[SPEAKER_00]: Christian parenting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, hello there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've got a question for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Should our homeschool summer break be a free for all or should we continue with our normal lessons?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or maybe is there something an in-between?
[SPEAKER_00]: In this episode I am sharing three lessons that I continued with my children every single summer.
[SPEAKER_00]: There are three intentional reasons behind each of these lessons, and I promise to share my why for each one of those with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's not lose the ground and the break throughs that we had during the school year over this summer, with a little bit of forethought and maybe some sneakiness we can keep our family moving forward.
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to this episode of Little By Little Home School Podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am Lee Nguyen and we are in the middle of a best of series here and we are diving deep into some summer topics.
[SPEAKER_00]: Over the years I have done quite a few summer topics and so we're just going to compile them.
[SPEAKER_00]: We've done a couple.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've got a couple more here for you just to help you to really think about this summer break and to be intentional about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I hope that you enjoy today's episode.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you are interested in the little by little homeschool conference, tickets are still available, and we would love to have you join us on September 19th in Syracuse, New York.
[SPEAKER_00]: Reach out if you have any questions, but the link in the show notes is going to take you right to the site and you'll be able to get all those questions answers and be able to purchase your tickets.
[SPEAKER_00]: Grab a friend, maybe grab a mom friend that is thinking about homeschooling or simply come by yourself and make some new connections there.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, let's get into this episode.
[SPEAKER_00]: some summers we enter into the summer break from homeschool and we are so over that homeschool year.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we also we don't want to lose the ground that we've gained.
[SPEAKER_00]: We've been able to see some progress the light switch kind of going on the light bulb whatever the whatever that saying is for our kids just things are clicking.
[SPEAKER_00]: We've gained some ground in just different areas and we feel like we really set up a routine and should we just let that all go or What should we do?
[SPEAKER_00]: Should we still be doing some type of lessons with them because we don't want to lose that ground now when I first began homeschooling I followed the public school Not to a T. I didn't take off or teacher in service days or do the half days that they did By the way, we are already doing half ways
[SPEAKER_00]: But I didn't do those at holidays that didn't apply to us.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't need to take off for election day or something like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I followed their start date, their end date, and therefore their entire summer break schedule.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was all I knew.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I started to see, hmm, maybe there's some flaws in the system.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is way back.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've seen many more since then.
[SPEAKER_00]: We've talked a little bit about this, but I started seeing some flaws in the system and I realized, you know what?
[SPEAKER_00]: I can make up the rules, quote unquote rules, for my own family.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have to follow what they're doing.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so the third summer that we were home schooling, I started doing these three lessons with my kiddos and at that time they would have all been in elementary school and I was so thankful that I set aside a little bit of time whether it was daily or a couple days a week or weekly, but I was so thankful that I did that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm going to tell you why for each of these three lessons, why I was glad and the results and the outcome of taking some time to do these three lessons at a homeschool mom should continue with their child through the summer break.
[SPEAKER_00]: Number one is going to receive
[SPEAKER_00]: Possibly lots of groans.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would be very cautious of how you introduce this to your child.
[SPEAKER_00]: Make sure there's no like rotten eggs or tomatoes around.
[SPEAKER_00]: They probably wouldn't even get that type of reference to do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But just just watch how you introduce the fact we're going to continue math through the through the summer.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ah, right now you're like, oh my goodness, my kid would freak out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, here's the thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're not going to sit down and we're not going to introduce new lessons.
[SPEAKER_00]: This isn't going to be anything new.
[SPEAKER_00]: If they learned long division this past school year, we're just going to practice that.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're not going to start anything new.
[SPEAKER_00]: So therefore the math lesson isn't anything that should take very long.
[SPEAKER_00]: What I started to do was the math that we did when my kiddos were an elementary
[SPEAKER_00]: in the very back they had homework sections.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, why would I do these homework sections during the school year?
[SPEAKER_00]: They're already doing enough problems already in the daily work.
[SPEAKER_00]: So why would I do, why would I give them homework as well?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I do give them homework during the school year.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then I, what I would do is when that homeschool year was done, I would not pitch that workbook yet.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would simply go to the back, sometimes I would tear out the pages, and every day they would do one or two sections, depending on maybe how much time that they had, or maybe how they were doing, or their attitude, with maybe determined.
[SPEAKER_00]: how much math they had to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it was maybe 10 problems and it would just start back at the beginning and so the very beginning lessons that they would do would be really quite easy because it was something that they did back in August or September of that year.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why did I had them do math?
[SPEAKER_00]: I found that over the summer when we followed the public school schedule.
[SPEAKER_00]: We would get done, I think it was early June, and they wouldn't start until after Labor Day.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they basically had all June July and August, and they forgot everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, not everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: But all of the little things.
[SPEAKER_00]: They forgot those, and it was very frustrating when we would start the homeschool year back up again, and like you knew all your math facts.
[SPEAKER_00]: That is a huge thing in elementary school.
[SPEAKER_00]: is if they can get their math facts, their addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, all the other math builds off of that.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can learn all the algebraic things to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Can you tell I'm really, really good at math, with it taking to figure out all of those things when it comes to
[SPEAKER_00]: if they have those.
[SPEAKER_00]: So at the bare minimum, I would have them do things that would help just to solidify their basic knowledge.
[SPEAKER_00]: So math, I think I had them do it most days or at least Monday through Thursday and the reason was that they wouldn't lose that ground that we had gained over that home school year.
[SPEAKER_00]: And what I found by doing that is that the math book, the lessons that we would use when we would start back up with our new home school year,
[SPEAKER_00]: I found that we didn't even need to do those.
[SPEAKER_00]: We would probably most years to skip the first 20 because it was all review because my kiddo already had that all we for three months we had done that super solid.
[SPEAKER_00]: They knew all of that stuff so we could skip all of that and just start again with introducing new concepts and starting with new lessons.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's why every day or at least a couple of times we just doing a simple review of math.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe your math doesn't have any type of extra homework or anything like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Find worksheets just online.
[SPEAKER_00]: Flashcards just have them go through anything, especially if they can just solidify what they have done.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a lot of free options out there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or maybe in the workbook you didn't have them do every single problem.
[SPEAKER_00]: Vocal back and do some of those other ones that they didn't do beforehand.
[SPEAKER_00]: or maybe you did start and like me, you skipped the first 20 lessons.
[SPEAKER_00]: Have them go back and just slowly work on that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I could take them a month to get through all of those problems.
[SPEAKER_00]: If it's of super intense math, I'd have you with 30 problems on each one.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just have them do 10 problems each day, 30 problems in one lesson.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, then that would give them 10, 10 and 10, three days.
[SPEAKER_00]: The second lesson to continue through the summer months is reading again.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's not lose that ground.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's not lose that excitement of learning.
[SPEAKER_00]: the love of learning.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a time where they can even maybe do even more reading.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you have a kiddo who's not reading yet, that's okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can read to them.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can also, if this kiddo has older siblings, part of their required lessons or what they need to do each day is to read to their younger sibling for maybe just 10 to 15 minutes.
[SPEAKER_00]: My youngest was very much spoiled.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would read aloud to him every day.
[SPEAKER_00]: His sister would read aloud, wrote 15 minutes a day, and his brother would read aloud to him for 15 minutes a day.
[SPEAKER_00]: Really got a lot of time being read too.
[SPEAKER_00]: also by older siblings reading out loud, it gives them practice to reading out loud, which is an amazing skill that not everybody has, and it's really something that can benefit them later in life, but it's also something that comes with practice.
[SPEAKER_00]: And how much better is it to practice reading out loud to a small child who can't read, then to suddenly be thrust into
[SPEAKER_00]: a group somewhere and they ask you to read something out loud and you've never done it before.
[SPEAKER_00]: It'd be so much easier if you are, say, ten years old and you're reading to your five-year-old brother or sister, that just kind of starts to take off the pressure and you become more used to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But overall, reading, if all of your kids can read, let them read, head to the library.
[SPEAKER_00]: Once a week, even if you want to, let them take out a huge stack of books if they want to, they don't get to reading all the books.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes it's just the excitement of getting those books.
[SPEAKER_00]: But every single day, if you can, get them reading.
[SPEAKER_00]: Set a timer, you could do it at the same exact time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everybody, maybe mid-morning or maybe right after lunch.
[SPEAKER_00]: After everybody's been outside or you've been to the pool and you had lunch, we're all coming home.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're gonna just take a little bit of quiet time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Gonna set a timer for 30 minutes, and everybody has to find a place and we're all just going to read.
[SPEAKER_00]: If everybody's doing it, there's no other distractions.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it really sets up kids to not just view reading
[SPEAKER_00]: during school, but it's something that I do all the time, and if they realize that they can read all the time, they're going to continue reading even beyond their formal educational years with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: So give them that gift of realizing how much fun reading is right now and don't stop.
[SPEAKER_00]: when the official homeschool year is done, continue reading through the summer.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, and sometimes libraries have like summer reading programs and challenges and kids get earned.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know, maybe a free ice cream cone at the local ice cream joint.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or maybe they could earn, I remember ours had some pretty big prizes and if for every book they read, they could put an entry in, I thought for sure, one of my kids, one of these years would have earned the,
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, whatever game station, which was okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't want them to have that anyway, but I thought for sure they would win because they'd go in with, you know, you know, you know, two weeks have had read 30 books and these are like smaller chapter books, but just reading just overall reading and check if your library has some type of program with some type of incentive works for your kid.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Go ahead and do that right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just the simple act of reading and finding books that they like will then get them away.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're not going to be brightening them when they're older that I promise you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's dive into number three.
[SPEAKER_00]: The third lesson, two continue through the summer.
[SPEAKER_00]: Even when you're formal schooling is done for the year, is character building, and this isn't like, become characters, actors, and actresses.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, that would be fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: But this is like character training.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is working on, and people are like, well, where do I start?
[SPEAKER_00]: Start with the food of the spirit.
[SPEAKER_00]: Start with love.
[SPEAKER_00]: Dive into, do a character building of, about love, then peace, and patience, kindness.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't let the summer be one where everybody's just
[SPEAKER_00]: And we're fighting with this person and lying about that or stealing someone's candy or popsicle.
[SPEAKER_00]: Use those moments of character belief.
[SPEAKER_00]: Doesn't even have to be anything formal.
[SPEAKER_00]: You could even be wanted to be kind of a little bit formal.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do something around the breakfast table, lunch table, dinner table when dad's home.
[SPEAKER_00]: do something then where you're maybe reading a Bible story or reading a short story about character and just talking about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's something that doesn't have to be a formal set aside time.
[SPEAKER_00]: But again, it's just taking the time instead of saying, okay, we do that during morning time of home school during our home school year.
[SPEAKER_00]: But now we're on break.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're not going to worry about that kind of stuff.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, continue the character building, which you can very easily tie into, even if you don't have any type of formal, I don't want to say curriculum, many type of formal books that talk about character building and character training.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just read Bible stories and then you can simply talk about the character of that.
[SPEAKER_00]: The stories of David, you know, in different things that he has done in the Bible, that really helps kids to then see, oh well,
[SPEAKER_00]: that wasn't really quite right.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe this is how things could have been done better.
[SPEAKER_00]: Get a kid's story book Bible.
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't have to be anything formal that says character training, character building.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because oftentimes kids absorb these types of traits, having honesty, perseverance.
[SPEAKER_00]: They learn those best when we do it in a more nonchalant kind of way.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or if you do something formal, remember those different things and when topics and when scenarios and when situations come up, where they could have displayed this or where they did display this, you can then verbally confirm what they have learned and you can see that it has been absorbed in their heart and they're living it out or you can see that it hasn't quite been absorbed in their
[SPEAKER_00]: this right here that character training and character building is an entire lesson in clarify your home school.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is something that I didn't really know about until I started home schooling and that I could be more intentional about building these different character traits and there were ones that we went over and learned together and I shared the resources that I used in clarify your home school, the course, and it just wasn't something that I thought about and
[SPEAKER_00]: and by not stopping it because it's summer break has really would be able to see the see the fruit of the fruit of the spirit.
[SPEAKER_00]: In my kids, as the years went by, and it was 100% worth continuing throughout the summer, even on Christmas break, just all the time.
[SPEAKER_00]: And even now their teens, we still sometimes throw in some of those character building character training,
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's go over that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, one more time real quick here.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the three lessons to continue during the summer, even while you're on break from home school is math.
[SPEAKER_00]: Keep it simple, keep it to other grade level.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't introduce anything new, just let them review things, let them solidify what they have done, help them not to lose any of the ground any of the progress that they have made during the school year.
[SPEAKER_00]: You'll you'll be so glad you did when you start back up on your new home school year.
[SPEAKER_00]: Number two was reading.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, the weather is nice.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll send him outside to read, let them read, hang in, hang it upside down in a tree.
[SPEAKER_00]: That'll tie the tree and that I talked about earlier, give him some popsicles and a book and send him outside.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe don't send them out with a library book and popsicles, because that might not go very well, or maybe send them out with popsicles.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you bring the book outside and you guys do a read aloud, so that was number two is reading.
[SPEAKER_00]: Number three, don't stop the lessons of character building.
[SPEAKER_00]: Continue those.
[SPEAKER_00]: To be honest, I think the best approach would be something to do a slightly formal, not super heavy and tense just at dinner time.
[SPEAKER_00]: We need a story together.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then as the days and the weeks and the months go through is the summer, you start pointing out different areas that they need to work on and reminding them of, you know, why are we diligently taking care of our yard right now?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why are we mowing it well and being able to have those conversations with with your kiddos?
[SPEAKER_00]: So these are the three things that I found out by trial and error.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I want to set you up so that when you start your new homeschool year, you're feeling like, okay, we didn't lose that ground.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am excited that you are either have completed your homeschool year or you're working towards it, you have done an amazing job, enjoy a little bit of summer break here, whether you are a family that does more year-round homeschool and you take just two weeks off, or maybe you're a family that's going to take a couple of months off.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am excited about the memories that your family is going to make and when you can sneak in this map, this reading and this character building and you'll be good to go in the next school year starts.