nelewaf Posted December 11, 2011 Share Posted December 11, 2011 Does anyone have a dc that do(es) competitive sports or has a special interest that takes alot of time each week? (> 10hrs/week) If so, any creative tips that you can share on time mgmt or scheduling? I'd appreciate it, we are starting on a new endeavor w/ dd - Irish Step competitive dancing. The dance school is 1 hour away, and classes are twice a week. It's alot of time away from academics, and she Loves it. If she does well, the time committment will only go up ; and now we are starting to fall a bit behind on academics...... :confused: For example: Do you school in the summer? .... (and does it work ok?) Thanks Alot!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DragonFaerie Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 Does anyone have a dc that do(es) competitive sports or has a special interest that takes alot of time each week? (> 10hrs/week) If so, any creative tips that you can share on time mgmt or scheduling? I'd appreciate it, we are starting on a new endeavor w/ dd - Irish Step competitive dancing. The dance school is 1 hour away, and classes are twice a week. It's alot of time away from academics, and she Loves it. If she does well, the time committment will only go up ; and now we are starting to fall a bit behind on academics...... :confused: For example: Do you school in the summer? .... (and does it work ok?) Thanks Alot!!! My DD was in competitive gymnastics for years, always training at least 16 hours per week (often with a 45 minute car ride each way). The best way we handled it was to get up early and do some school before gym, and to do a lot of school in the car. Much of my of DD's work is independent so she could bring her books and workbooks and do things while I drove her to and from gym. I also scheduled more schoolwork (and the longer subjects) for non-practice days and left the quicker, easier stuff for gym days. As she was only in 1st-3rd grade at the time, we didn't have to extend school to weekends but it definitely took some serious scheduling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZooRho Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 It hasn't been easy. DS is a competative swimmer. Swims 3 mornings a week. He isn't getting home till like 7. He then leaves about 2:30 and gets home about 6:30. Actually this is sort of a new schedule and we are really still trying to get into the swing of the timing of it all. He may end up doing some things this summer Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MeganW Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 (edited) Not a sport, but my kids are in a lot of therapy - PT, OT, & vision therapy, so 4 days a week we have those appointments in the middle of our school day. I have a humungous Land's End bag that has school in it. Each kid has a backpack with their pencil box, glue sticks, scissors, small write-erase board, folder to carry completed work home, etc. We do school everywhere. The lobby if we have to, but the therapy offices know that we homeschool, and we are often able to use their conference rooms. I try to do skills that everyone is working on when we are all together, and focus on individual weaknesses when I have them one-on-one. It has taken some real practice to get the kids to understand that we have to X amount of work every day, and they can focus whereever we are, or they do it in the evening instead of doing something fun with Daddy. Think through which of your subjects are portable, and which aren't. RightStart math? NOT portable! Too many manipulatives. Reviewing memory work? Very portable! I do have to unpack everything, think through the next day's stuff, and repack almost every night. It shouldn't be as complicated as I make it, but it works. Edited December 13, 2011 by MeganW Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nelewaf Posted December 12, 2011 Author Share Posted December 12, 2011 Thank You All!!! This has helped.. (I love this Forum, Thank You SWB & Co. !) My take - aways: for non-travel dance days do longer, messier, non-workbook stuff. For dance days, more skill-based stuff : Latin, grammer, vocab, and reading/literature. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
acurtis75 Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 We travel a lot and are always running around town even when we're not traveling. For us, the iPad has been a huge help. I can load work on it for dd to do in the car. I also have brainpop for her to watch videos and a lot of books on there. This prevents me from having to bring SO MUCH STUFF everywhere we go! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TengoFive Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 I have 4 kids swimming right now, with the 5th in lessons. We drive 45 minutes each way and then swim from 2-3 hours in the evening in the winter. In the summer, we are at the pool for 4 hours. We do a lot of school on the way to and from swimming. I try to get as much on cd as I can, like Story of the World. We also work on memorization at that time. The kids all have a week's worth of school in their binders and work on it on the road and at the pool. I also have my binder with all of the teacher's manuals for the week. It works very well for us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NCMom Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 My middle dd is swimming 18+ hrs per week,; the pool is 1 hour away... Morning practice means we get up at 4am 3x a week. We really should be there 4-5 times in the AM, but the coach is cutting ME some slack this semester :D. High school is a little different but she does school EVERY Saturday and year round. She has to do work at odd times/places - in the car, in hotel rooms at meets, at dentist appointments. It's been too hot here in the late summer these last few years to do anything BUT school, so that helps. "School" cannot be an M-F, 8-3, sitting-at-the-dining-room-table thing here. hth, Georgia Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sebastian (a lady) Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 Does anyone have a dc that do(es) competitive sports or has a special interest that takes alot of time each week? (> 10hrs/week) If so, any creative tips that you can share on time mgmt or scheduling? I'd appreciate it, we are starting on a new endeavor w/ dd - Irish Step competitive dancing. The dance school is 1 hour away, and classes are twice a week. It's alot of time away from academics, and she Loves it. If she does well, the time committment will only go up ; and now we are starting to fall a bit behind on academics...... :confused: For example: Do you school in the summer? .... (and does it work ok?) Thanks Alot!!! I have a swimmer. Even though the practice is relatively close, it's still about a half hour each way in the car. I try to make sure that I have a history relevant audio book in the car for him to listen to. This helps to make up for the reduced time he has to delve into history the way his brother does. I also make sure that he has a school reading book in his back pack for when he ends up waiting for me to pick him up. Same with meets, which usually involve waiting for an hour to swim for a couple minutes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
plansrme Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 I have a gymnast (20 hours/week, half-hour each way) and swimmer (8 practices/week, 20 minutes each way). My kids spend a lot of time in the car, but we are all home from 8-2:30, M-F, and during those times, we do nothing other than school. In addition to the suggestions above, we pare down our school to what I consider the essentials. For instance, we do not follow rabbit trails or do a unit study for Christmas, which I am sure would be great fun; they just do not fit our lives right now. If something is not efficient, I jettison it. We have been on a similar schedule for years (in fact, in previous years it was worse, because both girls also danced), and we always finish our curriculum during the normal school year. Are there topics I would like to do more in-depth? Absolutely. Would I change anything? NO! Terri Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom22ns Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 My gymnast does 16 hrs/week and a 30 minute drive each way. Both kids also participate in a private school band that just 1 hours 2x/week but has a 45 min drive each way. Band and Gym don't start until 2:30 & 3:30 respectively. We start school at 6:00 (ds) and 7:30 (dd). They save reading and things that are easily done in the car for last and do them on the drives if needed. I think the most important thing for keeping things on track here is starting school early each day. My kids don't get the luxury of sleeping in. They don't stay up late. Gymnastics requires us to live on a more strict schedule than most homeschoolers, but no more so than a ps student and we still have plenty of time for everything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SkateLeft Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 Not only do I have kids with pretty intense athletic schedules, I have a special needs little guy with a variety of therapies and doctor appointments each week. My middle two kids are short track speedskaters, and one of them is also a figure skater. My 13 year old only just transitioned to speedskating this year, and I'm hoping she'll choose one or the other by next year. My oldest sails for a local varsity high school team. Fortunately, that's only during the spring, summer and fall. Depending on the time of year, we're at the ice center 5 or 6 days a week. It's our home away from home. Their team does short track practices, long track once a week, and inline once a week. Meets can take us all over the country. It would be very easy to get carried away. Some things that help us: 1. I have to set limits. Since my kids are short trackers, we passed on doing any long track this year. Yes, it's a great experience, but we don't need it. We mainly stick to short track practice, dryland workouts and individual ice time with our coaches. That means no long track meets either. 2. Those two kids do school four days a week. They're on the ice very early on Tuesdays, so they take off on that day. 3. I've perfected the drop off and pick up. I know that doesn't work if you've got little ones and the drive is long. 4. Do schoolwork at events. It's not unusual to find my oldest sitting at the ice center, usually during meets, working on her schoolwork and her netbook. Fortunately, most ice centers in the midwest have wifi. :) If not, we'll find a nearby coffee shop for her to do her work. 5. Use audiobooks for long drives. We almost always have something school related with us, especially when we travel for meets. We listen to a lot of audiobooks. There are some awesome resources out there. Audible and the Teaching Company have provided many hours of educational listening in the car. 6. I also establish specific goals for each kid. So when things get tight, I can keep in mind what each kid needs to focus on. It's a delicate balance, but it works for us! My oldest has her driver's permit, and I'm looking forward to when she gets her license and can start doing some driving to help out! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Georgiana Daniels Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 Our 7 year old dd is a competitive gymnast--4 times a week, about to go to 5 times a week (15 hours.) Six-year old is a soccer player, so she's off right now, but when she starts again that's once a week for practice plus 1 game (not much by comparison.) YES, we absolutely homeschool when others are off--we often work Saturdays, and summertime. When other kids are off for Christmas this year (2 weeks, approx) we will at least be doing math and reading. The schedule works well, and we will probably reevaluate in the fall to make sure enough time is focused on academics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sweetpeach Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 My boys are both busy paddlers -- we're up at 5 am, 4x a week and afternoon practices 4x a week, 4 - 6. We no longer follow a traditional school day because we're all too tired. Two mornings a week, we go back to bed for a "sleep in" and then do school in the afternoons and history/corrections after supper. I think the biggest hurdle in our home was helping the big boys understand that school had to get done during non-traditional hours. Weekend afternoons help us stay afloat with school, but that didn't come easy for the boys. They believed in the sacred, no-school weekend, so helping then understand that you can't have your cake (paddle and sleep) and eat it too (no weekend work) was a bit tricky. Warmly, T Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Donna Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 Does anyone have a dc that do(es) competitive sports or has a special interest that takes alot of time each week? (> 10hrs/week) If so, any creative tips that you can share on time mgmt or scheduling? I'd appreciate it, we are starting on a new endeavor w/ dd - Irish Step competitive dancing. The dance school is 1 hour away, and classes are twice a week. It's alot of time away from academics, and she Loves it. If she does well, the time committment will only go up ; and now we are starting to fall a bit behind on academics...... :confused: For example: Do you school in the summer? .... (and does it work ok?) Thanks Alot!!! My dd plays violin and it takes a lot of time during the week. Her practicing takes 3-4 hours every day. She has a 1.5 hr classical lesson on Fridays then orchestra for 2 hrs Friday nights...I drive 3 hours on Fridays. Twice a month we travel to NY for Irish fiddle lessons which is 3 hours each way and then there are performances anywhere from 1-4 times a month, various workshops and competitions throughout the year, and camp and travel overseas for fiddle competition in the summer. Dd is the only one I am homeschooling at the moment which has been easier because we can do things whenever we have the time. She fits in school between practice sessions throughout the day. There isn't always time each week to do the experiments and extras I'd like to do so I take a day here and there to do those...we call them "fun days." She gets her basics finished each week but we often does school in the car or in the evenings. We take along the laptop to do Rosetta Stone or for her to work on her current "novel." We definitely do not do a regular school day or week. I school her 4 days a week since Fridays are basically a bust with all the lessons and orchestra. We fit in errands and appointments on Friday mornings. She is learning a lot and loves to learn. Yes, we do some school in the summer...I try to fit in special subjects or something she is interested in through the summer rather than the "regular" schoolwork. We do regular school in late August after we get home from Ireland and go until the 2nd week of July when we head to fiddle camp. My dd would love to learn Irish Step Dancing, btw! If only there were more time in a day! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zaichiki Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 Does anyone have a dc that do(es) competitive sports or has a special interest that takes alot of time each week? (> 10hrs/week)My kids study instruments. They practice and perform for about 10-15 hours a week. We go to the music school 3 days a week which means a commute of an hour each way. If so, any creative tips that you can share on time mgmt or scheduling? We do some work "on the road" or between lessons/practice chunks. For example: Do you school in the summer? .... (and does it work ok?) Thanks Alot!!! We school year round with breaks scattered throughout. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haiku Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 My kids play hockey. They have two practices and two to four games each week, and they also have three hours of open ice time each week. We school year-round. That's the only way we could get it all done. We devote 8 months of the year to hockey. Tara Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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