Hello all!
I have a had several questions about all year homeschooling and I thought it best to wrap it into a post. 
We started our homeschooling journey as a very traditional homeschooling family. I got little desks, we used texts, and we went from the public school’s first day through the end of the public school’s year. This is what hubby and I were hard wired to do. Though beginning our second year it began feeling more like the time schedule and this rigidness was controlling us and the homeschooling. Rather than enjoy our journey of homeschooling each day became a day that had to be checked off a wrestled down.
I started my flexible timing by taking December off for Christmas. WOW! We were much more relaxed. We accomplished many more service project that month. It was a joy and I found that the kids continued to learn. The books never went away. The drawing, coloring, making Christmas cards all kept happening. Then we changed again when the end of the year came and we were in the middle of a unit. Why stop? We didn’t.
Now I have been homeschooling year round for several years. We take large breaks off for holidays, and broken up several times a year. Our learning never suffers the “summer drain”. Slow and steady is our motto. A couple of our children have slow processing problems. They need all the extra time they can get to comprehend and remember their learning. This style of all year round schooling helps them tremendously!
Before I share our calendar I want to dispel some myths I see crop up.
1. Schooling year round sucks the FUN out of childhood. I guess that would be right IF I was sending my child away everyday to a big brick building and making them stay inside all day. Since we homeschool all year round we homeschool in the morning and are done by lunch! Plenty of time to play and explore on their own.
2. My laws won’t allow me to do this. Read you law carefully many laws ask you to keep attendance records. Keep the records starting from the official beginning of the school year to the official end, here that is July 31st is the end, August 1st is the beginning. As long as your set number of days of attendance fall between those days you are fine.
3. I need a break to plan and keep ahead of the kids. I agree. I have one week breaks every 6-8 weeks depending on the material we are working on. I have a large goal and idea of where we are heading for the year. For us planning the whole year our is impractical. Planning our 6-8 weeks seems to be just perfect.
So how do you do it, Heather?
I print off an all year calendar. I look at the a material like Mystery of History we are using this year. It has Units broken into 9 weeks. I could go to the full 9 weeks but that is a bit long for us so I will go 6 weeks that way I can get them back into the swing before the end of the unit and test. I may make adjustments after I get the Apologia texts. Those are the only two text style books we are using this everything else should easily adjust to any schedule.
JULY 2010: We are working all month.
AUGUST 2010: Working the first two weeks. Break Aug 16-20 Working Aug 23 on.
SEPTEMBER 2010: Working all month.
OCTOBER 2010: Several days off in the beginning of the month for birthdays. Then large break OCT 25-29
NOVEMBER 2010: Working all month, except Thanksgiving break NOV 24-26.
DECEMBER 2010: Working through DEC 17 on Christmas oriented materials and service projects. Last two weeks of the month off for Holidays and traveling.
JANUARY 2011: Working all month.
FEBRUARY 2011: Working all month. ( I know I am over my normal time of 6-8 weeks then break. The winter is very hard on the kids. I am actually scheduling in cushion for lots of dr appointments and (Lord please no!) Hospital stays that creep up this time of year.
MARCH 2011: Working the first week of MAR but the second week is off. Then the last two weeks back at it.
APRIL 2011: Working all month, prepping for final evaluations, finish all big projects.
MAY 2011: Work until evaluation then take the month off!
Remember we only work in the morning and we get afternoons all year round off. I use the afternoons for big messy projects, work the kids need to accomplish on their own (such as rewriting a sloppy paper), and grand ideas that naturally spring up from our learning. Staying flexible allows us to handle those dr appointments which can really throw off a schedule. Since I write my homeschooling plans on a 6-8 week structure I can take full advantage of weather changes, unexpected field trips, and current events. For me this works great.
Find your own groove. Think about what matches our family learning personality strong structure, light structure with lots of flexibility or total flex. Then how does the time learning fit into this for us. If you are strong structure you may be lead by units, tests, and learning materials nature structure. If you are total flex you are most likely already schooling year round, life round! I am in between.
I hope this helps clear up what year round homeschooling is. Let me know if you have any questions of suggestions! God bless!
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Thank you Laurie for the peek into your year. I am currently working to find our groove in the year-round experience.