Non-Traditional Schedules
When do you get to most of your schoolwork? One of the greatest benefits of homeschooling is the flexibility it affords us.
Even those of us who do most of our schoolwork during ordinary school hours appreciate the freedom to go on a family vacation during the off-season, or spend a rainy spring break hitting the books so that we can take time off when the weather’s nice.
There are other ways to utilize the flexible nature of home education on an everyday basis, however, and many homeschoolers sing the praises of making the most of off-beat schedules.
Would a non-traditional schedule work for you?
Maybe your husband is a firefighter or a pilot, maybe you work a full- or part-time job outside the home, or maybe your family’s circumstances involve out-of-state travel or swing shifts.
I set a schedule for my family’s school year, but I’m rethinking it (already!) (and we haven’t even started yet!). I wonder if trying to fit our schoolwork into traditional hours isn’t the best idea for us in this season of life, with three toddlers underfoot.
Perhaps we should save some of our work for after the babies go to bed in the evening, or for the weekends when my husband is here to help with the madness.
I love this quote: We always have time enough, if we will but use it aright. -Goethe
It reminds me that one time is not as good as another to do a particular work.
If I take some time to think about when it will work best for my family to read aloud, focus on math, or take a nature walk, we will not only get to it more often, but the work done will be of higher quality.
We have a very non traditional schedule and it has taken me a year to figure out just how to make it work. My husband works 12 hours rotating shifts…..going from days to nights. So I have two different kinds of days for school, when he is working, we do a family day and when he is off, then kids do a student day. A family day consists of all the resources that require me to read or be present to complete and these are usually the religion, geography, history, science, literature. A student day consists of those resources in which they can complete without me for the most part, which is usually those things that are custom leveled like math, spelling, vocab, phonics, penmanship, reading, typing, writing & grammar. While the kids are attending their lessons, me and my husband spend time together talking and going over family goals. It is nice to be able to spend one on one time with my husband in this way and it has been a great way in getting kids to embrace independence. Once they have finished their work, then we usually do a fun activity as a family. So while student days aren’t as fun as family days are, they do have encouragement to do their best and be independent if they can. I am of course available if they just can not figured something out. So there is some consistency in the inconsistent schedule and as for leisure time, my husband has 7 days in a row off every month and so we usually take off 2-3 days during that week so we all do not get burn out and we use those days to take care of home projects together. This has worked out great for us and I loop the each type of day so we never really get behind in anything. The only planner that has worked so far has been the simplycharlottemason.com organizer, so I highly recommend it. We really do not have and end of school year or beginning and there isn’t a definitive summer break since we take off so often through out the year, but it works for us. This has all been so helpful, eye opening, and very encouraging. Thank you!
My daughter is not a morning person, and I struggle with physical problems and usually feel better later in the day. So we do most of our structured homeschooling after 7pm! I also do some on weekends and breaks, especially our read-alouds such as Bible, history, science and literature, since she looks forward to that anyway. It took me a while to let go of trying to get things done during “school” hours, but doing things this way has reduced some stress!
Well I feel like I am a little late to the discussion but this is an area of concern for me. We are starting for the first time this year, my oldest will be a “kindergartener”. I am so excited to start homeschooling for real, and would like to have a somewhat traditional schedule. But, I also work from home. I need to work a few (~8-10) hours each week to make up the difference needed for us to stay in our home, and we have already cut out just about all spending except utilities and food. So, I am very nervous to see how this will play out. Also, with a three year old who will want to be part of everything, a one year old who is very demanding lately (must be with mama ALL THE TIME) and a new baby on the way!! I am hoping we can accomplish what is important and meaningful for this first year in about 2 hours every morning, not including Fridays which is my primary work day since daddy is home. Am I crazy? Or is this reasonable? Looking at our simple little curriculum, which is largely Oak Meadow and is a gentle/deep introduction to the quality of letters and numbers (which my little guy really already knows), this seems possible. I’m thinking we can fit in nature stories throughout the week, afternoon walks etc. when I’m not working, and our commitment to the Liturgical year just by attending services for the special feasts and talking about it during our circle time. Experienced moms… please give me any advice!
We live “way up north,” so the schedule that works for us is one that takes our cold climate into consideration. I have tried the six-on, one-off schedule and while it was nice during the winter, it got v e r y h a r d when the weather warmed up and we had six more weeks of school. No one felt like doing it and as a result we were not very productive. I have found it works well to start after Labor Day, plug away (with holiday and spring breaks), then stop at the end of April. We take May off, and finish the last few weeks in June or July during the heat. We do begin and end our schoolyear with a lighter schedule than the rest of the year.
Climate also affects our daily schedule. We are not morning people here. so we don’t get started with school until nine or ten. If we pushed through until we were done, we wouldn’t finish until three. This meant that it was already starting to get darker and colder by the time the kids got outside to play in the winter. Also the littles would go down for naps at this time so they wouldn’t get outside at all. We began taking a 2-hr lunchbreak with everyone going outside immediately after eating. They would come in around two, the littles would go down for naps, and the rest of us would finish school. It is a very productive time because everyone has their wiggles out and the little ones are asleep. I also got a bit of a break in the middle of the day while they were all outside.
Flexibility in scheduling is one of my favorite things about homeschooling. I love hearing all the different ideas from people here.
We are another family that does 6 weeks on and one week off. There are also a couple times throughout the year when we have more time off like around Christmas and Holy Week/ Bright Week.
As far as days go, we’re traditional in our waking hours. We try to start morning basket around 9, do that for an hour or so and then break until lunch. Our more one-on-one work comes in the afternoon during the 2yo’s nap time. For right now this routine works beautifully, but I make it a point to reevaluate every so often and am willing to change when I see that we need it.
My husband is a gem. Truly. He teaches Latin to our 7th and 5th graders (First Form this year) and will teach Prima Latina to our third grader. These classes happen during the week in the evening. I love that man! :) And he loves being a part of their education, learning Latin with them and he has a new appreciation for what I do! Bonus. :)
We like to start our day early and finish by early afternoon. We have yet to learn how to actually get back to work after lunch, but since my 7th grader will have oodles more work, we have to make it work this year. What ends up happening is that we delay lunch until the work is done…which means that on some days we don’t eat lunch until 2pm.
My bigger two are really self-starters. They are usually finished with their work way before I’m ready to sit with them for their teaching time.
The baby is walking this year, so I guess that technically he’s a toddler and the preschooler is, ummmm also a self-starter, which keeps me on my toes.
So, to answer the question: we do a little of both…we use a normal (albeit earlier start and finish) school schedule AND a non-traditional schedule. At least that’s the plan. We usually start strong and then, we dwindle to the pace of a slug. :/ I guess that time will tell how well this works out!
I had the same Goethe quote on my blog yesterday. Great minds think alike ;)
We are moving from a non-schedule to a more traditional but still flexible schedule. My kids, well my 9 year old, needs lots of big breaks during the day. So I guess where I take advantage of the flexibility of homeschooling is in letting him have time for video games and outside time right in the middle of morning “prime time” school time. I know he slows down a bit (briefly!) in the afternoon and so that’s when I ask him to do independent work.
One of the greatest blessings of homeschool flexibility has been the relationships my children have formed with their grandparents. For years now, we have driven an hour to the country every Wednesday so we can spend the day with my parents. This day often ends up being a “waste” academically and sometimes I feel like it’s interfering with our school. But when I really consider it, I know it’s one of the most important things we do.
My oldest, who is almost 8, is, and always has been, a night owl. She is rarely asleep before 10 pm, no matter what time she’s in bed. So, sometimes, we do school all snuggled up in my big reading chair or in the guest bed (so we don’t disturb her sister). Last night she couldn’t sleep, so we practiced multiplication facts. Our second daughter is 6 and needs to have her school work completed before noon. The AAR pre-reading lesson I do with my four year old son usually happens just after quiet time. I guess you could say we school morning, noon, and night around here! I think the key is to catch each child at his or her best. I actually really like having time with each of them individually through the day – little islands of “just us”. Keeps me sane.
I actually just re-did our schedule since the traditional one with a time schedule was not working in any fashion. It actually worked beautifully the first day and then not again (we just finished week 3).
So I wrote up a flex schedule. There are certain things that happen at a certain time – mostly just those things that everyone is involved in. So at breakfast I read aloud our Bible, a lit book and we do verse memory. We do a short nature time around 9. And then an afternoon loop during snack (picture, music, hymn study, poetry, Shakespeare, etc).
Otherwise, each child has a list of subjects with an amount of time (CM time recommendations for their ages) and how many times a week. Math, individual Bible, typing/writing are done 5 days and have to be done each day. The rest can be done as they want, when they want as long as the allotted time is done at the end of the week.
We start it on Monday so we’ll see how it goes.
Our eldest graduated this past year and it just really made me realize how fleeting it all is. I don’t want to miss it! So I wanted a schedule that allowed us to move things easily so we can go to the park, take a fun day, get together with friends as well as fit in appointments (lots of medical stuff).
We generally do school in the mornings BUT our flexibility comes in with the medical appointments that abound in our family. We have 8 children and our 7th was born with many serious medical needs. Last week he had surgeries #13 and #14. He’s 2 years old. We’ve had nearly 200 appointments just for him in his 2.5 years of life. Surgeries have ranged all over his body with more than half being brain surgeries, then some spinal cord surgeries, and other areas. About the only spot he’s not had surgery on so far is his arms/hands.
All his medical appointments mean school is flexible – it may be done at home, at the hospital/doctor’s office, in the van (long drives to and from medical places), or it may simply mean that mom is gone and so the kids work independently or with dad or grandma overseeing.
We never set ‘finish this by a specific date’ goals, not too practical for us. We just homeschool year round and take time off when we need to.
I have a feeling that your kids are learning FAR MORE from loving on your 2-year-old than they could ever learn through a lifetime of reading, Tristan.
This discussion is so very timely! I have been pondering this issue all week. I had already decided we were going to do new lesson times of math and Latin on Saturday when Dad is home and can help too. That way during the week when he is at work it is practice time and morning time when and how I can make it work. I have a busy climbing one year old, then 3, 7,9,11 &12 year olds. They are fiercely independent unschooly learners so we don’t sit for traditional school times these days but fit in learning as we live our life. Bc on Tuesdays my husband usually works a 16 hour day I am deciding to try to see that day and Wednesday as he recovers but still goes to work -as not trying to accomplish too many goals as I get burned out otherwise. So doing schooly stuff Thursday Friday and Saturday and Monday and making Tuesday and Wednesday be more relaxed to accommodate Dad’s long hours.
It is so free-ing to think outside of the box and let our family be who we are with our schedule.
Great idea for discussion btw :-)
We don’t really have a super nontraditional schedule. The only thing that we do a bit differently is that I make Monday our short day. We only do a light Morning Meeting, math, language arts, and either art or nature study. Basically since my husband is a minister, Sunday is our busiest and most exhausting day of the week. He preaches two services, I teach a Bible class in the morning and run Children’s Church in the evenings. I tried for many years to do a full load on Monday, but we were all dragging. So a couple of years ago I started making Monday a nice and easy intro to the week by doing just the basics with no set time schedule. Most of the time we don’t even wake up until 9! Tuesday-Friday though we are pretty traditional.
Our family usually makes Monday our light day as well. You’re the first person I’ve heard who does the same!
This is a great topic to bring up right now. After Brandy’s post earlier in which she said there must be something wrong with the schedule that has a “don’t be my slave” warning, I’ve been seriously rethinking our “ideal” schedule. I would prefer to wake early , get to work, and be finished by noon. BUT. I also tend to sleep in, and attempts at working into an earlier wake time for me usually result in a Grouchy Mama Bear or burnout within a couple days. I’ve come to the conclusion: maybe I really need that extra sleep!
So. I think I’m going to throw my perfectly-adapted-PNEU-like-schedule into the “maybe some day” pile, and reconstruct something that will actually WORK, flowing from the natural rhythms already in place. I’m thinking of some kind of morning loop/afternoon loop that we just do when we get to that point in our day. I really like a more traditional schedule, but I’m in a season when I still have a toddler, preschooler, K’er, and my oldest in 2nd, so there are still a lot of demands from people who don’t school yet, so I think our start/stop times need to be very fluid at this point, and we just won’t get in the same amount of schoolwork each day. And that’s ok! (I keep telling myself it is, anyway.)
we also have light Monday’s. My boys are busy in team sports that usually involve significant Saturday travel because we live in rural Maine.
Sunday’s we travel again to Mass and Sunday School.
Monday is laundry day and house cleaning. The boys have chores spread throughout the day, as well as schoolwork. Their favorite subject is always the first workbook of the week, and is one they can be independent doing while I plug away at chores and lesson/meal/menu planning for the week. Then we fit it what else we can for schoolwork.
we always have a leisurely breakfast such as Pancakes that we don’t have time for over the weekend.
It helps me to have the housework under control by the end of the day so I can spend time sitting down with them during the rest of the week
when we follow this plan for Monday’s we finish the first day smiling :)
Also we don’t do every subject every day.
I categorized subjects last year, hands on, independent, needs Mom, individual, group activity, must do each day, traditional workbook etc
then I spread the workload out so that each day has a balance of each type. Before that I found that some days were very labor intensive for me and I was burnt out, it is better for us to have a mix of different things.
Also this year I am considering changing to a Jan-Dec school year. I grew up in New Zealand and that is how I had school. I always feel flustered in May/June that we should be finished, because in my brain the year is only half done.
I have a kinder and a first grader, so we don’t do much evening work for obvious reasons. And we try our hardest to make Saturdays devoted to spending time as a family and Sundays devoted to The Lord. But even while schooling on a M-F schedule we find time to let the flexibility of homeschooling be a benefit to us.
We like to go out during the day, for example, so we do our morning time and “three r’s” early and are finished by 9 or 9:30. We spend the rest of the morning in good weather at the park or hiking, or in winter at museums or sledding. We come back for lunch and a nap for the babies and spend another hour digging deep in history, other cultures, science ect on a rotation.
I’m lucky to have been homeschooling since day one, and to have had several years to study educational theory and different pedagogies before I started. I never felt pressure to make our day look like public school the way that my friends who first schooled publically for several years did. That can be a hard mind-set to break free from.
This is a nice reminder that everyone’s life is different. I teach part time at a local college, and I also have prep work and grading to do at home. That changes our day somewhat. Also, I’m not a morning person, but I’m working on shifting to more of a morning schedule. Typically, we start school in mid to late morning, eat lunch, then continue into early-mid afternoon. I don’t think it’s my ideal schedule, but we have stuck to it for our first two years. This year, I hope to shift us into an earlier start and end time.
My kids are not morning people! I get up early and clean a bit, do laundry, pray, tinker around on line, etc. We tend to work on academics from mid morning until lunch time. The early afternoon is quiet time to read, play on the computer, maybe finish up something academic, whatever. Later afternoon is time for activities, errands, hanging with friends. After dinner tends to lend itself to another couple of hours of academic work, mostly because my kids are older and take outside classes and so they do homework for those classes then. They often do some work over the weekends as well.
We have finished with 21 years of homeschooling, so I will share what worked best for us. We tried to be finished by noon, so with that ending time as our goal, we scheduled our start time. It’s a great way to make self-starters. To extend school throughout the day (which I would have loved to do!) frustrated our kids. So, I wrote out their schedules with the essentials needed, and they “plowed” through their part and we ended with our read-alouds, my part. It isn’t so much about our part and the timing of the school day. It seems to be allowing our kids to love learning(you can’t tell this by their faces), and not cram all those great ideas into them by age 18. Results: Our 30 year old continues to love to learn and is now homeschooling his own 2 boys. Our 28 year old continues to read widely and travel broadly in her music ministry. Our 21 year old lives in Europe and teaches at a Bible college there. Our 19 year old loves people, which is his “gift” he operates in daily. He will move to Europe for a few months to continue his school this fall. I am am amazed- I didn’t make this happen- really, it is all God’s grace and favor on them. Teach them to love God, and He will take care of the rest.
Marie,
I like your idea of starting with the ending time goal for scheduling your start time and letting that motivate your kids to plow through their work. That is something to consider. :)
What encouragement! I l-o-v-e hearing from moms who are looking back at their journey and are willing to share what worked and what didn’t. :)
My little guy is only 3, so no really schooling going on here. But I imagine our day to day will be flexible and run more on rhythm than schedule (as it is now). But, depending on where we live, we aren’t likely to do the ‘start in Aug/Sept’ and ‘end in May/June’. we currently live in central Texas, and I would be more interested in doing school Jan, Feb, and March, and then again in June, July, August — the months when its less nice to be outside. Of course, doing school outside would be okay, except for the chiggers. :P
That’s exactly what we do, Rachael! We start lessons in the less temperate {HOT!!!} months of the year, beginning in July, and essentially roll year-round, taking generous amounts of time off throughout the year. It has really allowed for a more restful pace overall for us! You’re definitely on to something there!
Since have our last baby we have had to be more flexible. He is almost two now, and still doesn’t always cooperate when the older ones and I try to do read aloud or other schoolwork so we tend to wait till he takes his nap and squeeze it all in. Sometimes I find that having one of the kids stay up with me when all the others are asleep helps have one on one time to get some work done. They love it too! Stay up with Mom? Yes, please! My husband has been on a 4 week work schedule and so we tend to only do school on the days he works and then have a family day on the other traditional day that we would have school. I love having the flexibility to do what works for us when it works for us!
Our schedule is fairly traditional as far as the school day goes. We start at 8am and go until 1pm. Where we differ is that we work for six weeks and then take a week off. This gives the kids something to look forward to and that week off gives me time to do an overview of the work they have done for the past six weeks. As we are able to talk about where we are in our syllabus at the end of each 6 weeks, we are all able to stay on schedule for the year much easier this way. And I don’t have to cram at the end of the school year. We take this schedule through the whole year. We try to plan our vacationing and small trips during the weeks off. We are flexible as things happen, but this is what we strive for. I have been homeschooling for 10 years now and have tried many different schedules and have found this one works best for us. I have a 10th grader, a 8th grader and a 6th grader. Thanks to all the others who comment. I love reading about what others are doing.
Hooray for 6-on-1-off! :) Sabbath schooling. We do this too, and so does Mystie!
Love that idea, Jamie! We do something similar – finish a term and take a week off between each term, but I love this idea of 6-on-1-off — Sabbath Schooling! A restful week mid-term. And it allows me to be more regularly attentive to shelves and schedule tweaks and home projects that take a bit more of my time! Thanks for sharing this!
We Sabbath School as well! I love it — it has totally changed our homeschool! The only difference is that in the spring I have what I call a “floating week.” Because I breed goats, I save my week off for kidding week…
I found great freedom last month when I realized that Circle Time {or Morning Time} just didn’t work for our family first thing in the morning. We have a very short devotion immediately following breakfast, a couple of catechism questions to answer, and a very familiar song. It lasts 5 minutes {five children ages 6 and under}. At lunchtime when my two youngest are napping and I only have my three oldest {ages 6, 5, 3} this is when we take the time to dig in deeper to our devotion, memorize our catechism, memorize Scripture, and we learn a new hymn or song, and reprise some other pieces. It works wonderfully well and was a very good learning curve for me to take note of how other people do certain aspects of their home school and then figure out how it is going to keep our home ebbing and flowing. What was most surprising is that we are consistent with our Circle Time now because the time and placement in our scheduled day was so crucial.
Read-aloud time (or circle time or morning time) doesn’t work well in the mornings for us either – at least not right now anyway. Generally, we try to do ours after lunch before quiet time.
We’re probably going to move our morning time to afternoons too, just as soon as the twins shift to taking one long afternoon nap on a regular basis (instead of the two shorter naps).
I have found it works best for us to divide “Morning Time” and “Circle Time” (I have very little children). “Morning Time” for us is truly first thing in the morning – before breakfast, before we are dressed. I need some time in the morning to just sit on the couch and drink my coffee, so that time ended up being when I read aloud from our current chapter book, and then we say morning prayers, review our Bible verses, read the life of a saint, learn a hymn, and read a chapter from Scripture. Then later, just before lunch, we have “Circle Time” which is especially geared toward the preschooler, but is also when we do our children’s catechism, fun songs, poetry, children’s Bible or saint stories, and some picture books. It really works well with our natural rhythm to divide it up this way. I think it will work as the children grow and we (hopefully) add more little ones, because “Morning Time” will serve the older children and “circle time” will stay in place for the little ones.
My husband works for our local school district, so our schedule follows the traditional hours of school. We do start a little earlier, have a nice long lunch and quiet-time break in the middle, and end a little earlier. But no after-school homework like all those poor little wee ones we see walking home!
We usually just do things in an order more than at a particular time. It ends up being somewhat traditional. My husband has a regular work schedule- he’s gone form about 8-5:30 every day. So we get up, bathe, get dressed, eat breakfast, do chores, then read aloud, then the nuts and bolts part of school: grammar, spelling, handwriting. Then the fun stuff- the content stuff. Reading time, history/timeline/geography, science. My husband is now doing math with the kids in the evening. It’s life of Fred, so I will actually hear them laughing out loud and having fun with math! *gasp* (I am going to try to love math and work in some of the math pretties ideas and the notebook ideas that others have posted in other comments on this blog. :) )
My problem right now is the rip-roaring social life offered by our homeschooling group. It’s possible to get way too involved around here. I am actually overwhelmed with it at the moment, and have a strong desire to move to outer Mongolia to have some quiet, as much as I love all these people. LOL!
Today we have 4 (!) sick kids. Lots of interruptions to our homeschool lately. I will have to cancel the playdate which was to be this afternoon. I think I will just do read-alouds today- Horse and His Boy, a book about Albert Einstein, and one about early explorers. :) And it’s Fine Art Friday, so we’ll watch a Shakespeare film today. Those are the best parts anyway. And someone wanted to learn how to make our own paper, maybe we’ll do that once everyone feels better.
The rip-roaring social life of homeschoolers. I love it. :)
I try for a traditional schedule, which I feel is non traditional in the homeschool area where I am. My husband gets up quite early for work and is usually home by 3 pm so if we don’t start early we won’t be done by the time he comes home. It helps that I am generally a morning person so I force my kids to be also…..I know, I know mean mom! We are outdoorsy/crafty people and that happens in the late afternoon/ evenings. Plus if we aren’t done before DH gets home it just won’t get done. He did second shift for about 4 months and I thought we could do school in the afternoon but it just didn’t happen…maybe I am just a slacker. :0P
We have a very traditional school schedule while remaining flexible and realizing that life is education. For example, I consider involvement in certain activities that take place outside of school hours, such as ministry work, time in nature, and ballet classes, to be just as important as book learning. In addition, we read aloud at the dinner table, and I have my girls read silently or Dad reads aloud at bedtime. I have always wanted my children to view reading as a part of life, not just a school thing. We also discuss all sorts of issues all of the time, especially at the dinner table. I also realize that relationships are of the utmost importance in education , and I do my best to resist my nature of just wanting to check items off my list. Guarding the relationships and valuing them more than sticking to the schedule and getting things done is vital.
Our first ever truly official day of homeschool is on Monday, so I don’t have a lot of wisdom from experience yet, but I do feel immense freedom and peace. Please let me tell all of you Schole Sisters how grateful I am for setting me up for success in teaching from rest, freedom, grace and poetic knowledge. All of the reading/listening you have supplied me with this summer has been just what I needed to start my homeschooling career on the right foot. Cindy Rollins is right that she is leaving this little blog-niche in the right hands! Thank you so much!
Well, this comment made my whole weekend. :)
I work part-time outside the home. This coming semester my older son will be taking one or two courses at a university 20 miles away. He is too young to drive. So, my younger son and I plan to “do school” in a park and library near campus those two mornings each week.
Flexibility with scheduling is important for us. We have a general school schedule which is doing school work in the morning/early afternoon hours. However, because of my husband’s varied working hours, we have to be flexible with that schedule. That means sometimes we might do school later in the afternoon/early evening. Also, with my oldest daughter (who is high school age), when we need to discuss school work, we often do that either during the afternoon quiet time for my youngest daughter or after she goes to bed at night.
I’m thinking we may start doing more of our school in the early afternoon here, too, because once all the babies transition to having the same naptime, that will be prime time for reading aloud and such.