If you school year round

[jillian]

How do you schedule especially if you've got a first grader. We will be doing a full schedule next year. We are doing K this year and planning on finishing around June. Would you take a couple weeks off and then begin first work? Or would you spend a month or so just kind of enjoying time off of "school" and do some living learning, vacation and visiting family. It's great because we can drive to our family and stop at some really neat places along the way. We are in SC and our family lives in north MS and the Houston area of Tx. Lots to see on those trips.

[boscopup]

I took off about 3 weeks between 1st and 2nd grade. That was plenty for us. We didn't lose what we'd learned the previous year, but we still got some rest and relaxation for a bit.

 

I school 6 weeks on, 1 week off, and now that the weather is getting cooler, I've been letting them do less school and more outside play time, without guilt, because we've already gotten so much done this school year. ;) We're on day 71 of the school year today.

[jillian]

I took off about 3 weeks between 1st and 2nd grade. That was plenty for us. We didn't lose what we'd learned the previous year, but we still got some rest and relaxation for a bit.

 

I school 6 weeks on, 1 week off, and now that the weather is getting cooler, I've been letting them do less school and more outside play time, without guilt, because we've already gotten so much done this school year. ;) We're on day 71 of the school year today.

Yeah we were thinking doing the 6 weeks 1 week thing. We too live where it is hot for months and is just cooling down now

[boscopup]

It was really nice schooling through summer (inside with the A/C running!). The kids don't want to play outside when it's hot. Now that it's cool, they're willing to play outside for hours. It's awesome. Definitely worth schooling during those 100 degree days! :D

[delaney]

I do 3 on and one off year round now and they rotate who is off. That leaves me only teaching 3 at one time 1 week per month. The weeks someone is off they have to do math and reading only and entertain the 3 yr old. I gave them 2 weeks off at Christmas, 3 days at Thanksgiving, 1 week at spring break, and then 2 straight weeks off at the end of August. I counted out that they get 170-180 days each of instruction. Right now they are all on this week so I just do the basics. The other weeks I can take a bit more time to do more instruction since I am only dealing with 2 and the little guy is not on me all the time. I am hoping next year to pull him into the rotation a bit since he likes to learn.

[Woodland Mist Academy]

I took off about 3 weeks between 1st and 2nd grade. That was plenty for us. We didn't lose what we'd learned the previous year, but we still got some rest and relaxation for a bit.

 

:iagree: 3 weeks for summer break worked well for us in the early years.

[Missouri Okie]

We do six weeks on and one week off, too, with two weeks off in May and December.

 

However, I like Delaney's idea of staggering the weeks off between kids to get more one-on-one instruction. I may have to try that next year.

[jillian]

My thing is how do you know where to stop for that week you take off? Or when you are planning how do you know what sort of divisions to do?

[Miss Tick]

I follow a more traditional schedule to coordinate with my husband's schedule, but then we don't really stop, kwim? When summer arrives I will let things "end" - like when we get to the end of a book (history, science, phonics, etc.), but math and reading keep going, perhaps one less day a week. LA also gets a reduced schedule - once or twice a week? Spanish gets cut back, more video watching or informal conversations. After a month or so of this in the summer I will slowly start to ramp things back up - adding a subject a month, slowly increasing math, reading and LA, etc. We take two weeks of vacation in the summer and usually one at the start of the year. I schedule more vacation days than we actually end up taking - if DH works on a vacation day we generally do too.

 

Instead of taking off a full day here and there, I am more likely to intentionally skip a subject (this week we aren't doing any official science) to lighten things up.

[In2why]

We school year round 4 days a week. We take Friday's off for fun and field trips.

 

Our longer breaks are based on how we feel and what is going on in our life instead of weeks on or off.

 

For instance we are taking next week off because I am going out of town and DH isn't going to do school. Then we will take some time off at the end of December for Christmas. Once it gets warm in the spring we will take some time off, and then we usually take off July so I can get us ready to start again in August.

[Mommy to monkeys]

We school year round.

The idea has always been to do it 4 days a week and then take time off as needed. (like for when we go see family, or when family comes to see us)The extra day each week is for cleaning and catching up on the mounds of laundry that somehow accumulate. Sunday mornings are for grocery shopping. :D

 

But I'm pregnant this year, so I'm stepping it back up to a 5 day week so we can take a good month off when the babies arrive.

 

Otherwise, I prefer shorter breaks. . .when we even take a WEEK off, it makes it hard (for us) to get back into the aroutine. . .and I somehow seem to forget how to teach AND take care of my house. UGH!

[jillian]

Right now for Kinder we are on a 4 day a week schedule. I like it because we have an extra day for doctor appointments/play dates/outside stuff and it gives me a day to catch up. Saturday is for gymnastics and baking/fun stuff and Sunday is grocery shopping and Mass. I sometimes vary my grocery shopping day though. DH wants us to up it to a 5 day/week schedule for first but we will only do the essentials (L.A. and math along with a read aloud) every day and then stagger the other subjects I think, at least for awhile. If we need to up our schedule that's great if not and 4 days is working great.

[duckymama]

We do the six weeks on one week off schedule with more time off during the holidays. We take off time during the summer when we have vacations planned.

 

Our off weeks are only partial off weeks. I still work with the K and Pre-K boys. Our older two work on any subjects they can do on their own.

[acurtis75]

We pretty much school year round and just take breaks for vacations, holidays, etc. We normally work 5 days a week but we take frequent breaks for fun and/or travel. On short/break days or weeks we'll just do essentials like math and one language arts instead of several. So far this is working for us. I've been forced to take a month break before & it was torture getting her back in the routine of studying daily. I don't like to take more than a week off at a time...if we're traveling for longer than that we do some sort of lessons or learning while we're gone. Sometimes it's curriculum stuff but other times we'll write letters or do some reading and narration about the area we're visiting.

[Critterfixer]

I'm jealous. I school year round on four and a half-day weeks, but I don't get the extra days off. That's when I go to work.

However, the boys do get the days off and that's good. We don't tend to take a week off, however. Instead we just take a day off here or there as we need, for going places or getting things done on the house.

[boscopup]

My thing is how do you know where to stop for that week you take off? Or when you are planning how do you know what sort of divisions to do?

 

Ah, I see what you're asking. Basically, when is your year "done"?

 

My year is done at the end of May, when the schools around me get out. That way, when we get to high school, we'd be graduating at the same time. That's a long way off, and it really doesn't matter NOW, but I like consistency. :lol:

 

My curriculum is all in different places and different levels, so we just stop where we are and pick up where we left off. I do try to have a good stopping point, like I wouldn't stop math in the middle of a chapter and take 3 weeks off. I'd finish the chapter before the break. Maybe save the cumulative review for after the break, as it might be needed.

 

The curriculum that is done "by the end of the year", I try to have end at the end of May. For example, we plan to finish SOTW2 by that time, and if we finish early, we'll just not do formal history for a week or so if needed. Next year, I'm planning a different type of history, so I won't want to start it early (if I was going into SOTW3, I might just go ahead and get started). This year, we were about halfway through SOTW1 when the end of the year came, so we picked up where we left off.

 

Also, I print out a year-long calendar from donnayoung.org that has lines to the right of the weeks of each month. That way I can pencil in my breaks and see at a glance when everything is. I first put in the holiday breaks we'll take (Thanksgiving/Christmas) and the end of year break (end of May/beginning of June). Then I just go 6 weeks on, 1 week off, adjusting as needed to fit those breaks and any planned family vacations. I'm also flexible... if we plan a vacation after I've made my calendar, I'm fine with moving things. That happened this year. We were supposed to break the 3rd week of September. DH decided to take us to the beach the last week of September, so we schooled one extra week before taking our break. No big deal.

[Dustybug]

We school year round, taking breaks as needed. When we finished our last school year, we took 3 weeks off and then started right back up. This year, I think we will do 4 weeks on, one off with just phonics instruction and maybe math too. We will take a few days around Thanksgiving. A week, maybe two at Christmas and the rest is just whenever we need it.

[Ellie]

My thing is how do you know where to stop for that week you take off? Or when you are planning how do you know what sort of divisions to do?

See, that kind of year-round schedule wouldn't have worked for me.

 

We took off Thanksgiving through about the middle of January; a couple of weeks in the spring around Easter; a couple of weeks in late August/early September. We just worked on stuff the rest of the time, and I felt free to take off for Mental Health Days, lol, or Disneyland in the middle of the week in May. ;-)

[Haiku]

It's great because we can drive to our family and stop at some really neat places along the way.

 

We go year-round, 4 weeks on, one week off, with 2 weeks off at Christmas and 2 at the end of June. Our new year starts the Monday after 4th of July (or Tuesday, if 7/4 is a Monday).

 

But if I had the opportunity to take a long driving vacation with lots of great places to visit, I'd take off however long I needed to do that.

 

Tara

[jillian]

We go year-round, 4 weeks on, one week off, with 2 weeks off at Christmas and 2 at the end of June. Our new year starts the Monday after 4th of July (or Tuesday, if 7/4 is a Monday).

 

But if I had the opportunity to take a long driving vacation with lots of great places to visit, I'd take off however long I needed to do that.

 

Tara

Yeah the long drive vacation would definitely be something like just we talk about what we see and learn through life instead of books.

 

Eta: great idea everyone!!!! Thank you.

Edited October 10, 2011 by jillian

[Tranquility7]

For record-keeping purposes, our school year runs from July 1 – June 30. I tell DS his grade level based solely on his age. He turned 5 in June, so he is in Kindergarten this year (July 1, 2011 - June 30, 2012). His grade level is irrelevant to what level of work he is doing – I just tell him so he knows what to answer when people ask!

 

We take breaks as needed, sometimes just from a particular subject, sometimes from everything. For instance, we have not been doing Science or Art for the last couple of months, but I’m planning to start up with both again in Nov.

 

I have noticed that (so far!) often when I schedule a break, we end up doing some school anyway, since DS enjoys it. For instance, he often asks to do SOTW, and he LOVES his reading/spelling program (AAS). We just took a week vacation, and during it DS begged to listen to SOTW in the car, and we did the coloring and maps in the hotel also at his request. He also did some math facts practice sheets, as well as a lot of reading on his own to DD (very sweet!). And we also did read alouds. This was all on vacation! Now, I would not have pushed any of this. But it is just part of our natural routine, and he did not mind at all, and often initiated the activities. So who am I to turn him down! ;-)

 

I start and stop curricula at will, depending on what is working well for us. I prefer this, since then I can switch when necessary, and I also don’t get overwhelmed by having to start everything new all at once.

 

I keep lots of different records, but one of my favorite “bird’s eye view†records is attached – an Excel sheet where I just keep a running record of what we are doing in which month for each Subject area. This way I can see exactly what we are getting through, and at what speed. I plan on keeping this bird’s eye view record going through his whole education.

 

This graph starts in Nov 2010 since that is when I started schooling DS. The black vertical line represents when our new school year began. You can see the carryover of some subjects.

 

 

For “school recordsâ€, I would record that we did the following for the 2010-2011 school year:

Singapore Math Earlybird A and B

Piano

Art (misc)

First Lang Lessons 1

All About Spelling 1

Science (misc)

Story of the World 1

Mapskills

 

I omitted WWE and SWR from my records since I tried them and they just didn’t work for us that year. But I included SOTW1 even though it carried over a bit, since we mostly did it that year.

[wy_kid_wrangler04]

At that age I would not stop phonics or math. I would however maybe do some living math books with games. We do living books for a while to break up our school years. We do not stop any curriculum until its done then lets say we finish with science but still doing other curriculum. The kids will chose some books from the library that sound interesting in science, a topic of their choice that they are interested in, get as many books as they want to read on that subject (they choose the books) I have 1 rule, you read the books you get. If they pick 1 book, thats fine, if they pick 10 books, that's fine. We just keep going like that. Lets say they finish English next. We will do either some living grammar books or continue reading classics. If they finish history next then they get to chose a historical person, or a time period, or a specific event to chose books on. Once all their curriculum is done then they get 1 poetry book, 1 history book, 1 biography book, 1 science book, 1 classic, 1 living math book, 1 mystery-- I think I am forgetting something-- anyways you get the idea. Then they read all those, we go back to the library and pick out another round. The amount of time we do this depends on the time of year we finish. My ds's I help them pick topics (how about spiders? insects? plants? trees? Mummies? etc) It is amazing! My oldest dd spent all last year learning about plagues/ diseases of the past. They learn so much and feel so in control its amazing!

[jillian]

For record-keeping purposes, our school year runs from July 1 – June 30. I tell DS his grade level based solely on his age. He turned 5 in June, so he is in Kindergarten this year (July 1, 2011 - June 30, 2012). His grade level is irrelevant to what level of work he is doing – I just tell him so he knows what to answer when people ask!

 

We take breaks as needed, sometimes just from a particular subject, sometimes from everything. For instance, we have not been doing Science or Art for the last couple of months, but I’m planning to start up with both again in Nov.

 

I have noticed that (so far!) often when I schedule a break, we end up doing some school anyway, since DS enjoys it. For instance, he often asks to do SOTW, and he LOVES his reading/spelling program (AAS). We just took a week vacation, and during it DS begged to listen to SOTW in the car, and we did the coloring and maps in the hotel also at his request. He also did some math facts practice sheets, as well as a lot of reading on his own to DD (very sweet!). And we also did read alouds. This was all on vacation! Now, I would not have pushed any of this. But it is just part of our natural routine, and he did not mind at all, and often initiated the activities. So who am I to turn him down! ;-)

 

I start and stop curricula at will, depending on what is working well for us. I prefer this, since then I can switch when necessary, and I also don’t get overwhelmed by having to start everything new all at once.

 

I keep lots of different records, but one of my favorite “bird’s eye view†records is attached – an Excel sheet where I just keep a running record of what we are doing in which month for each Subject area. This way I can see exactly what we are getting through, and at what speed. I plan on keeping this bird’s eye view record going through his whole education.

 

This graph starts in Nov 2010 since that is when I started schooling DS. The black vertical line represents when our new school year began. You can see the carryover of some subjects.

 

 

For “school recordsâ€, I would record that we did the following for the 2010-2011 school year:

Singapore Math Earlybird A and B

Piano

Art (misc)

First Lang Lessons 1

All About Spelling 1

Science (misc)

Story of the World 1

Mapskills

 

I omitted WWE and SWR from my records since I tried them and they just didn’t work for us that year. But I included SOTW1 even though it carried over a bit, since we mostly did it that year.

OMGosh thank you so much. I was having such a tough time visualizing how a calendar/planner looked for this

[BetterthanIdeserve]

My goal is to school year round - mainly because all we seem to do better with a 4 day school week. I stay on top of housework so much better and I don't feel guilty taking a morning or afternoon to "play" with my friend and her younger kids (her oldest in ps) or spend time at grandparents. We took 7 weeks off between Kindergarten and 1st grade - about 2 weeks longer than I planned, but oh well. It was so hard to get my DD6 back into a school routine (even taking it very easy the first three weeks) that I doubt that I'll take that much time off again. I'm planning to take off 4-5 weeks next summer but still have reading and some sort of math a few times each week. I may use the time to get ahead in history (or do some U.S. history) because it's my DD's favorite subject she would like to do more projects. I'll plan at least 1 week of that vacation to do some major prep work in lesson planning for 1st semester. I've planned another prep week in between semesters. Some subjects (math, history, science, grammar, writing, picture and composer studies) have an end point for the year for us. A few things (our spelling, handwriting, reading, memorywork) are just do the next thing, so we'll stop wherever we're at when we reach the end of our year and then continue on. I also plan plenty of sick time because my patience goes way down when I'm trying to teach with a migraine or sinus infection. If we don't need that time, great! I'd rather finish "early" rather than feeling like I'm finishing behind schedule. Good luck figuring out what works best for your family!

[sbgrace]

This wouldn't work for everyone but we are flexible. We took last week off for a vacation but a solid week is very rare. It's more often that we miss a day here or there for various reasons. We always end up with many more days than are required. One of mine does much better with no breaks honestly so getting back in the groove today after last week off was rough. Our days missed here and there work a lot better for this family than scheduled weeks off.

[Tranquility7]

OMGosh thank you so much. I was having such a tough time visualizing how a calendar/planner looked for this

 

Oh yay, I'm so glad my little chart helps someone else out!

 

I should also add, in case it wasn't clear before - I don't really "schedule out" our year ahead of time this way, but rather update my Excel sheet every few months to reflect what we have been doing, and what we will probably be doing in the next couple of months. I also will probably start adding some things to the schedule in the future (like a geography program I have in mind) just so I don't forget that I want to do them - but it is never carved in stone and if I put it in and it doesn't work out, I just move it.

 

It also helps me recognize when we might finish something and I should be thinking ahead about what we want to do next (such as for Art, where I use different programs through the year) or whether I need to order the next level of something that continues (like SOTW, SM, or AAS).

 

I also love that I can have guilt-free breaks from things that are taxing to me (like Art and Science, since they are both more hands-on) and still chug along on the do-the-next-thing programs (SOTW, SM, AAS).

[JessicaLady]

This wouldn't work for everyone but we are flexible. We took last week off for a vacation but a solid week is very rare. It's more often that we miss a day here or there for various reasons. We always end up with many more days than are required. One of mine does much better with no breaks honestly so getting back in the groove today after last week off was rough. Our days missed here and there work a lot better for this family than scheduled weeks off.

 

:iagree: I had originally planned to be fairly scheduled but then we'd have these huge learning losses. He just couldn't retain info. So, we take days here and there. Sometimes the days are scheduled and sometimes they're not. My son actually misses school when we don't have it and I like to keep him happy. :)

 

I say my son is in First only because that would be his grade level in ps. However, as far as when our school year is 'over' isn't so easy to define. He's much better w/ math and spelling and is not quite on level with reading/phonics. Not sure why that is, but he's kind of all over the place. It feels weird to me for us to take an extended break when he's straddling 2 different grade levels.

 

We tend to do 5 days/wk but Fridays are for review/assessment only. We don't cover any new material on Fridays.

 

Like I said, I really wanted structure. Everything in my life I organize and schedule. And although my workboxes are organized and school is always ready to go, our homeschooling schedule is really, really flexible.

 

J

[veggiegal]

We're following an adapted British School System schedule, with our breaks spread much more evenly through the year than is typical in North America--it's a version of year-round schooling. I wrote about the details here.

[go_go_gadget]

We just sort of... go. We usually school M-F but I don't worry about it if, like today, they ended up spending the day with their grandparents instead of doing school. Sometimes we make it up on the weekends, sometimes we don't. Their stepfather and I are full-time students ourselves, so the kids usually have our finals week off each quarter, but then we also school more intensively in the summers so it more than evens out. They're both working about a year and half ahead and I school them hard, so if we miss some time here or there it doesn't bother me in the least.

[Tigger]

We school year-round and take breaks as needed. Last year when we'd wrapped up everything we needed to cover for first grade in early May, we took an extended break until the new school year started July 1st since we'd not only finished all the material, but were way over on how many hours were required for the year. In that break we continued with two things though - phonics/reading and math - on a lighter schedule. Math was strictly mental math to maintain skills and phonics/reading was lots of practice to mastery/fluency of material learned to that point. Then we started up again in July on our summer schedule, with breaks for camps and activities as needed, and were back in the full schedule just after Labor Day. We've taken a few days here and there since Labor Day and are planning a couple of weeks off around Christmas and New Year's - other than that, we continue on, even during vacations (just lighten the load on vacation).