Simple Morning Time Notebook Volume I

Sharing is caring!

Are you looking for a solution for teaching multiple children or a wide range of ages? Simplify your homeschool by starting with Morning Time. Morning Time is the part of our day where we gather to learn the subjects that are best learned in a group setting. It inspires our day with truth, goodness, and beauty. This Simple Morning Time Notebook is the format our family will be using the upcoming year. Take a peek inside and purchase one for yourself. I hope you’ll join us!

Video: Simple Morning Time Notebook: Volume I

A Peek Inside Our Morning Time

A few months ago, I received a comment on YouTube from a mom who said that she would like to look inside our Morning Time folders to see what we study each year. I tucked this thought away in my head until recently when I started planning for a new school year. I began trying to think of a way that I could share my Morning Time plans with other moms so they can have something tangible to print out and use in their homeschool. That is where the idea for this notebook came together.

---

Well-Suited for Ambleside Online Users

From the very beginning of our homeschool journey, I have loved Ambleside Online. It is a beautiful, rich curriculum. As our family grew over the years (we now have 10 children), it became more difficult to continue doing AO, but I did not want my kids to miss out on the abundance that AO provides. Because of this, we adapt Ambleside Online to meet the needs of our family. Our yearly choices are what I like to call the “ultra lite” version. We still enjoy the feast , but only as much as we can handle. We usually do only 1-2 poets, artists, or composer suggestions per year. I would rather my child know only a handful of composers/artists/poets very well, than a shallow knowledge of many composers/artists/poets. I try to choose the most well-known and loved choices each year from the Ambleside Online options.

How We Do Morning Time

We typically do Morning Time 3-4 days a week, give or take depending on our schedule. We have subjects that we do daily and others that we loop on a rotation. In our notebooks, I don’t have a detailed schedule for how much I plan to accomplish in a certain time period. I have found that in homeschooling, some mornings we get a lot done and other mornings, we just aren’t that into it. For this reason, I like to have a lot of flexibility in our Morning Time plans.

Studies we do daily:

• Bible Reading/ Christian Biography
• Scripture Memory
• Other Memory Work
• Hymn Study
• Current Events

Studies we do regularly or on a loop schedule:

• Poetry
• Picture Study
• Composer Study
• Language Arts Review
• Nature Study
• Shakespeare
• Math Games

Here are other Morning Time posts you may enjoy reading. These will further describe how we typically do Morning Time

How to Simplify Your Homeschool with Morning Time

Teaching Bible in Morning Time

Simple Ideas for Memory Work in Morning Time

3 Christian Resources for Current Events in Morning Time

Simple Ideas for Poetry in Morning Time

11 Excellent Christian Biography Resources for Your Homeschool

What’s in the Simple Morning Time Notebook Volume I

Here is what you will find in our Simple Morning Time notebooks.

Bible Reading/ Christian Biography

We read from a storybook Bible every morning. One morning a week we substitute the Bible reading
with a Christian Biography. Often we use Trial and Triumph, as suggested by AO.

Scripture Memory

We memorize Scripture by simply reading the verse once or twice out loud together each day. You
may find it helpful to do a current verse and a review verse.

Other Memory Work

This year we are learning The Declaration of Independence, The Preamble to the Constitution, the
Presidents of the U.S., and the Continents and Oceans. We memorize these by reading a small section
once a day until it becomes familiar. *We do not completely memorize the Declaration of Independence.

Hymn Study

Having a hymnal in hand is very useful for learning hymns. We do hymn study at night as part of our
bedtime routine, but many people like doing it as part of Morning Time. For the months of November,
December, and March, we use our hymnals to review Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter songs.

Poetry

This year I have chosen William Blake (AO Year 3) and Rudyard Kipling (AO Year 5) as the poets we will study. We study one poem at a time, reading it once until it becomes very familiar. Often, kids will memorize the poem from hearing it so often.

Picture Study

I chose Claude Monet and Georges Seurat for our artists. Because I find it more motivating to write down the title of a print after we have studied it (and less pressure to try to do every suggestion), I have kept these lines blank for your child to fill in. Additionally, it helps make the painting become more personal to kids when they have to hand-write the title. You can find specific print suggestions on Ambleside Online and either print them from there or show them digitally to your kids from your device. You can also purchase art prints from Simply Charlotte Mason.

Composer Study

The composers we will be learning this year are Johannes Brahms and Franz Liszt. Refer to Ambleside
Online to choose which songs you prefer to enjoy. Create a playlist from these on your phone. Have kids hand-write the songs in the blanks as you listen to them.

Grammar

On the mornings when we do grammar, I write out a sentence on the white board and together we
label each part of speech.

Nature Study

Although I typically assign our kids to do their Nature Study Notebook as part of their checklist, many
children enjoy sketching during Morning Time. Pull out some field guides or have them collect specimens to copy during Morning Time.

Shakespeare

We will be reading the stories of Twelfth Night and King Lear. I have not been able to complete an actual Shakespeare play with our kids, but I do like them to be familiar with the characters and the stories. Because of this, we read sections from Tales from Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb and Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare by Edith Nesbit. We also enjoy the Bruce Coville Shakespeare picture books. Since Shakespeare plays have deep plots, I have found it helpful to read the story to my kids more than once in a progression of books from easy to harder. With each reading, they understand more details.

Math Review

Kids love doing these review games and they can be adapted for almost every age. These math
games teach addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division as well as money skills.

Get Your Simple Morning Time Notebook Volume I

If you would like to get your copy of the Simple Morning Time Notebook that we will be using this year, you can purchase a digital download for $7 by clicking on the button below. I hope you will join us in our studies!

Pin It for Later!

Sharing is caring!