Homeschooling vs. quarantine schooling has become a hot topic in our society as schools have been shut down and parents are taking on the roles of school facilitator. As a full time, veteran homeschool mom I am concerned by those who have been forced to school at home calling what they do “homeschool”. One of my greatest concerns is that school and government officials will begin to compare real homeschooling with quarantine schooling. Those of you that have been forced into quarantine schooling are walking a challenging path, one that even full time homeschoolers cannot understand. Here is a look at homeschooling vs. quarantine schooling to gain some understanding.
A canoe will get you across a lake but you wouldn't use it to cross the ocean.
A cruise ship and a canoe are both made to carry you across the water. While a cruise ship is made for the long haul, to carry you across vast oceans it would be ridiculous to cross a lake with.
What does full time homeschooling look like?
What does full time homeschooling look like? For starters we begin school the second week of August and end the third week of May. We take 20 days off for Christmas, Thanksgiving, Good Friday, and spring break, all the other holidays we work. Here is a peek at our daily schedule .
Daily Schedule
6:00 am. Our two younger kids wake, they are 10 and 7. I wake up at this time and read a chapter in the Bible and then a book for 20 minuets. The littles eat breakfast and play quietly for a bit.
7:00 am. I use this time to get my work done while the littles do their chores.
8:00 am. Time to get my morning chores done and my 15 year old wakes, eats breakfast then moves onto her chores.
9 – 12:00. School time with the littles. We start with math then language arts, reading, history and finish with science. My 15 year old starts her school day and begins with English.
10:00 am. The 17 year old wakes, reads his Bible and prays for the day then eats breakfast. My 15 year old joins me and the littles in the schoolroom to work on math.
11:00 am. The 17 year old gets started on his schoolwork. He usually starts with his outsourced Physics class then he works on literature, history, and math.
Lunch break
12 :00 Lunch break for me and the littles, sometimes my 15 year old joins us. Most of the time the littles are done with school by noon but sometimes we have things to finish after lunch.
1 – 3:00 The two big kids work on their history and personal finance. My littles play or do art, but this is their free time to play however they like, inside or outside. During this time we finish any chores that we didn’t get too earlier.
3 – 5:00 My 17 year old gets his math and sign language done. (He is taking a sign language class outside of the home)
From August to May this is what our days look like. I plan for library runs, park time, field trips with and without friends and sometimes we meet daddy for lunch. We get every subject completed that is required in our state for each grade. When you homeschool you have to abide by your states laws otherwise you can get in serious trouble.
As I was writing this post I decided to look at a local school districts calendar year and compare it to our calendar year. I was surprised! I calculated how many total days there are from the first to the last day of school for a total of 210 days. This school district has 28 holidays and in-service days plus 6 early release days. (I calculate the 6 early release days to equal 3 full days off) That is a total of 31 days off taking them from 210 to 179 school days. If you add in their testing week, 5 days, it takes them down to 174 instructional school days.
Homeschooling vs Quarantine schooling
Following the same calendar as our local district gives us the same amount of days to complete school, 210. We take 20 days off for the holidays leaving us 190 school days. Sometimes we have sick days or travel days but we still end having completed more than the required days of school. Occasionally we work through the summer, we don’t do school work every day but we have been known to complete a full subject over summer break!
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It’s safe to say that homeschooling vs. quarantine schooling are incomparable and vastly different. Since the quarantine began and children were sent home to learn, the term “homeschooling” has been used interchangeably. As I have pointed out they are two vastly different concepts with their own unique set of challenges. What I hope that people see is that although homeschooling and quarantine schooling are all striving to achieve the same goal, they are vastly different in their own ways. You cannot ask a cruise ship to preform the same as a canoe.
