Morning time is a bit of a buzz word in the homeschool blogging world right now. I think the latest influence I have seen as instrumental in promoting this wonderful idea would be Sarah Makenzie's book Teaching from Rest. I have not read the book myself, but I have read Sarah's blog, and I found that she does something simple I have done for years and takes it a bit further.
In our home, morning time started out as morning devotions. The boys and I would sit down and work on our catechism question for the week and then we'd read from Teaching Hearts Training Minds and pray. After going through THTM twice, which amounts to nearly four years, we decided to change things up and read from the Children's Story Bible by Catherine Vos.
I found the idea of using this time for more than devotion and adding memory work for various subjects to be such an eye opener. I can use this time to get as much or as little as I want done with the boys and then let them break up and do their own independent work. I added history or literature to the mix rather than trying to read aloud to younger kids at a later time. I read a chapter or selection each day after devotion. It is so much easier to do this while everyone is already together. We also use this time to sing a hymn, practice memory work, and do our grammar sentences. I am thinking about adding in geography and some fine arts on a rotating basis in the future. For now, a song, bible, history/literature, grammar sentences, and memory work is more than enough for me.
The boys love this time. Before we started reading our history book this year, we read Heidi. They LOVED it, and so did I. I had not read Heidi before this and it is such a wonderful story with many life lessons. When I would be tempted to skip Morning Time, they would ask for it. They wanted to know what was going to happen next. Sometimes they would ask me to read again in the evening.
I think they love it because we are focusing on the truly important things that are so easy to skip and gloss over, like learning hymns, poetry and hearing mom read aloud. They are learning the bible at home rather then getting snippets of truth only on Sunday mornings. These are the parts of education that make it beautiful and attractive.
Don't think for a minute that little ones can't do this. My 5 year old takes part and loves it. He was very proud of himself when he finished learning Psalm 121. It was so fun to listen to him recite it all by himself. He also loves hearing our story. I think the biggest stumbling block to getting Morning Time done is ME. There are days we get up later than we should and I am tempted to nix it in an effort to avoid falling behind in our core work.
So how about you? Are you doing Morning Time with your crew? What are some things you do that your family loves?
