We know the hours can easily disappear when we don't have a schedule in place for our day, especially when homeschooling.

To reach your new homeschool year’s goals, you want to set your days up for success.

Otherwise, you’ll feel overwhelmed and exhausted scrambling to get everything done after you’ve run out of time. In other words, you won’t get it done.

It happened to me, and it’ll happen to you too if you don’t watch out!

One way to be more productive during the day is to create a morning routine.

HOW TO PLAN YOUR MORNING

Planning your morning is a matter of working backwards, starting with the night before. You have to decide what time you will go to sleep, so you get enough sleep to wake up at the optimal time to perform your morning routine.

As a mother of two, the morning hours were important to me as they are probably important to you. Waking up an hour or so before your children will give you a less harried start on the day.

To create your morning routine, you have to first decide what are the important things you want to do as a part of your routine.

Whatever you decide, write your schedule down on paper so you can see it in front of you. Pin it to the wall or wherever you want to put it to remind yourself of each step. You want to follow a certain order too, so your routine becomes a habit you don’t have to think about.

After coffee, you read for 30 minutes; after reading, you go for a 30-minute walk and so forth.

The things you write down will be your morning ritual. It’s sounds so simple, but it will have a huge impact on how much you get done. Planning a routine is also a proactive strategy which will serve to keep your stress levels down as well.

But it doesn’t stop there, not when you have kids!

THE OFFSPRING RITUAL

You want to follow your morning ritual with what I call the Offspring ritual.

Teach your children to get into the habit of getting up at a certain hour each day and performing their morning ritual. Maybe they start their day by brushing their teeth and then chatting with you for 10 or 15 minutes to reconnect after a good night’s sleep.

After a good chat, they run off to get dressed, put their dirty clothes in the hamper, make their beds, and come in for breakfast at a designated time.

(Eating on a schedule is much better for your children’s health than eating at random meal times.)

Depending on how you set things up, you can prepare breakfast while they are getting ready or you can enjoy another cup of coffee and wait for them to help you prepare it.

After a relaxed breakfast, the children clean up while you get ready to teach And that’s why we also need a homeschool ritual.

After you finish eating breakfast with your children, you will head to your homeschool room and examine your plan for the day and prepare to teach your children.

Once your mind is in gear for teaching, you can ring your school bell!

THE HOMESCHOOLING RITUAL

A general rule is to teach your most essential subjects first, the ones that if there were an interruption to your day, you could still relax knowing you'd gotten those finished.

Language arts and math for the morning hours work well.

Give your children 2-minute breaks when they begin to get restless, so they can stretch, run around the block, or jump on a trampoline. Getting a good dose of oxygen into their brains will replenish their thinking energy.

You want to schedule a long lunchtime break when they can eat and then go outside and play for a while.

Let the morning hours be the more intense hours of study, and in the afternoon you can take it easy. Read some history, do a science experiment, or read a story out loud. Some days you may have outings planned with other homeschoolers.

Always make sure you children have enough some time to read or pursue their hobbies; practice an instrument, do some artwork, or play a sport.

On the days when you stay home, try to finish homeschooling around the same time each day, so everyone has leisure time before dinner including, and most importantly, yourself!

Final Reminders

If you create a schedule and adhere to it, you will prevent your day from slipping right past you. Otherwise you’ll find that too many times the afternoon has rolled around, and you have barely made it past grammar.

The key to your success with keeping a routine is to keep in mind that we are not perfect beings and some days we will falter in our plan. We don’t tell ourselves we are hopeless at sticking to a plan, as this will reinforce that behavior.

Instead we get up the next day with a new intention, and we start all over again. Eventually, we will get better and discover the freedom and ease that comes with keeping to a plan not to mention more productive homeschooling days!

Don’t miss our free download, Ten Books Every Well-Educated Child Should Read.

Teach your child to read before sending him to school! Learn more about Elizabeth's unique course, How to Teach Your Child to Read and Raise a Child Who Loves to Read.

For parents of children under age seven who would like to prepare their child for social and academic success, please begin with Elizabeth’s singular online course, Raise Your Child to Thrive in Life and Excel in Learning.

When you join the Smart Homeschooler Academy online course for parents, Elizabeth will make homeschooling manageable for you. She’ll guide you in helping your kids reach their intellectual potential and developing good character.

As a homeschooler, you will feel confident, calm, and motivated knowing you have the tools and support you need to homeschool successfully.

Elizabeth Y. Hanson is a homeschooling thought-leader and the founder of Smart Homeschooler.

As an Educator, Homeschool Emerita, Writer, and Love and Leadership Certified Parenting Coach, Elizabeth has 21+ years of experience working in education.

Developing a comprehensive understanding of how to raise and educate a child, she devotes her time to helping parents get it right.

Elizabeth is available for one-on-one consultations as needed.

"I know Elizabeth Y. Hanson as a remarkably intelligent, highly sensitive woman with a moral nature and deep insight into differences between schooling and education. Elizabeth's mastery of current educational difficulties is a testimony to her comprehensive understanding of the competing worlds of schooling and education. She has a good heart and a good head. What more can I say?”

—John Taylor Gatto Distinguished educator, public speaker, and best-selling author of Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling