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The following is a post from contributing writer, Michelle Cannon of The Holistic Homeschooler.
As Summer quickly approaches, many homeschool families are preparing for a summer break. Our family, however, will continue through the summer with homeschool lessons because we homeschool year-round.
6 Reasons We Homeschool Year-Round
Homeschooling year-round affords us:
Continual progress – Frequent, short breaks mean we can pick up where we left off rather than spend time reviewing material. This helps us to continually progress.
Flexibility – Our schedule may be marked to take the months of March, July and November “off” from homeschool, but sometimes it doesn’t happen that way. Perhaps we missed a day or a week here and there due to work, special needs issues, or activities. We can use that month for “make-up” time.
Freedom – That flexibility allows us time for other things. If we want to go camping for a week, we can. If we want to spend a week doing nothing, we can. After all, we have an entire year to get our curriculum completed.
Less homeschool burnout – Regular, frequent breaks means we don’t suffer burnout as often. In our homeschool, we take a month-long break every three months. Three months is a pretty short time for focusing on homeschool lessons. Just as we start feeling unmotivated or tired, it’s time for an entire month off!
Time to Focus – If my children are struggling in an area, there’s plenty of time to work on it until they’ve mastered the skill.
Time to Enjoy – Perhaps there’s no struggling to master a skill. Perhaps we’ve taken a rabbit trail that greatly interests us. That’s okay too. We have plenty of time to enjoy a particular book or study.
These are the reasons my family enjoys this schedule. It works for us.
What type of schedule does your homeschooling family use?
photo credit: bluebirdsandteapots via photopin cc
Michelle is a single mom homeschooling the last two of her five children.  Read more from her at The Holistic Homeschooler where she blogs about Charlotte Mason homeschooling. You can connect with her on Facebook, Twitter, G+ and Pinterest.Â
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We generally homeschool year round as we go at a more leisurely pace through our curriculum. Do you have a example of your yearly schedule? Do you schedule your breaks or do you just take breaks as needed?
Hi Teri!
Our schedule begins April 1 and ends March 31 the following year. So basically it looks like this:
Term I – April/May/June
Term I Break – July
Term II – Aug/Sept/Oct
Term II Break – November
Term III – Dec/Jan/Feb
End of year break – March
We use a 6 weeks on one week off and take longer breaks over the Holidays and 8-10 weeks in summer
I’ve seen a few others do it that way too. Mine is actually based on Charlotte Mason’s schedule. But when my grown kids were little and attending public school, the year-round calender was 13 weeks on followed by 6 weeks off.
I have decided to do this type of schedule, too, after one year of homeschooling. For us, it’s April, August, December off. 🙂 I noticed that this was our normal rhythm this year and we definitely needed all of December off to do tons of amazing Christmas things. The bonuses for me are the flexibility and the avoidance of summer forgetting.
True! A few months off all at once can require review. I’m all about constantly moving forward in our lessons. It’s not for everyone, but it works for us.
We do the same thing. I love the flexibility. We live in Europe right now and travel all the time, so it’s nice to to be held down to a rigid schedule. When we get back to the states and my children are older perhaps we’ll be on a more regular schedule, but I’m enjoying the freedom of flexibility right now.
oops, nice NOT to be held down 😉
Traveling Europe sounds lovely! That’s a whole different breed of learning. 😉
Hi, I do year round with my grandson and we don’t have a typical schedule of a certain amount of weeks on and then so many off. We are just trying to find our groove. I don’t use a curriculum at all so nothing to worry about there. When he seems to bored or disinterested or just plain antagonistic about doing school work, we take a break for a few days or a week or so, whatever he needs to get back to it. Although we really are not taking breaks at all because he is always asking questions about one thing or another and then we go to the computer or the library and the learning begins.
Playing it by ear works too!