Daily workload

[Roadrunner]

I know this is so very individual and that’s why I am asking. How many hours of academic work does your high schooler do daily? (Not counting extracurriculars). 

I am especially curious if your child has a time intensive extracurricular. We have about 15 hour commitment outside of academics. And that’s after quitting some things.

Edited July 22, 2019 by Roadrunner

[teachermom2834]

It's hard to say exactly because my dc have always preferred to work in spurts and to work some on the weekends rather than just get it all done during school hours. I would guess that my 10th grader last year worked about 40 hours per week. His main ec is 4-H which keeps him busy throughout the year but it isn't a regular daily or weekly commitment. So he might have three or four hours of meetings per month but then he is gone entire weekends 1-2/mo throughout the year. It is nothing like what my boys who played sports put in time wise and leaves this kid more time for academics. 

Last year that 40 hours per week was for seven online classes, two pretty easy co-op classes, and one light homegrown class. He absolutely could have done less and still done "enough" and we would have dropped some things if he had a quality ec that was more worthwhile. This dc is moving to de this year and I actually think he will spend less time than that. We'll see how that goes- too much free time isn't good around here.

It obviously is going to vary for everyone. Just our situation. I don't think working 40 hours is necessary but I don't think it is outrageous either. Our state mandates 4 hours per day and many homeschoolers I know stick pretty close to that guideline.

 

[BakersDozen]

I would say my high school students take 7-8 hours/day for 6 classes. That does not include the time they spend watching movies I assign (and I assign a lot - 27 last school year for Psychology alone) or prepping for exams. Most home schoolers in my area seem to be able to pull of a high school load in 4 hours/day but they do the bare minimum and their kids take very "light" classes.

[BakersDozen]

Quote

I am especially curious if your child has a time intensive extracurricular.

My kids participate in Bible Quiz. They put in 2 hours/day of studying until Finals/Regionals at which point they study for 3 hours/day. National competition may mean 4+ hours/day (but by then it's summer so we're on review/finishing-up work load status.

[Roadrunner]

If you are doing 7-8 hours a day, how are you breaking it apart?

i am asking all these because we are going to substantially revamp our schedules. 

 

[regentrude]

In high school,. we aimed for 6 hours per day. That translates into 6 credits, which is entirely sufficient. (And then there is summer, and DE etc, and you can easily do more, but 6 credits per year is perfectly respectable.

Edited July 22, 2019 by regentrude

[Roadrunner]

17 minutes ago, regentrude said:

In high school,. we aimed for 6 hours per day. That translates into 6 credits, which is entirely sufficient. (And then there is summer, and DE etc, and you can easily do more, but 6 credits per year is perfectly respectable.

 

Are you including all the DE class time into this for your DD? Seems so little to me. 

[Miss Tick]

Dd does ballet 20+ hours a week. I just wrote up her schedule for freshman year. I schedule 6 hours per week for the 5 core classes, and 4 hours for her elective, so 34 hours scheduled. We also do a little side-study of German, but I'm thinking of that as an extracurricular. 

Only 4 for the elective because I'm having her spend some time this summer getting it started, although it will be a light credit (~150 hrs). The core classes will be regular classes (~180 + some homework or reading). I scheduled 6 hours per week, because she has a tendency to put off necessities, and if there is space in the schedule it is more likely to get filled with relevant work. None of my dc are enthusiastic self-starters in the education arena, but all are sweet, compliant, rule-follower types who will generally follow the schedule, so this has worked for us.

[Roadrunner]

I have been looking at reviews for some of the AP courses at PAH and most report about 2 hours a day of work. So I am thinking for any AP course one credit doesn’t equal one hour. I know for math for us it also doesn’t equal that. 

I guess I need to figure out how to balance harder courses with lighter ones.

[regentrude]

19 minutes ago, Roadrunner said:

Are you including all the DE class time into this for your DD? Seems so little to me. 

We tell our college students to plan 2 hours outside of class per hour in class. That would mean that a student working for 30 hours per week ( 6 hours/day for 5 days) can complete 10 college credit hours in a semester, which I consider a respectable load for a highschool student.

 

by the time my DD was taking mostly DE, I didn't have her log her time in detail anymore. However, I would not expect highschoolers to do more than six hours of concentrated work. (Heck, many adults don't do more than 6 hours of concentrated work during a work day.) We did no busy work and made every minute count. For work done at home, we schooled 8 to 12 and 1 to 3. 

[BakersDozen]

Quote

I have been looking at reviews for some of the AP courses at PAH and most report about 2 hours a day of work. So I am thinking for any AP course one credit doesn’t equal one hour. I know for math for us it also doesn’t equal that. 

I guess I need to figure out how to balance harder courses with lighter ones.

My kids (and students) know that if they choose the Honors/AP track that they can expect 1.5-2 hours of work per day. I do balance out classes so that my high schoolers have 2-3 "heavy" classes, 1 mid-heavy and the rest lighter electives. So for example, this fall my 16yo will have AP Language, AP Psychology and AP Human Geography which will definitely demand more of her time than math and science (mid-heavy classes) or Art Appreciation. My older kids normally school 9-12 and 1-4. They have to put stuff away at 4 and take a break (my rule) but usually do more work in late evening which is when the house is quiet and they actually do some of their best/most focused work.

Not sure if any of this is helping...

[MamaSprout]

We are doing a bit of overhauling ourselves. When I mapped out my original 8 credit plan onto a blank weekly calendar, I quickly realized it was not going to work. I've really wrestled with this.

Right away we took care of some stuff over the summer. Dd had some things she wanted to self study AND wanted some outside classes, so I was able to combine the two into one DC and found another DC elective class that is also a way to continue one of her extracurriculars. I dropped AP Bio in favor of a spring DC class (holding my breath that this works out and isn't smack in the middle of the morning next semester). I couldn't see a good reason to do AP Bio in her case.

Right now she'll have 6 hours/ day + music practice. Nine am-noon at home with no interruptions. All of her outside classes and lessons are afternoon/ evening (when I'm working). Music practice is 7:30ish -9 am. I've already moved doctor and dentist appointments so they don't conflict with anything. We will need PE, and that might be a very early morning class 2x a week through the school year + what we've done this summer. We'll see.

She'll have busy days, but everything fits without crazy contortions. I try to keep her work off of weekends because we travel and she likes to do backstage stuff for the community theater.

[Lori D.]

We could manage about 5.5 to 6 hours of focused work each day. Neither DS was an early riser, esp. after hitting puberty. We worked from about 9am until 3-4pm, with a 45-60 minute lunch break. On the weeks we had activities with the homeschool support group we would only put in 1-2 hours on that Friday. (In 9th/10th grade we did more with the group, so about 3 out of every 4 Fridays; in 11/12th grade, we did less with the group, so about 1, sometimes 2 Fridays out of every 4.) So on average, we were putting in about 24-25 hours of academic work per week.

That was all we could manage. Both DSs needed a lot of "down time" and time to just explore interests or hang out with friends in order to put in that focused school time each day. (Also, I personally think it is VERY important to teach teens BALANCE of lifestyle, and that life is not JUST about academics and "getting into college". Also, I have very average/ordinary students -- no one had the self-drive or the goal of wanting AP or Honors classes, and no one wanted to go to a top tier / selective / competitive school, so thankfully we had no need push right up to burn-out stage to get perfect ACT/SAT scores or top 5% stats.)

We did no homework and only a very little reading in the evenings or on weekends. We did no outside classes, and each DS only did 2 classes each of DE when in 12th grade. There were several summers where we did have to continue into the summer with just the Math to finish, but that was due to having one student who struggled with Math, and one summer it was to make up for having taken 3 weeks off during the semester for an extended special family trip.

In addition to the activities with the homeschool group, DSs were involved in several extracurriculars, including varsity tennis team with the local high school, YMCA Youth & Government, weekly church youth group, and a few other short-term things in different years of high school.

DSs averaged about 6 credits per school year. 1-2 credits were accumulated over the summer. Both had 24-25 credits total on their final transcript, and had all the required credits in the specific subject areas to be eligible to apply to and be admitted to college.

ETA -- PS
I forgot -- when tennis season was going, we could only get about 4 hours/day of academic work at home, due to afternoon practices and travel for matches, so we did shift a bit of our schedule and did some of our reading/lit discussion to the evenings or on weekends for the 12 weeks of tennis season.

Edited July 22, 2019 by Lori D.

[Lori D.]

3 hours ago, SusanC said:

... Only 4 for the elective because I'm having her spend some time this summer getting it started, although it will be a light credit (~150 hrs). The core classes will be regular classes (~180 + some homework or reading)...

150 hours is average, not light 😉 -- it probably just *feels* light to you guys after your 180+ hour classes 😂

[Miss Tick]

1 hour ago, Lori D. said:

150 hours is average, not light

I have been wondering why in the world I wrote down 120 as the bottom of the range (long ago). That is good to know. Me having to "push" electives is an uncomfortable idea.

[Garga]

Math and science took 1-5 - 2 hours a day.  So on some days, 4 hours of schoolwork was on math and science alone.

English, history, language: 1 hour / day each.  Some days were were lucky and the language lesson was short—only about 40 minutes.  Loved those days!

Elective:  1 hour/ day but only 4 days a week.  

From Sept to April in junior year: 45 minutes each day of SAT prep.

Each “hour” of work is actually only 50 minutes with a 10 minute break between hours of work.  

We took a half hour lunch break everyday.  

My son has slow processing speed, so some days were very, very hard to balance.  Oh, and he has adhd and the meds wear off after 8 hours from the time he takes the pill.  Working past 4:30/5:30ish was a complete waste of time because he couldn’t focus.

We had a strict start time: 8:10 and would work until 4:30-5:30 every day with the above 10 minute breaks and lunch break.  I saved the easiest stuff for the last hour of the day when the meds were mostly worn off. 

He started his junior year taking hapkido lessons 2 evenings a week and working for about 3 hours at a time on random evenings/weekends.  But it quickly became apparent that living a life on the go isn’t the life for him.  His boss was willing to let him work only one Sunday afternoon a week.  And finally in the spring, he dropped hapkido.  My son just isn’t cut out to doing extra curricular activities.

I think that without adhd and a slow processing speed, and if he was a high energy person, everything would be different.  You really have to know the person you’re teaching.  

Edited July 22, 2019 by Garga

[alewife]

6 hours ago, Roadrunner said:

I know this is so very individual and that’s why I am asking. How many hours of academic work does your high schooler do daily? (Not counting extracurriculars). 

I am especially curious if your child has a time intensive extracurricular. We have about 15 hour commitment outside of academics. And that’s after quitting some things.

My kids did school from 8 am to 2:30 pm, with a break for lunch, Monday through Friday.  (My oldest conducted research every Wednesday from 8 am - 5:00 pm during the school year when he was in high school, so his Wednesday was longer.) In addition to that time, they usually met for an AoPS class  in the evening once a week, conducted their lab experiments on the weekends, and continued with math and reading literature throughout their summers.

In my experience, I dropped quite a few online AP classes because I felt they were an unnecessary time suck.  I found it more time-efficient and just as educational to create my own AP class that fit better within our time constraints.

Good luck finding a schedule that works for your kids!

[fourisenough]

This is a very *timely* 🤣 topic at my house, as I re-engineering DD’s academic schedule to fit her new ballet schedule! 

She will be taking 3 regular classes: Algebra 2, Chemistry, and Latin 2, plus 3 APs: English Language, Government, and Art History. 3 will be live online and 2 are asynchronous online, plus one self-paced. I have her scheduled to work 32 hours per week, and expect that she will need to do another 4 hours on the weekend on heavy weeks. 

She dances 32 hours per week. Luckily her commute will be eliminated by living at the school. 

Her daily schedule will look like this:

7-8 Wake, dress, breakfast

8-12:30 Schoolwork

12:30-1 Lunch

1-3 Schoolwork

3-3:30 Snack

4-9 Dance 

9:30-10:30 Dinner, shower

11-7 Sleep 

Saturdays are a full day of dance and, ideally, Sundays are free of any commitments. She sometimes prefers to complete science labs and other big project-type work on the weekends to free up time during the week, so some time may be spent on Sundays working. She will grocery shop, meal prep and do her laundry on Sundays, too. Oy vey this kid is going to have an intense year.

Since AP Government is Thinkwell, she can definitely push it off to next summer if she finds that she can’t get it all done (and not take the AP test, obviously). I won’t tell her that from the start, though! She’s a fast worker and very efficient with her time, so I suspect she’ll be able to rise to the challenge. 

Edited July 23, 2019 by fourisenough

[Roadrunner]

I just tallied our hourly commitments with music (we are dropping sports and it is breaking everybody’s heart here) and it’s 63 hours a week  including class time. It’s not workable. 

[alewife]

6 minutes ago, Roadrunner said:

I just tallied our hourly commitments with music (we are dropping sports and it is breaking everybody’s heart here) and it’s 63 hours a week  including class time. It’s not workable. 

Can you move some of your classes to the summer to free up some more time during the regular school year?

[alewife]

9 minutes ago, Roadrunner said:

I just tallied our hourly commitments with music (we are dropping sports and it is breaking everybody’s heart here) and it’s 63 hours a week  including class time. It’s not workable. 

How many online classes are on your schedule?  If you have some of those in the line-up, can you replace them with home-brewed classes where you control the timing and can set your own deadlines?

Edited July 22, 2019 by alewife

[Roadrunner]

4 minutes ago, alewife said:

How many online classes are on your schedule?  If you have some of those in the line-up, can you replace them with home-brewed classes where you control the timing and can set your own deadlines?

 

I will PM you if it’s OK

[fourisenough]

14 hours ago, Roadrunner said:

I just tallied our hourly commitments with music (we are dropping sports and it is breaking everybody’s heart here) and it’s 63 hours a week  including class time. It’s not workable. 

We're also at 64. I am thinking I need to move Thinkwell Government to summer and just do the regular, rather than AP course. Five classes seems ever so much more do-able than six.

Edited July 23, 2019 by fourisenough

[madteaparty]

2 minutes ago, fourisenough said:

We're also at 64. I am thinking I need to move Thinkwell Government to summer also. Five classes seems ever so much more do-able than six.

You ballet parents get nothing but respect from me. OMG. 

[Lori D.]

1 hour ago, SusanC said:

I have been wondering why in the world I wrote down 120 as the bottom of the range (long ago). That is good to know. Me having to "push" electives is an uncomfortable idea.

Yes, you are right: 120 hours IS the minimum -- 150 is the average -- 180 is the maximum. So courses that are in the 135-165 hour range are nicely average. Reprinting the following below, as it might be helpful for planning...

 

. . . . . .   minimum .average . maximum
1.00 credit =  120 . . . 150 . . . 180  hours
0.75 credit =   90 . . . 110 . . . 135  hours
0.66 credit =   80 . . . 100 . .  120  hours
0.50 credit =   60 . . .  75 . .. . 90  hours
0.33 credit =   40 . . .  50 .  . . 60  hours
0.25 credit =   30 . . .. 35 .. . . 45  hours

The 120 hour minimum comes from the Carnegie Credit and refers to the minimum teacher/classroom contact hours for 1 credit (it is usually understood that there will ALSO be additional work done *outside of class* that counts towards the credit). The 180 hour maximum comes from public schools which typically are required to meet for 180 days per year -- so 1 hour/day x 5 days/week x 36 weeks/school year = 180 hours. However, most public school classes actually meet for 40-50 minutes per day, BUT, regular homework is assumed to fill up that shorter class time back up to 1 full hour of time. In general, if you shoot for the average, and you fill out 135 to 165 hours for most of your classes, then the credits on your transcript come out to be roughly equivalent. But, of course, there are lots of exceptions to that (:D -- such as:

- English and Science classes usually take much closer to 180 hours (or a bit over), due to the extra time needed for reading/writing, and for labs

- some required classes will inevitably end up more as "box checking" classes if the student has a low interest in them -- for example Economics, Government, PE, or Health -- and often, once you complete the program, you find your hours often fall much closer to 120 hours (or 60 hours if just a 1 semester/0.5 credit course)

- dual enrollment courses sometimes cover more advanced material, but in a shorter period of time, so you'll be lighter on the hours for completion, but heavier on the material learned, which balances out

- if a student is completing a program in far less than the 1 year (at the rate of 1 hour/day 4-5 days/week) then you might consider that the program is too light for this student and try switching to material that is more meaty and challenging for the student

- if you have a math struggler, you may need to take much longer than 180 hours to complete the program; if a student needs 2 school years to get through Algebra 1, then it is okay to call that 2 credits (the student put in the time, for sure!), and label it Algebra 1: part 1 and Algebra 1: part 2, or Algebra 1a and Algebra 1b, other designation to honor the student's work, but to accurately describe what content was covered

- sometimes you just have to decide whether or not to count all of the hours spent on reading the Literature for an English credit, or all of the practice hours for instrument practice for a Music credit -- and count some of the hours of repetitive work as homework

Planning for roughly 5 hours a week is a good amount of time for a 1.0 credit course. That gives you leeway to cut some material or some assignments if you find you are constantly bumping up against your 5 hour/week limit. And it also gives you leeway if you want/need to drop to just working 4 hours/week from time to time -- like, if you need some sick days, or a special event crops up, or your student absolutely hates a resource and you can't find a substitute -- you can drop or streamline, and you're still well-covered in hours.

Edited July 22, 2019 by Lori D.

[Momto6inIN]

We aim for 6 hours per day. Sometimes math takes more than its alotted hour and sometimes science does too, but other times the other subjects don't take as long, so it all averages out. When my oldest took AP courses he spent 2 hours per day per course, but he liked that pace. My 2nd one does not, and he spends a lot more time on speech/debate and drama than the oldest did. I have absolutely no way of knowing how many hours he spends on those 2 ECs outside of class/rehearsal, but it's a lot.

[Farrar]

My kids do 6-7 hours a day most days. It's not usual for them to add a bit more on the weekends to finish up things. But they're slow workers, especially one of them.

One of my boys dances about 20 hours a week, plus more when there's a performance. During Nutcracker season, when he was downtown performing, it was like a job. Other ds also has an intensive extracurricular, but it's theater - there are weeks with nothing and weeks when he's there nonstop. So it's very uneven.

[Roadrunner]

14 minutes ago, Farrar said:

My kids do 6-7 hours a day most days. It's not usual for them to add a bit more on the weekends to finish up things. But they're slow workers, especially one of them.

One of my boys dances about 20 hours a week, plus more when there's a performance. During Nutcracker season, when he was downtown performing, it was like a job. Other ds also has an intensive extracurricular, but it's theater - there are weeks with nothing and weeks when he's there nonstop. So it's very uneven.

Your dancer’s hours are also hitting 60! 

I guess we are going to have to mostly adjust and trim a little where we can. 

[Farrar]

8 minutes ago, Roadrunner said:

Your dancer’s hours are also hitting 60! 

I guess we are going to have to mostly adjust and trim a little where we can. 

Honestly, when my dancer is off, he's OFF. Like, he plays video games, texts his friends, watches YouTube videos, binges Parks and Rec and The Profit again and again. He almost never has a true day off, so when he does, he nearly always plans a day out at the movies with a friend. So... I feel like there's these different sides of it. He works for school with no complaint, he dances every second they let him, and then that's literally it. I have to poke him to get him to do anything else.

[Roadrunner]

8 minutes ago, Farrar said:

Honestly, when my dancer is off, he's OFF. Like, he plays video games, texts his friends, watches YouTube videos, binges Parks and Rec and The Profit again and again. He almost never has a true day off, so when he does, he nearly always plans a day out at the movies with a friend. So... I feel like there's these different sides of it. He works for school with no complaint, he dances every second they let him, and then that's literally it. I have to poke him to get him to do anything else.

 

Mine is used to have mostly free weekends (some leftover work in Saturdays and nothing on Sunday). I really would like to keep it that way if at all possible.  🙂 

I think in our case there is simply very little fluff if any, so to have the stamina for long hours and not have a physical outlet as we did in the past is going to be tough. 

[The Governess]

I would say my freshman last year spent 35 hours a week on school (2 DE classes per semester and 3 “regular” classes), and then probably 25 hours a week at the ballet studio. So yeah, we are right about at 60. Some weeks were fine and some were stressful. She’ll have a similar schedule this year.

[Donna]

My dd has a very time intensive extracurricular (actually more of a vocation at this point).

She generally takes 9-12 credits dual enrollment and does another course at home. She works in spurts or when she finds time, often late at night. The time she spends per day is very variable depending on the week and the assignments (heavy weeks include large writing assignments or studying for exams). Some days she'll spend 8 hours and other days 2-3 then catch up work on a weekend.  She tends to work efficiently and writes easily. She would probably spend a lot more time if she weren't so. 

I cannot even put an average number on commitment outside academics. It is definitely more than 15 hours a week but, again, depends on the week and whether she is on tour or in a recording studio, with whom she is working (is there planning and arranging to be done), and how much she is practicing.

[MamaSprout]

We're around 40-45 (I think) here with music and school, but not any EC. EC is theater and a leadership thing, so her hours vary a lot. We really were careful to pick our classes to be able to make a workable time frame. Really weigh each class. We dropped Latin and switched around math to Derek Owens + a "fun and okay if it doesn't get done" AoPS class. I dropped her back a level in French so she can get her feet under her in her first online class. Dropped one of her two instruments and picked up voice. Gave up a drawing class and counted the clearly-high-school-level music theory textbook she's finishing up in it's place. We dropped her sport last year. My already-written two-year history plan went out the window because she was already self-studying something else that I could put in as DC with a time that works. Oak Meadow Health turned into the body systems chapters in Biology that she won't get with the DC class but needs for the SAT 2. I guess I'm saying nothing is sacred.

Edited July 23, 2019 by MamaSprout

[fourisenough]

On 7/22/2019 at 5:01 PM, fourisenough said:

This is a very *timely* 🤣 topic at my house, as I re-engineering DD’s academic schedule to fit her new ballet schedule! 

She will be taking 3 regular classes: Algebra 2, Chemistry, and Latin 2, plus 3 APs: English Language, Government, and Art History. 3 will be live online and 2 are asynchronous online, plus one self-paced. I have her scheduled to work 32 hours per week, and expect that she will need to do another 4 hours on the weekend on heavy weeks. 

She dances 32 hours per week. Luckily her commute will be eliminated by living at the school. 

Her daily schedule will look like this:

7-8 Wake, dress, breakfast

8-12:30 Schoolwork

12:30-1 Lunch

1-3 Schoolwork

3-3:30 Snack

4-9 Dance 

9:30-10:30 Dinner, shower

11-7 Sleep 

Saturdays are a full day of dance and, ideally, Sundays are free of any commitments. She sometimes prefers to complete science labs and other big project-type work on the weekends to free up time during the week, so some time may be spent on Sundays working. She will grocery shop, meal prep and do her laundry on Sundays, too. Oy vey this kid is going to have an intense year.

Since AP Government is Thinkwell, she can definitely push it off to next summer if she finds that she can’t get it all done (and not take the AP test, obviously). I won’t tell her that from the start, though! She’s a fast worker and very efficient with her time, so I suspect she’ll be able to rise to the challenge. 

We had a last-minute change of plans re: ballet school. DD will now have a much more humane schedule! It will look like this:

7-8 Wake, dress, breakfast

8-12 Schoolwork

12-12:30 Lunch

1-5 Dance 

5-6 Dinner/free time 

6-9 Schoolwork

9-10 Shower, self-care, wind-down

10-7 Sleep 

She’ll now have only 3 hours of dance on Saturdays and Sundays will remain totally open. If needed, some schoolwork can easily be completed on the weekend. I feel so much better about this schedule. Also, her dinners will be provided for her, so she’ll only be responsible for her own breakfast & lunch. 

[Guest]

DD typically is doing academic stuff about 35-40 hours/week during the school year and 20-30 in the summer, and even vacations usually have significant content. (And a lot of her “free time” this summer was spent creating a Pokémon fan game) Having said that, though, she also is taking a lot of extra classes-she has gotten 11-12 credits each of the last two school years, with about half her credits coming from college classes, and if she is not doing a class and has extra time, she is likely to dive into great courses or other online educational content. 

Until very recently, she also was cheering anywhere from 10-20 hours/week, plus competitions every few weeks from October-April. I don’t think she’s quite sure what to do with all the time she has. 

I don’t think she sleeps much.

[Roadrunner]

4 hours ago, fourisenough said:

We had a last-minute change of plans re: ballet school. DD will now have a much more humane schedule! It will look like this:

7-8 Wake, dress, breakfast

8-12 Schoolwork

12-12:30 Lunch

1-5 Dance 

5-6 Dinner/free time 

6-9 Schoolwork

9-10 Shower, self-care, wind-down

10-7 Sleep 

She’ll now have only 3 hours of dance on Saturdays and Sundays will remain totally open. If needed, some schoolwork can easily be completed on the weekend. I feel so much better about this schedule. Also, her dinners will be provided for her, so she’ll only be responsible for her own breakfast & lunch. 

 

I am in awe. The stamina it takes to dance for 4 hours and then after being physically exhausted to put in another 3 hours of work! Wow! Just wow! Lots of respect from me! 

My kids were never able to even hold their pencils after sports. 

[kokotg]

Now that we're a couple of weeks in, it looks like my high schooler (10th grade) will be doing 9-4:30 or 5 most days with an hour for lunch and then a couple of hours most evenings. This has about 2 1/2 hours of music practice built in to it. One afternoon a week he has a game club he goes to and Friday afternoons are music with homeschool band. Weekends are pretty crazy right now, too, with a clarinet lesson Saturday morning and youth orchestra Sunday afternoons. Trying to take advantage of all the time in the car to knock out some Great Courses and audiobooks.