Plastic toys are common place now, but not so long ago it was metal and wood toys and before that it was cloth and wood. Both the Charlotte Mason and Waldorf philosophies advocate simple toys. And the Waldorf philosophy shuns plastic all together.

Head, Heart and Hands is a Waldorf concept regarding the rhythm of the day in that 'head' work is done in the morning, 'heart' work midday and 'hand' work in the afternoon. I approach each lesson with the ''head, heart and hands' concept, as well as my whole year.

This is a small portion from a longer lecture I gave at a homeschooling workshop.The topic of children and chores is one I could talk about far longer than 4 minutes. Charlotte Mason has some good advice on establishing habits and I used those tools to help my children establish good chore habits.

The ‘will’ is what makes you do things. If you want to do things on a regular basis you can achieve it in one of two ways: Habits or Rhythms. The Charlotte Mason approach to training the will is through habits.

Though there are a lot of similarities between the Charlotte Mason and Waldorf educational philosophies, there are some stark differences. And while both use narration as an educational tool, they both approach it differently.

Ever wonder what the Charlotte Mason and Waldorf philosophies are all about? How similar and how different they are? I'm joined by Challice from Sodbuster Living and together we will have a conversation about the similarities and differences on two educational philosophies: Waldorf and Charlotte Mason.

If you're new to the Charlotte Mason educational philosophy, you'll want to watch this video and then head directly over to Challice's channel Sodbuster Living for more videos from showing you the practical side of the Charlotte Mason philosophy in action.

The short answer is yes! The long answer is there needs to be some understanding on what can be combined and what cannot. There are some deep differences between the Waldorf and Charlotte Mason philosophy, and I will help break down some of the differences in the main lesson block versus the short varied lessons, the duration of lessons, and the use of living books versus storytelling

Child-led learning can be energizing, but it requires balancing your children’s interests with your capacity as a teacher. Early enthusiasm may lead to burnout if the your energy, priorities, and limits are ignored or overlooked. A practical approach is to honor child-led impulses while also designing a sustainable rhythm for your household, especially when teaching multiple children at different ages and stages.Minding your energy and interests is necessary for long term success.

In this homeschool Q&A, I reflected on the balance between long-term and short-term planning. I’ve learned that while planning out an entire year on a daily or weekly level might seem ideal, it usually collapses within a week or two because life’s unpredictability quickly disrupts it. Instead, I’ve found that planning in broad strokes months in advance is most effective. Big-picture goals, such as finishing a math book by the end of the year, give me flexibility and wiggle room when unexpected interruptions like illness or travel occur.

Answering your homeschooling questions: How do you balance a busy schedule? My friends once said (having heard it from someone else), you have to say no to The Good to Day yes to The Great. Get to know your values and priorities so you can have a clearer picture of what commitments you accept.

I'm answering your homeschool questions. How do you prepare for first grade? There's much to occupy your research when exploring your options for first grade. I enjoyed those years of exploring educational philosophies and deciding on curriculum. There are two significant things you can do for your children to help prepare for grade 1.

When people ask me about organization and preparing for the years ahead in homeschooling, I often notice that their children are very young—or sometimes they don’t even have children yet. Other times, I’ve met parents who are already worried about college when their child is only five years old. While I usually reassure them that there’s plenty of time, I also really appreciate when parents think about the big picture. Having long-term goals in mind is valuable because they shape the daily choices we make, and they also help clarify whether we plan to homeschool through high school and beyond.

When I think about flexibility in homeschooling, I always start by clarifying my priorities. Knowing what matters most helps me decide what can be shifted, postponed, or even set aside temporarily. There were seasons in our homeschool when big life events, like moving or welcoming a new baby, brought lessons to a halt. In some cases, I planned ahead by starting the school year early or doing a little extra when I had more energy, knowing that I’d take time off later. Other times, like during home renovations, I accepted that homeschooling would pause and made adjustments by working through holidays, rolling lessons into the next year, or trimming back to the essentials.

I love the full back sticky Post-Its for lesson planning because I can stick it to books or workbooks and write my notes for that resource directly on it. It will stay put for literally years and I can refer back to them the next time we do that unit or use that book and my children can easily see what they need to do. This is great for those needing a physical lesson plan even more physical than a written document.

When I think about the struggle of sticking to homeschool plans, I have to admit that I relate deeply. I tend to overplan—not in a micromanaging way, but in the sense that I want to do it all. I want to read all the books, complete every project, go on every field trip, and weave in every beautiful idea I come across.

When I first started using the Waldorf approach, one of the things that felt overwhelming was figuring out the format of a main lesson. At first glance, it seems like a very long stretch of time—an hour and a half to two hours, even for children as young as seven or eight.

When I think about burnout in homeschooling, I know it’s something that can sneak up on me if I’m not careful. Over the years I’ve learned to notice the times of year when I feel most drained—usually in January and February.

Finding any routine, let alone honing a homeschooling routine, is near impossible with a newborn and even more challenging when you have other children as well. In those years in our homeschooling and parenting journey, it meant one of two things for us:

Mom guilt is birthed the moment we become a parent. It's like it's delivered with the baby. Mom guilt has a place, but we need to recognize when it's not welcomed and actually destructive. When it comes from an outside source, peer pressure or cultural norms, we need to evaluate and even scrutinize it.

I thought cultivating a love of learning for my children came from cultivating engaging lessons that meaningful and memorable. I had glorious aspirations and now 2 decades into my homeschool journey I feel like some of those choices didn't materialize the outcomes I expected.

Remember that laws are constantly changing and I highly advise that you check with your local State Department of Education for the latest rules and regulations. You can also check out HSLDA for your homeschooling rights in all 50 states.

Are you the only one homeschooling in your community? Maybe you are, but chances are that there is someone else just like you in your community thinking or feeling the same way. If you are feeling lonely or isolated as a homeschooler, here are two things you can do (and one of them wasn't even available when I first started homeschooling!).

I'm not a naturally patient person and actually I think I've been practicing patience all wrong these years. I have a new understanding of it and my understanding of patience is likely to change again in the future as well, but currently I'm recognizing I don't have to endure or suffer unnecessarily to exhibit patiences.

No matter what you chose, remember it's your choice, your family and ultimately, you know best what's right for your family. My opinions on screen time are my own and ones that reflect my personal research and principles. T

Homeschooling (or even parenting) when you have multiple kids or a baby or toddler is super challenging. Throw on top of that a productive and fulfilling day and it seems like you are chasing a fantasy. How do you have a productive day when you have little children.

Do you struggle with balance? Of course you do because pretty much everyone does. Think about it. If you are balancing on a balance beam or tight rope, it takes a lot of effort, skill and concentration. Rather than finding balance in our life, how about we seek harmony?

Celebrating festivals and engaging in traditions is something you are going to find in Waldorf schools that brings rhythm and expectation to the year and seasons. But what if you don't celebrate those festivals or would rather celebrate other things? W

Why are fairy tales important in Waldorf education and what are their deeper meaning and purpose? If you know the why behind a lesson, you have great mobility in changing out that lesson with one that suits your family needs better. For our family, we traded out the classic fairy tales for the stories of the previous prophets in Grade 1.

We love our Waldorf curriculum and the opportunity it provides to suit our family depending on which stories we use for each grade. Trading out stories to reflect your family's cultural, religious or ethnic background is one of the underused and overlooked aspects of the Waldorf curriculum.

Because I'm a huge proponent of formal education and a play based early childhood, I'm mostly suggesting that instead of structure for a 5 year old, we look at what natural pillars exist during the day that we can take advantage of.

Sometimes we need help. Actually if we admit it, we probably need help much of time. When we homeschool, we are still caring for all of other responsibilities (usually), and so it makes sense that sometimes, we're going to need to outsource things.

It seems like staying focused it harder and harder these days even without the challenges of ADHD. While I am unable to speak about ADHD and other learning modalities and challenges, I know two women who can.

Main lesson books are like blank notebooks. They are a place to deposit the day's learning in the form of written or illustrated work. While in many cases, there are specific lessons which go into the main lesson book, there is also a lot of room for flexibility. Sometimes, we do our main lesson books with pastels, watercolors or color pencils.

Today we are talking about waking children up, for Fajr (Morning Prayer) or any other time. I'm of the opinion that you let children sleep. If there is a need to wake them up, I'm also of the opinion to do it gentle, like raising a curtain, turning on a soft light, speaking gently to them or another way that works for you (maybe turning off the fan or opening the window, etc.).

Planning is one of those elusive things because mostly what you see is the final process: The process of putting your final thoughts on paper and organizing when lessons are going to happen. When you plan for the school year using unit studies or another method which is more flexible than a boxed curriculum (and even with a boxed curriculum), you'll find that a lot of planning is happening outside of the planner.

There are two resources at your disposal: Time or money. When we first started homeschooling, we had very little money, so many things we did were heavily budgeted. I bought things from eBay, or second hand or saved for a few choice items.

Motivating children is tricky. Actually motivating anyone is tricky. I find that motivation is less about what someone else does to me and more about what I feel about my own tasks, projects and accomplishments. I need my work to feel meaningful, productive and worthwhile.

Sick days are not easy whether it's the parent or child going through them. Sometimes it's just a cold and that doesn't impact the day as much as the flu or maybe it's something even more impactful.

Gosh I like books. They bring me such joy! I love picture books and well written non-fiction books to accompany our main lesson blocks. But do you need so many books for a boxed curriculum?

It's my opinion that the best math teachers are the ones who didn't do well in math in school. When we struggled to learn a particular subject, I feel we are better at teaching it because we know how hard it can be to grasp a concept.

Today's video touched upon lesson planning and how I'm planning these days. It's not the best system for us for the time being, but it is quick. One pro is that it's like a checklist independent of clock or calendar.

It's that time of year! It's time to clean out the homeschool room and make room for new material and new inspiration. Aside from the more laborious tasks of cleaning and dusting, purging is fun, freeing and motivating

You can homeschool anywhere! We've homeschooled in the kitchen and garage and now in our school room. We also like to homeschool in front of the fireplace, on the couch and on the go!

Sharing some tips on how we organize our bookcases

This cabin and home were built by the original owners in the 1980s. It's a stunning space with gorgeous details and expect craftsmanship. This cabin is about 12 feet by 12 feet (but I'm not actually sure about the exact measurements). It was built for the owners to live in while they built the main house

You'd think that reorganizing a few bookcases wouldn't be too hard. As an amateur organizer, I should have known better. Today's project took two days and many hours. I'm very pleased with the way it turned out and anticipate that it will be much more functional, but I am surprised that it took so long.

I'm a creature of habit, so once a room is set up in our home, I have no desire to change it. Our school room has basically been the same since we set it up in 2013. Small changes here and there have happened, but nothing as dramatic and involved as this. I decided to remove the mounted chalkboards and mount my mobile chalkboard on the wall instead.

Grab a cup of something hot and sweet and sit back as I take you on a detailed tour of our homeschool room. I'll share insight on why we designed the school room this way and organizational tips and even tell you some of the things that didn't work out.

Need help organizing your homeschool room? I can help! Open bin or closed container? Choosing storage containers for your classroom can be challenging. I'll go through a variety of storage containers and point out the highlights and challenges of each.

Time for a homeschool room tour. Grab a cup of coffee and sit back, this video is long!!! Bookcases are from IKEA and are the Expedit brand. Look for the Kallax brand these days. Magazine folders are from IKEA, too. D

I don't know why it took me so long to move our peg doll supplies to the craft room, since that's where we make them! Set up and clean up is so much easier now that the supplies are where I need them. I love opening up the drawer to see everything I need

Want to record tutorial videos on a budget? I rigged a setup that's very easy and super affordable. I record most of my videos in my craft room. I have two standing height 'printer's cabinets' from Home Decorators by Martha Stewart on one side of my room.

Again I thought this project was going to be fast. It wasn't. But at least I got 95% of it done in one day. The only thing remaining was the updated labels. Now all our hands on projects, science, math and English units are in bins in our homeschool cabinets. I like it, but there's not much wiggle room in any of the bins.

If my curriculum isn't stored well, it doesn't get used; or, it gets lost or ruined. I came up with an idea to easily access and use some new activities I picked up from Target's Dollar Spot. I made pocket envelopes from 8.5x11 inch sheet protectors and stored them in inexpensive file folders with three-ring prongs. I slipped in my new supplies into the pocket and put it into the file folder. All of them are now stored in a hanging file drawer.

It's all about organization in your school room. You can organize by grade, subject, theme, type, product or publisher. I'll show you a couple ways to organize your thematic units or unit studies. I don't separate my curriculum by grade except for my Waldorf curriculum which takes up a small space. Most of the bins I use to organize my units are from Big Lots or T.J. Maxx and all of them are open bins so they can accommodate over-sized items.

Wondering what kind of storage containers hold up well to kids? I have a few ideas that can help you keep the clutter and clothes at bay while still maintaining beauty and functionality. Sometimes fabric bins are just too cute to pass up, but very quickly they fall apart with regular use. Plus they are a pricier option. Join me as we explore the highlights and challenges of storage containers!

Let's face it, we spend a lot of time in the kitchen. For many homes, it's the heart of the house. Our kitchen isn't just for cooking or eating, it's for entertaining and occasional homeschool projects.

Mason jars are a great storage solution for the kitchen. They are pretty, affordable and made of glass making them good for you and good for your food! I don't put labels on my jars, but sometimes I'll cut a piece of the packaging and nested between the two lids.