School 4 Days a week - thread please?

[honeymomma4]

hi!
I know i've seen it somewhere on here. Suggestions for doing a 4-day school week. Which day do you double up - is there one that is lighter? We are using a combo of LHTH, LHFHG and BLHFHG

but mostly the middle one. I'd love to get Fridays off. Usually we just did 4 days then the 5th on the following day. I "can" school year round just don't know if I will have it in me this year. due with baby at the beginning of spring.

thanks!

[4arrows]

I would also LOVE to find out how others have done this successfully. We also are expecting our 5th baby in spring. I have never done a 4 day week and am a little nervous to try it...seems like a 3 day week-end could cause a loss of information ?:) I was thinking of taking Fridays off too as we do an afternoon co-op that day. Has anyone experienced a problem with splitting up the units between two weeks? We are doing Beyond and CTC, the latter already being scheduled as a 4 day unit would be no problem. But what about Beyond??? The units would always be split up over two weeks with a 3 day lapse between them...I saw Carrie recommending this to someone on another post recently and that she has had success with it. Hopefully Carrie will give us some wisdom here
Thanks so much!
Elizabeth

[krismoose]

We've had success just continuing on with the next day of the unit after the day(s) off, without doubling up or skipping anything. I like to have our "day off" on Wed or Thurs, because it just seems to work better around here, but Friday off worked as well. If we have 3 days off in the middle of a unit I will just review for a moment before continuing the history or storytime reading, so we (myself included) can all remember what was happening when we left off.

[Robbi]

I don't have a lot of experience since we just started after Labor Day. We are doing Beyond only 4 days a week with Fridays off. It has not been a problem at all. I have not combined anything, I just continue on the next day. So, for example, this week we did unit 2, day 5 on Monday. And then went to unit 3, day 1 on tues. It worked fine. It was nice on Monday to have the familiar song & verse. And then getting a new one on tues was no problem either. Doing this will add 9 weeks to the guide. I decided I was ok with that becuz we are using Beyond for 1st grade. I think steady progress is the key, they will all get there!!!! hope this helps some.

[Daph]

We've been doing the same with Bigger: we just skip a day and continue on the next. I think the content that's in HOD is perfect for one school day. If I combine, or skip anything, I'll be adding too much or missing too much. I'm having a problem with the thought of being 9 weeks over, though. I need to let that go. LOL For those of you who are doing it this way, do you ever "catch up"? I'm guessing not. I need to let this go.

[twoxcell]

I'm doing Little Hearts and soon Beyond 4 days a week with my dd to slow her down a bit. She is 5 will be 6 on Oct. 31st and should be starting Beyond the second week of Oct. For her I simply just do four days of her guide a week, and on Thurs. we have co-op so I just do her phonics and some math with her in the morning before co-op. My ds is doing Bigger 5 days a week though, and I do LHTH with my 3 year old 3-4 days a week.

[pjdobro]

We are loving the 4 day week in Preparing this year. I think if I had it all to do over again, I would just chill out and do a 4 day week with all the previous guides as well. It took me a while to accept being on a different day of the week than in the guide, i.e. doing day 2 on a Friday, but I finally let go of that last year and just enjoyed the year. If we didn't finish up the unit on Friday, it was ok. We just started where we left off the next week. It really is freeing when you can let go of the idea that day 1 has to be Monday and you have to finish a unit in the same week that you start it. LHFHG, Beyond, and Bigger are such wonderful guides and really should be savored not rushed through, and it really doesn't matter if it takes 3 years or 4 to make it through all 3 of these guides. So if I were starting over, I would slow down to a 4 day week stretching those guides out the additional 9 weeks and just enjoy the ride.

[4arrows]

Thanks everyone for sharing your experiences...I would like to try doing 4 days/week...little nervous though to take the plunge Praying about it
Elizabeth
using CTC and Beyond

[Daph]

Thank you, Patty, for those words of wisdom. It's always nice to get affirmation from another homeschool mom. It's like I need someone to tell me, "This is ok." xD

[tnahid]

What I have decided to do at this time is to do the left side of Bigger on Fridays as well as the Storytime and Science portions, and that is all the formal stuff we are doing. We are not doing LA or any of the other lessons. We will be schooling year round doing LA and Math, so I am thinking that it will work out better. The rest of our day is going to be open for field trips, cleaning, playing games, etc... I like that because mostly the Fridays in Bigger are notebooking, timeline, and a Bible discussion, reveiwing the poem and narrating the storytime book. It still keeps the children on a certain type of schedule but is more relaxed than other days.

This is my plan so far! Just a thought for you to consider... P.S. My math and LA never line up with the days suggested because we use different curriculums, but even last year when we used the recommended curriculums, we were never on the right day with it. And it was totally fine!