Back to school planning for parents

Have you got children at school? Do you feel there’s always a lot to organise at the start of a new term? You may need to think about new uniform, sports fixtures and homework timetables.

It’s always helpful to feel prepared for a new school year.  As a parent this takes on a new meaning.  Use some of the ideas below to help both you and your child have an organised start.

Hello, it’s Alex (@TheJournalCorner) from the Archer and Olive ambassador team.  Today, I’m going to share some ideas using an Archer & Olive journal to help plan and organise for the start of a new school year.  I will give you some examples of different pages to try and also include a free printable you can access later in this blog.

Supplies needed

For this topic, you don’t need too many supplies. A Journal and pen will suffice, but there are some extras I found helpful:

• Archer & Olive journal - white dot grid 
• A selection of coloured pens like these pastel calliographs 
• Planning stickers  - I love these plain ones from the everyday collection 
• Archer & Olive planning stencil
• Archer & Olive sticker tweezers
• Black fineliner
• Pencil 

If you are looking to purchase anything from Archer & Olive, please use ‘Alex10’ to save 10%. This is an affiliate code, so it allows you to support creators like me too.

Brainstorm

Of course the start of a new school term will look different for everyone. You may have older children who are better at organising themselves, or maybe your first child is starting school and the lists seem endless.  There may be no need for uniform at all or a lengthy list of requirements for both uniform and sports kits.

Before creating any spreads, I sit and make a list of the types of pages I want to include or feel would be most useful.  I have shared mine as they may help as a starting point for yours and are relatively generic.

Using the pastel calliographs as a background for headers really helps add some simple decoration to your page.

Supplies List

One of the main pages I will refer to is a list of all the supplies needed ahead of a new term.  Sometimes this is provided by the school with some quite specific details. You may need to look through what items can be used again, what needs replacing and there’s usually a good excuse for stationery shopping!

As I have three children, I have divided this page into three sections because the equipment required varies by their age. I have used the planning stickers from the Archer & Olive every day collection to colour code by each child for quick reference to this list.

Weekly overview 

One of the most used spreads no matter the age of your children will probably be a weekly layout. This should be something you can create at the start of the term, that then doesn’t need changing. 

Some examples are listed below:

• class timetable
• equipment needed each day
• after school activities and pick-up times
• homework schedule 
• sports kit required 
• a note of any weekly assessments 
• the school menu

I found the Archer And olive Everyday pastel calliographs were perfect to create headers on this page that I could then write over. In this example below, I have created space for their after-school activity and club schedule.

I also use similar layout to remember which day they need PE kit, swim bags, library book and spelling test.

Uniform lists

There are many variations of these pages. Hopefully some further ideas below will help you get started or inspire you to adapt to suit your needs.

Uniform, if needed, may entail quite a specific list from the school. Often the cost of this can also add up so you want to make sure you either pass down uniform between siblings or perhaps look to buy secondhand. I also keep a note of measurements in case buying online.

I keep track of the uniform we own already and what sizes we have.   I will look at this whenever I am creating a uniform purchase list at the start of the school year.

In my journal, I divide this up by boys, uniform and girls uniform and also buy season. I include a separate page for PE kit as this is also quite a substantial list to include sports equipment as well.

School information

Another page I find useful at the start of each school year is a list of helpful contact details for the school in general and some teaching staff.

This could include the email address of your child’s main teacher, reception, school’s phone number and any relevant web address.

Alongside this page, I keep a note of the parent portal login and password, as well as any logins and passwords the children may use. This isn’t just their school email or portal but also for the many educational apps they use, sometimes at home too.

School Memory Keeping

Over the past few years I have really enjoyed collating photos of school memories too.  These are usually photos from sporting events, performances, awards achieved, and dress up days.

Creating a page for these photos at the start of the year will definitely help you be more consistent in printing and adding photos.  I try to create a double page spread per child I will add notes and the date for each photograph.

The dot grid planning stencil  helps to create this layout using the largest square to outline space for photos once printed.

Video - planning for a new school term

You can watch me actually create and talk through these examples in more detail in my video here.

Journal printable 

Try this free printable to save time creating layouts I have suggested above.

Summary

I hope you have found some different ideas to try in a journal today. Being prepared for a new school term will help both you and your child adjust and feel organised for the academic year ahead. For more journal inspiration come and say hello @thejournalcorner. We always love to see your creations, so please tag @archerandolive or use #aoshare on Instagram.

The Archer & Olive blog has several articles about returning to school.  Try these from a student perspective using a bullet journal or the top 5 back to school spreads. There are also some fun back to school doodle ideas!