How geeky can I get?

I’m about to tell you something that will confirm my geekness to all who’ve ever suspected it. (though, they’re probably already convinced : P )

I adore forms.

Printing them, filling them out, putting them all neatly in a binder – few things in life delight me more than data entry and mind-numbing tasks. There, I’ve said it… if you’re still with me and not snoozing away, I’m going to share with you my newest clerical toy. I waited, quite impatiently, a full month for this thing to be released. I was so giddy when it finally came!

The new 2009 Schoolhouse Planner is a combination of school and household forms sprinkled with general, helpful information and recipes that are just darn right handy to have. Each month is dedicated to a specific homeschooling topic and will coincide with TOS’ planner modules that will become available throughout the school year.

First off, the specs – $39.00 will get you 375 pages of organization and handy tips. You can type directly into the pdf, helping to keep the nice, clean look of typed pages.

The planner contains:

• 24 recipes
• 12 monthly articles (these coincide with the planner modules I spoke of above)
• Copywork charts and writing practice pages
• calendars – full year on 1 page and 2-page spreads for each month
• resource lists for each month’s topic
• and more forms than you can shake a stick at – home and school
• here’s a pdf with the full Table of Contents so you can see just what you’re getting.

Some of the features I really liked were:

1. The ability to type into the document. I love the clean look. I get lost in all my scribbles and sometimes can’t even decipher them at all!
2. Love, love, love that I can add all our birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, vacations, etc. to the monthly calendars before I print them. Everyone knows the daily squares are like precious commodities. I’m always terrified of filling them up and not having room to write important appointments in. I do not print the whole calendar at the beginning of the year. Instead, I print two months at a time. I add dates to the monthly calendars and save the changes in the pdf as I go along. After printing, each calendar month can be added to by hand, but the chicken scratch is kept to a minimum.
3. The mulitiple layouts of the school forms. Several of the forms are produced in a few different styles and will hold information for different numbers of children. For example, I make weekly assignment charts for two of my children, who are close in knowledge age, on one form (this form has a column for each child). But I use an entirely different style form for my kindergartener – a one-child form with a little bit different layout.
4. The hour logs and attendance logs. Simple yes, but oh so essential. I printed these out using the ‘multiple pages on one sheet’ feature of my printer. I can record a simple date or hour count in each little box and see them all at a glance on one page.
5. LAPBOOKING!!!! That’s right, one of the monthly topics is all about lapbooking and the monthly modules with incorporate lapbooking activities too!
6. The monthly topics and recipes. I’m a weekly planner when it comes to meals and I’m always on the lookout for new recipes. These were a nice surprise that I will definitely make use of. For the monthly topics – each month highlights an article with helpful homeschooling knowledge. Subjects like the thirteen colonies, clouds, emergency preparedness, American government, the planets and landforms are all covered. This is fun information that can easily be made into unit studies, especially with the help of the monthly modules TOS will also have available.

Many of the forms I will not print until the year’s end. Instead, I will keep adding to them throughout the school term. At the end of the year, I can print them all and store them in one binder – a neat record of our entire year. One binder to store along with a portfolio for each child makes my record keeping much more organized and readily available.

Some of these forms are reminders of things I should have had filed away for years and have neglected, such as the personal financial inventory and the inventory of appliances and electronics lists. Other things I should have on hand where the kids can locate them quickly if need be – important phone numbers and contacts, family health and emergency medical information.

All in all, I’d say this planner is worth the money. Save the time and energy it would take you to find all this information, home and school helps; and instead, read a book with your kids, go to the park, or do some real planning for next year. All you’re going to need is a printer, some ink and a sturdy binder or two.

If you’re new to homeschooling, need a fresh start or just need some control (hello, free spirits?) this planner is a great place to get everything at once. You are not going to miss anything with this set-up. From home to homeschool – you can easily cover all your household needs and state requirements in one quick download.

I did notice that TOS has a special offer going to sweeten the deal. If you purchase the planner by July 12, 2009 you will also receive the 2008 planner excerpts free. You can take a look at those here.

While you do that, I think I’ll go fill in some forms. ; )

Sara O’