Like I said yesterday, I’m changing the schedule/routine around here. One of my favorite homeschooling how-to books is The Well-Trained Mind by Susan Wise Bauer. Homeschool long enough and you are bound to cross paths with it; it’s a popluar resource for classical home education.

Since I’m a plotter and a schemer, the chapter regarding yearly schedules caught my attention. If you have TWTM on your bookshelf, I’m talking about page 637, “Option 3.” This plan has schooling breaks at the holidays and when your children are most likely getting antsy.

This is the schedule:

School: September through October
Break: Week off
School: Late October until Thanksgiving
Break: Week off
School: Early December
Break: Three weeks off for Christmas and New Year’s
School: Mid-January until late February or early March
Break: Two weeks
School: March, April
Break: Two weeks off
School: Late April, May, on through summer
Breaks: Anytime during the summer, whenever you’re vacationing

I think this approach makes a lot of sense and I like the idea of having weeks off at a time. I’m also a believer in schooling over the summer; I think much is lost from a young mind if it is left to vacation away from the books too long.

If any of you have done Bauer’s plan, I’d love to hear your experiences. On the breaks I plan on doing all that fun stuff that tends to get overlooked.

All for now – babe is sleeping, big kids are ready for a hot chocolate break, and I think I’ll have some coffee.

UPDATE: Political blogger La Shawn Barber likes the flexiblilty we homeschoolers have too.