What does your afternoon/evening look like?

[myfatherslily]

Do your kids do homework/afterschooling as soon as they get home?  Do they play first?  How much time do you spent on after-school work?  I'm just looking for a general run-down of your day after school.  We're a couple weeks into this new public school adventure and I'm still getting a feel for what works best for US.

[Melinda in VT]

We start school on Tuesday. This is the first year my youngest (going into 3rd) will have homework.

 

The plan is for him to grab a snack and play outside for as long as he wants until his siblings get back from cross-country. Then it's dinner and homework time for everyone. On Mon and We'd he'll have soccer from 5-6, so he'll have to do homework in the afternoon.

 

I'm not looking forward to homework.

[SKL]

This year is going to be different for us.  I just found out my kids will have bus service!  That means they have to leave for school a half hour earlier and will get home around 3:30pm (used to be at aftercare until 6pm; I work full-time at home).  I haven't really figured out our revised schedule yet, but here's what I'm thinking:

• 3:30 kids walk home from bus stop, get themselves a snack, do chores, play outside, and do homework/piano practice until ~5:00/5:30.  I will be working upstairs.
• I might have them stay for school aftercare one day, so they can do their piano lesson there as in the past... not sure yet.
• They have extracurriculars every evening, at different times.  Earliest is swim team, 5-6pm, latest is gymnastics, 6:30-8:30.
• Dinner time will depend on extracurriculars, usually between 5:30pm and 6:30pm, and it will be something quick.  I might ask my sister to cook ahead on weekends for us so it isn't Mac'n'Cheese every day.  :P
• As in the past, we'll work afterschooling into whatever time is not taken by extracurriculars.  We'll do some minimum every day - math concepts, math drills, grammar, vocabulary, reading, and shoring up whatever they are doing in school.  In general I would target 1-1.5 hours of written work / reading by them.  If there is time, I will read aloud.
• We'll try to fit in some therapy most evenings before bed.  Therapy takes 20-35 minutes.
• Showers - may not happen every day, but we will try.
• Brushing and going to bed by 8:30 (except on Tuesdays, when we don't get home until 9pm, and Fridays, when they get to watch a show on DVD).

On Saturday mornings/early afternoons, they will have sports and maybe arts classes.  I will ask their part-time nanny to faciitate this while I work.  Later in the afternoons, they will do a pile of afterschooling work, chores, and piano practice.  They might be able to watch a movie if there is no big school project coming due.

 

On Sunday afternoons after church and dance, they will be with my sister, who will do some academic work with them as well as cooking, chores, and general hanging out.

[Karen in CO]

Mondays right after school are saved allergy shots.

Tuesdays are cello lessons.

Wednesdays are for robotics club.

Thursdays are kept or orthodontist appointments.

 

Math lab is from 5-6 at Mathnasium everyday except Friday.

Dinner is at 6.

Homework and reading are after that. Younger is reading through the SL reader package. Older is reading through a science series - right now it's the Secrets of the Universe series.

[displace]

We're still trying new things too. This week was emotional being back to school and everyone's tired. After school we walk home, snack while I try to do a read aloud. Play a few minutes while I prep papers. We do HWT and reading currently, and playing quick card games to break up work. Someday when I organize it our card games will morph to sight word, math, or spelling games I hope. Work is resisted a lot so I try to finish it right after school as moods go downhill quickly later in the evening (mine and others).

 

We do work five of seven days as a goal. Monday, Wednesday, and sat are extracurriculars so I try to not do work the days of extracurriculars. I'm hoping to add in fun science experiments every weekend. We also have Spanish shows playing in the morning while I'm getting stuff ready if kids are done already and we have a few min before leaving. We're not driving around as much as we did during summer, but we love to listen to SOTW in the car when we drive.

 

Eta - I think we spend one hour on after school. Me doing read alouds, reading, and HWT, plus occasional teacher homework papers/projects. This includes playing games in between work and talking through resistance and struggles. Otherwise it would probably take 15-20 min, plus my read alouds.

[kiwik]

My boys have consecutive classes at gym on Mondays so the one not doing gym does their week's homework. They both do about 2 minutes spelling a night and ds5 has a reader which takes 5 mins or so. We have another after school thing Thursdays. The other days we try and do an EiW lesson and a little maths and some read aloud science and history but we don't get that much done;

 

3 to 3.30 play at school

4 to 5 free time at home

5 to 5.30 schooling

Bath

Tea

Stories

Bed at 7 to 7.30

 

That is what we aim for.

[MBM]

Almost always, after school time has been play time even now for my youngest who is a senior. I am a firm believe in taking breaks to refresh and prepare for evening activities. Usually, my son will play ultimate frisbee or go to chess club and then bike home. When he gets home he does homework, goes for a run, eats dinner, does more homework, takes a shower, and then hits the hay. Most nights he goes to sleep around 9:30 or 10:00.

[myfatherslily]

Thanks for all your replies!  It really helps me to see what's working for others.  I think we'll be having play time after school until dinner.  I'll read Bible during dinner, then we'll do homework or other extras that I've assigned.  If they don't putz around too much, they'll have time to watch a tv show before bedtime (which is when they'll do their personal reading).  We're settling in nicely, but there are definitely still some adjusting to do. :)

[Zinnia]

We do after school sports immediately after school (low key running club and "soccer school" which is like non-intense practices twice a week), from 4:30 to 5:30.  I'm there with them for that. 

We walk home, they do homework while i finish dinner, and they take showers.  We eat around 6:00, sometimes 6:15, right as dh gets home. 

 

After dinner, they play with dh for a short amount of time, and then, by the time everyone brushes teeth and settles down, it's bedtime. 

 

We do our "afterschooling" before school, when everyone is fresh.  My children have a life-long farmer schedule, though, and our school runs 9:10-4:10, so it's a big struggle to make those two mesh.

[displace]

I have to say this first week back has been a struggle.  I think everyone is just tired and exhausted so work is taking a long time and moods are grumpy.  I actually prefer doing work on the weekends when we have the whole day to get something done.  If school were later or we shifted to wake up a little earlier we could probably accomplish ten times more in a few minutes before school started.  I may try, just a few minutes before. 

[Word Nerd]

My honest answer to the question in the headline is chaos. I'm trying to remedy that, though.

[Word Nerd]

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[LLMom]

On the days we come straight home (no after school activities) I let them choose the order of doing things.  Most of the time, they play first, have a snack, wind down.  After supper, they are doing homework and chores.  I read a loud to them before bed. This is our "after schooling."  I pick the read a loud (a classic) and we read and discuss it. They shower, get things ready for the next day and go to bed (littles 8:30, middle 9:30 and bigs 10:00)

[almondbutterandjelly]

We're still figuring things out.  We have figured out that we must start homework as soon as we get home from school.  Also, we have determined that both my dd and I are useless after 7pm as far as school work goes, so we have to work with that.  One day, we got up an hour early in the morning to finish homework.

 

Although I guess you are really asking about people who add additional work on top of homework, and we can't really do that at this point.  I did buy a corresponding history book and am reading it to my dd when we have time to supplement her history studies at school (where they did not issue a textbook).  Does that count?

 

So here's our current schedule:  Home from school by 4:30.  Homework until done or 7pm.  Early rise as needed.  Morning reading, if needed, during breakfast.

[blue daisy]

If we have time before school, I read to them.  After school, they do homework and chores right away.  Their homework is personal reading time and occasionally a math sheet, and I have them do extra math practice for a few minutes as well.  The first couple of weeks (our school starts early), we tried saving their reading time for bedtime, and it just didn't get done.  By the time they got ready for bed and we read aloud to them, it was too late for them to stay up reading much longer.

[myfatherslily]

This is one of the issues I'm encountering.  Some days we can do DS's daily reading at bedtime, and some days we run out of time/energy.  DD always makes time herself, cause she WANTS to read.  DS is the one who needs it! 

Yesterday I had them do their homework right away, after snack, and it worked out pretty well.  Today I think I'll try having DS do his reading earlier, too.

I don't think I could manage the brain power to have them do anything BEFORE school!  We have sufficient afternoon/evening time.  It's just a matter of managing it well.  That's always the hard part, right?? :)

[Nart]

Most of our afterschooling is happening on the 180 days they are not in school and Fridays afternoons. Fortunately, I don't work Fridays and they get out of school at noon. My oldest has soccer practice Tues and Thursday all year long. Both my kids are on a pre-team climbing club that meets for 2 hours Mon, Wed, and Friday . They joined at the beginning of summer and it was a great activity but now it is taking up too much time. They both really enjoy it but I am going to try to just have them go two days a week.  That only leaves time for reading a book or some quick math activity at most. Luckily they both will be getting weekly  homework packets on Fridays so I have them finish all their homework Friday afternoon or on Saturday mornings if they don't have soccer games. 

[Arctic Bunny]

They come home at 3:30 and play until supper, at 5, unless there is something else going on. During piano lessons, one does piano, the other does Singapore Math and then reading or drawing or whatever, then switch. After supper they do their "school" reading (some years an assigned book, others a reading log, or keeping track of minutes). Teeth and pjs at 7:30, in bed by 8, Read aloud and/or SL history until 9.

[Greenmama2]

Following. My two started in B&M school a month ago after homeschooling from the start. The school is very sweet but it isn't going to meet their academic needs. We are still figuring out our after schooling schedule and DC are still tired etc from the transition. Currently elder does Khan academy once or twice a week when she's not too tired and I do read alouds in the car (DH drives).