Who does year around school?

[Mom2OandE]

Does anyone hs year around? How do you plan your schedule? Have you found it difficult to hs in the summer months when ps is out and more friends are around? Just something I'm considering. Thanks.

[Kim C]

Does anyone hs year around? How do you plan your schedule? Have you found it difficult to hs in the summer months when ps is out and more friends are around? Just something I'm considering. Thanks.

 

We hs year round. During the summer we do a lighter load and usually go 3 days a week. So, my ds 11 gets a break, but we still make progress. We are finishing math, grammar,and spelling this summer. We also started The Creative Writer, which my son enjoys and looks forward to.

 

Kim

[momaof3]

We only do math and reading in the summer so I can't really say we hs year round.

[Medieval Mom]

We school year 'round, beginning in July and ending in June.

 

I schedule 40 weeks of school, which allows us to take 1 week per month off.

 

Sometimes we take the whole week for vacation: Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's (back to back), when relative come to stay, etc.

 

Sometimes we have a "light" week instead of vacation. Light weeks may have a Robinson-type schedule (1 math lesson, 1 hour/lesson writing, 2 hours reading) plus something fun in the afternoons: botanical gardens, zoo, library, crafts, cooking, etc. Or, light weeks may be a chance to catch up on subject we just haven't gotten around to doing as frequently as we like--art, educational games, etc.

 

It works for us!

 

I'm not fanatic about it. If we're on a roll, we may keep going, knowing that we can take off an extra week later on if we're sick or know that company's coming for a while. (We have in-laws that come from Europe and stay for weeks at a time.)

 

In fact, this year was unusual in that I took off three weeks June/July to get our schedule in order. Ds couldn't WAIT to get back to school. He said, "I really don't think it's a good idea to take off more than a week again!" :lol:

Edited July 21, 2012 by Medieval Mom

[Mom2OandE]

We hs year round. During the summer we do a lighter load and usually go 3 days a week. So, my ds 11 gets a break, but we still make progress. We are finishing math, grammar,and spelling this summer. We also started The Creative Writer, which my son enjoys and looks forward to.

 

Kim

 

Do you go for a certain time and then take a break and then rinse/repeat?

[Laughing Hen]

We school year-round. Get in 36 weeks, so usually about 3 weeks per calendar month.

[KarenNC]

We have been schooling year round for the last couple of years. I actually get a lot more accomplished in terms of bookwork at home during the summer than we do many weeks during the typical school months (you can see what we are using this summer in my sig). During the summer, we don't have as many additional commitments (field trips, group classes, park days, etc), so we can get a fair jump on things. It gets so hot and humid that there's not a lot of incentive to do things outdoors and her neighborhood friend is usually with her mom during the summer (so not here). This is the first year we haven't taken time off for camps, as she's doing a weekly art class instead. Our homeschool group tries to do something once a week or so (go to the cheap summer movies, etc), since it's too hot to go to the park all afternoon as we do during most of the rest of the year. This keeps us in touch with homeschooling friends.

 

For planning, overall, I just break my materials down into individual "do the next thing" lists and each week move a week's worth of each subject from the master lists into my planner. This keeps me from forgetting things I had planned to include, but lets me be flexible enough to adapt to breaks at various times, unexpected appointments or opportunities, etc. We do take any days that my husband is off of work as days out of school, take a week in the fall to go to the beach with my in-laws, etc. Going year-round also lets me be open to more of those outside activities during the school year without feeling the crunch so badly.

[Mom2OandE]

We have been schooling year round for the last couple of years. I actually get a lot more accomplished in terms of bookwork at home during the summer than we do many weeks during the typical school months (you can see what we are using this summer in my sig). During the summer, we don't have as many additional commitments (field trips, group classes, park days, etc), so we can get a fair jump on things. It gets so hot and humid that there's not a lot of incentive to do things outdoors and her neighborhood friend is usually with her mom during the summer (so not here). This is the first year we haven't taken time off for camps, as she's doing a weekly art class instead. Our homeschool group tries to do something once a week or so (go to the cheap summer movies, etc), since it's too hot to go to the park all afternoon as we do during most of the rest of the year. This keeps us in touch with homeschooling friends.

 

For planning, overall, I just break my materials down into individual "do the next thing" lists and each week move a week's worth of each subject from the master lists into my planner. This keeps me from forgetting things I had planned to include, but lets me be flexible enough to adapt to breaks at various times, unexpected appointments or opportunities, etc. We do take any days that my husband is off of work as days out of school, take a week in the fall to go to the beach with my in-laws, etc. Going year-round also lets me be open to more of those outside activities during the school year without feeling the crunch so badly.

 

You know when I began thinking of this I was thinking more of 6 weeks on, 2off or something along those lines. I never thought of a monthly schedule of sorts. My dh is a pilot and is gone a lot - at least 20 days a month often more. This might be a great option for ensuring our family gets more time together. We could school when he is gone and have dedicated family time when is home for exploring, traveling, etc.

[Kim C]

Do you go for a certain time and then take a break and then rinse/repeat?

 

We usually take a break about every 10 to 12 weeks. We take 2 weeks at Christmas and a week in the spring. Over the summer we usually take 2 weeks off, one in July for vacation and one in August for a camp my son does every year. Going year round gives us more flexibility for when life throws us a curve ball and we need to take time off.

 

Kim

[NASDAQ]

We very rarely take time off. The only difficult part is fitting it around summer day camp.

[Angie in VA]

We do the next thing so planning is easy, and we take breaks when we need or want to. We kept working during the long hot days of all stars baseball practice, but took off the week of the tournament.

 

Dd is doing governmemt this summer so she will be able to be in FOUR ensembles (she plays violin) during the school year.

 

One year we took off 3-4 weeks at Christmas time and it was a disaster. My dc started the new year knowing nothing, lol. A few years ago we took off 3 weeks and we all came back refreshed and ready to work.

 

The summer is actually calmer for us b/c of no debate and no student orchestras.

Edited July 21, 2012 by Angie in VA

[edeemarie]

We do school year round and my kids don't really seemed to be bothered by it. With the weather being so hot lately they don't want to stay outside long anyway. I love the flexibility that year round schooling provides. If we need time off during the year we can take it off and not feel rushed to finish things. We usually take a few weeks off at Christmas, but other than that we just take a day off here or there as needed. My kids thrive on structure and a day without it turns into a crazy day at our house!

[GoVanGogh]

Does anyone hs year around? How do you plan your schedule? Have you found it difficult to hs in the summer months when ps is out and more friends are around?

Do you go for a certain time and then take a break and then rinse/repeat?

We have always schooled year-round, with this being our sixth year of homeschooling.

 

Our years run Jan-Dec.

We have six terms and I plan 26 days of school per term, which leaves us plenty of time for outside classes and lots of field trips. (We normally get in 185-190 days of school per year with outside classes and field trips.)

 

We school 3-5 days a week, depending on the season. Normally school 4-6 weeks, then take a week or so off. (Do take most of Dec off.) I don't plan our actual school days until last minute... We do a lot of outside classes and I like to wait until the beginning of the month before I pencil a date in our school planner.

I do plan our school lessons in advance, but leave the date generic -- Day 1, Day 2, etc., instead of Monday, July 23rd - if that makes sense.

 

(Most of our outside classes are stand-alone --- 1/2 day class at art gallery, 4 hr class at nature center, not a class that meets one set day a week for a semester or year.)

 

Every season/term is slightly different. Ex: Right now, DS has a sports class at dawn on Tuesdays, so we come home and crash. We are schooling M-W-Thur-and every other Fri this summer.

 

We actually school heavier in the summer. It is so stinking hot and we generally have less outside activities to pull us away from the home. Most of our friends are homeschooled and keep different schedules, so it hasn't been much of a problem. We are friends with one ps kid down the street but she is aware we school through the summer. She knows to call or text instead of showing up at our door. :D

 

I prefer to take the bulk of our time off in the spring and the fall, when our weather is more pleasant. Plus, I have a large garden and need to take quite a bit of time off to prune roses in spring, rake leaves in fall, etc.

[Moniksca]

We school year round. This year, we have a lighter schedule in the summer. We work on math, reading and writing 4 times a week. This year my son is working on a Canadian geograpy and desert lapbook. Because of the lighter schedule, the kids still have lots of time to play.

From September to June, we school 5x/wk and take a break when needed.

[Classically Minded]

We school year-round and take breaks whenever we feel like it throughout the year. I try and take a Christmas break and then some days off in the summer as well. This year will be different for us as I'm having a baby in early December, we plan on taking off 2-3 months, so we are schooling now and lessening the breaks until then.

[Shannanlee]

We only do Math and Reading during the Summer so not technically.

[boscopup]

We do. Normally, we start end of June and end end of May when schools get out. I take roughly 3-4 weeks off for a break and camp. I schedule around known holidays and vacations and usually have around 200 days scheduled, but we might take off some extra days in fall and spring when it's nice out. Summer is miserable, and my kids' friends live too far away to play.

 

I normally do 6 weeks on, 1 week off, plus extra during the holidays. This year, we're planning a big trip, so I planned around that and won't be doing 6 on 1 off. It's more like 10 on 3 off the way it works out this fall/winter.

 

This year, we did basics only during the first few weeks, and this week I started sonlight stuff, but since DS1 already did the first few weeks of his core at the end of last year, he'll start a bit later for history/reading (though he's reading a lot on his own anyway). My plan is to finish 36 sonlight weeks by end of May. We have a week or two extra built in, just in case we declare a play outside week. :D

[Elfknitter.#]

We do Jan to Nov, roughly til Thanksgiving. Then we're off for 6 weeks til just after New Year's. We take 2 weeks around April and August plus any sick days or time off for whatever unexpected events come. We don't have any designation of semesters, trimester, etc. we just work and work, promoted when the time comes, but mostly just keep chugging along.

[paceofnature]

We school July-June, roughly 3-4 wks on, 1 week off. I usually have my plans for the following year roughed out by February, make my purchases between Feb & April then plan the following year's schedule during our April break. At the "end" of the school year in June we take 2 wks off...and that is when I do the last bit of tweaking before we start up again in July. We typically do 6 subjects a day, but in July we do 4 and in August 5, starting up with 6 in September.

 

I was worried that my kids would be upset about doing school while their friends are out, but I find that in the summer we get most everything done by lunch. If I know the day will be longer, I will sometimes leave the "fun" stuff until last and the neighborhood kids can join in on science experiments or history crafts. Nothing like a yard full of kids playing with cornstarch & water or water balloon physics projects :D

[justLisa]

Both are studying Polish, DD is doing some art, and DS programming. I could not keep a full schedule though

[BugsMama]

We go year around- this year I had a rough month in may, so we ended up taking 6 weeks of at the end of may and june. We are back at it now though, I promote curriculum when we need it, and call them whatever grade they would be in public school. We break when we need it/want it, but I have a tentative 42 week schedule with every other friday off.

[Walking-Iris]

Sort of. Although this summer we stopped for break earlier. My year is usually divided into thirds. We start the "new" year about mid-August and break for about a week and in December for Xmas. Thanksgiving is usually just a long weekend break. Although I've been known to school the Friday after T-day. I try to plan on finishing certain books or unit studies in that first term. Then we start again from Jan to May, with a week break during Easter week. In June we do a lighter schedule and wrap up projects and basically do any finishing up. Summer break is the month of July and first week or two of August. I need that time to plan, buy, organize etc. Although we still do math and reading and a few projects even then at a much lighter schedule.

 

That sort of resembles a school yearly schedule, except we solidly school throughout May and most of June. I usually plan a 36-40 week school year.

[fourisenough]

But it just doesn't seem to fit our situation. My girls swim on a neighborhood summer swim team (which is tons of fun and a great way for them to make/connect with neighborhood friends). The season is brief, but intensely busy. It runs from mid-June through end of July with daily morning practices and twice weekly meets, plus other fun things (e.g. pancake breakfast, roller skating party, charity event, and marching with the team in 4th of July parade). After the swim season ends, they go to one week of summer camp and then we usually take a week or two of family vacation. By the time we're home and settled back into our routine, it is Labor Day!

 

Although with two in school this year (9th grade PS and Montessori half-day preschool), we're now bound to a traditional school year calendar anyway. So we'll just go with it!

 

I do have all the kids continue with math throughout the summer and I generally impose a 2-hour rest/nap time in the afternoon to encourage reading. My mantra is, "No feet on the floor between 2 & 4!"

[Ecclecticmum]

Well I was planning ala Sonlight Schedule style, but I figured the reason it doesn't work for me is everything is "too" planned. This, coming from a planning junkie, is hilarious to say the least.

 

We work year round, and when we weren't using our formal curriculum, we were doing natural learning. I've ended up decided to go the whole she-bang and do more of a relaxed style of homeschooling (it took a while for me to get my head around that, considering I was so against it, but it turns out i was doing it anyway :lol:

 

We take time off from school whenever I have burnout (have CFS), or when the kids are sick (T1 Diabetes sick day or when all 3 kids are sick), or when DH is off work. Elsewise, we school. The main thing is we work around DH's work schedule (DH is a lovely man, but very much an interrupt-er ;) ) which makes it difficult to get any explaining done when he constantly interrupts with random comments, lucky I'm not homeschooling him, or I'd go mad :tongue_smilie:

 

We're very rural, so we don't notice the school holidays except for the fact it slows down the internet :001_huh: (it was slow the other day, and DH said it was 'cause it was school hols' I didn't even know ) my kids are still very young though and making friends in a rural farm setting is slow going (they do make friends with lots of children wherever we go though, they are very social when out and about, we constantly have to end up hanging round half an hour longer if near a place with kids :001_smile: ) when they are home, they are each others friends, they pretend play, do teamwork (especially good on the spy front, they used teamwork to get into my teachers closet the other day, the youngest on "Stand out" watching for me, and one child lifting the other to open the lock :glare: )

 

So with planning now, we're grabbing a "spine" (Hideaways in History - Winterpromise) and will use the schedule as what has to be complete "roughly" that week (so won't use the daily schedule), and just have a tick off overview form for all the other stuff. I'll be using more of a Natural Learning/Unschooly type record keeper, so just writing down stuff after we do it, we'll see how that goes, but so far, for me, its been a big load of my shoulders that I wasn't even aware was there :001_huh: Over the past 3 days, we have completed much more than we normally would.

 

:grouphug:

[Dolphin]

We are pretty relaxed, so I find year round works best. We take a couple weeks here and there where we do nothing, other than that Math and Language flashcards are done 5 days a week. We don't count reading as school as my son is a bookworm and we have more trouble getting his nose out of a book.:D

 

This way, we have more time, I don't have to take time reviewing, we are just slowly and steadily moving forward. A lot of days we only do an hour or two, but mix that with no 3 month summer break and we seem to be where we need to be.

[Closeacademy]

Our year round looks like this:

 

Summer School--June & July 4th of July week and the last week of July/first week of August

 

Fall--we school August to November with weeks off for Labor Day and Thanksgiving

 

December--we do 2-3 weeks

 

Spring--January to April with one week off for "spring break" or just because we are sick

 

May--vacation/planning/buying month

 

We do 4-day weeks with playgroup on Friday afternoon. We do some schoolwork on Friday mornings--mainly math and reading. This year we will have a co-op on Tuesday that covers core subjects.

 

We don't worry about summers off because there are no children in our neighborhood and so all of our friends are homeschool friends. That's why we have "playgroup" which should be turned into "social time." It is an important part of our school plan.

 

We've done it this way since the beginning and it has always worked for us.:001_smile:

[Farrar]

We have done it both ways. For us, there are fewer friends around in the summer, actually. During the school year, we see lots of friends, but in the summer, friends have camp and take family trips and it's harder to get together. Sometimes its still a challenge - things are definitely all disrupted in the summer. But this year we've just plowed forward the best we can. We're going to break for much of September though and start again in October.

[Brooketopia]

I'm still tweaking our schedule to figure out what works for us; but, yes, we school year-round.

 

What's working well for us is ending our school year at the same time as our school district (Friday before Memorial Day) and then starting up again the first Monday after the Fourth of July. This way we can do all the fun "School's Out!" activities that are planned throughout June, and attend our city's Youth Arts Festival which runs for two weeks. Come July, no one's really doing anything anymore and we are bored, so it's fun to start school up again.

 

I'm planning on taking the entire month of December off this year, just to see if that works for us. We'll also take a week off at Thanksgiving, the week of Labor Day, and one week in August when the kids' swim lessons are just so chaotic that I know it's pointless to try to fit anything else in with those going on.

 

My big trouble area is the fourth week of January through the end of March. I struggle so hard to get anything done during that time, it's rather pathetic. I tried sprinkling breaks throughout it this last year, but once I simmered down it was near impossible to get going again. I'm going to experiment with staying busy this year, and just going all-out the entire time. Can't possibly be worse than struggling to get anything done at all.

[PeacefulChaos]

We do modified year round.

School starts mid July and ends the beginning of June. 6 weeks off for summer, and up to 9 weeks off during the school year.

[Tarreymere]

We go all year. It is just our normal daily routine to wake up, have breakfast, and start school. Any ps kids in our neighborhood wanting to play generally don't get up that early, they tend to show up around the time we are wrapping things up anyway. Depending on the kid and what is being learned I might invite them in......

 

We plan to do school every morning for two or three hours. We always do at least that much. Sometimes we end up doing school all day long because we get into what we are learning or reading or whatever, but that isn't planned that way.

[lea1]

Last year was our first year. We took about 6 weeks off from end of May to beginning of July and we are back at it now. In retrospect, I think 6 weeks was too long for us to take off. The boys forgot some things and they had somewhat of a hard time getting back into a routine. I think they do better with some structure in their days so i will have to take that into consideration next time.

[momto2Cs]

I've always said, no, we don't school year round.

 

But...

 

looking at what we do, I have to say we actually do school year round. It just fluctuates.

 

Summer - we read a lot, do fun science projects that we otherwise don't get to, play math [and other] games, and continue to work on dd's reading. We also take a lot of days/time for fun, summer activities, like swimming, hiking, play dates at the park (actually year round for us), and so forth.

 

Winter and other "breaks" - we learn about the holidays we are celebrating, or follow whatever focus the kids are really excited about. For example, last winter break it was all about Dickens and Victorian England after we went to a Dickens Faire. Again, we read a lot, and play [semi-]educational games, make crafts, etc.

 

The rest of the time, we are more focused, with actual math lessons, history, science, etc. We're still fairly relaxed overall, but we do "school" more during the non-holiday seasons. We'll be more focused like this for usually about 6-7 weeks, then need a little break, when we swing back to more-relaxed mode. Kind of Tidal Homeschooling, I guess!

[duckens]

Oooo! I like your metaphor and description of tidal homeschooling, Momto2Cs!!! You are brilliant!

[...................]

Yes. We do year-round, four days per week with Fridays being fun day.

 

We don't really have kids in our neighborhood, so having "kids around" doesn't affect us.

 

But, if we hear of something great (picnic, trip with friends, birthday party) we just take off and enjoy it. I would Not make my kids feel left out over one day of school. However, that doesn't happen often since both their best friends homeschool year round, and the kids we know around town are all in summer camp, and the kids at church are all much younger.

 

If we had a neighborhood brimming with happy children riding bikes and swimming and visiting each others' houses, that we could see and hear, (like when i was growing up!) I don't know if I could get my kids through their schoolwork!

[Priscila]

I plan to school year round. We just started our first school year. In fact, we haven't so much as taken a weekend off. We've done school for 12 days straight. Consider, though, that my daughter is 3, I'm a stay-at-home parent, and she and I (and her sister) are home alone almost every day for at least 10 hours while their daddy is at work. During those ten hours it is very easy for me to find 30-45+ minutes to do a lesson out of The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading, look at a few anatomical charts, write and draw, and read her tons of books. We have done all of those things for as long as I can remember, anyway (sans the OPG reading lessons and anatomical chats). It helps a lot that OJ loves to do all these things. ;) Even on days that we've gone to the zoo, aviary, movies, to visit friends/family (in the last 12 days) we've had plenty of time to do school.

 

I write my lesson plans 7 days in advance, and I know what's coming even after that. I don't plan to take a day off anytime soon. It's too easy so far.

 

The only time off from school that we'll take will probably be mental health days (for me) and up to 6 weeks of vacations from my hubby's work IF we're traveling. And even then, I'm sure I'll be quizzing, or singing about, or otherwise referencing school. Eventually, we might pick up weekends from school. Probably not very soon, though. I'm too excited! :D

[Woodland Mist Academy]

We do. When dd was younger we had a yearly plan with a week break scheduled most months and 3 weeks off in December and June.

 

Now that she is older and our life is different, we no longer have regularly planned breaks. We take breaks for illness, traveling, extracurricular activities, etc. If we did that and took monthly breaks, we would not be able to accomplish what we're trying to. Also, the planned weeks off felt unnecessary at some point because we were taking so much other time off.

 

We are now doing lessons 7 days a week if nothing else is happening. We may only do a couple core subjects, or we may do 6 or 7 hours of core subjects and "extras." This allows us so much more flexibility.