Homeschool Schedules and Routines: Part 1

I am breaking Homeschool Schedules and Routines down into two different posts. In part 1, I will be addressing six different methods for planning your school year and how to set up a big picture plan. In part 2, I will discuss creating a scope and sequence along with a few methods of planning out your weekly and daily schedules and routines. We will cover fitting your school routine into your life routine more in Post #12: Balancing Work, Life, and Homeschool.

In our state, homeschoolers are required to complete 180 days of schooling consisting of 4 hours. Most states require a similar number of days (or a set number of equivalent hours). There is not a requirement on when you do all of your school days.

Below, I will discuss a few different methods of planning your homeschool year. Keep in mind that it is possible to create a schedule that combines scheduling types. For example, you may year-round school and use the weeks on/weeks off method.

Public School Calendar Method

Many families choose to follow the calendar set by the public school system. This system is by far the easiest to implement. Simply find your local school district’s calendar and print it off. Each day that children are in school, use that as a school day. Take your breaks when students are out of schools.

This method works great if you have other activities centered around the public school system and would like for your breaks to line up. Many churches, co-ops, tutorials, and clubs use the public school calendar.

For similar reasoning, the public school calendar method also works well if one parent works for the school system or if you are homeschooling one child while another attends public schools.

By not using the public school calendar as your homeschool calendar, you can schedule vacations, appointments, or park visits for days when most schools are in session. This usually means that you have lower crowds on those days!

Year Round Schooling

Year-round schooling is becoming a more popular homeschool schedule. Year round schooling does not mean that you school all the time. It simply means that your schedule extends a few weeks beyond the typical August to May schedule.

Using the year-round method allows you to the flexibility to do four day school weeks. Just for reference, for a 180 day school year, a 4 day school week plan requires 45 weeks (as opposed to 36 weeks in a 5-day school week plan). This still allows you 7 week per year to take off of school. Many families choose to do 4-day school weeks to accommodate one parent’s work schedules. For example, if Dad works Monday-Thursday, the family does school on those days so that they can spend more time with him on his days off.

You could also do 5-day school weeks using this schedule and have 16 weeks off throughout the year.

Our family uses a modified version of year-round schooling. I start our school year during the first week of July and we get in a lot of days while it is too hot to play outside. Then we take off a lot of Fridays in the fall and Spring when all we want to do is play outside. We also have an extended Christmas vacation. We typically finish our school year between the first and middle of May and get a 6 week Summer vacation.

With year-round schooling, you should note when your school district would like you to turn in your school attendance. Our state mandates that for attendance purposes, the school year runs from July 1, 2020- June 30, 2021. However, our district requests that attendance be turned in by May 31st, so I technically cannot count any school days in June.

Calendar Year Schooling

Calendar-year schooling simply means that you start your new school year in January instead of August.

This plan can be tricky if you live in a state where you must turn in attendance. Our state mandates that for attendance purposes, the school year runs from July 1, 2020- June 30, 2021. That means that if I were calendar schooling and completing second grade between January and December 2020 and third grade between January and December 2021, my school year dates would not line up with the state attendance dates.

Because of these differences in record keeping, this method may not be as easy to implement. Of course, you could always print off the calendar in July and just mark each day as you go. Continue on the same form even after you start your new school year in January and turn in the form once you have completed 180 days.

With calendar-year schooling, you should also note when your school district would like you to turn in your school attendance. Our district requests that attendance be turned in by May 31st, so I technically cannot count any school days in June.

Weeks On/Weeks Off Method

The "weeks on/weeks off" method, also known as the Sabbath method, is pretty simple. You decide on a number of weeks that you would like to do school and the number of weeks that you would like to take breaks and alternate between these "weeks on" and "weeks off".

For example, in a 6/1 schedule, you would do school 5 days per week for six weeks followed by a one-week break. You would repeat this cycle six times for a 180 day school year. In a. 9/2 schedule, you would do school in four 9-week terms with 2-week breaks in between each term.

This plan works well for the mom that needs week-long breaks throughout the year. You can be laser focused on school for several weeks and then have a week or two to focus your priorities on other things. If you utilize this method, you may want to consider only scheduling appointments, playdates, and other events during your off weeks so that they do not interfere with your ability to do school.

The Monthly Goal Method

The monthly goal method is a very lax method of scheduling your homeschool year and it is the method I personally use. Count the number of months that you would like to homeschool (usually 9-11). Then divide the required number of homeschool days by the number of months you will complete them in. Each month, set a goal of doing that number of days per month.

For example: My family enjoys doing school from the first of July through the end of April with a full month off in December. That totals 9 months. Our state requires 180 days. 180/9=20. I print our attendance calendar and write the words “Goal: 20” next to July, “Goal: 40” next to August, “Goal: 60” next to September, etc.

If you reach your goal by the end of the month, you could take a few extra break days. If you can get ahead of your goal, you could give yourself a break the following month.

This method works well for people that do not like having a rigid plan. This plan has allowed my family to take lots of unplanned weekend trips, say yes to last minute events, and take unexpected sick days without feeling like we are skipping school.

Fly By the Seat of Your Pants Scheduling

I am not really sure that I should call this a scheduling method. But a lot of people probably do this. The fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants scheduling method means you do not really schedule. You print out the attendance form at the beginning of the year. Jot down when you do a school day and turn in the form when you complete it.

Creating Your Big Picture Plan

Now that you have chosen the form of homeschool scheduling that will work best for your family, it is time to plan out your big picture.

If you are using the public school calendar method, print out the public school calendar and use it as your guide. You are done.

For everyone else, grab a year at a glance calendar and two different colored highlighters (for this example, I will assume that you grabbed a pink and yellow highlighter).

Using your pink highlighter, mark off any planned vacations, events, or any other days that you know you cannot do school. You may want to highlight holidays, birthdays, days your spouse has off from work, and weekends if you know your family will not want to do school on those days.

Keep in mind that field trips can count as school days and you can learn about a holiday as part of school. We have also done school while on vacation because the beach was an excellent place for nature studies and science class when we were studying biology!

After you have your off days scheduled, go through with your yellow highlighter and mark days that you plan to do school. This should total up to at least the number of school days required in your state.

Now that you have your big picture plan, you can start creating more detailed homeschool plans!