This review is all about the homeschool mamas! I have been checking out the current Hey Mama! Print Schoolhouse Planner 2016-2017 from The Old Schoolhouse and boy, is it ever nice! I think this is the biggest one I have seen, it has 196 pages. It is 9″ x 11″ x.5″, has a glossy, sturdy cover, and is all bound together with silver wire – o binding.
While I am not much of a “planner” person, as we tend to be mostly a relaxed homeschooling family, there are a good number of things I really like about this particular planer.
As you can see in the picture above, the theme is old fashioned looking this year. I LOVE vintage looking things! Scattered through the planer are vintage, sepia toned pictures of the homemaking tools pictured on the cover, along with an explanation of their uses. It does give a mama cause to consider how much easier we have it when it comes to doing these tasks!
Starting right out of the gate on the inside front cover, there is a very nice letter of encouragement from Gena Suarez, publisher of The Old Schoolhouse Magazine. At the beginning of each month, there is a small devotional, encouragement note, and/or Bible verse. Speaking of Bible verses, my very favorite thing is that with the exception of just one page, all scripture used in this planner comes the King James Version of the Bible. You all know how I feel about that one, right? 🙂
What does the Hey Mama! Schoolhouse Planner have in it which makes it so good for you to use, you might ask? Well, let me tell you, because I think this planner could be used no matter what style of homechooler you happen to be. First, here are the things you will see in this planner:
- year at a glance calendars for 2016, 2017 & 2018
- Monthly calendars, each with a Hey Mama! letter and a page for notes
- A plethora of forms, which I’ll describe below
Homeschool Forms:
- Weekly Planners
- Monthly Goals
- Semester Goals
- Yearly Goals
- Attendance Chart (if you are required to keep track of how many hours or days per year that you homeschool, this will help you track it.
- Books read this year
- Curriculum planning sheet
- Homeschooling Contact List
- 36 General Writing Prompts (enough for one per week if you follow a 36 week schedule)
- Story Starters
- The 13 Colonies by Date
- Timeline of Inventions
- U.S. Presidents and Their Wives
- Branches of the Federal, State and Local Governments
- United States and Capitals
- Creating An Academic Transcript
- Checklist and Skills Learned
- Other Courses
While there will be sections that I won’t likely use as designed (again, I’m not much of a pre-planner when it comes to school), I think it will be a very simple twist to use the planning pages in reverse, as in, logging what we DID instead of what we are going to do. I tend to feel as if I failed if we don’t cover everything in “the plan” when it’s written down to be done, but feel more of an accomplishment when I can write in all the things we did do, instead. 🙂
I like the general writing prompts. I have four kids, and I think if I give them each the exact same writing prompt for the week, I will get four completely different stories.
There are only four “Books Read This Year” pages, and i hope they will read more books that the spaces allow, so I will, if needed copy the page and keep it in the planner. Same with the actual planner pages, as we school year around, so I will need more of those pages. There are also a couple of pages of story starters, such as “What is the best birthday present you ever received and why?”
The pages I think are good for a jumping off point in creating a study would be “The Thirteen Colonies by Date”, the “Timeline of Inventions”, the “U.S. Presidents and Their Wives”.
The pages giving the branches of the Federal, State and local governments are also a great jumping off point, especially in this, an election year!
The United States and Capitals gives them in the order they became part of the United States, which is a choice i would have also made.
Finally, should you need to create a transcript in your state, there are very good instructions for doing so, and there is also a page for “other courses”, which I would consider to be electives, along with a”Checklist and Skills Learned” page.
I think a family who follows a “regular” school year could use this planner just as it is, especially if they are required to keep records and attendance. I also think however, that this planner is useful for those of us who school all year, who are very relaxed, who unit study, or even who unschool, Why? Because as I said above, instead of putting in ahead of time what you will do each day, you can instead wait until after you’ve finished the day, and then log what you did!
All of this to say, I really, really like this planner!
As you can see below, click on the picture and use the coupon code, and you will receive $10.00 off of the cost of the Print Planner. What an excellent deal!
To read what 124 other crew members had to say about the Hey Mama! Print Schoolhouse Planner 2016-2017, please click on the banner directly below.
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