How I Homeschool with 4 Kids

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Homeschooling can be incredibly rewarding and fun and lovely, but sometimes (okok, OFTENTIMES,) it can be super overwhelming and frustrating.

Even just homeschooling one child can be difficult and hard to find a groove – let alone two kids or more. Factor in age differences and spreads, subject matter, and maturity levels, it’s enough to become a logistic nightmare.

This being our third year homeschooling, (as well as the second year with four kids), I thought I’d share a little bit of how I manage to juggle all the kids and their schedules this year.

In case you don’t have my entire clutch of children and their ages and grades in your short term memory, here’s the rundown of the tiny humans:

Cookie Monster: ~8, boy, 2nd Grade
Gamera: ~6, girl, K
Glow Worm: 4, boy, Pre-K
Sasquatch: 11 months, boy, N/A

I will split the day up into morning, afternoon, and evening chunks. Mostly because that is how my Ink+Volt Planner sets it up and now, my brain is used to it. (Actually, I think most of us think of the day like this. Either that or it’s Wake/Work/Home/Sleep.)

Quick Note: Other than our scheduled classes and activities, I do not plan out minute by minute for the children. That’s because I tend to get derailed easily and it’s too much pressure to keep “on schedule” and too easy to give myself an excuse to give up because it’s 8:30am and we’re already behind.

I have a list of subjects I want the kids to go over at some point during the day and then as long as the kids do them, I don’t really care when they do it.

The picture to the left details what I have planned for each child in terms of classes and what I expect to cover each day with each child.

As long as I hit most of them in a week, I am satisfied. (I look at it like doctors tell you to look at child nutrition: see what they are eating on a weekly vs daily basis.)

Anyhow, here’s a quick rundown of a typical day. I will have another post with my tips for homeschooling multiple children.

Morning

All the older kids wake up sometime between 6am and 7:30am. They go downstairs after changing clothes and hang out with Hapa Papa. They’re allowed thirty minutes daily of iPad time and that’s when they use it.

Allegedly, they’re supposed to be getting their own breakfast and eating it. Allegedly.

After their screentime is over, they play or read or do whatever – as long as it doesn’t wake the baby.

Whenever the baby wakes up, I hand him over to Hapa Papa until about 7:30am and then Hapa Papa has to get ready for the day. I eventually go downstairs around 8am and we begin the part of the day where I start my “parent” shift.

Depending on the day, I either get them ready to leave the house to attend a class or I start them on their daily activities. Since Cookie Monster and Gamera only have a morning class one day a week, I have been experimenting with leaving them home alone for up to an hour while I take Glow Worm to his various preschool classes.

(Therein is my first secret – send your preschool aged children to preschool!!)

I usually ask Cookie Monster and Gamera to either practice piano or do their Chinese homework when I’m out ferrying Glow Worm. Surprisingly, they’re really good sports about it and play through each of their songs five times and then, they typically pick a Chinese book to read. I guess it helps that the bookshelves are right next to the piano.

Cookie Monster has FINALLY discovered that reading is fun, so now he burns through 2-4 books a day. Not to be left out, Gamera has also started reading because she wants to be like her big brother. They are both obsessed with the Mr. Men and Little Miss series and thankfully, there are 96 books so it’s enough to keep them interested for a good long while.

When I get home, I try to put Sasquatch down for a nap. (That’s my second secret: cram in as much teaching as you can when the baby is napping.) While he is napping, I will work with Cookie Monster and Gamera on topics that require my presence to explain or teach (math and English reading).

For Cookie Monster, we are currently working through Singapore Math 3A, Kumon Division Grade 3, Explode the Code 1, and BOB Series 2. For Gamera, we are working through Singapore Math 1B, Explode the Code 1, and BOB Series 2.

Cookie Monster loves to blaze through as many pages as possible and we get a lot done every session. He pretty much likes to work until he doesn’t want to do it anymore and I let him because really, he’s so easy going and agreeable, I don’t mind.

Because Gamera is only in Kindergarten, I really don’t care how much we go through for her. She also has less stamina and complains really quickly so we rarely do more than 15 minutes. I am constantly amazed at how little time passes before she sighs and whines that her hand is sore and that she’s soooooo tired.

Now that I’m a little less trigger happy with the yelling and being easily overwhelmed by noise, I will occasionally have them work on math simultaneously. However, it’s still difficult because there are so many word problems in Singapore Math and neither of them can read yet. So, going through the workbooks still requires a lot of my focused attention for reading and/or translating into Chinese.

We don’t do Explode the Code at the same time despite the pages being pretty self-explanatory and repetitive, I have the kids using the same set of workbooks because I am cheap and refuse to pay that much money for the whole set for FOUR separate children.

Instead, I use transparent sheets and they use dry eraser markers to circle and practice writing. (I laminated ten empty laminate pouches and then clean them with hand-sanitizer gel and a cloth.) Since they are in the same book right now, I can’t teach them at the same time. Once Cookie Monster finishes the first book (he’s over half-way through), I can have them work together.

Now that Cookie Monster and Gamera are older and Glow Worm is at preschool so he doesn’t need entertaining, we’ve cut screentime and whoever is not being worked with at the kitchen table is usually playing, drawing, or reading quietly by themselves. If Sasquatch is awake, the other person is keeping him out of trouble.

At some point in the morning, I put lunch in the Instant Pot so that we can have food to eat. Then I go to pick up Glow Worm from Chinese preschool.

Afternoon

In general, I try to make sure the kids finish their work before lunch because after lunch, they are DONE. The afternoon is reserved for extracurricular activities or play dates or just playing. If we are really behind in doing our work and I actually have mustered up some sense of urgency, I might have the kids do more work.

Once or twice a week, I will go through part of a lesson from Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding Vol. 1 after lunch with the older three kids. They do not enjoy it but seriously, I take up less than fifteen minutes of their time to cram in some science lesson and then they’re back to playing.

I keep intending to pair the lessons with R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey but honestly, I’m lazy. This will take a lot more intentional work on my part.

Then, we’re off to some class or activity and before you know it, it’s dinner time and Hapa Papa has come home and I don’t even greet him before I hand him the baby and run away upstairs to be away from my children.

Evening

I try to prep on a weekly basis (mostly the science portion – which clearly, needs to be worked on a bit more seriously) and I can really only do that in the evenings or on the weekends. Otherwise, this is also when I’m doing research on curriculum or writing.

Ok. I will be honest. By researching curriculum, I really mean search Guavarama’s blog for what her kids are doing. Or if I’m feeling REALLY researchy, I will search the different Facebook Homeschooling groups I belong to for their advice. And then, I start ordering entire sets indiscriminately on Amazon.

Oh, and to clarify. This is not what I do MOST evenings or weekends. That is merely the time I have really free to do so.

Other Stuff of Dubious Interest

Here’s what our homeschooling spaces look like:

Also, I have been asked before what I do when we have either bad days or if we are sick or somehow end up missing a day or two or five of homeschooling. Do we try to make up the missing days and subjects? Do we double up or add work until we are caught up to where we’re “supposed” to be?

Nope. The answer is NOPE.

Look. My kids are in 2nd grade and Kindergarten. I cannot imagine any scenario where they are learning stuff that absolutely requires us to be at a certain point by a certain date.

This is the whole point of homeschooling: to work at your own pace independently from other kids!

And though some folks could argue that my kids are way ahead in Math so that’s why I don’t worry, Cookie Monster is really behind in reading. He’s in 2nd grade and still doesn’t know how to read English.

Despite it being an intentional decision on my part to emphasize Chinese literacy at the expense of his English literacy, I do have bouts of insecurity about my choices when I hear of his peers reading Harry Potter or Percy Jackson. Plus I, myself, was reading 5th or 6th grade level books at his age. I have to willfully forget what stuff I was learning as a kid his age. Otherwise, I start freaking out.

At least Cookie Monster’s Chinese tutor says he’s at grade level for kids in China – I have no way of verifying this statement without undue effort on my part so we’ll just have to all take his tutor’s word for it. This is vastly superior to my current abilities so YAY!

Anyhow, what was I talking about?

Ah, yes. Do I “make up” our work?

The answer is still, “No.” I just continue where we were at our normal pace. It does, however, take a few days to ease back into homeschooling when we take days off. Not because the kids aren’t willing – but because I have completely forgotten the rhythm and how to homeschool my kids and think every day is Saturday.

This year, I also intentionally cut back on their classes and activities. In actuality, I only cut their weekly outdoor education class and combined their twice weekly one hour M2 class into a weekly two hour class. Although now that I think about it, I added kungfu for Glow Worm but since that merely requires us to attend kungfu an hour earlier and Cookie Monster and Gamera work on their reading during Glow Worm’s class, it works out.

In addition, every two weeks, PharmGirl and I trade off teaching sewing or knitting at my house. We just started this so I have no idea how this will work or last. Thus far, Gamera really loves the sewing projects PharmGirl is teaching and is underwhelmed by my attempt to teach her a knit stitch. Cookie Monster has ZERO interest in either subjects so I am only going to force him to learn how to knit with ZERO success.

Just these small adjustments have made a HUGE difference in my stress levels and I no longer feel as if I am always rushing from one thing to the next. Thus, secret number three: consolidate classes into larger blocks of time and/or cut classes to increase time at home.

This way, I also don’t stress about Sasquatch’s nap time because a tired baby is a cranky baby.

I am not completely satisfied with my laziness and I know I need to add more history or social studies – and I mean to. I really wanted to start incorporating the Black History is American History course that I bought but honestly, I am not used to prepping for any lessons quite just yet.

I am barely doing science – I am not sure I can handle prepping history, too. And the course is super easy – but it still requires me to go to the library and borrow books. And read. And teach.

Yes, I know. I am truly mediocre.

But, hey. I do what I can at the moment.

Anyhow, I don’t mention the baby too much because honestly? He’s my fourth child. We ignore Sasquatch a lot and he basically wanders my house and plays with the other three kids when they’re not doing their work.

Like I said, I try to cram everything in during his 2-3 hour nap. On days he’s being difficult and refusing to sleep, we get a lot less done. Or, I am just really ok with letting him do whatever he wants as long as he’s safe.

In terms of actual schooling/teaching that I do at home (vs the kids taking actual classes), it is very minimal. At most an hour per kid. That’s because my kids can finally read. Well, they can read Chinese anyway. And they can read it well enough that I no longer have to sit next to them as they read aloud to me.

Now, because I want to make sure their pronunciation or reading is correct, I will still occasionally have them read aloud to me once every week or two. But for the most part, they have complained that reading the books aloud makes them too thirsty and it takes too long so now, they have started reading silently – AND TO THEMSELVES. It is a beautiful and wondrous thing.

And that’s my last secret: once your kids can read independently, your workload decreases a lot.

Alright. That’s all I can really think of for now. Did I miss something? Is there something you’re dying to know about our daily life that I did not mention or detail enough? Let me know in the comments.