A School Post: On Workboxes

My friend sent me some info on the workbox system and I have been hooked on the idea ever since, finally putting it into practice this morning.  Seriously, I could not have felt more organized (which I love), everything went so smoothly, and Joshua loved it, too.  I would have appreciated something like this back in my own homeschool days.  Or is it home school?  Or home-school?  You'd think I would know.  I think I just found a shortcoming in my education.  That, and my overuse of commas.  ,,,,  I can see this organizing concept becoming even more useful in the years to come.

There's no point in my describing how it works.  Others have done so before me.  In fact, you can go straight to the original workbox maker-upper's website: CLICK.  But...I'm gonna do it anyway.

John ordered a 10-drawer cart online.  Joshua and I put it together on Wednesday night.  I then laminated and velcro-ized some box numbers and a chart.  I heart my laminator.  So handy.

In each drawer, I placed an assignment and the necessary supplies, then numbered the drawer, and placed it back in the cart.  I'm currently using 6 boxes a day.  I haven't added penmanship or phonics to our daily routine yet.

Joshua is basically in control of the boxes, though he must go in order.  As he completes each task, he replaces the drawer, removes the number, and puts it back on the chart.  When he empties the last drawer, he's done for the day.  He gets way more excited looking inside each drawer to discover the next project than he did when I was piling the stuff on the table.  I can throw in a random book, game, extra craft, or whatever, to help break up the day and make the boxes more exciting than ever. ;-)

Here's my chart.  I wanted to print the numbers off, but I ran out of printer ink.  In light of the 'system,' I didn't really need the "Done!" card, but it aided Joshua in learning how the process worked.

This morning, the first drawer contained a box of markers and a sheet of paper.  John and Joshua went outside with them and drew a picture of the outside of our apartment.  The second box contained construction paper, scissors, markers, cotton balls and gold glitter glue.  Joshua made a picture of Heaven, with the streets of gold.  

I purchased a box of 20 craft projects, supplies and all, that worked out to less than $1 a craft.  We did the snail (pictured above) this morning, as we are doing a sort of makeshift bug unit study.  One of the drawers just had a book, and we read several pages.  Both of us learned some neat bug facts.  

I ordered these tanagram blocks that came with 50 pattern cards.  It's a nice way to break up the hour and definitely stretched Joshua's brain a bit.  

He was a bit baffled at first...

...but he did it!

Who would have thought that such a simple concept could have me so excited that I'd blog about it?  Ha, me!  I'm so easy to amuse. But in all seriousness, if you choose to homeschool (...or home school... or home-school), it's lots of fun.  The workbox system, that is...though the tanagrams were fun, too.  :-)