Prepare for school routine, or rip it off like a bandaid?

[Calizzy]

We are planning to start school next week and dh has suggested we start getting ready by going to bed earlier and getting up earlier. No way!! If I only have 6 days left of summer I am soaking every minute up! I LOVE summer break. We stay up late, sleep in, swim at the pool, have bon fires. And the older I get the more indulgent I become. I am just going to set the alarm for 6am on the first day of school and we will all have to deal with it. 

Do you start winding down to prepare for the back to school routine, or do you soak it up and rip off the bandaid?

[Moonhawk]

Live it up! Ride the wave! Party like it's 1999! Enjoy the last dregs of the ambrosia that is summer. Especially in 2020, lol. 

Just don't expect too much on that first morning. And maybe make sure that you get to bed a bit earlier that last night (the kids, maybe not you) so that way you're only battling schedule change, not sleep deprivation too on that first day.

[mommyoffive]

I would just set the alarm later that first day.  Live it up.  It we were homeschooling on our own I probably wouldn't even start until October.   

[theelfqueen]

I would be asking myself ... why do we need to get up so much earlier for school? You're homeschoolers, your schedule is yours. We've been easing into school... a little math, some reading, a great courses lecture... last year I concluded that getting up early to be on schedule was not a need for our school at this point. 

[Loowit]

I would continue to sleep-in while I could, if that were something we did.  Actually, I will need to get up earlier on school days so I can get my work out in before getting ready for school, but the kids don't really change their sleep schedule much, so it isn't something I feel we need to ease into.

We tend to get up about the same time regardless of school/no school, so it isn't something I worry about too much.  Right now kids are expected to be up by 9:30, and on school days at 9, so I don't see the point in starting a fight discussion over 30 mins difference for a week before to prepare them.  When they were littler it made a bigger difference and I did start changing sleep routines gradually, like for day light savings time, but once they hit a certain age it was up to them to figure it out.

[TomK]

FWIW, I kind of eased into it a bit, but that was an artifact of dealing with the COVID aftermath. I wanted to make sure my daughter was at the point I thought she was. Well, she missed a bunch of stuff there at the end, so I started doing some work to sort of catch her up for a week or two before we actually started. Then, about a week before, we started adding in some reading.

Of course, I'm not sure that made it any easier for us, though. It's just day 4 for us, though, so I don't know that it didn't, either.

[Junie]

I think it depends on what you mean by staying up late and sleeping in.

If your kids are currently getting up at noon and will have to get up at 6 for school, I think you might need to ease in.

 

[rebcoola]

We usually ease in but we don't wake up early for school.  Even with a toddler we sleep in until 8:30

[Moonhawk]

4 minutes ago, rebcoola said:

We usually ease in but we don't wake up early for school.  Even with a toddler we sleep in until 8:30

Tell me of this sorcery you possess!

[Spryte]

We don’t really change our sleep schedule drastically for school.  We’ve always homeschooled, and we just do what works for our bodies.  I remember easing in as a kid, every end of summer, before going back to brick and mortar school, though, so I definitely see where the idea comes in.  But our school schedule doesn’t really change wrt sleep.  If we had to switch to a much earlier hour, I’d ease in, for my sanity (though it’s possible I’d go the soak it up route, too, but not  sure).

We do sort of ease into school though.  We do school light for a bit, math and some extra light, fun topics.  Then on the official Day One we have a Not Back to School party at home. We eat a special breakfast (mountains of donuts), the kids get school cones filled with supplies and some funny t-shirts.  We organize our supplies, and check out all the new books, set up calendars, etc.  We might read some of the fun stuff, and then go on a field trip.  We definitely hit a park or go swimming.

The actual school work starts on Day Two.  🤣

Edited August 6, 2020 by Spryte

[*Jessica*]

I’ve tried easing in for years and it’s always less than satisfactory.  This year I decided to just rip off the bandaid and we started on Monday with a full schedule.  It’s been a much smoother start to our year!  
 

Of course, my wake-up time and the 9yo’s is 8am, not 6am!   And the teens sleep an extra hour and have to be ready to start at 10am.  

[JustEm]

No, we don't wind down.  The first week of school just starts a bit later than we planned and we slowly adjust to a different sleep pattern during the first few weeks of the school year

[rebcoola]

19 minutes ago, Moonhawk said:

Tell me of this sorcery you possess!

Lol my only secret is blackout shades and when they are little and wake up 5 or 6 feeding them and acting like it's the middle of the night.

[Moonhawk]

4 minutes ago, rebcoola said:

Lol my only secret is blackout shades and when they are little and wake up 5 or 6 feeding them and acting like it's the middle of the night.

Ah. So what you're saying is that I'm too late and there really is no hope for me, lol. 😉 

Enjoy paradise for me! 🙂 

[mathnerd]

I suggest having a late start for your school day on the first week and then pulling in the schedule gradually. So, you could sleep in until the late start time all of this week 🙂

 

[Junie]

37 minutes ago, *Jessica* said:

I’ve tried easing in for years and it’s always less than satisfactory.  This year I decided to just rip off the bandaid and we started on Monday with a full schedule.  It’s been a much smoother start to our year!  
 

Of course, my wake-up time and the 9yo’s is 8am, not 6am!   And the teens sleep an extra hour and have to be ready to start at 10am.  

I didn't mean to imply that we got up at 6 am. 😉  I just know that some people do.

I actually don't know what time my kids get up.  It is widely known at our house that Mommy is Not Human until 8 a.m. and she is not to be disturbed for anything less than a call to 911.  School starts at 9.

Edited August 6, 2020 by Junie

[Carrie12345]

The only people I’ve ever woken up for school (other than co-op days) have been teenagers who would sleep until noon if I allowed it. If anyone’s naturally sleeping until 9... maybe even 10, that’s fine by me.

My recent graduate now has to be at work by 6:30 and it hasn’t been a problem, even after 18 years of being able to “sleep in”.

[TheReader]

Well, depends on *how* late the kids have been staying up. In years past, DH would let them literally toss the idea of bedtime totally out the window, so we were recovering from things like 2 am "bedtimes" which just wouldn't work.

These days we've kept them to 11:30 bedtimes except for Friday nights, so we will probably only go to bed a little early the first night. Put together with everyone has everything online this year, anyway, and it really doesn't make a huge difference. 

[Carol in Cal.]

I see no reason to make yourself miserable in advance.

But then, I see no reason to make yourself miserable at all.  One of the coolest things about homeschooling in our family was not having to get up unnaturally early.  YMMV.

[mmasc]

We’ll be going with the bandaid ripping around here—my kids got up around 10:30 today and we start Tuesday——not at 10:30😆