Summer School?

I am often asked if we do school year round. I usually respond with "sort of". We are certainly not as structured and are not strict about getting all our subject in but we do some school like work on days we don't have activities planned. I don't want them begging for screen time all day long. So after our usual scripture start of the day they practice piano, do a page or two of their cursive book, an assignment of Math, read two chapters of a book that I assigned them and then tell me about those two chapters. They also have their normal chores and such as well. So I make them earn screen time if they can complete those things each day. They often don't finish it all so don't get Wii or movies every day. Often they just want to play outside most of the day and I think that is great! But more often than not they do those things so they can have a little time on the computer.


Today we started a new read aloud book. I usually read a fairy tale or story from the book of virtues after our family scripture reading but instead I picked What would the Founding Fathers think?. Since it is so close to the 4th of July I figured it would be a good choice.  I read Courtney's review of the book a few weeks ago and knew I needed to buy this one for my kids. It also helped that I know the author's family. We made it through about a third of the book today and will work through it a bit each day. So far my kids have really loved it but it is the kind of book I don't want to rush through. There are a lot of things to discuss as we go!

So no we don't actually do school during the summer but in order to avoided the dreaded "I'm bored" or "There is nothing to do" I make my kids do a little work in order to earn privileges like computer, wii or movies. It fills our day nicely and if all those things don't get done everyday I don't stress. School will start again in August when we will get a little more serious and dedicated to our studies.

For now this is what is working for me.