The following is a post from Tabitha
Sometimes homeschooling your children is just hard. However, we keep doing it, just like we keep parenting, because we know we are doing what’s best for our children, day in and day out. Consistency is important.
On the other hand, one of the great things about homeschooling is the freedom to just take a break when it is needed. This can be when YOU need it, when the kids need it, or when a special opportunity comes up that just can’t be worked in any other way.
Surprise Zoo Day!
How can you tell when it’s time to take a break? (scheduled or unscheduled… unscheduled is more fun.)
- When you don’t want to get up in the morning (more so than usual)
- When the kids don’t want to get up in the morning (see above)
- When everything for school seems to take twice as long as it should
- Getting behind on your homeschool schedule
- When your December/January temperatures are in the 60s and you don’t live in Florida, California, or anywhere else that it’s normal
- Snow day. Need I say more?
- New baby
- Morning sickness (see above)
- Family events
- Free day at the zoo or museum
- Homeschool group activity
- Sick day
- Special event on TV
- Pet died
- Lots of little arguments breaking out for no reason
- When there is nothing you are looking forward to
- Nothing seems to go right
- Haven’t had a day off in a while
Now, a lot of these reasons to take a break have obvious things to do on your break, like the homeschool day at the theme park or the snow day. The reason for the break IS the thing to do for your break. Sometimes we aren’t sure what to do to break up the routine, though. Some things we like to do…
- Play outside
- Field day
- Bike ride
- Visit friends
- Go to the museum, zoo, art show, car show, etc.
- Go to the movies
- Have a movie marathon at home (or TV show). This would involve popcorn, tents, and pajamas. If that works.
- Library day (sometimes an unplanned library trip holds adventure unseen!)
- Visit a nearby state park
- School play- either visit a local school or make your own
- Concert
- Make your own art day
- Make a mess day- paints, playdough, all the messy stuff out at one time
- Water day (works best in warm weather…)
- Pool day
- Window shopping, people watching, mall day. This sounds worse than it is. Just don’t do it during the holiday season!
- Culture day- new foods, costumes, experiment
- Science day- do the science experiments that aren’t part of your curriculum… like a huge volcano… or something from Mythbusters you aren’t supposed to try at home.
- Kids plan the day… fill a jar with things they want to do with you for fun (on slips of paper) and draw one thing at a time.
I think you get the idea. Sometimes we all get into a set pattern and just can’t see how to get out of it. That’s when sometimes it’s good to drop everything and do something different for a day or more. You come back to your work with a clear mind, refreshed and ready for new challenges. It doesn’t always work but it’s worth a try and doesn’t hurt anything. I have found that when this happens all the time, we may need to change up the whole routine and that’s a whole other story.
More often than not, a break is just what we need and we are ready to settle down to learning again, looking forward to the next day off, whenever that may be.
Tabitha (wife to Tom, homeschooling mom to 8+ kids ages 15 to ‘on the way’, learning something new all the time).
About tabitha
Good ideas! Love the “something from Mythbusters you aren’t supposed to try at home.” Isn’t that everything on there lol?!
Thank you so much for posting this. My husband just left Monday for a 14 month deployment. We didn’t plan on taking a break, but I realized Monday afternoon that we would not get lessons done that day. By Tuesday, I decided we’d take the week off. We were ahead of schedule, anyway, and we needed this week to deal with our emotions and find our new “normal”!
I know this won’t be sufficient to ease what you and your kids are dealing with, but I am so grateful for men like your husband who dedicate their lives to our country and our freedom and for families like yours who love them and patiently (or impatiently) await their return. I pray that the time goes quickly for you all.
That is so smart! My husband returned home April ’10 from an 18month deployment. It was rough at times but there were many happy moments, too. God Bless you all and thank you for your service.
Ah! I got distracted in the middle of that and summed up too quickly. lol. I meant to also say that you are a rock star…every one of you…and don’t you forget it!! Of course I don’t know if this is your first deployment or not, but, if it is…my advice would be to talk lots about Daddy…send care packages…Skype if you can…write letters…have pictures of him with the kids and with you all around…plan something fun or maybe a little out of the ordinary every month or so to keep spirits up and help the time to pass. I also got my kiddos Daddy Dolls which they still sleep with. There were meltdowns (me!) and tantrums (um…also me) and sometimes having to take it one hour at a time…but keep your chin up. I hope time passes quickly…but that many wonderful moments occur between now and when your family is whole once more. God Speed.
I really struggle with allowing us to take that break. My oldest is only 6 1/2, so how far behind could we possibly get, right?!
Take this week, for example. He’s complained about doing school every single day. I work really hard to make our school time seem fun, so I have a hard time not taking that personally. So a couple of days this week, I’ve ditched my plans and we’ve done something fun, but educational (an art project, a cool science experiment, etc).
Call me crazy, but this is where I struggle with homeschooling: Part of me thinks I need to model diligence for him in that we work through our assignments for the week, regardless of how cranky or tired we feel. It’s important to follow through with our goals.
Then the other part of me thinks: This is *homeschool* for cryin’ out loud! Part of the joy is being able to ditch the set plans and do something fun!
I hope I’ll be able to figure this out with more years of experience.
-Lauren
Your post didn’t really make a lot of sense to me, because all of those fun things you list??? *ARE* what we do to homeschool.
It makes me wonder what it is you all are doing for a “regular” school day???
LOL
Those were just examples. Most of those are included in our homeschooling… but it’s fun to drop everything and do something unexpected, no matter what you do normally.
Regular school days are usually at home with so many of us, doing a lot of those things, yes, but also doing bigger fun stuff separately as we do have a high school kiddo that has more serious stuff to study. So sometimes the break is good for the big kids and me to do something the littler ones get to do all the time…