How to Schedule for Multiple Children

Planning Before Lessons

Many parents spend about 30 minutes a day preparing the next day’s lessons. Others take two hours over the weekend to plan the week ahead. The amount of planning does increase with the number of students, but smart planning can save a lot of time. Consider doing the following:

• Review the lesson objectives and assessments before teaching to assure that you'll cover all of the important concepts for each of your students.

• Gather all books and materials in the morning so that later you won’t have to interrupt a lesson to go and get them. Some people also find that printing everything in advance works well.

• Have older children do some of their own preparation and planning.

• Make sure your children know what to do when they've completed an independent task to avoid “I'm done … now what?” interruptions. Plan enough activities to keep everyone busy.

• Decide in advance which optional activities to include.

Scheduling Daily Work

• If one child is more active and easily distracted, teach that child first.

• Structure your day so that while one child is working independently, another can work directly with the teacher.

• Make sure that each of your students knows what must be accomplished each day. Some people keep assignment notebooks for each child. Others post lists on the refrigerator or in the computer's calendar.

Making Learning a Group Effort

• Encourage children to see what the other students are doing.

• Do one subject at the same time for all students. Share materials, but focus on each child’s objectives and assigned activities.

• Have older kids help teach younger kids. This can give older students a valuable review of basic skills and concepts and can give you extra time to work with another child or to plan.