In which I think out loud

I brought my laptop with me to Jemimah's dance studio today, intending to do a bit of blogging, only to discover that the OS X installation still has 4467 hours remaining. Yup. In the meantime, I'm pecking on my iPad. One finger at a time. Life is hard. It is.

I've been fretting a bit over how I'm going to fit everything in this year, with an extended holiday in the middle of it. I know I said only a few posts back that finishing the year wasn't as important as what we'll learn on our trip, but it's different now that I'm trying to juggle it all around to make it work. I mean, some stuff is optional, but there is a minimum, right?

I thought you might like to see how I muddle this sort of stuff through. Consider this a wee peek into the workings of my brain. Okay?

So. By squishing a couple of weeks together at the start, we have exactly enough weeks for AO7 term two. We will finish Week 12 the day before we leave. I might even manage a day or two of exams there. It is term 3 that is the problem.

I have 7 full weeks on our return. Now I'm happy with 7 weeks of maths and science and Latin and 'extras' ( We'll be practising our French and Japanese in situ and will have plenty of nature study), but I really want to fit in all the AO books. I'm thinking I really need to read How The Heather Looks: A Joyous Journey to the British Sources of Children's Books before we go. It's about a family's literary journey around Britain, and we might get some inspiration, I'm guessing. Maybe I could add that to the Family Free Read list. I've added a book on the two Margarets, Against the Tide by Hope Irvin Marston into our evening Family Devotions, and I could probably follow that with Douglas Bond's bio on John Knox, The Thunder. I want to cover these two books because we're going on a week long Covenanter Tour of Scotland, remember? We've read Douglas Bond's Crown and Covenant Trilogy, but it was a few years ago, and we sort of need the reminder of the events of the Reformation to get the most from the tour.

I can finish Ivanhoe in term 2 if we schedule two chapters a week, and then read the left overs in the last week. That one is easy. Fearfully and Wonderfully Made I will continue as written, leaving five weeks to carry into AO8. Many people choose to wait until then to do this book anyhow, so that should be fine.  By reading a full chapter of A Taste of Chaucer per week instead of dividing each story in two, I can fit that into a term as well.

The Daughter of Time and the third of The Lord of the Rings can come with us for reading while we're travelling. We're halfway through the second of the Ring trilogy, so I just need to get that done before I go.  We still have a couple of free reads to complete.  David Copperfield is the only one that might have to continue into the summer.  Dickens isn't known for being concise.

If I do all of that, we're left with a slimmed down term 3 that should fit neatly into our 7 weeks.  What think you?  Achievable?  What would you do differently? Should I cut something out?   Is there anything that you think we really need to add before our trip? I'd love your input.

Incidentally, speeding up the AO schedule isn't something I really recommend.  You can certainly manage the readings, but something has to give, and it is generally the stuff that makes for a rich and generous liberal education  - the picture study, composers, poetry, nature study, science experiments, handwork, languages, that sort of stuff.  I'm doing it this time because our upcoming trip is filled with cultural experiences, but I wouldn't want to do it very often.

Oh, in case you're wondering, there are 2532 hours remaining on the installation now.  Seems this post has taken me 1935 hours.  Whodathunkit?  Time certainly flies when you're doing school planning.