(This is the seventh post in a series of planning post, and the sixth post on planning for our homeschool.)

This is an aspect of planning that I resisted for along time.  I didn't want to schedule our year, or do long term planning, because what if we didn't stay on track.  What if we changed our mind and wanted to take a longer trip to Alabama, or let a kid go spend a week at the grandparents, what if we ended up sick with the flu for two weeks.  It would mess up my schedule, the nearer the beginning the year the more it disturbs everything.  I'm pretty type A, after I get it map out, I don't like life upsetting my apple cart.  I've gotten better in the last couple of years with giving myself the grace and flexibility to throw the plan out the window and write another one.  After all if you preach that you love the flexibility and then you aren't flexible what does that say?

Last year was actually the first time I did this.  I sat down, and tried to foresee anything and everything that might affect our homeschool year.  For example every year I want to be done by Memorial Day at the LATEST, if we can be done by the first week of May even better.  We either want to go to Alabama for Memorial Day weekend to see the Balloon Races, or maybe go to Orlando for the FPEA Homeschool Convention.  I typically take off the same week as the cousins for Spring Break, so that one of them can go for a visit.  I usually take the whole month of December off, because there are so many crafty fun things to do, and the kids have no attention with the impending holidays.  I also typically take around two weeks off for Thanksgiving and go to Alabama to visit my family.  Family might come down in the Spring or in the Fall for a visit, but I seldom know that in advance.


In some states you might have a minimum amount of time that you have to call "school."  You might have to log 180 days like we did in PA or perhaps you have to have school for 36 weeks.  You might have to complete a set number of educational hours.  If you have to log weeks, it might be enough to block off several weeks, with some breaks noted, and perhaps allowing enough so that you can always take off a week and tack an extra on the end if you need to.  If you have to log days, you might want to actually count out the days, to be sure that you account for days here and there that you want to take off, whether that's holidays like Labor Day, or your kids' birthdays.  If you have to log hours, you may need to actually do the math to figure out about how many hours a day you plan to do school and then figure up your days accordingly.  Or like me you may subscribe to the educational philosophy of real life learning.  That our children are literally learning all the time, through play and daily life, just as much as they do when they are hitting the books, perhaps even more.  In Florida we aren't required to count days, but I like to.  It gives me a marker, and it always makes me feel like I have accomplished something when I can actually measure how far we've come.


Most states require public school to meet somewhere between 160 and 180 days, they also allow students to miss up to about 15 days of school.  There is also a lot of non-instructional time in school.  There is the changing classes, bathroom breaks, lunch period, PE, and of course the down time in class.  It's not that they are wasting time there, it's just the nature of managing a lot of kids at once.  There is some down time in our school day, where one kid has to wait for me to finish with another before helping them when they get stuck, but the whole we can get our work done in a lot less time during the day.  We also have the flexibility to do some school on the couch when a kid is sick, or skip a day for that one, and have them make it up on Saturday.  Sometimes I double up on lessons so that we can take a pretty day and go to the park.

On average though I try to shoot for around 170 days, or somewhere between 30 and 40 weeks.  Before you say, "But Danielle, that's a huge range!"  Let me tell you a little about how we break down our year.  First I am in the habit of tracking our homeschool year July through June.  That was the breakdown in PA where I started our homeschool journey, and it's been a habit that has stuck.  That means for me, since my goal is to be done early to mid May, I'm going to take off all of June.  I'll do any planning then that I haven't gotten around to yet, I'll reorganize the school schedule.  The kids will watch way too much tv, and we'll visit family in Alabama.  When July rolls around I'll start thinking about educational experiences I can sneak in, without the kids realizing what I'm doing.  We'll have swim lessons, a week at the beach with the extended family, and this year 4H Fun Camp.  They don't realize it, but these are field trips, and great learning experiences.  I just named 4 weeks of learning, 5 days a week, and the beach is actually 7 days.  In August we'll ease back into our routine, starting back getting serious about our chores (can anyone say home ec., it's a vital life skill you know).  I'll pick up math just to make sure they aren't too rusty.  There will still be a ton of Splash Pad days with the local homeschoolers, library trips (we go every other week, since it's a bit of a drive), and there will be a ton of fishing with Daddy.  Until the planting season starts back up in September, he'll be home on Fridays, so we'll take day trips and do lots of "field trips."  By the time I actually start back Tuesday after labor day, I may have as many as 30 "educational" days already in the books.

There are alot of popular options for homeschooler schedules.  You'll meet people who go from Labor Day through Memorial Day because that's the traditional school year.  Those who follow the local school calendar because they have some of their children in school, or they use the local school district in someway.  There are those who go year round, taking a couple of weeks off here and there through the year.  There are lots who will do 6 weeks or 9 weeks on, and one week off.  Then you have some outliers like me.  My husband's busy season runs from Labor Day through middle of February when he is planting, and then from February through middle of May when he is still growing the crop.  Knowing that by far his busiest time of year is October.  We take advantage of his schedule.  He's going to be working 6 or 7 day weeks.  So we frequently log 6 days of school.  Then in the spring when the extracurricular schedule picks up, I can relax a bit.  Some years I've had a longer school year but only had a 4 day school week.


No matter what my upcoming school year is going to look like, I try to map it out.  I take my year at a glance page in my planner, and I circle every Monday for a week that I intend to do school.  I also put a little round sticker with a number on it on each Monday in my monthly spreads.  I then get a rough count of how many days of school that will entail.  I break them up into roughly 10 week periods.  With at least one week off at the end of it.  It doesn't mean anything to the kids, it's just a way for me to plan.  I don't like leaving a unit half finished before Christmas break, or introduce a math concept on Thursday if I'm taking a Spring Break the following week.  I note the different periods with different color dots on my monthly spread, and I number them.  This year I'm anticipating having 13 weeks in term one running from labor day till I stop in December, there will be a gap for Thanksgiving in there though.  I then have 10 weeks in term 2 from New Year's until Spring Break.  Finally there will be 9 weeks in term 3, between Spring Break and the end of our school year.  The first 13 weeks will largely consist of 6 day weeks, while the rest of the year will be 5 day weeks.  And if the grandparents come we'll adjust things.  Anything we don't complete this year, we'll just roll over to the following year.  After all I'm going for mastery, if that takes longer than estimated that's fine, as long as we really learn something.


It's nice to have a loose idea of what our year will look like.  It gives me the ability to look at plans when I want to do something different, and give myself permission to change tack because I can see where I can make adjustments.  Use to I would feel guilty if we were opted for a field trip after I'd already made lesson plans.  I use to beat myself up when I felt too lousy to do school.  Now, I just look and can readily see where I have wiggle room built in, and I can see how much we've already accomplished, and I don't stress as much if something comes up.