This year I’ve really done 3 on and 1 off. We finished the first two terms and it’s worked very well. Next week begins our last term of 12 weeks.
During our off week, we finish any straggling assignments from the previous 3 weeks, but this is usually a minimal amount of work. Reading always continues, but not assigned reading. We use our off week for travel, field trips, hair cuts, zoo visits, shoe shopping, deep cleaning and organizing, you name it. Any project or idea that requires more time than I can give it during school gets pushed to our off week. By having an off week every month, it means none of those BIG projects have to wait too long. It works for us and I intend to continue it until it doesn’t work.
I also lead a CM co-op and we adopted the same schedule of 3 on/1 off. It’s been terrific for us. I also take 2-3 weeks at Christmas, 2 weeks for Spring Break and 2-4 weeks for Summer break (not all at once.)
HTH,
Christie