Curb a potential time waster like determining sub-topics by using the chapters found in a topical book on the theme you have selected. It’s quite the nifty tip because a lot of the ground work on a topic has been laid for you. It keeps the part that can be overwhelming, which is planning a unit study, to manageable.
Unit Study Planning
Of course you determine if you want to cover those chapters as sub-topics or not. Mix and match those chapters turned sub-topics with other books, articles or magazines you have on hand on the subject too.
Because the process of lesson planning can be simplified, below I show you how I created my draft planning page from just one book, Discover the Ocean, which I talked about on Day 3. Selecting Superior Sub-Topics. 10 Days of Diving Into Unit Studies By Creating A Unit Study Together.
I wanted to use one book to give you the basics of planning. After you plan a couple of unit studies, you will come up with your own sub-topics and like I mentioned add others from other resources you have too.
{part of the form from my unit study planner}
Also, when it came to the literature column, I just dotted down what we have in the house already which fits nicely with this topic. Then, I researched the scriptures to find ones that applied to my topic of Ocean as well. And, you can take the Bible study one step further by adding facts about the parting of the Red Sea.
Another reason I picked out this book to use as an example with you is because it has a glossary section in the back too. Right there I have my spelling and vocabulary section built in and to choose from for my unit study. I just wanted to show you that if you pick out a resource that is extremely helpful, it can making preparing unit studies a cinch. As you gain more experience and become a pro planner, it becomes easier to piecemeal a unit study from several different resources.
After choosing the sub-topics, then assign those sub-topics as subjects. Now, you can glance at your unit study as a whole to see if your unit study will be lop-sided or if it looks like you have a nice balance of subjects being learned throughout the topic. Remember, it doesn’t matter if it’s lop-sided because that may be your focus. This unit study on the ocean is a bit more lop-sided intentionally because I needed it to be more science focused.
As you can see from the above example, I can still create another column for art if I choose to at anytime. My primary focus for that column right now is to use the misc. ideas to focus on some vocabulary that I know Tiny needs. That is the flexibility of creating your own unique unit study because it can be slanted whichever direction your family needs or wants to go.
Remember this is my big overview and certainly I do not have to stop here with planning and wouldn’t want to. I can still add some art and keep on with sub-topics. Having more sub-topics is another key to keeping your unit study moving along. Sometimes we will take a sub-topic a day and for other unit studies, we may take weeks.
Ease of Unit Study Planning
Flesh out your unit study with sub-topics generously because you may either move ahead faster or find some you don’t like as well. You will have plenty to choose from if that becomes the case.
At this point too, I also look at other resources I may need. I listed some here for you below that make studying about the ocean fun. The way I decide if I want to buy something versus borrowing from the library is if I know I will use that resource for many years like with multiple children or if it’s a resource with facts that can be studied over and over again throughout the years even with one child.
You have just created a course of study with relatively little ease as well.
I got so excited to show you all of this information floating around in my head that I got ahead of myself. We are not quite ready for the stage of pulling resources together. I have one more post to show you about planning before we start pulling more resources.
Pulling resources is still kind of like planning too, but I wanted to show you how you can satisfy the educationalese of a state or country if you live in one that requires stricter record keeping. If you don’t live in a place like that, then who knows you may astound folks with your teaching prowess after I show you the next post on this series which contains a few educationalese.
Did I lose you? Are you with me? Have you grouped your sub-topics together for the theme you chose? If you are using my unit study planner, then just pencil them in. If not, create your sub-topics some way that you remember them.
Are you having any problems creating any of the subject sub-topics from the resource you chose?
Hugs and love ya,
10 Days of Creating A Unit Study Together
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