School Schedule

Well, I did it. I finally did it. I mapped out our school year with breaks and all! I used this calendar creator to make monthly calendars and I figured out how to get all 36 weeks in.

What I've decided about school: We'll do language arts (reading, grammar, spelling, writing), math and Gospel Study five days a week. Maybe more, he sometimes asks to do school on Saturdays. Who knows. We'll do all other subjects two days a week: science-M, W, geography-T, TH. If I ever get around to adding in art, music and French, those will be two days a week too.

Weeks with holidays, I'm just going to take off the entire week before hand. I never get around to doing fun and creative and memorable stuff leading up to holidays. I'm hoping that if I schedule an entire week off, we can get around to making cards and crafts and cookies and I won't feel guilty about not getting to math. We'll also school year round so there won't be a long period of time for him to forget things.

On Fridays, we'll have to take Corey to work so we can have to car to go to park days. We've missed the last couple due to illness, lack of sleep, and Corey forgetting to wake me up. Since we'll be doing a partial day of school on Fridays and since playing at the park ought to count toward PE AND socialization (I mean for pity's sake! If people are gonna whine about homeschoolers not being socialized, then they can't complain when we count "socialization time" as part of school. If you could see me right now, I'm rolling my eyes big time. Rant over) I'm counting it as the fifth day of the week. So I technically only need 36 weeks of school (just a reminder, Pigby isn't old enough for me to report him to the school district yet; this is all strictly for practice for when he is.)

So school starts August 22. We'll go a full four weeks and then take a break September 19-23+weekends. I know we're skipping over Labor Day, but we'll live. Then we'll start again Sept 26 and go another four weeks. This year Halloween is on a Monday, so our break is the entire week before that (Oct 24-28+weekends). I am planning on doing arts and crafts and fun stuff the week before and doing school on Halloween and going Trick or Treating at night. If we end up skipping school for other fun things, I won't cry too much. But Halloween is my second favorite holiday of the year. It will be appropriately observed.

So then we go Oct 31 for three weeks and take the entire week of Thanksgiving off (Nov 21-25). That will give me plenty of time to clean and prepare and cook and let us do some fun things. Then we start on the 28th for another 3 weeks and take the entire week before and week after Christmas off. I was just going to keep it to a two week break, but Pigby's birthday is exactly two weeks after Christmas and I really wanted to give him a real birthday party last year, but was so big and pregnant I didn't. I really want to make sure he gets one this year, so I am taking off the entire week before his birthday as well. So there's a three week break from Dec 17-Jan 8. That's a longer break than I wanted, but it is such a busy and stressful time of year, I want it to be nice and relaxing. I love Christmas, I want to start making some good memories this year.

So then we'll start on Jan 9 and go two weeks with our break starting Jan 23. I did this so we could take the entire week of Valentine's off, but if we went straight through from Christmas to Valentine's without a break we'd be going 5 weeks. That's pushing it for me. I have a feeling I'd slack off somewhere in there and all my best laid plans, well you know what would happen.

So then we take off from Feb 13-17 and start back on the 20th and go for three weeks. I'm easing back into the routine after Christmas (2 weeks, break, 3 weeks, break) because the February doldrums are very real and it is hard to motivate yourself and get school done. At least according to all the experts on WTM. So we'll have a break from Mar 12-16 and can do some fun St. Patrick's day things. Then we go 2 weeks and have a break from April 2-6, the week before Easter. Then four weeks with a break off before Mother's Day. That way I can hopefully get around to having the kids make Mother's Day cards for grandparents. Four more weeks of school with a break before Father's Day for the same reason.

Then two weeks with a break the first week of July. Then four weeks and we're done with the "year" on Aug 3. That actually gives me 37 weeks, so we can take off some time for sick days if we need to.

During all those breaks, I'm going to have to plan for the next year and order curriculum and all. On the calendars, I plan on marking down the days we actually do school. Maybe if I'm a super star I'll mark down the number of hours too. But I won't hold my breath on that one. I just need to make sure at the absolute minimum that I can do 180 days.

I'm getting kinda nervous/anxious now that I'm down to the final year of "practice" before the real deal. The final year of practice means the real deal is almost here. The real deal means that his education to be 100% on my shoulders. It's a big responsibility. And I haven't yet managed to find the balance between homeschooling, cleaning, cooking, and taking care of the other kids. It's hard. It's considered the equivalent of a part time job. So much to do and so much pressure from the world to be perfect. I'm trying to remember that getting something done is better than getting nothing done, even if it's not perfect. We'll see how it goes.