When Plans Change and Life Makes You Sit Still

Well, this school year certainly didn't begin quite the way I had planned!

Just one week before we were scheduled to officially begin our 2026–2027 homeschool year on September 7, I made the unexpected decision to cancel Power Homeschool (Acellus). And while I felt it was the right decision for our family, there was one rather significant problem. I had only seven days to figure out a replacement curriculum!

No pressure, right? 😅

For nearly four years, Power Homeschool had been part of our regular homeschooling routine. It wasn't our entire curriculum, as I always supplemented it with other subjects, books, projects, and activities, but it provided a structure we had grown used to. And I had already spent a large amount of time planning our upcoming school year around it. In fact, I had our entire first semester planned out through the end of January! So why the sudden change?

During the summer, Acellus introduced changes that were making it increasingly difficult to fit the program into the way we wanted to homeschool. Just as they had promised, changes were coming, but unfortunately, they weren't quite what we had hoped for. The scholarship requirements meant the children needed to log in five days a week and complete a certain number of hours each month. There were also restrictions on how many courses we could take and how frequently we could change them. Now, I understand that these requirements may work perfectly well for other families, especially when Acellus is their primary curriculum. And in some ways, the program does offer flexibility. But for us, it was beginning to feel rather restrictive.

I had carefully designed our homeschool schedule to accommodate Missouri's 1,000-hour requirement without overwhelming the children. I also wanted to leave plenty of flexibility for our church activities, which have become an important part of our weekly routine. Trying to fit Acellus's requirements into that schedule was becoming increasingly difficult. On top of that, I had been wanting to give the children more opportunities for independent study, allowing them to explore subjects that interested them beyond our regular lessons. I also wanted the freedom to spend additional time on certain topics without worrying about keeping up with an online program's requirements.

Unfortunately, with the monthly hour requirements, we were finding it difficult to fit everything into our schedule. Rather than using Acellus as a supplement to our homeschool, I was beginning to feel as though I had to organize our homeschool around Acellus. And that wasn't what I wanted. There was also the financial side of things. With the increasing costs (they raised it again) and the possibility of losing our discounted rate, continuing with the program was becoming less appealing. But finding a replacement wasn't exactly something we'd budgeted for, especially with school starting in just a week! Ideally, I wanted to find something free. At the very least, I wanted to avoid spending a fortune on an entirely new curriculum.

My first thought was to look for another online school or curriculum. Something that would provide structure without the restrictions we'd been dealing with. I considered Khan Academy and spent about two days researching different possibilities, but nothing quite matched what I was looking for. Eventually, I decided that perhaps it was time to return to something more familiar: good old-fashioned textbooks and workbooks! The problem was that I didn't have time to order anything. So, I started looking for free resources and taking inventory of what we already had at home.

Thankfully, not everything needed replacing. Our Bible lessons were already planned, and most of our health and foreign language studies could continue as originally intended. The biggest gaps were math, language arts, social studies, and science.

For math, I was incredibly grateful to discover that The Good and the Beautiful offered free downloadable math curricula through eighth grade. That was a tremendous help, especially since I needed something for both children without adding to our expenses.

Language arts took a little more creativity. We already had our reading plans in place, but I wanted something more structured for grammar and other language arts concepts. Then I remembered our DK Help Your Kids with Language Arts book. Rather than purchasing another curriculum, I decided we could work through the book together while I created worksheets and activities to go along with each lesson.

For social studies, I decided to build our first semester around Liberty's Kids, along with Who Was? biographies and a Book of Centuries inspired by the Charlotte Mason method. I was also happy to find free resources through Simply Charlotte Mason to help us get started.

Science, which we'd be focusing on during the second semester, was another subject I needed to figure out. Thankfully, I found free science textbooks from Utah that seemed like a good fit, and I already had our DK science book to use alongside them if needed.

As for health, removing Acellus actually gave me more room to focus on the lessons I'd originally wanted to do. I had been preparing worksheets centered around the Fruits of the Spirit, along with lessons on healthy habits and physical well-being. We could also incorporate regular workouts and physical activities, combining health and physical education into one part of our schedule.

And somehow, by the time Monday rolled around, I had managed to pull together enough resources to begin our school year! Of course, that didn't mean everything was completely finished. One of the hardest parts of making such a last-minute change was knowing how much of my previous planning had gone down the drain. I had already organized the entire first semester through January, and suddenly much of that work no longer applied. Thankfully, I'd managed to prepare everything for our first week of school and had already started working on the second. But instead of having several months of lessons ready in advance, I was now preparing our schoolwork one week at a time.

At first, that felt like quite a step backward. But as we've been settling into our new routine, I'm beginning to see some advantages. Our weekly schedule follows the same general pattern, so I don't have to start from scratch every time I sit down to plan. And because I'm only preparing a week or two ahead, it's much easier to make adjustments when the children need extra time with a particular topic. With our previous setup, pausing a subject for more in-depth learning could mean rearranging weeks or even months of assignments. Now, I can simply move things around as needed without having to redo quite so much work. And I have to say, having my planner in Goodnotes makes those little adjustments so much easier!

It also opens up more opportunities for projects and independent study, something the children had expressed an interest in doing more of this year. If they want to spend additional time exploring a subject, we can make room for it without worrying about falling behind on required online hours. In a way, our schedule has actually become more flexible than it was before. And then, just when I thought things were beginning to settle down, my birthday arrived!

On the 12th, I managed to twist both of my ankles after taking a misstep while we were out walking. Thankfully, we were all holding hands at the time, so my family was able to partially hold me up. Otherwise, the whole thing could have ended much worse! Unfortunately, that meant spending quite a bit of time off my feet. And as if once wasn't enough, I managed to twist them again just two days ago, which certainly hasn't helped the healing process! But there has been an unexpected upside to being stuck in bed. With so many of my usual activities temporarily off the table, I've suddenly had more time to focus on preparing lessons, organizing our new materials, and figuring out a rhythm that works for us.

After nearly four years of following a routine built partly around Power Homeschool, adjusting to something different was going to take time. And while I certainly wouldn't have chosen to injure my ankles, I couldn't help wondering whether the timing was a little providential. After all, I had been scrambling to prepare everything while keeping up with my usual responsibilities. Now, whether I liked it or not, I had to slow down. And that gave me an opportunity to concentrate on getting our homeschool organized.

It's funny how things sometimes work out. Looking back, I still can't believe how quickly everything changed. One week we were preparing to begin another school year with a familiar curriculum, and the next I was putting together an entirely different approach using whatever resources I could find. It certainly wasn't the start I had imagined, and I can't say I was happy about having to redo so much planning. But I'm grateful that we were able to find what we needed without spending money on an entirely new curriculum.

And while we're still adjusting to our new routine, I'm beginning to appreciate the freedom it's giving us. Perhaps this unexpected change was just what our homeschool needed. Only time will tell, but for now, I'm looking forward to seeing where this new approach takes us. Even if getting there meant spending a little more time in bed than I had planned!