Morning Time is what I call our joint lessons first thing in the day. This includes our memory work, Bible study and prayer, work with a globe, history read alouds, music, etc. Honestly, all sorts of things. I think I've read poetry during this time, screened a video, read Shakespeare, pulled out a giant floor map, completed puzzles, listened to a piece of classical music, and done a math activity. At it's most basic, this is just our 'all together' time for whatever we're able to do at the same time.
My children are 9, 7 and 5, so obviously there are some differences in ability, which doesn't really matter with morning time because I make sure to have age appropriate expectations in place. For example, I read aloud about the ancient Greeks. The 9yo is able to discuss what he heard and sit for the reading. The 7yo is able to sit for the 5 minutes and fidget with something. The 5yo is able to be a not-disruptive presence in the room doing her own thing.
All of the lessons are very fast and repeated often. We might recite a memorized poem all the time as we learn it, then less frequently as we get more comfortable, and then periodically once it is learned.
A question I was asked today was what, specifically, we are learning in morning time. Okay, this is pretty fluid, but off the top of my head right now we are...
Reviewing days of the week, months of the year, names and order of the seasons. (for the sake of the 5yo, essentially. )
Memorizing The Lord's Prayer (done, but we recite periodically).
Memorizing the books of the Old Testament (we are done up to Song of Songs).
Reciting the provinces of Canada west to east.
Singing and commiting a hymn to memory - Be Thou My Vision.
Also a folk song - Land of the Silver Birch.
Also the National Anthem.
Memorizing Psalm 23 (we're halfway done)
Reading books together - Story of the World volume 2, various other fiction and non-fiction.
The oldest 2 often read a chapter of a short biography out loud to me.
We might do an English lesson together, reviewing a grammar rule or a phonetic rule or something.
I read a verse of Mark, and we stop whenever we reach something to talk about. Plus whatever rabbit trails we encounter.
Sometimes we do a group math lesson, often involving going outside.
Sometimes we do a group nature study lesson.
Sometimes we do a group art lesson.
I'm sure there's more, but you get the idea. Stuff we do together!
Morning time sometimes progresses to a group activity such as going to swimming lessons, going to the church together to practice the piano, visiting the library, etc.
A great book on morning time is this one:
Now, how long does this all take? Truthfully, the time we spend sitting together is possibly 30-45 minutes, and covers our bible, history, geography, etc. It really isn't that much time.
HOW, in real time, does morning time play out? I call everyone into the livingroom and make sure they are all sitting more than arms reach from each other, and also that they have whatever activities they need with them. We open with a very short prayer, and then launch into memory work. After we've done al, of that, we're sometimes just done, but often we're still good for a while longer so I will start running through readings. Maybe a chapter of Story of the World will suddenly launch us into a conversation about calligraphy and I remember I picked up a book recently about that very topic and we follow a rabbit trail for a while. Sometimes we bring out a dictionary to look up a word, or bring over a tablet to Google an answer to someone's question. Occasionally I have to send a child to fetch a different reference book or a map from another room, but we try to stay together and focused in one room to avoid wandering. Usually after 45 minutes we're ready for a break, but every once in a while I end up transitioning into our fiction read alouds. When we're finished with morning time, that's it - I don't test and I don't do homework type stuff.
The rest of school is individual.
So there you go! Morning time!
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