When finished, click on the graphic to go to the next page for more options on this STEP.
This Step Is the Largest Part of Your Planner
Take your time choosing which layout fits you the best THIS YEAR. Your needs change each year so should your pages.
Look at my post How to Choose the BEST Homeschool Lesson Planning Pages THIS Year if you’re confused about what kind of homeschool lesson planning page you will need this year. I rounded them up and explained them on this one blog post so you can see the differences.
4 Options. Choose ONE!
General tips to understand how to use my lesson planning pages.
Sample Page of best how to use this page. Though I have it divided into 3 sections and it fits well with 3 students, this page can certainly be used with a larger family.
Simple divide one or more sections evenly. This is doable because normally with your youngest children, you do not need as much room to write.
If you have a PreK/K they can share one area divided into two. Give the bigger areas to your older students. I have not put names on the smaller narrow column that is first because you may want to write more than one child’s name in that column. You decide. Me? Since I have only 3, I use one section per student.
Curriculum Pages for Planner
The planner page is organized just enough to help you because I list the subjects out for you.
The skill subjects are MATH and LANGUAGE ARTS. The 4 sub categories of Language Arts are Grammar, Reading, Writing and Spelling. They are listed on my form under Language Arts
The content subjects that most of teach our children together on like Geography, Science, History, Foreign Language, Bible and Art share one box since those subjects rotate during the week. For example, we do history one day and science the next.
That box at the bottom of the form for content subjects has enough room to write or lesson plan what you want to do for the day. There is enough room because you do not do content subjects every day. Like mentioned above, they are normally rotated.
Option 1. “The Original” (The one I’ve used most often). It has subjects filled in as explained above and you write in lessons numbers as you do them.
This will make your planner the thinnest because it uses one page per day for all kids.
Remember print front/back or double sided. Do not waste any of your paper.
Option 2. Because some years you need GLAM and COLOR
You ask for it and I took my time making it, but the Glammed Up version of the free Option 1 above is here. It is in color.
Glam It Up Package – Ultimate Homeschool Planner
My lesson planning pages are my signature style and I wanted to share these things that I tweaked on it.
- It is all in color. Oh yes, yippee.
- I have spaced the writing lines more evenly.
- Too, I have added columns to the content area in case you want to break down and jot your notes for each subject in a more organized way.
- I left a space at the bottom for notes in case you wanted to expand on one subject or if you just wanted to jot down some comments.
- At the top right, I added 4 boxes that can be used for a quick list or for a to-do column. In addition, if you live in a place that requires more stringent record keeping, the columns allow for you to track by weeks.
- At the far right at the top, I kept the lesson number but made them bigger.
Also, every 5 lesson plans, I changed the color of the Lesson Plan Numbers so that you could easily see when you covered a typical school week of 5 days. - Under Lesson Plan, I put a space for the date if you want to pen it in.
A few things I did not change because they have worked timelessly over the years are:
- It is still ONE lesson per PAGE planner. I do not care for weekly planners that take up one or two pages when I need more room to write. Weekly planners have their place, but in homeschooling, I find we need more room.
- It is still undated. This means it will be a ONE time purchase.
- Too, you are never behind on an undated planner because you school the days that fit your family. Just fill in the dates as you go.
- It still has a space to use with 3 kids. Again, not because I only like three kids, but that seems to fit the space best. Remember, if you have younger children, you can easily divide off the sections to include them. The workload will vary with the ages of your children, so two children could easily share one space.
- The basic subjects that are the same year after year are filled in too.
Ultimate Homeschool Planner is a 190 page download and it is a starter PACKAGE.
It includes:
- 1 Unique Cover
- 1 Inside Title Page
- 4 Tab Top Dividers
- 2 Attendance Forms (one with semesters and one without semesters labeled)
- and 180 Lesson Planning Pages with the subjects filled in & 8 Photo Pages
All pages are in full color and undated.
Guess what? You can get it for just $4.99.
Look at my Main Shop Page for pictures of each form too and a more detailed description if you need it. (I know you want to see lots of pictures of it.)Option 3. Like the Original above EXCEPT it is Editable. It is only 2 pages. This means you need to fill it out and print how many pages you want. You type in your own subjects.
Option 4. It’s like the original above EXCEPT it’s editable AND it has two pages PER day. The main difference is that tracking is done by day and week AND your planner will be thicker.
This is good for states that require more record keeping or require tracking the week of school that you are in because you need to track school weeks.
Too, some years I needed a two page spread for each kid just because we had way more to do.
Because this will make your lesson planning pages area twice as thick, I would make one for half the year and then bind it. At the middle point in our school year, I would bind another one. Some years I made two half years at one time. You decide what your needs are this year.
But most years, I just needed quick reference and the Original always worked when I wanted to bind one planner.
If you want more flexibility in your lesson planning forms, then check out these other purchase options for editable lesson planning pages.
How to Grab All The Free Lesson Planning Pages Here on Step 4
Finally, how to grab the free lesson planning pages. It’s a subscriber freebie.
That means when you sign up to follow me, you get access my subscribers library and this freebie.
However, not all of my freebies are in the library (wink).
I like to keep up to date with what is valuable to you so I can give you more, some freebies you must sign up again on the form below even if you are already a follower.
It’s the only way I have of freely delivering them to you. Just follow the steps below.
► 1) Sign up on my list.
► 2) Go to your inbox and confirm your email from the automatic reply I sent you.
►3) Last, look for my reply AFTER you confirm your email.
If you need to Go Back:
Click Here for Step 1 Choose a Pretty Front & Back Cover.
Click Here for Step 2 Choose Calendars & Appointment Keepers
Click Here for Step 3 Choose Goals & Objectives
I understand your thinking COMPLETELY. I actually do have two younger kids (1st and Pre-K). I didn’t want to use two pages per day in that I might get bogged down with too much detail (my battle not yours). Not seeing the word “Phonics” on the one pager was becoming a silly struggle for me. I need to just let go and choose an option. I love to plan… and sometimes I OVER plan. Just trying to keep it simple. Last year I used a week at a glance (not conducive for ME for lesson planning). The two page option will work more than fine… I just need to allow for blank space and be okay with more paper usage. Thank you so much for not just willy nilly coming up with these options, but having a thoughtful reason behind it. I may find that I will be grateful for the option I choose : ) I’m so excited about putting this together. I’ve lured my friend into having a planning day and we are going to use your Curriculum Planner : )
Hey Tracy,
That is JUST what I thought, you probably have younger kids. I really would LOVE to do one for you though with the younger kiddos in mind and that is one page.
Have you printed yours already? If you have time, I can whip one out for you..lol..ok maybe no whip but could have it done soon.
This actually would be very helpful for those having only young children!
Did you print yours yet? I believe I can have something ready for you this week.
No, I haven’t printed. That would be awesome. No hurry.
Quick question: On the editable documents, I noticed my font is in red. Any reason you don’t use black? Or is that a me thing on my end? I was hoping to not have to use color ink on these longer print jobs. No worries if that’s set in stone.
Thanks a bunch!
Why did I not think of this before… I am just going to print the first page only of the editable 2-pager. Sorry for all the fuss. The brain is warming up now.
Now for a nerdy question… what font is this that I am typing in these comments.
Hey…Nerds are COOL!!! lol
A font lover too uh? I love fonts too and I think I am using convergence right now.
I was a little confused too about option 2 (and 3) and I read all the prep before starting. I like your original (one page per lesson), but I wanted to fill in my own subjects and name of child. It appears your original is one page per day and the other two options are 2 pages per day. I was hoping to save on paper. Am I missing something.
By the way… I love this process. I am excited to have a planning tool that actually works for me and my family. Even Parent Teacher stores don’t have this. I’m impressed… thanks!
Hi Tracy,
So glad you asked this question because I get it a lot and hopefully explaining it here helps. I may even make this a blog post. :o)
So you either have one or the other choice with the subjects or like you pointed out 1 page or 2 and I hope explaining my thinking behind it helps.
I filled in the Language Arts because those ***are*** the subjects for language arts for most all grades. I will clarify “most” in a minute.
In other words there is no need to fill in your own subjects and yes I like when they fit on one page.
See—-there is so much confusion about what to cover and what can end up happening is that we make a “gazillion” lol subjects to cover. To avoid stress and not understanding what subjects to cover and to share my experience with all of you, I typed them in there and it comes up to “one” page like you point out.
Btw, I don’t put “editable” where you put your child’s name {the first column}. That area is just too small even with the smallest font, you can hardly squeeze in a name that is typed so its easier for me to just write it in. My oldest, Tre, only has 3 letters in his name but not my other two kids so I just left that area blank to write in.
Now, I want to explain the reason for putting that second page. For a “very” short time in the early grades you will have phonics instead of grammar,etc. and because a lot of homeschoolers have younger children, there is a more variety of subjects like phonics, arts & crafts, read aloud time,etc. This page should be used like one or maybe two years and then to the “original” page. [I am meaning the one where its on one page and subjects filled in or Option 1.]
Again, my purpose in my “original” is to help you avoid OVER planning and too many subjects. It is to help keep clear what is a “SKILL” subject that “needs” to be covered versus a “CONTENT” subject that we may “like” them to cover.
My “original” form is to help clear the air and lift the veil of mystery in subjects. It is my desire to HELP you and not promote forms that are confusing or where I do not share my experience with you.
And yes you are correct, it is NOT full of blank lines on my original. I love my forms better than any teacher store..lol
The other thing too that I understand is that some years we may need to work on some skill subjects more than others, so I have the 2 page form for that too. But they are really just a few years we have like that.
Can you tell me which parts under Language Arts you would want to fill in? I could see using that if you had all young children and would focus mainly on phonics,etc.
I have waffled about making my “original” {or the one page} editable but then again I almost feel “bad” doing this. I say this because my thought behind sharing this in the way back beginning was to help more homeschoolers than just those that came through my program. To help promote understanding of “school subjects” by sharing my experience hopefully helps them to not plan more than what is necessary.
See what I have seen happen is that “burn out” looms and it normally does because our “planning eyes” are bigger than what we need to do.
I want all my followers to have “smooth sailing” in calm homeschool waters and to ENJOY it and LOVE to plan and I do not want to add to their being overwhelmed.
Does all of this make sense Tracy? Can you tell me which subjects you want to add? Now that I have a blog here and can explain the forms, I may make my Option 1 editable.
I know this is long, but it has been a long time coming and I probably need to make it a blog post soon too.