What Worked - Minimized Planning

Last summer, I read a life-changing book. I was particularly fascinated with one of its messages to do more and plan less. I've applied it to some aspect of my life and I'm convinced of its validity.

Minimized Planning in the Kitchen

For breakfast and lunch, I have a specific type of meal for each day. So on Mondays, we have scrabbled eggs and toast for breakfast and spaghetti with meat sauce for lunch. I have a breakfast pantry and a lunch pantry. These items can be mixed and matched to create the meals that most of my kids like. :) My breakfast pantry consist of eggs, milk, cheerios, oatmeal, bread, hot dogs, flour, butter, honey, yogurt and seven days worth of fruit. My lunch pantry consist of pasta, marinara sauce, Alfredo sauce, Chinese noodles, sesame oil, oyster sauce, ground meat, frozen mixed vegetables, frozen pizza and dinner leftovers. :) For dinner, I buy seven meals worth of meat, vegetables and serve them with rice. I don't think about what I want to do with them. I simply try to buy a variety of types and cuts. I do have a pantry of dinner seasonings and flavorings. The night before I simply grab a portion of meat from the freezer and mentally think of its preparation - grilled, stir-fry, baked or stew and the basic ethnic theme I want to go for. So say I grab some chicken and think stew! I could do Oriental and add soy sauce, cinnamon stick and star anise. I could do Italian and add canned tomatoes, basil and oregano. I wing the proportions. Sometimes I need inspiration and I go to Allrecipes, Ina Garten or my cookbooks. Sticking to the minimalist theme, I do not have a large collection of cookbooks. My husband jokes that I never cook the same meal twice. And this was back when I did plan out our meals extensively. So now, I just scribble the recipe on scrap paper and throw it out when the meal is done.

Minimized Planning in the School Room

Beginning the school year, I list the core subjects that we are to cover - reading, writing, math, Chinese and fine arts. Beside each subject, I list the resource I will use. This is where I use great restraint. What I do not do :-

• I do not intentionally cover more than my core subjects.
• I do not list more than one resource. Yes, there is no perfect curriculum or book list but I limit my choice to only one. I figured that if I finish with that one resource and have finished all other subject, I can pick up the supplementary resource later in the year. So for example a lot of people I know mixes Story of the World and Connecting with History. Side note: I have not used either programs. So if I were to cover world history this year, I would choose between one of the programs. Should I finish Volume 1 in either resource, I might consider repeating Ancient History with the other program. This forces me to choose the program that is better suited for my needs, reduces my time planning to combine program and naturally re-enforce repetition in the subject.
• I do not have daily plans. Most of my resources are straight-forward and require little preparation time. We simply do one lesson a day and move to the next tomorrow. The same with reading lists. If the reading list is already in a theme format, great. Otherwise, I don't bother to compile thematic studies.