Calendar flexibility a great homeschool benefit

One of the many advantages of homeschooling is that you get to set your own calendar. It is not surprising, then, that there is a lot of variation in how families approach the idea of a summer break.

Most homeschoolers follow the general academic pattern of having summers off, with two ways in which the timing is decided. For what is probably the majority of families, especially those using packaged curriculums, the length of the school year is determined by covering the material chosen for the year; vacation doesn't start until the books are finished. If something that keeps school from happening comes up during the school year (e.g. a stretch of illness or a family move), the school year may extend into the summer months.

Some families allow a student who finishes material early to stop school early. Another approach is to set start and end times by a static date. For example, a family may choose to start school on the Monday after Labor Day and end it the Friday before Memorial Day; what material doesn't end up getting covered in that time frame waits for the next year. If students have allotted assignments of things like book reports, math chapters, etc., they might not be allowed to stop until those are done, but the portion that Dad or Mom has to be directly involved with stops on time.

Other families do school year around. Those that use a more traditional academic approach usually follow a schedule punctuated by small breaks. For example, a family may follow a "three weeks on, one week off" pattern, perhaps at Christmas and once in summer stretching the one week off to two or three. For families who follow a natural learning philosophy, there often is no particular compartmentalization of "school" and "not school"; for them, all of life is school. So, because life keeps going on all the time, school goes on all the time, too. The venue of the learning may vary, but there is no "break" as such.

No matter which approach we use to set "vacation time," virtually all homeschoolers incorporate vacation trips into our school, rather than having them be time away from school. A Hawaiian interlude becomes an exotic field trip studying geology, botany, or oceanography. A drive to a resort like Disneyland may incorporate stops to explore the magnificent redwood forests. In the past few years, trips to trace the route of Lewis and Clark have been popular. There is even a Washington State History curriculum that is based on traveling around the entire state! Another homeschooler advantage is that, by planning trips during the months when traditional schools are in session, we are able to take advantage of "off season" rates, and often find greatly reduced crowds, as well.

For homeschooling families, even those that use a traditional academic approach for their "formal" schooling, learning becomes a lifestyle that doesn't stop when the summer sun beckons!

Susie Aasen is a mother of five, and a veteran of 17 years of homeschooling, active in two local support groups. She enjoys working with new homeschoolers and is available for presentations to groups interested in learning more about homeschooling. She can be reached at rpaasen@comcast.net.