Asalamu’alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatu you heard right sis, batch scheduling for your muslim homeschool this time, not batch cooking.

Last week’s blog post about time not being the measure of a successful homeschool seemed to have resonated with a lot of you, Alhamdulillah. With so much to do, lots to fit in, and even after having simplified, there can be a lot we need to get through in our Muslim homeschool. So I thought I’d follow up that post with a practical tip on how to manage things, without compromising the time we spend on things, using batch scheduling.

And like many mothers, I’ve had my fair share of routines and schedules over the years, with some working better than others. And one of the best tips I came across from another homeschool mother was to ‘batch’ things. Not to be confused with a ‘block schedule‘, with most mothers have probably heard of, and can still be used with batch scheduling.

Now, you might be thinking Umm Saleh, I know you like batch cooking, but batch scheduling!? What is that?!

Well, it’s as the name suggests. With batch cooking, rather than cooking everyday, you cook up a few things at once right.

Well with batch scheduling you simply teach a bunch of that subject together; perhaps things that you want to do in your homeschool, yet don’t have time or space to do on a daily or even a weekly basis.

Some mothers may choose Art projects, science experiments or fields trips that they ‘batch’ together for a particular week every so often.

But for me, batching proved to be useful on a weekly basis, Alhamdulillah. Because there are things that I feel like need daily attention, our top priorities, and there are other things that I also feel are important but aren’t as top of a priority and so don’t need daily attention. So, batching allows me to give time to everything but at a ratio that I’m happy with. Whereas with loop schedules even though subjects are spaced out, sometimes even spacing things out can be difficult.

But you could also batch schedule for other reasons such as certain times in the week you have more help at home, are less busy, or you’d rather just make all the mess in one go.

Personally, I like us to go deep into related things, especially those things that we really want to immerse ourselves in, and so switching to something completely unrelated doesn’t always helps. Also, when we combine similar subjects, there’s more room and possibility for kids to make connections between things and really just benefit from those deep learning sessions.

So, if you’re struggling with fitting things in or feel like your top priorities are somehow getting compromised or cut short because you want to cover over things that are important (but secondary in line), try batching.

Instead of doing all the things every day, do a ‘batch’ of that thing at one time. So rather than doing a lesson of something four times a week, take a morning and do a few lessons.

You might be thinking isn’t that too much to digest in one go. But really, no, it doesn’t have to be. You can take breaks in-between, utilise weekends, mornings/evenings that you don’t have a lot going on anyway and batch certain subjects. Also, because it’s something you don’t do every day, kids and you won’t feel daunted but instead refreshed, in sha Allah.

By batching things according to priority, it takes the pressure off to fit all thing things into every day. Instead, you can be reassured knowing you don’t have to cut things short because, yet you’ll get to it at a certain time later on in the week in sha Allah.

So, if you’re struggling a little, take a little inspiration from batch cooking and give batch scheduling a go!

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