By Megan Spears
Here we are again back to school. In past weeks, I have read tons of articles and blog posts on how to get organized and prepared for back to school. In my opinion, the key to being organized for back to school is getting a handle on the family schedule.
It truly is amazing how much information we moms and dads have to keep track of each day. It can be overwhelming and almost enough to make you question your sanity. When you have multiple schedules and various activities, the days of using a cute puppy wall calendar are long gone. Start today… toss out that cute puppy dog wall calendar, it’s just not helping your situation. You need to have a planner that will include multiple people and multiple events and enough room to track it all.
STEP ONE: determine if you like paper versus electronic. There are so many options these days that you need to really determine how best your family will be able to process the information. If you have teenagers with mobile technology, maybe an electronic planner (with alarm reminders) will work best. Services like COZI or Google have electronic calendars that will allow you to track multiple people and multiple events. Did I mention that both of these services are FREE? Products like Outlook that integrate with your computer can be helpful also and easy to manage from your desktop but can be costly.
If you are a paper gal maybe a refrigerator wall planner or a purse size planner would be best. I love paper, so this is where I thrive! Planners like MomsAgenda, BusyBodyBooks or Franklin Covey all provide detailed planners for either the refrigerator or your purse. Each planner has space for every member of the family with space to document multiple tasks for that person. In addition to tracking activities each week, there is space to track to-do lists and project notes.
The key is to determine what will work best for your family!
STEP TWO: implementation! You can purchase a planner and hang it on the wall, but if you don’t take the time to implement it, it just won’t work. Often, the breakdown in family schedules happen because we haven’t taken the time to manage it. Spend just a few minutes at the beginning and end of each day to get a handle on your schedule.