Meet Maria, Your Savvy Homeschool Planner

At The Savvy Homeschooler we crafted a digital homeschool planner designed to bring calm and clarity to your busy days.

About Me

Our Promise

Like any robust system, there is a learning curve when first using the planner. But once you understand the workflow, it dramatically reduces the mental load of homeschool organization by putting schedules, assignments, curriculum, transcript tracking, student portals, and planning tools all in one centralized space.

a photo with all our kids in 2015

The “Who” Behind the Template

Hello and welcome! My name is Maria, and I have been homeschooling for 17 years. Together, my husband and I have 9 children. I was blessed with 3 daughters from his first marriage, and together we had 6 children — 5 boys and 1 girl.

Three of my six children have already graduated through homeschooling. One earned a B.A. in English, graduating Summa Cum Laude, and is now teaching English in Shimane, Japan while also writing his first novel. Another began at the University of Washington as a junior with a perfect 4.0 GPA. My third graduated high school with straight A’s and is pursuing work in the trades as an electrician. I am currently homeschooling my remaining three children: a high schooler, middle schooler, and elementary student.

My Faith & Values

As a follower of Christ, I credit my children’s success to the Lord and the wisdom found in His Word, especially the book of Proverbs, which has greatly shaped how I teach work ethic, discipline, and responsibility in our home. We attend a local non-denominational, Bible-believing church.

While my faith is an important part of who I am, this planner itself is largely non-religious, aside from one inspirational quote about running the race to win.

My Planning Journey

Over the years, I’ve used many different curriculum styles and planning systems while trying to create a homeschool structure that was both organized and flexible. I originally built my own planners in Microsoft Excel, later experimented with CANVAS for digital lesson planning, and eventually transitioned to Notion because of its ability to create customized student portals, assignment tracking, transcript management, and flexible scheduling all in one place.

What I Needed in a Planner

What I needed most was a system that could:

• Organize multiple students

• Track high school credits

• Handle repeated lesson structures easily

• Allow lessons to “bump” forward automatically while skipping weekends

• Give students a visually appealing dashboard for accessing assignments

After struggling to find a Notion template that truly fit those needs, I decided to learn Notion myself and build the planner I had always wished existed for homeschool families.

Why I Created This Template

This template is the result of years of homeschooling experience, trial and error, and a genuine passion for planning and education. While it does have a learning curve because of how robust and customizable it is, the goal was to create a complete homeschool management system that could truly grow with a family over time.

I hope this planner blesses your homeschool journey as much as creating it has blessed mine.

Happy Planning!
Maria Smith