Hearing recitations and Morning Time

[thenightbeforechristmas]

Morning Time

Thank you, Jessica, for starting this discussion and noting Cindy Rollins' Web site. I plan to read more of her posts this summer. **Continuing the discussion on Morning Time could those on the forum outline what they do to start their homeschool day?**

I have struggled with what to do for our Morning Time. I am eager to get started on math (which we do first) so I often just do the calendar. But I would like to do something more engaging to energize and bring life into the day.

On good days here's what we do (Note: I have a kindergartner, two year old and infant):

Devotional - example: Leading Little Ones to God
Hymn or song
Prayer - brief
Calendar

How about you??? What do you do or did do with young children for Morning Time?

[Molly in SC]

Breaking up "morning time"

At the beginning of the year, I tried to do Bible story, catechism, Bible memory, and read aloud all in one swoop. By the end, the toddler was melting down and the three and five year olds were totally disengaged. It is hard with little kids. Now I do Bible, Scripture memory and catechism after breakfast. In the afternoon when the toddler is napping, I read picture books, fables, and we review the art and music selections from previous weeks. For me, breaking it up helped so much. I hope to add hymns to the morning time and novel reading to the afternoon time next fall.

Molly

[KF2000]

Hi there! I have to agree with Molly...while we had mostly little ones, we had to keep it really brief...and so I often felt like I did not know what to do either. I would go from one extreme to the other....first we would shoot for doing Liturgy of the Hours....have meltdowns, then I would back off, and totally forget to even say prayers!

So it is really good to work with the ages you have, and also what fits you really well. My kids simply told me not to sing. So that took care of hymns for us! What finally did the trick for us was seeing another family's routine in action. We totally copied, but I love it.

So while we are sitting at the breakfast table I read the saint of the day. Then as soon as we are done eating, wherever people are we pray. We do a morning offering, Angelus, guardian angel, seven glory be's to guardian angel, and then prayer to the Holy Spirit....feels like it covers the bases. Then if we have time, I would read something age-appropriate for "spiritual reading." But usually that gets covered by Mass, so when we get home we just get to work on the day.

AMDG,
Sarah

[SaintJude7]

Daily

Hi Sarah,
Reading your post reminded me how much I used to enjoy getting to daily Mass. It was the thing that got us up and dressed and out of the house in the morning. We stopped going several months ago. I had a problem with constantly having to explain the extremely casual attitudes of most of the frequent attendees. (No kneeling, gossiping before and after Mass right in the center aisle, the big hand-holding chain during the Lord's Prayer that we got less than appreciative looks for not participating in, etc...) Unfortunately the other two churches near us have the same issues. Then, when we started attending the TLM, my son with autism had a difficult time switching between the two. I hope that we can start occasionally attending the TLM daily Mass at noon, but it is a forty minute drive.
Attempting the Liturgy of the Hours might push the kids to mutiny. But I think I am going to have to lift the morning offering idea from your repertoire. Maybe I can even work up to the Angelus if I set an alarm for 11:57.
Blessings,
Jude

dd 17
ds 14
ds 11
ds 9
dd 7
ds 4
dd 2

[Melisa Burke]

My children are a little older, 7 and 9, but I thought I would share our morning. Right after breakfast, we head to the family room for Rosary. Then I will read either a short saint story, a chapter from a saint chapter book or some other type of spiritual reading. If the kids are working on memory verses outside of what they are learning with Christian Studies, we will review those at this time. If we are learning a new Latin hymn, this might be the time that we would sing it. Then we head up to the school room and begin the rest of our day.

I love hearing how everyone begins there day.

Thanks for sharing.

Blessings,

Melisa

[Melisa Burke]

Jude,

I also wish we could get to daily Mass more often. We live 30 minutes from our parish so it would be two hours round trip for us. We also occasionally attend the Traditional Latin Mass, but it is 40 minutes away.I would love to make daily Mass part of our schedule. Being committed to daily Rosary helps, but Mass would be really wonderful.

Sarah,

I can't think of any better Morning Time than daily Mass. What a great way to start your day!!

Blessings,

Melisa

[KF2000]

I have enjoyed hearing from others as well, and so there is something I have been wondering. I usually review any memory work (catechism, drills, recitations, etc) when I am working with each child...but is that something others do together as a group? Because I have wondered that, and if so, how do you handle that kids are doing different things?

It sounds neat to me, but I think it would be too long for us. Just curious.

Jude...I know I miss it terribly when we don't go. If you would like, the priest where we go (it is a parish closer to us, but it is not "our" parish) is wonderful...and he records the Gospel reading and his daily homilies, which then get sent to anyone on the email list. My parents live fifteen hours from us, and don't have daily Mass in their town, so they love it. Plus, they occasionally hear the baby! There are people on the list from India to Australia! So if you would like to get them, you could private message me your email, and I could get you added. The man who does the list gives me brownie points for all the people I have added!

AMDG,
Sarah

[armymom]

If nothing else it is always interesting to see how different families are! I tried doing something like a full morning time, but I discovered that once I had done read alouds it was impossible to peel everyone off of the couch and get going for the day. And my kids eat breakfast in their jammies! We take a morning routine break after breakfast. Then, our morning time is peppy! We sing seasonal songs, we skip, we dance (or at least the oldest dances - I am eight months along and sit out more!) we do fingerplays, we sing Psalms. I take recitations and keep it short by only having a couple of weeks in the rotation at any one time. My kids memorize fast and at the young grades the memory work is so short. I think it will be harder when we have more than a couple of questions needed. We sing a Psalm of the month and next year I want to add a poem of the month to memorize. We have been doing Jr. K prayers for a while and next year we are going to lengthen a bit and gear more to the church year. I have a 5, 4, and 2 year old and everyone at least starts the circle together for the skip and sing part. The younger two participate more when we do hand motions which I have quit mostly since I can't really move around as well at the moment. Hopefully that will pick back up after the baby comes this summer. For us, the most important thing is that I am prepared. The more I am singing from memory, the faster they catch on. The more I have recitation flashcards ready to go, the better these things work. Sometimes I throw in counting games too. It is amazing to me how much the little ones pick up. Sometimes the 2 year old is sitting to the side doing a puzzle while my Ker recites, but sure enough a couple of weeks later he will know something wild like the names of the planets. The baby ought to be brilliant by the time he hits four! Thought I would throw this in since our day is a little different than some others.

Oh and we used to do calendar, but that has recently been derailed by the toddler throwing the magnets around. Plus there was a lot of bickering about who got to stick which part onto the calendar. But, with a rising Jr.K I might try to add that back into the fall too. We save all Bible stories and the like for read aloud time, which we do after all seatwork is complete.

Lena

[KF2000]

Wow Lena...I would love to sit in on that! You are so much more active than I ever was! ( and being preggers to boot!) My days with all littles were very reserved by comparison. It is an interesting thing to think of, of being able to have all the resources MP has provided back in the beginning for us. I am so glad to hear what it is like for those of you who do! At least we had Mr. Rogers

And Melisa, we must have overlapped messages...did not see yours until today. The offer of the homilies is there for anyone who would like it. We listen to them on my tablet when we miss Mass for sick ones, which we had an absolute slew of this spring.

AMDG,
Sarah

[SaintJude7]

Audio Sancto

Another great resource for solid homilies is audiosancto.org
I know that all three of the priests at our FSSP parish upload homilies. The names of the priests are withheld, so they can focus on their own parishioners and not have to field emails or calls, but I recognize their voices.
Blessings,
Jude

dd 17
ds 14 (special needs)
ds 11
ds 9
dd 7
ds 4
dd 2

[Melisa Burke]

I have listened to some of the homilies on audiosancto. They are very good. Thanks for reminding me. I had forgotten about this resource.


Melisa