10 Reasons You Need a 4-Day Homeschool Week


Are you thinking of changing from the traditional 5-day week to a 4-day homeschool week, but wondering what you would do with an extra day?

Here are 10 ways to use that day to add organization and fun to your home.

10 Reasons You Need a 4-Day Homeschool Week

10 Reasons You Need a 4-Day Week

1. Day for Catch-Up

I don’t know about you, but it doesn’t take much to throw my week and my plans off. A sick child, a clogged toilet, or a surprise field trip do it every time. Instead of worrying about the change to my long-term plans, I use Fridays as a catch-up day. The catch-up day is already built into the week.

2. Day to Clean House

It’s hard to find time to clean the house with kids underfoot all day. You turn around, and they’ve turned your living room into a fortress. Actually, my little ones are doing that right now! Toys are strewn everywhere. In addition, you’re trying to educate your children. You need time for cleaning and time for teaching math. By moving to a 4-day week, you gain a day to focus on cleaning the house each week.

3. Day for Appointments

Appointments always interfere with homeschooling. First, you need to cut your lessons short in order to fill the diaper bag, grab toys for the waiting room, and ensure all the kids are properly dressed. A 4-day week gives you a day to schedule all the appointments. You can easily plan them into your weekly schedule.

4. Day for the Library

Just as it’s hard to fit appointments into the homeschool day without a major adjustment to our routine, we also need to find time to head to the library. Use your extra day to drop by the library. Enjoy the time to read books together, browse the shelves, and chat with the librarians.

5. Day for Nature Hikes

These extra days are perfect for nature hikes. You can head out for a long hike without worrying about skipping something important because you’ve already completed your week’s work. There’s time to stop to admire turtles sunning on a log or count ducklings swimming in the water.

6. Day for Games

Let’s face it; everyone loves games. But games are time-consuming, and the press of life keeps us from pulling out the games as often as we should. Instead of worrying about how to add games to your week, use the gift of an extra day and assign it to be a game day. Pop popcorn, bake cookies, and enjoy the guilt-free time playing together. Just think of the memories you’ll make!

7. Day for Projects

There are many time-consuming but awesome projects we skip because of time constraints. Use the gift of an extra day to complete some of these fun projects. Create a salt map of the United States. Mummify a chicken. Create a LEGO windmill. The options are endless.

8. Day for Reading

Sometimes all you want to do is to spend a day curling up with a good book reading. A 4-day week gives you the day you can spend curled up at home reading good books with your children. You can read books aloud or curl up separately with your own books. It doesn’t matter. You have the day to relax and read great books together.

9. Day for Travel

Just think, you essentially have a 3-day weekend every week. Do you enjoy traveling? You now have the time to go farther. Spend a day traveling to another state and spend the weekend exploring. Visit family, friends, and National Parks together. Just think of the marvelous adventures you’ll give your children over the years to come.

10. Day for Field Trips

My very favorite thing to do on an extra day is field trips. You can visit local National Parks, museums, and businesses. You can learn about the local city government. You can take a trip to the zoo. Field trips make for a memorable educational way to spend a day each week.

Switching from a 5-day week to a 4-day week gives you the gift of an extra day each week to spend doing the extras that get pushed aside during the chaos of daily life. Slow life down so you, too, can enjoy a 4-day week.

Sara Dennis

About the author

Sara Dennis is veteran homeschool mom of six who's still homeschooling her youngest kids after the oldest ones have graduated, entered college, and moved on to adult life. She loves chatting about the ins and outs of educating kids at the kitchen table. Sara blogs at Classically Homeschooling.

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  1. I just switched to a four-day week over a month ago and I love it! We use our free day for many of the reasons you’ve listed. It’s awesome! We usually take our day off on Wednesdays but if there’s a homeschool co-op field trip on a different day, we may switch things around.

    We also school year-round so we also do a 6 weeks on and 1 week off schedule. Combined with the 4 day week, I love our schedule!

    Thanks for sharing!
    xoxo

  2. As a Messianic Jewish family, we have found that not schooling, or minimal schooling (something my son wants to finish or that “Pops up”) works best for us as well. That way we have time to clean the house before the Sabbath meal, (we have from 6 to MANY people over for the meal and teaching), make the Challah, go to the chiropractor, etc. It is a busy day but I always feel that plenty of learning takes place and we are more mentally prepared for our Sabbath. For some reason when I quit teaching in public school and started homeschooling, i thought life would feel less like being shot out of a cannon! I was wrong, it is still really easy to be caught up in BUSY and schedules. Home schooling 4 days just happened on its own in our house as a way to deal with the crazy. 🙂

  3. 4 day a week worked great for us when year around schooling. Since moving to a place with much harsher winters and short summers, we take the summer off. We school 4 days a week during spring and fall to allow for travel on the weekend and cleaning on Fridays. During the winter we stay in and do work 5 days a week. Cleaning on Saturdays since there isn’t much else to do. Lol.

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