Workboxes at Work

Material from a previous blog:

This school year we have begun using workboxes.  I actually don’t remember how I got introduced to Sue Patrick & her system but I have been learning about it for the last year or so.  I would strongly recommend that anyone interested go directly to Sue’s website so that you can learn more as I may not present everything exactly as she recommends.

I purchased & read & Sue’s book & have listened to her speak at a workshop recently.  Her system is not a curriculum but a method of organizing your existing curriculum to make it work better for you & your family & to learn more.  In addition to helping you organize it also teaches you to be more visual in your  presentation of school work & to incorporate review materials into the school day.  Although I will say that I do not agreee with all her methods or ideaology I appreciate her emphasis very much.  She unashamedly calls homeschool Moms to be professionals with a high calling that requires much.  Anyway, visit Sue to learn more about what she does; I wanted to show my homeschool friends how things have been going at Brookgreen Academy.

Below you will see the workboxes for L4 (Preschool.)  I did not purchase a show organizer as suggested but instead revamped an existing bookshelf that was already in our home.  We have a very small house & a large family so space is of the utmost importance to me.  The workboxes are shown here packed & ready for the next morning.  Let me say that I am not a workbook teacher!  The boxes may appear to be filled with worksheets but they are actually brimming with LEARNING!  We have been doing workboxes for 3 weeks now & all I can say is… I’m still doing it!  I don’t know if it is something I will maintain forever, that will be interesting to see, but it has definately benefitted our learning in ways that will stay with us forever.

The best things about this system (for our family) have been-

1. This system forces me to be prepared!  Not that I have ever been a lazy teacher by any means but I am very good at pulling things together at the last minute which might work but it does not allow for the maximum use of time & resources.  You can not pull workboxes together at the last minute.  I’ll let you know if I get to that point in the future!

2. We are utilizing tons of fun hands on interactive things that I have always collected & wanted to use but "never found the time to do."  Part of this organizational system is a conscious effort to vary types of tasks & motivate students with different types of learning tools & manageable chunks of material.  It is great to finally get out all that stuff I always intended to use & really see my boys learning & loving them!

3. This system integrates review which I recently realized was a real deficiency in our school day.  We have so much fun learning new things & for the most part have an extremely high retention rate but there are some things that just require review & I had not previously scheduled that into our day.  This sytem helps me do that.

Above are the workboxes for E6 (1st grade.)  Here again, I used what would fit into the space we had available & yet still allow E6 to see his work which is an important part of making progress & keeping expectations clear & visible.  Instead of the plastic shoeboxes he has a set of drawers & if a day requires more workboxes that this drawer allows I simply stack shoeboxes on top to make additional workboxes.

Another great advantage of this system is that I am becoming so aware of how & when to make things more visual.  I am looking at all kinds of materials now & seeing ways to use it in more hands on, fun & interactive ways than I ever did before!

My oldest, F9 (4th grade) is not using workboxes in this sense (by his choice.)  We have been using a successful written daily schedule for several years but I have adapted that schedule to make it like workboxes on paper.  I will try to get a picture of it & post that soon.  He is thinking about switching to the physical workboxes so we’ll keep you posted.  Although this may appear to be geared more to young children Sue uses the system with her children- 14 & 12.

Well, all this is well & good but what results are we seeing?- the proof is in the pudding.  I am spending more time planning (bad?) so that we can spend more time learning (excellent!)  Instead of spending my "school hours" rushing to gather materials, find a book, & trying to stay one step ahead of the gang- I am spending my time answering questions & doing "Work with Mommy" activities with my children (which are wonderfully scheduled to allow individual attention to each child.)  I am not an early learning advocate (other than the natural education called life) but my L4 wants to do "real school."  Now instead of his days being filled with twaddle & endless preschool workbooks he is actively engaged in quality learning & doing 2-4 hours of "school" every day, most of which he manages himself.  My E6 is able to know how much X (x being that which he prefers not to do) he has to do to get to Y (Y can’t I do that instead.)  He also knows exactly when the school day ends & he can devote himself to higher callings such as wooden weapon making & theatrical noises with body parts.  As for F9 he is getting many of his favorite activities (reading) sprinkled through out the school day instead of piled on at the end (which could be translated as not as important !)

I hope to share more about the workboxes because I know many of you are interested in this.  Of coarse there are so many folks blogging about this right now & many have much grander ideas than me.  Hope this is helpful to someone.

material from a previous blog