycle through subjects in a loop instead of doing them on a certain day each week. For example, in a normal block schedule, I can set aside Wednesday afternoons for nature study, Thursday afternoons for composer study, and Friday afternoons for art projects. But… if our schedule is interrupted due to unforeseen circumstances, we will either totally miss what we planned to do for a particular subject that week or have to double up the next week to “catch up.”
If I use a poetry-composer study-art loop schedule, we can cycle through those tasks without worrying about totally missing out on Art Friday, for example. If we don’t get around to art on Friday, we’ll just do it on Monday. Even though I have a reading plan with assigned tasks for poetry, composer study, and art study each week, we often fall “behind schedule” because of things like illness, drama rehearsals, field trips, or Distractible Mom Syndrome. In this case, we just pick up where we left off the next day and don’t worry about not getting it finished on a particular day. Although a loop schedule more accurately represents what we do, I haven’t yet figured out how to reflect this in our weekly planner pages, so I’ve simply listed each of our loop plans on a separate sheet.
If you compare our loop schedules to the reading plan (as shown above), you’ll see that it goes in the same order. I hope this makes sense! If it doesn’t, or if you have additional questions about loop scheduling, please let me know!
What is the Storytime Loop?
The Storytime Loop includes some extra readings that our family would like to incorporate into our school days. Because reality often derails our school plans (e.g., illness, urgent errands, unexpected visitors, etc.), we started implementing a loop schedule for such things a couple of years ago. A loop schedule gives us the freedom to pick up where we left off when our plans have gone awry due to reality. I’ve included a place to check-the-box to keep track of where we are on the schedule. The intention for this loop is to cycle through storytelling, Shakespeare (which will likely take two days for each reading), mini-biographies (which may also take two days for each reading), and poetry.
Books referenced in the Storytime Loop:
MT: Medieval Tales that Kids Can Read and Tell by Lorna MacDonald Czarnota
BOV: The Book of Virtues: A Treasury of Great Moral Stories by William J Bennett
TTT: 10 True Tales – World War I Heroes
WRH: What Really Happened During the Middle Ages by Terri Johnson
Shakespeare: We are using Stories from Shakespeare by Anna Claybourne, but there are other versions available, including the free ebooks Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare by E Nesbitt or Tales from Shakespeare by Mary Lamb. Visit Cycle 2 Read Alouds for more information on these books.
Picture books: After finishing Medieval Tales, we plan to continue practicing the storytelling skills using the picture books we’ve selected for the coming year. You can find those selections at Cycle 2 Picture Books.
What is the Wonder-Beauty Loop?
The intention for this loop is to cycle through Nature Study, Hymn Study, Orchestra/Composer Study, and Art Study/Projects. These are special activities that bring joy, wonder, and beauty into our school days. Again, because reality often derails our school plans, we use a loop schedule which gives us the freedom to pick up where we left off when our plans are interrupted. I’ve included a place to check-the-box to keep track of where we are on the schedule.
Books we are using for the Wonder-Beauty Loop:
Nature Study: We have a wide range of books we are using – some picture books, some reference books. A free ebook that may be used for Nature Study is Anna Botsford Comstock’s Handbook of Nature Study. (See Cycle 2 Read Alouds for a link to download the free version if you have trouble finding it. One of our goals is to learn the constellations of the night sky. One helpful resource for this (for young children) is Glow-in-the-Dark Constellations by CE Thompson (what a neat book!). The Moon Book is also a great picture book to help with studying the moon. I’ve left second semester blank so we can better follow our children’s lead as we take nature walks starting in the spring semester.
Hymn Study: Then Sings My Soul by Robert Morgan
Composer Study: The Story of the Orchestra by Robert Levine
Art Study: Discovering Great Artists by MaryAnn Kohl (art projects and mini-bios) along with Usborne’s Famous Paintings Cards and wikiart.org (for art study).
Journaling
Although it’s not mentioned in the plan, we’ll set aside about 15 minutes daily to record thoughts (e.g., discoveries from our nature walk, copy the poetry we have memorized, thoughts about a hymn, or even just the weather!). We will only journal one item per day, so not everything will have a journal entry. This idea came about as we traveled across the U.S. and saw the many journal entries of pioneers, inventors, and trailblazers (like Lewis & Clark). It’s a special keepsake I hope will mean much as the years go by.
Latin & Map Practice
Latin: Our children enjoy Song School Latin immensely. Not only do we use the workbooks and CDs, we also enjoy the DVDs which are sold separately. The DVDs include a fun storyline to keep children excited and engaged, and they include a “derivative river” which I find super-fasinating and helpful!
Map Practice: Not only do we practice the locations of our CC memory work, but we’ve also been working on drawing blob maps and tracing/labeling a certain continent each year. This year, we will be focusing on tracing Europe. You can find free blob map templates here and a free map-tracing download at Map Tracing with a Printable World Atlas.
Download the Western Civilization Study Loop. (Only if you’re using the Western Civilization Study by Brimwood Press. If you aren’t, instead of using this plan you can simply read a couple of chapters per week out of a volume of SOTW.)
What is the Western Civilization Study?
The above document lists how we intend to divide up the coursework for the Western Civilization Study by Brimwood Press. We will begin each lesson with the reading from the Calendar Quest companion novel (the attention grabber for our kids). The next day we’ll work on the geography activity as noted in the Western Civilization book. On another day we’ll read from What Every Child Needs to Know about Western Civilization (indicated by the abbreviation WC). If you have younger children with shorter attention spans, you can simply read the summaries in the appendix, but as a parent, you will likely enjoy reading the entire lesson (at least I did!). While you are reading from the Western Civilization (WC) book, children can color the corresponding page from Color the Western World. HoH stands for the Hats of History timeline cards as indicated in the Western Civilization book. Our children took turns placing the stickers on the back of the timeline cards. [Note: The WC book refers to a Scroll Timeline that’s no longer available. Our family never used the Scroll timeline, but this year we plan to add images to our Timeline Notebook. You can download a timeline notebook template. We have looped this schedule in case it takes us longer to complete certain lessons, as we like to keep our lessons short & sweet to aid in joyful learning.]
Cycle 2 Planners – Changes
Due to recent complaints from third-party sellers who are creating and selling planners and other Classical-Conversations-related digital resources (and who were subsequently asked by CC to remove topics from those planners), I will no longer be able to include the weekly memory work topics in my (free) planners. For years I have been granted permission to post topics in my resources, but times change, and so the guidelines must also change to maintain peace and unity across the great wide realm of the digital world. Classical Conversations has requested that I leave in the memory work topics from one week in each of my planners in order to show parents how they can fill it out for themselves. Other content on my blog will be updated accordingly, so you will see a few changes in the coming months. Though I am not granted preferential treatment, I have been given extra time to make these changes since I do not sell anything on my blog. My prayer is that my planners will still be helpful and useful even without the topics listed.
On to brighter things… I have been updating the planners a bit so that I can make a final transfer to the Mac. Because of differences between Office for PC and Office for Mac, the design has changed quite a bit. I hope it’s a better layout than I’ve previously used, but I realize some are accustomed to the old designs. So… because I had to make this update, I thought I’d offer these for download as well. I hope what I provide here on this website blesses your school year. Thanks for reading Half-a-Hundred Acre Wood!
Download Blank Cycle 2 Planner Update: 5-Day Week
Download Blank Cycle 2 Planner Update: 4-Day Week
Download Cycle 2 Planner Update with Our Reading Plan.
One last planner I have includes daily readings from Story of the World and our read aloud selections for the coming year:
It includes links to free websites for drawing, orchestra, etc. It’s in the original format of my previous Cycle 2 Planners. Click here for PDF (does not have active links). Click here for XLS (includes active links).
For those who wish to edit these planners for their own family, the following are Microsoft Excel versions of these planners:
Four-Day Planner XLS
Five-Day Planner XLS
Planner with our Plans XLS
Again, please contact me if you have any questions! Blessings to your family in the coming year!
Other related posts:
Our Cycle 2 Reading Plans from 3 years ago
Our Cycle 2 Read Aloud Selections
Our Cycle 2 Picture Book Selections
Our Cycle 2 Booklist
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