When do you start a new school year?

[manyblessings]

Question is in the title :001_smile:

 

If you start a new year in January, or an atypical point in the year and are required to report how do you handle the reporting (and assessments/narratives/testing)?

[boscopup]

We start at the end of June, after a 3 week break between that year and the previous year. I have to report to my cover school in January and June, and I just report what we've done when. If I had to standardized test, I'd be ok because our school year ends at the same time as everyone else's around here (end of May).

 

I chose this route because when we get to high school, I wanted them to be done in May like everyone else, so college applications and such wouldn't be hairy. Of course, we have several years before that matters at all, so I don't worry about it now. I just like my son being able to say he's in the next grade at the same time everyone else does. Less confusing that way.

 

We start new levels of each subject when we hit the end of a new one, so our school year change over is a bit of a blur anyway. We started homeschooling in January of last year, which meant several subjects went through the summer before being completed, and then DS accelerates in some subjects - not doing just one level in one 36 week timeframe, so he's just all over the map anyway.

 

Note that we do have extra weeks built into our schedule, but that's been very handy. Just a couple months ago, I had to take a week off for my sanity (not school related), then we ended up taking an extra 2 weeks off in December due to out-of-town family visiting, and then this week we have a stomach bug, so I'm just taking the week off (yes, it's only Tuesday, but DS1 is still a bit dehydrated and will probably take a couple more days to be back to normal). So originally I had 215 school days scheduled, and now we have 195. We still have 3 weeks we could blow off and still be "normal". :lol: (though my cover school only requires 140 days)

 

Also, since we schooled through the summer, we were able to relax during the fall and not feel like we were getting behind. The weather was soooooo nice this fall. I'd chuck the boys outside to play, and we'd just do a tiny bit of school.

[Ellie]

January 1. :)

[Mommee & Baba]

Our new year usually falls at the end of July, after a 3-4 week break. However this year we're starting our new year the first week in August, this will give us 4-6 weeks of a break...allowing me to properly plan and prepare everyone's lessons in my planner and get my preschoolers crafts all pre-cut and prepared for the entire school year.

[GoVanGogh]

January 1.

We live in a non-reporting state.

[kristinannie]

We started June 1 last year and I was planning on doing that again. However, we have basically moved into first grade and started a lot of new curricula since I wasn't completely happy with everything. I am undecided as to whether we should start "first grade" in June as planned or just have the year start Jan 1. Or just have the year start whenever it feels right... :lol:

 

Of course, as far as the state is concerned, our school year will start June 1. I don't think they really care when we really start. I will just send it whatever plan we are using at that point in time and call it whatever grade my kids would be in if they were in PS.

[sewingmama]

Jan 30. But that's the start of the public school year here anyway. I have to report mid-year when my DD turns 6 so I will just show the first 6 months of work and pre-prepared lesson plans to the end of the year.

[justamouse]

When the old one ends. Whenever it ends. :001_smile:

[NotAVampireLvr]

We are starting this year in July. (DS1 in school until the end of June) We plan to school year round, but take advantage of gorgeous spring/fall weather. Our breaks will probably two weeks off at Christmas, our normal week in in the summer up in Maine and then in the spring/fall shorter days to allow for more outdoor play and learning.

[PentecostalMom]

We "officially" promote and start whatever the first Monday is after July 4th. We usually end around the first week or two in June and take 2-3 weeks off.

[twoxcell]

We start in July, but have no reporting requirements.;)

[Aurelia]

I try to start in September, but it never works out that way. Either I have things to buy, or we're finishing up previous curricula. Ariel has always had a mental leap in late December-early January, and usually I end up having to start a bunch of new, more challenging stuff then, so we just start our new school year January 1, though I'll let her call herself the next grade starting in August/September to prevent confusion with family and friends who follow the PS schedule. We don't live in a state that requires reporting. If we did, I'd use the previous grade for reporting purposes and just use materials appropriate to her ability.

[SweetMissMagnolia]

been saying I'm going to go year round LOL but so far we've stayed with the ps schedule (august or sept-may or june).....maybe this will be the year I go year round.....

[NittanyJen]

We school year 'round, and just kind of start the next thing as we finish the last, so we have no beginning and end of any school year (I list the kids as 'ungraded' with the district). Last year much of our first round of stuff happened to wrap up around mid-May, so we took a week off to celebrate "summer vacation" for a week :).

 

However, the school district considers home schoolers to run a year from Aug 1--July 31 every year. They don't really care about our academic calendar; that's just for attendance purposes, and we have to report at least 180 attendance days in the year.

 

In our family, we "school" well in excess of 200 days in a calendar year.

 

I used to wonder about the philosophy of whether I should report days from the school district's Aug/July reporting year or our "school year" whatever that might be, or what to do . . . then I decided we are so far above and beyond the district requirements that I really don't care. I do track attendance just in case anything should happen to me and the kids should happen to have to re-enter public school (I keep records/portfolios for the same reason, even though we do not have to do so legally; I will not share this info with the state, generally speaking, but again, if the kids should have to re-enter the school abruptly due to unforseen circumstances, I'd rather be prepared to demonstrate their academic standing).

 

But back to the topic . . . I have a program that lets me track attendance with a mouse click. I figure I'll humor the state and track attendance based the academic calendar year that they requested; it's easiest to do it that way (and I really don't care about number of days in some year of my own design, do I? Why create two systems?).

 

So . . . I do my own thing regarding my actual academic year; I report to the state what they want to hear. I keep the record-keeping simple. Tick-marks on a calendar would work.

[manyblessings]

Thanks so much for the replies. We made the switch to year round schooling last year, and so that's why I asked. :001_smile: I was unsure of what to do since the girls are almost done with many of their subjects. I figured we could either start new materials for the subjects that are almost finished, or I was considering working faster on the remaining subjects and then starting a new year. I'm truly leaning towards working continuously and starting new material as the previous is finished.

 

Of course though it boggled my mind when I tried to think of how to handle the narrative assesments with either choice, whether we continue with new material or start a new year at an unusal point.

 

An added question for those of you that school continuously- what do you do when highschool comes and they're all over the place with what they've finished and accompished?

[jayb842]

We finish in May. Then we'll start again in July. Lord willing we will finish 4th grade in March of 2013. That also depends to how much ds masters quickly.

[go_go_gadget]

We school year-round, with no official breaks but with plenty of ad-hoc ones. I don't actually count, but we school at least 225 days/year. Our charter school runs from mid-August to mid-May, but since the kids are working well beyond their official grade levels I don't need to do anything special about reporting our progress. Next spring we'll have to do STAR testing for the first time, but I'm not at all concerned about that for the same reason. It does usually work out that we finish a grade level across the curriculum in about the same 2-3 month period, and it looks like that will be March-June this year, but that has no effect on our reporting.

 

Mostly I only notice that school is "officially" out of session because I have to start paying for all of our activities out of pocket again. :blink:;)

[mommy5]

At the end of May we start the new school year ... usually after about a 3 week break. We like year round schooling. We build in a break around Christmas ... and sometimes do short weeks (4 day weeks) and extra time for whenever we need it.

[melissamomof5]

We live in a non-reporting state also.

 

I usually start after Labor Day. We have short summers here, so we try to have official school off and enjoy the outdoors. :D

[Lisa in the UP of MI]

We officially start (and move up a grade) in late August, but school lightly over the summer. We start new curricula whenever we are ready.

[Dustybug]

When the old one ends. Whenever it ends. :001_smile:

 

 

Same here.

[Hadassah]

Whenever the old one ends. We school year-round/continuously. Usually we do a six weeks on, one week off schedule, with longer breaks thrown in sporadically. Our kids simply finish one program and begin the next, without grade distinctions.

We live in a non-reporting state, thankfully.

[Socalimom]

We school year round. However, our start month is June or whenever we finish.

[MeganW]

Since grades are really just for reporting, and for placement in extracurriculars, and talking to friends, we change over on June 30/July 1 to keep them on schedule with the public school kids.

 

Grade level has nothing to do with materials we are using - we are currently using some preschool, some kindergarten, and some 1st grade stuff going at the moment! We use the material that is challenging but doable regardless of reported grade level. That may be higher or lower than the level on the material's label. :)

[Amanda_Jo]

We start a new year in late July (for reporting purposes) after we take an 8 week break from May to July, however most of the children change "grade level" near their birthday. So, dd 8 moved from 2nd to 3rd grade workbooks in the fall, 5 year old started real Kindergarten books in the winter and 6 year old will turn 7 and move up to 2nd grade in the spring.

I move my kids up as they finish/master their curriculum no matter what time of the year it is, so we are getting new stuff in and replacing finished workbooks monthly, it seems, around here.

[anmom]

:iagree:

When the old one ends. Whenever it ends. :001_smile:

 

:iagree:

[gramlingk]

We have started in August and sometimes in September. This is pretty typically alligned with the public school calendar. However, in Georgia we have a full year to complete our 180 days so it wouldn't matter if we reported attendance from January to December as long as that is what we stated we were going to do from the beginning. I know other states have much more stringent rules, though.

[TheApprentice]

We start the second week of July, after a three week break.

[lakshmi]

We start new levels in our curricula when we finish the old ones. So it could be at anytime throughout the year.

 

We promote by grade on June 21 to the next grade based on age, but we school year round. We use grades for the children to communicate with adults, basically. Other than that they're at many different grades in content.

[ErinE]

We start the first Monday in August. We live in a reporting state, but we school year round. Testing is in the late spring and we usually take July off to visit family. New curriculum is added whenever we've completed a level, but I usually give the kids a week off before starting up something new.

[MarthaAl]

We start in early August when schools around here go back. All the kids from church and neighborhood are heading back then.

For a winter start we begin right after the New Year.

[mommy5]

We've been starting in May ... around Memorial Day and looks like we will try to do that again this year. I really like year round schooling. This year we will take a rather long break in April, though (probably 8 weeks) post-partum. Then we'll start back up (usually we don't take longer than 3-4 weeks off at the end of the year. We don't take "regularly" scheduled breaks through the year except for major holidays and whenever we need one/family days/vacation days or sick days. These are typically scheduled as needed... This year we are planning 4 quarters/9 weeks each ... with 20 flex days for each quarter. That way each quarter/semester has a start and end date and if we finish up early at the end of the school year we'll have a longer break then, too.

[kalanamak]

1 August, but we year-round.

[frugalmama]

technically we started July 29th I think - but then we stopped in early August due to family issues {death in the family} and we are just now restarting with a new and improved selection of materials. We did unschool with software in the break, so I'm counting it as school :D

 

That being said - our normal school year runs september - may, this year we are starting in a week.

[Tidbits of Learning]

We are doing January to December with month long term breaks in end of June to end of July and mid-December to end of January. We have to send in a letter of intent every year and I send that in in May or June b/c I originally sent it in at that time.

This is our first year changing grade levels in January so we will see how it goes.

[rocketgirl]

I don't have to report although I keep specific records. So I decided that when ps ends, we call that our end too, which is May. The kids complete the Library Reading program in the summer & do other things that I count towards the next school year altho I don't tell them in June that they are in the next grade. We still have a formal beginning in late Aug or Sept.

[kolamum]

Well, we usually start officially in January or February, but then again that's the same way most schools start here. ;) Having said that we still tend to do a different schedule and I just state that in my intent/layout paper/form. I state that we'll follow a x week on x week off schedule. :)

[desertmum]

Officially we started back in October but due to health problems in the family and some curriculum choices that did not work I decided to start again in January 9. I'm overseas so I don't have to report to anyone.

[MissKNG]

We follow the ps schedule (sort of). We run from the end of August/beginning of September (whenever the closest Monday to Sept 1st falls) through May 31st.

[happypamama]

We school year round and take breaks as necessary, but we usually have a fairly light June, due to other things (like ballet recital week) going on. We officially promote everyone and have the "first day" excitement in early July, as our school district lets us start counting our days as of July 1. If I changed grades over at some other time during the year, I'd just tell the district the child was in whatever grade he/she was in at the time of reporting. (When my evaluator does our evaluation in the spring, she writes whatever grade I tell her, and based on that, she notes whether I need to include testing results or not.)

[trlt]

We start after Memorial Day in May. We school year around and live in a non-reporting state. It works best for us because we can take time off as needed and I don't feel like I am getting behind.

[Tigger]

In Missouri we don't report, but do keep records. So for record keeping purposes (1000 hours) we start our school year July 1 (and go through June 30). We do school through the summer, but it's a very light schedule and helps get in some of the hours required throughout the year so we don't need to do 5.5-hour days in a typical, 180 day, school year calendar.