How to Wrap up and Let go of your Homeschool Year

As summer approaches, it’s time to slow down, wrap up, and let go of your homeschool year. Scheduling the last day of your homeschool year takes grace and kindness – to yourself and your students. Recognize the importance of rest as well as celebrating milestones and accomplishments.

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Catholic Schoolhouse homeschooling difference

The Catholic Schoolhouse Program is designed for accountability, providing gentle boundaries to keep you moving forward.

No rigid schedules, just thoughtful guidelines.

• A typical 180-day school year has four nine-week quarters.
• Each quarter of the Catholic School Program contains just 6 weeks of memory work.

This difference in length of quarters allows breathing room for your family and encourages teacher creativity. You can deep dive and explore topics your family enjoys while still having a framework to keep you moving forward through your homeschooling plans.

It’s important to take time to be thoughtful and purposeful with your homeschool planning including times of rest. Remember, it’s about creating moments of joyful learning for your homeschooling students. Each quarter, Catholic Schoolhouse allows you to determine what is essential and what you can drop for now.

Make time for rest

Schools do the same thing. They miss days–for weather, for large programs, for mental health when the teacher says, these kids need a movie. Yet, every year, one grade ends, to make room for rest.

We are blessed that we are immersed in the love of learning–that we don’t just do school, we LIVE learning. Yet, our students get tired.

• Your students have been on for nine long months.
• Your students will benefit from being off. 
• Brain science demonstrates that time off–daydreaming, staring at the clouds–is when short-term memories are physically transferred to long-term memories.

Define and set your last day of school

We encourage you to set your last day. Give yourself some buffers if needed, but set that day.

You say, but I told them they were done when they finished this list or that list. They were irresponsible, and now they must learn consequences. . . well, I’ll bet the very child you are thinking about right now has had smaller consequences all year–and it hasn’t worked all that well or you wouldn’t be in this situation.

Well-run companies give ample vacation days. Why? Because it’s a perk to reward good work?
No, not really, because they know it’s a tool to get better work in the future.

Be that well-run company–you need a break–a time to be mom or dad, not teacher.

The break, however small, will allow you to return in the fall with renewed enthusiasm! (caveat–there are those that do year-round school, like Germany, which works well because long breaks are dispersed through the year, not 365 days of teaching and learning).

Celebrate that last day of homeschool for the year

Once you set that last day for your homeschool–celebrate. 

• Look through portfolios and notebooks.
• Talk and share all the great things accomplished this year. (Too often in our stress and anxiety, we list what’s left and forget all the good and fun that happened along the way.) 
• Focusing on the positive makes children proud–and proud learners want to learn more!
• Select the best of the year’s successes and allow each child to assemble their “Best of 6th Grade” Book. 
• Spend a few dollars to have the Best of Grade Book spiral bound at an office store. Share these Best of Grade Books with grandparents. During summer quiet times, spend time re-reading your Best of Grade Book. This goes a long way to move those memories from short-term to long-term storage–no work, just recollection.  
• This is why we take pictures and tell stories–it’s not so we remember what our children looked like–it’s so they remember the important stories of their life. 
• Celebrate all YOU, as a parent and as a teacher, have learned, grown, and accomplished. Congratulate yourself and look forward to a summer of rest. And, maybe, start dreaming about what the new school year will bring.
  

A Teacher’s Prayer by Olga de Juana

Help me to be a fine teacher, to keep peace in the classroom, peace between my students and myself, to be kind and gentle to each and every one of my students.

Help me to be merciful to my students, to balance mercy and discipline in the right measure for each student, to give genuine praise as much as possible, to give constructive criticism in a manner that is palatable to my students.

Help me to remain conscientious enough to keep my lessons always interesting, to recognize what motivates each of my students, to accept my students’ limitations and not hold it against them.

Help me not to judge my students too harshly, to be fair to all, to be a good role model, but most of all Lord help me to show your love to all of my students.
Amen.

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Catholic Schoolhouse provides what to study so you have more time to focus on how. 

Catholic Schoolhouse’s trustworthy framework of memory work creates the structure you need so you can homeschool with confidence while teaching with your unique style.

Bring Joy to your homeschool.

Catholic Schoolhouse is also so much more than Memory Work–with added resources such as History Cards, Integrated Art Program for all ages, and Hands-on Exploratory Science Guide, teaching can become fun again.

Be sure to check out the Catholic Schoolhouse Blog for FREE ideas, resources, and activities to get you started with homeschooling.