When planning out my school year I try to keep a loose plan and not lay out the year in detail because I know I will end up changing it as time goes on.

I started by going through the school year and marking off the days I knew we wouldn’t be doing school. I then broke up the remaining time into 6- or 7-week segments, each of which became a term. Our entire year has now been broken into 6 terms and a summer session.

For subjects we do every day — math, reading, and writing — I just do the next lesson in the book.  I don’t need to plan much for those subjects as I know we will just keep doing the next thing.

For others — like spelling, history, and science — I skim the teacher’s guide and figure out how many lessons we need to get done per term to finish by the end of the year. I can then fill that information into my planner for the year. For example, I know I need to do lessons 1, 2, and 3 in our science curriculum during the first term to stay on schedule, so that’s what I write for term 1.

My 6-term school year plan gives me a nice overview of what I need to get done each term without having to get specific or plan daily lessons. I have found that I do well with this kind of flexibility.  It also allows me to add in any holiday lessons, life skills, or character traits I want to remember to focus on as the year goes on.

Once I outline the year by terms I can now just focus on the term coming up, and gradually add more substance to those plans. Below is a close-up of the plans I am working on.

Shown on the left is my overview of the year, with sections to make notes for each term. On the right are my plans for the first term of the year.  This is where I am able to get more specific about each subject area, make a list of supplies needed, and keep a running shopping list.

Printable

6-Term School Year Planner (PDF)