Welcome, friend. This is Day 1 of a 5 part series on organizing Classical Conversations. Click below to see the other posts and read more about what we have planned!
The official “school” season is upon us and many homeschool groups will begin meeting in just a few short weeks. As we prepare to begin Cycle 1 of Classical Conversations this year, I want to share with you how I set up my home to continue the learning from Foundations class each week.
Since Classical Conversations is the core of our homeschool day, I use the trifold board in a “breakfast board” set-up. We have this board set-up in our kitchen (which is our schoolroom) everyday. The children can see the week’s memory work at a glance which is a huge step toward helping them memorize the information. They can also use the board to help them fill out notebook pages and other activities that we do to enhance the memory work. I love that the board can be taken into any room or it can be taken with us to CC each week and used in the classroom (I am a tutor, so it’s perfect!)
In class, I plan to cover each subject with some cute Scotch reusable mounting shapes and a blank piece of paper. Then, in class, we will uncover one subject at a time as we discover the week’s memory work
The board is simple to make. I adapted the idea from Half-a-Hundred Acre Wood where you will find great instructions for how to make the pockets. I used a roll of double sided tape to adhere the pockets and adjusted the arrangement of the pockets to fit my needs.The printables are listed here on this site, as well.
Here is what the board looks like before the weekly sheets go in. Note: there is an empty pocket for the timeline cards because you should always include the last card of the week before. (Since this is week 1, there is no card in the pocket right now.)
While I love sharing my ideas with you, I encourage you to keep in mind that this is one of MANY great ways to work with the materials and Classical Conversations doesn’t necessarily advocate one way over another. You are the teacher in your home and your children will be most blessed by doing what works for your family!
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This series is written in conjunction with 22 other bloggers to bring you 5 days of Organizing. Click below to check out the other great topics…
Kim Sorgius
Kim is just a girl, crazy in love with Jesus. She's a single mother of 4, a passionate homeschooler and life-long student. After teaching 8 years in public school, she traded her M.A. in Early Childhood for sippy cups and homeschool co-ops. Kim is the owner and editor of The Homeschool Village and Not Consumed where she encourages others to rest victoriously in the hands of God, rather than allowing life's difficult circumstances to consume.
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We don’t use Classical Conversations, but I love this idea. It can be used for any homeschooler that wants to keep key information in front of the kids’ faces. Thanks for sharing.
Yes, Carol. I’ve seen this type of board used in many different ways to promote learning at home!
I love this idea. We use CC as a supplement to our curriculum choice. Thanks for sharing this! =)
I love this idea! This is my first year of homeschooling and my first year of CC. I’m a bit overwhelmed at the moment. I have a 2nd grader and a 4 year old. We haven’t started our CC tutorials yet. May I ask, where are you getting the sheets you put in the pockets? From CC connected? Thanks for helping!
Hi Catherine,
Yes, those sheets are from CC Connected. On the site that I listed, you will find an exact list of the documents that you can use.
It’s very easy to get overwhelmed as both a new homeschooler and a new member of CC. Don’t buy the lie that you can mess up! God has equipped you and will fill in the gaps when you walk in obedience!
I hope you will enjoy some of the other posts that I have coming this week! I’m pretty excited. Can’t you tell?
Can you tell me who made the tri-fold board sheets on CC Connect? I have found a few but not all of the Cycle 1 subjects. Thanks
Go to Brandy’s site here…http://www.halfahundredacrewood.com/2012/07/cycle-1-memory-work-tri-fold-board.html
She lists the exact documents she used in a chart with the user name. (Many of them are from her.) You can also try searching brandyfarrell as a user in CC Connected.
Looks great! I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the series. I keep going back and forth on whether or not I’d like to do CC, and hopefully I’ll get more ideas from this series to help me decide. We wouldn’t do it this year, but maybe in the future.
Would you mind sharing how you made the subject labels?
I just made them in Pages (which is the MAC version of Word). I typed in the words and made them all the same size. I used the font: noteworthy.
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Thank you for the great tutorial! Could you please tell me what you used for the timeline card holders?
I bought them at Office Depot.