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Do you homeschool differently in December?
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I suppose the title to this post could be “Do you homeschool differently over the holidays?” I’m specifically focusing on December at my house because the rest of November is our baby break as we enjoy and adjust to having Tobias here. We did school from July-October, knowing baby was coming, so this break is a good fit. However I do not want to stay on a complete break for all of December. At the same time, I don’t want to jump into a full schedule until January.
Hence the question!
In the past we’ve done regular full school work until close to Christmas, we’ve had years where we did “Christmas School” with special focuses (ex: Handel’s Hallelujiah for composer, art focusing on Christ, reading the four gospels together along with history studies of the time period, dropping science for winter nature study, etc). We’ve also started dropping subjects each week of Dec. as we finish ‘half’ of the planned work for the year, so when we are halfway through the math book we drop math, when we are halfway through the science plans we drop science, and so on, ending up with a lighter and lighter schedule the closer we come to Christmas and New Years.
This year I don’t know what we’re going to do! I’ve got a few tentative ideas (for example I know we’ll be reading aloud A Christmas Carol and that the kids need to spend December practicing the math concepts they’ve learned up to now a few days a week so they’re ready to move into new lessons come January.). Beyond those I don’t know what we’ll end up choosing to do for December.
I always feel guilty when I drop subjects for December – it actually makes me grumpier because I keep thinking about how we’ll have to double up come January to get back on track…….I know I’m not supposed to feel that way, but my “type-A-check-off-the-list-do-it-perfectly” personality is my worst enemy come holiday time.
Usually, we just end up taking off whole days – not doing anything for days at a time. And I still end up grumpy and pushy for the month of January……perhaps I need help! 😉 (as in “hi, my name is Karen, and I can’t stop homeschooling or thinking about school and what we OUGHT to be doing.”)
We’ve done some special unit studies (for lack of a better name for it) around Christmas. Here are some we’ve done:
- Jesse Tree–we made ornaments and read the Bible stories from their Children’s Bible (I did this when my oldest were young)
- Tomie Dapaola unit study that I found online
- Christmas Around the World with Reader’s Digest books
- Jotham’s Journey or other in the series
- Christmas picture book a day (sometimes with a craft or activity)
I try to keep up with 3Rs…I think this year we’ll be keeping up with all our subjects so we don’t get too far behind. I am planning on another Christmas book…probably one of Charles Dickens’ other stories (Chimes or Cricket on the Hearth). We’ll also add in our usual Christmas picture books.
As a family, we have Advent devotions (and light an Advent wreath). We are studying Handel this term, so that should fit in nicely. We’ll have a Christmas/Advent hymn and folksong for December as well. I’m thinking of having the kids make some of their paper sloyd projects for grandparent gifts. I also try to bake cookies…each child makes a batch with me. This works great to prevent so much chaos in the kitchen (compared to when they all help), and it gives us some one-on-one time.
I no longer like to drop all our other subjects. My DH is a pastor, and I’ve found it’s best to keep the kids busy when he’s constantly writing sermons for Christmas and Advent. lol Although we usually have to take time off for cleaning the house closer to Christmas.
We don’t really change anything. We have no family in the area and generally spend the holidays, just our family, at home. My DH only gets Christmas day off this year, so we will likely just continue to “plug along” with school.
Some years we have taken 2 weeks off around Christmas, but I find, the kids and I like the routine so we just keep going with school 🙂
We school on the calendar year, so I like to finish early in the month, so that we can have a 3 week end of year/Christmas break. Of course I do plan for the next year, especially the first term, during those weeks. We like to get out and enjoy Christmas activities.
In future years it is possible that our schedule will have us travelling earlier in the year and we may need most of December to finish up the term (or I could run over into January).
In that case I would do our regular school until close to the 20th and then take a week off. I could make adjustments to some lessons to make them Christmas-y.We change things around for Dec. Sometimes, the kids do holiday themed worksheets that I print off. Sometimes, we just do less of our regular work and stay busy with holiday activities.
We like to celebrate Hanukkah and Christmas. For Christmas, we do an advent calendar that has an activity for each day. Some are fun things like watching a movie and drinking hot chocolate, some are Christmassy crafts, some are “good deeds” (like buying a toy for Toys for Tots or hot chocolate for a Salvation Army bell ringer). So, we stay plenty busy.
I think that this year, I’ll have them do one or two of the 3 R’s each day and make lots of room for the fun activities.
Thank you for the replies so far ladies! It is neat to see how we each use the time. I sat down with the kids’ books and figured out where each one was in the year of work we ‘plan’ to do (especially my high schooler – crazy that I have one of those this year!). Then I looked at how many weeks we have from Jan-May. We’re pretty much right where I hoped we would be, the only thing that is not as far as I had hoped is oldest’s Biology (which she hates…because it began with microscopic and is working it’s way to more complex organisms and she would rather skip all the small stuff… but we’re almost out of that now).
So my plan for December is to spend time reviewing math concepts, read aloud A Christmas Carol, and do science (biology with the high schooler and God’s Design: The Human Body for the 5th and under crowd). The kids will finish their current independent literature book. My learning to read child will work for 10 minutes most days on reading with me.
That’s it! Then we will start fresh come January with a full schedule again.
Last year, we took off the whole holiday season-from Thanksgiving through New Years. It was too long a break. This year we are taking off the week after Thanksgiving to start the Christmas season with a bang. We are going to put up the Christmas tree and decorations, bake some goodies and freeze some for later, make ornaments and read a Christmas book. Then we will start school again and take off again starting the week of Christmas through New Years. I’ve found we enjoy short, frequent breaks over longer, fewer breaks.
We slow down and focus more on the holidays. We don’t take a long break, and we are already pretty relaxed, so we’ll spend more time snuggled up and reading, more time baking, and more time playing in the snow together. We continue with everything else, but lightly.
Alright, this thread has had me thinking hard today. So, if I’m always grumpy because I’m feeling like there’s so much school to do and too much other stuff (Cmas caroling, pie-baking @ church, etc.) to do, I need to change my definition of a “full day” of school.
So, I plan to require 4 days of math per week (our week is 5 days – which don’t all occur within the same calendar week, if that makes sense), 1/2 of their regular lang. arts, 1/2 of our history and sciences, and all their independent reading and only ask for verbal narrations.
That should lessen my load quite a bit, lessen their load some, but still retain some structure for our days.
And now I’m wondering about this: when we come back to a full schedule in Jan., shall I worry about trying to get “caught up” in history and science?
I know the answer – caught up? There is no such thing when you homeschool – you are where you are. It doesn’t matter!
But my type A, compulsive list-checker side needs some reassurance that it is okay to not finish the books!!
LOL! Yes, it is okay not to finish the books. Or to keep going with a book past the ‘end’ of the school year if you want to.
A question – what history and science are you using?
For us, for example, we are using God’s Design for Science with my 5th grade and under crowd (the 9th grader is doing Apologia Biology). While we planned to do all 3 green life science books, each with around 40 lessons if I remember right, we can skip some lessons if the topic just doesn’t interest us. We’re about to being the human body book. My kids know insane amounts about the skeletal and nervous system thanks to Mason having medical issues with spine, spinal cord, brain, and bones. So we will probably skip those lessons.
I guess what I’m trying to explain is that YOU are the master of the curriculum. Just because the writer put 15 chapters of information in a text doesn’t mean you have to study all 15. Maybe you are only interested in 8 or 10 of them. You’re the boss!
Boss-girl! Oh, yeah! ?
We’re using AIG science, also. We’re doing the blue set this year. We’re doing the final exam of the Weather and Water book today. (together, as a group – not at all as a true final exam)
For history, we use SCM’s module 4……I’ve been adding and deleting things based on some Your Story Hour stories we have and some other people that my girls are very familiar with. I do love how the module is planned out – but it does cause some mental anguish when I change it up……I guess it’s just a “me” thing that I need to grow out of!?
Thank you for the encouragement!
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