Planning a Year of Wonder: How I Plan our Homeschool Year with The CMEC

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As we prepare for our fifth year using The CMEC, one of the questions I receive most often is, “How do you plan your year?” While every homeschool family approaches planning a little differently, I’ve found that having a simple framework helps me begin each year with peace and confidence rather than overwhelm.

Over the past several years, The CMEC has provided a rich feast of living books, beautiful ideas, and meaningful lessons for our family. In this post, I’m sharing a behind-the-scenes look at how I organize our year, schedule our terms, and prepare for the months ahead while still leaving room for the wonder, flexibility, and relationships that make a Charlotte Mason education so life-giving.

How I Plan Our Year with The CMEC (Without Overcomplicating It)

It’s hard to believe that we are preparing for our fifth year with The CMEC. What once felt unfamiliar and a little intimidating has gradually become a familiar rhythm in our home. Each summer, I look forward to the quiet work of planning out our year ahead. And this is not because I want to schedule every detail, but because thoughtful preparation helps me to create an atmosphere where wonder can flourish.

Charlotte Mason also expressed the importance of the teacher’s preparation in her volumes.

The teacher’s part is, in the first place, to see what is to be done, to look over the work of the day in advance and see what mental discipline, as well as what vital knowledge, this and that lesson afford; and then to set such questions and such tasks as shall give full scope to his pupils’ mental activity.

Charlotte mason, vol 3, school education

My Step-by-Step Process for Planning a Charlotte Mason Homeschool Year with The CMEC

Over the years, I’ve refined a simple planning process that helps me organize our books, lessons, and terms while keeping our focus on what matters most: living the liturgical year, cultivating good habits, meaningful relationships, and a love for learning.

Today, I’m sharing exactly how I plan out our CMEC homeschool year and prepare for the months ahead. So, let’s dive in…

Step 1: Print out The CMEC Guides + Materials

So, you’ve attended launch day with The CMEC and printed out the materials. Now what? I know it can feel overwhelming with so many materials to print and sort through. But really, it doesn’t have to be!

I just love launch day with The CMEC. There’s a certain feeling of excitement as we get access to upcoming year’s work to be done, booklists, and form guides! And I’ve been super eager to just print everything without any thought or plan in place. But, that usually leads to overwhelm and chaos for me.

The CMEC provides a lot of excellent information, resources, and courses. In fact, I revisit the Summer Planning course + chat videos each year as a review to help refresh my planning process. But, I have learned to adjust and swap out things to fit with our particular family…and how my crazy type-A brain functions.

So, the very first step that I follow on or after launch day, is to print out the form guides. I also print a fun cover designs for the guides, and spiral bind them with my pro click.

After, I’ve organized the guides, I sit and read through them and make notes of things that I need to supplement, books to order, other ideas and things that come up during the reading, etc.

I also love to read through the Kinderleben guide each year (even if my children are in older forms). There’s so much wisdom and great ideas to glean from this guide and it’s always worth the refresher!

Step 2: Create a Homeschool Calendar

The next step in my planning process is to make out our school plans and calendar for the year ahead. I believe that this is one of the last steps in the course, but I make it one of the beginnings in my planning process.

I print out a year at a glance calendar and mark off liturgical feast days, holy days, and other important dates to remember, potential field trips, and various other events we have tentatively planned. Then, I pencil in where I think that I want to start our year and potentially end.

From here, I start planning out our terms. When I begin with term 1, I usually count out 6 weeks with a break week after that. Then, the next 6 weeks, plan out where exam week falls, and then another break week. Some years, I may extend beyond 6 weeks depending on what our future plans look like. Term 1 this year does not have a break until the end of the term due to various reasons. But, you kind of get the idea behind my school calendar.

Below is a closeup image of how I drafted this out.

Step 3: Organize Logbook and Lesson Planner

I went over this process in depth in a recent blog post, so I’ll link it here: How I set up my 2026-2027 Teacher Planner + Logbook.

Step 4: Plan Book Purchases + Create Pre-Reading Log

I keep the form guides and shopping lists side by side and will keep a stack of highlighters and post it notes handy. Each student has been assigned a color from the very beginning of their school days. This has worked well for our family and helps to keep things tidy and organized.

While I read through the guides, I make notes of any books I may want to supplement or research further and which books we already own. (Thanks to the Bookshelf app for making this easier to track! 😅) I also highlight the books needed to purchase on the shopping list.

This is also where I’ll notate any audiobooks we may want to consider in our plans. I shared a bit about how we do this in this Yoto post.

Here’s where I’ll also make plans for combining forms and subjects. As the children advance in forms, they have been able to take on more independent work which makes planning a little easier too.

Next, I’ll create a pre-reading spreadsheet and stick that in my teacher planner under the pre-reading log section. This is basically just a simple breakdown of the forms and term readings so I can keep track of what I need to pre-read.

I also keep track of captain ideas and other notes in a section of my teacher planner.

Step 5: Order + Organize Books!

This is always a fun part of the process. Fortunately, I usually don’t have to order too many of the books and things for my lower forms.

Also, while I’m waiting for the books to arrive, I begin organizing, tidying up/re-shelving old books from the previous school year.

This is the perfect opportunity to do a deep clean and organize all of the school spaces. I will also make lists of any school supplies, handicrafts, notebooks, and additional things we will need for the next school year.

I usually order these things closer to the start of the school year or whenever the back to school sales hit in stores or online. FYI, Prime Day is at the end of June!

Step 6: Prepare Common Subjects + Morning Time

During this step, I read through the common subject guides, prepare playlists for hymns, folk songs, and composers.

It’s a time where I make plans for what things we can work on as a family, how I can simplify and combine. I’ll also prepare our liturgical celebrations and other spiritual formation and bible readings.

I’ve shared a bit about how we usually do our morning time here and shared some favorite resources too. And also how we approach Musical Education in our Classical Homeschool here.

Step 7: Pre-read + Make Lesson Plans

Another favorite in the planning process! As I mentioned above, I create a pre-reading log and make notes for captain ideas, chapter notes, lesson plan ideas, etc. in my teacher planner.

My lesson planning process isn’t super complicated. It basically consists of our seed thoughts/captain ideas, any specific timeline notes, geographical notes and other things that I want to cover during a lesson. Sometimes, I’ll pull photos for further study, set out an atlas/maps list, extra resources or books/page numbers for additional topic discussions.

The point really is just to be a prepared mother-teacher; to be a guide, philosopher, and friend. And to follow Charlotte Mason’s method of a lesson. Some years, I can get a bulk of the year planned. Other years, I prep just a term at a time.

We as teachers depreciate ourselves and our office; we do not realise that in the nature of things the teacher has a prophetic power of appeal and inspiration, that his part is not the weariful task of spoon-feeding with pap-meat, but the delightful commerce of equal minds where his is the part of guide, philosopher and friend.

Charlotte mason, vol 6, Towards a philosophy of education

Step 8: Build the Timetable

This part of the process is usually the most complicated for me. And so, I leave it towards the end! 😏 But, the process has gotten easier over the years.

I have students in 3 different forms this year, and while there is time for independence, I still need to juggle plan out what works best for our family and our life. So…from living out the liturgical life, to keeping a busy homestead and cattle ranch, and raising a child with special needs — our days are full.

And I’m sure you can relate!

So, I take a bit of time to really get intentional with how I want our days to flow and be structured. Our timetable is not something that I fret over too much. It is a tool to keep our days structured, but is also flexible and does not overwhelm me.

And again, The CMEC has great ideas for getting started with building a timetable. I rely on the Timetable Quick Sheet each year!

Step 9: Final Organization and Tidy of the School Spaces

Lastly, I prep and organize the school spaces. I like to do a final walk through of the bookshelves, student supplies, handicrafts, etc.

We try to keep to a habit of daily and weekly tidy of the spaces throughout the year. But, a good thorough cleaning and organization is definitely necessary before we begin the year.

Step 10: Mother-Teacher’s Education

Improving as a mother-teacher is something that I really strive to work on throughout the year. You’ve probably seen on various posts that I have mentioned just how much I love The CMEC’s Mother Educational Course.

In addition to these, I also like to take time over the summer month’s to refresh and reenergize myself by reading or listening to good books.

To be honest, I don’t listen to many audiobooks personally. However, on occasion, I do like to listen to certain books while working in the garden. This is where I do a lot of quiet reflection and mental planning ahead. But I also thoroughly enjoy having the quiet sounds of nature while working in the garden to recharge myself and help stimulate creativity.

So, it’s all about balance here.

Here’s a few of the books that I enjoy on Audible as a preparation for the upcoming school year:

• For the Children’s Sake
• Tending the Heart of Virtue
• In Vital Harmony
• The Chronicles of Narnia Series

These are the core four that help me to reawaken wonder and keep me energized as a mother-teacher.

I also enjoy reading other books that I’ve shared in the past regarding my mother’s scholé as well as sections of Charlotte Mason’s volumes.