This post contains affiliate links. By clicking on the link and making a purchase, I may receive a small compensation at no extra cost to you. I only promote products that we love and use in our homeschool. Please click here for full details on my Disclosure Policy.
From the start, we have homeschooled year-round. I didn’t think much of it. It just came naturally. When my kids were little, we did preschool activities all year. So when I began homeschooling, we kept on learning all year. I never put much thought into HOW to homeschool year-round; we just did it.
Maybe it was from my years as a teacher and teaching summer school. Perhaps it was because the preschool curriculum we used (Itty-Bitty Bookworm was the best!) was year-round. However, I quickly realized that there were many benefits to homeschooling year-round.
I know many people will say, “let kids be kids and have the summer off.” But, again, I’d argue there are a lot of benefits to homeschooling year-round (there is summer school for a reason).
Need some convincing?
Read about the benefits HERE.
But if you are interested, which I think you are since you are here, let me help you learn how to homeschool year-round. It is super easy and a lot of fun!
Table of Contents
- How to Homeschool Year-Round
- How to Plan a Flexible Year-Round Homeschool Schedule
- Putting it all Together
- Your Schedule Will Look Different than Others
- How to Homeschool Year-Round is Up to You
How to Homeschool Year-Round
When you homeschool year-round, you have SO much flexibility for your family. After all, most curriculum is based on 30-36 weeks of school.
You have so many options when you have 52 weeks to spread work over.
Different Ways on How to Homeschool Year-Round
- Some families will spread their schoolwork over the entire year but homeschool 4-days a week. You can split up your work over a longer period but shorter school weeks when you homeschool all year.
2. Other families take the Trimester Approach. Divide your year AND subjects into three trimesters. This allows you to fit in specific electives and subjects in the year but not all at one time.
For example, you might schedule outdoor science units or travel to historical sites for history studies in the summer. You might also squeeze in simple activities like handwriting practice, health, physical education, etc.
When dividing up your trimesters, make sure to consider how many vacations you want to take throughout the year. It will help you divide up your trimesters evenly.
3. Another way to homeschool year-round is to work six weeks and take a week off. It is just like it sounds. You plan out your homeschool for six weeks and then take a week’s vacation at the end.
4. The way we homeschool year-round is more of a flexible/relaxed approach. We kind of go with the flow. As a result, our summers are more relaxed, and our days are not as long as during the traditional school year. I’ll discuss more details below.
How to Plan a Flexible Year-Round Homeschool Schedule
I have had a flexible and relaxed homeschool summer schedule for the past seven years. We homeschool three or four days a week and only cover a few subjects.
Since we homeschool year-round, we do the bulk of our core subjects during the fall and spring semesters, and the summers vary on what we cover.
To make sure the kids don’t have summer slide, the kids always work on reading, writing, and math. Those are areas kids tend to regress in over long breaks. However, the kids usually have free choice on what they read and write. I also include many math review games like Baggin’ the Dragon or Prodigy (free version).
The rest of our subjects vary. Sometimes we don’t finish science and history by June, so we continue it over the summer.
Other years, we chose to work on a fun project together. This year we will work on Maine Studies (a state requirement) together. We’ll visit places around our state and study state government and history.
However, getting in those extra days in the summer means we have more flexibility with our schedule during the year. We can take days off whenever we need a break.
You know when you had a busy weekend, and everyone is exhausted Monday morning. Or you get invited to a fun day with friends, have a full day of appointments, or the whole family comes down with some illness. You have the time.
Now, don’t get me wrong. We like taking time off in the summer too. Sometimes we take the whole month of June off or a week or two in July.
So, in the end, we homeschool three mornings a week and take the rest of the day (and week) to enjoy the summer.
Putting it all Together
So, you’ve learned a few ways to go about homeschooling year-round. Now it is time to make your schedule.
First, you need to determine your goal of homeschooling all year.
- Do you want more flexibility in your school calendar? (Work a few days a week in the summer)
- Do you want to break up your subjects and rotate them throughout the year? (Trimester or quarter approach)
- Maybe you want short blocks of schooling and frequent breaks. (6 weeks on, 1 week off)
- Or are you looking to have shorter weeks? (4-day-a-week schedule)
Once you understand your goal, you can schedule out your year.
So, your next step is scheduling things out.
- Take out your calendar and cross off the holidays and vacations you know you will take. This way, you can get an accurate picture of how many school days you potentially have and how much wiggle room you have during the year. Remember to make sure you are meeting your state’s requirements. Here in Maine, we are required to homeschool 175 days a year.
2. Get your curriculum. Figure out how many weeks each program will take to complete. Now count this out on your calendar. This will help you plan your year.
It will help you decide if a 4-day-a-week schedule will work for you. Also, you can see if it will only take two trimesters to complete something freeing up the third. In my case, it tells me how many breaks we can take and if we will continue some subjects into the summer.
3. Start mapping out your school year. For example, if you work 6 weeks and take one week off, what subjects will you cover. You can also decide what subjects or topics you will study in the fall, spring, or summer.
Or you can do like me and go with the flow. I pick our subjects for the year, map out tentatively how long it will take us to finish each, and see how many days we can take off during the year and get things accomplished when I want to.
Your Schedule Will Look Different than Others
I’ve learned over the years that how you homeschool will look different from anybody else. The same is true with year-round homeschooling. I can give you some pointers on how to homeschool year-round, but your year will look different than mine.
That’s okay. It should.
Another thing I learned is that schooling year-round may change from year to year. It will depend on how many kids you have, their ages, life circumstances, etc. That’s the beauty of homeschooling!
How to Homeschool Year-Round is Up to You
So, if you decide to homeschool year-round, remember you have the freedom to make the schedule that will work best for your family. First, determine your goal in schooling all year and then go from there.
We love year-round schooling, and I’m sure you will, too!
