We run the school year from January to December. Most people don't do this. Most run the same as the public school. What do you do?

My daughter graduated 3rd grade last week. She's in 4th grade as of the new year. We'll have a graduation party on Jan. 2nd.

We start the first monday after my birthday < AUG 1>.  We go 5 days a week, including holidays, until we get to 90 days.  Then we take about a month off.  After that, back on the 5 days a week for 90 total school days.  Then off for summer.

We also run January-ish to December. We have been buying new materials with income tax return at the end of February, so maybe that's the official start to our year? But my kids, especially my oldest, are on so many different levels depending on what subject, that really I'm just letting the material roll whenever it rolls.... So, in reality, I don't guess we have a "school year". We just have times when we stick more to the schedule, and times when we're more lax about it. ;-)

My preference would be to work through the summer ( we live in a very hot climate and would be better to stay in doors in the summer and do 'work'), but my kids have a lot of public school friends so the pressure is too much to work when they're off so we somewhat follow the public school schedule. Blach! We always do take more time off though, even though my kids don't think we do!  We started our break last Thursday and will be off through the first Monday of Jan.

This is our fist year of homeschooling. My daughter is 14 and has several special needs. I started at the end of August trying to stick with a school year but have found, like many other areas of homeschooling, I have needed to be flexibile with scheduling. We had a hospitalization in the middle of October, which totally took us out of any type of routine. So, since then we've been going free-style.

I too would like to continue going throughout the summer. I just need to be tricky and not call it school. :-) My daughter is still very negative to what that word brings to mind.

My son takes classes at the local school, so we stick with their schedule.  We used to go July-Mayish, but it has gotten too difficult/complicated to try to homeschool on one schedule and take his school classes on another.

We pretty much follow the traditional school year.  We do a light schedule for summer to keep things fresh.  We technically start our new year in the middle of July.  Next summer we might try to just ease into the 5th grade materials.  Either way, he's still learning.

We have tried so many things over the years, but we've been doing this for a few years now and it seems to work...we start on July 1 or thereabouts, work for 4 weeks and take a week off all year long.  Two weeks off at Christmas and then we are done at the end of April and have 2 beautiful months off with no schoolkids hanging around!  :)

This frees us up to also take off any more days that we need to during the year.  LIke this year we are actually taking almost 3 weeks for Christmas.

I go by the public school year. We are usually done with school before they are because we don't take off teachers work days, some times my holidays are not as long as theirs. Having said that, In the summer time we still do school work. Spelling and Math still goes on five days a week.  So in the summer we have school an hour to a hour and half. We are always learning. Homeschooling never stops for us.

We go year round, we still take time off for Holidays and things but I don't really start and stop at a particular time.  We just move grade to grade as they are ready for it.  The kids know what  "grade" they should be in so they can tell when someone asks.

We have tried just about every schedule out there but my dh has had so many different work schedules days, swings etc that I learned pretty quick just to go with the flow.  So if his schedule has him home dad helps with grading or teaching a subject, if he has to sleep most of the day we do some in the morning and then some in the evening when he leaves. 

I only have one at home and we go from about the last week in August until we finish her SOS  and spelling and math (we don't use SOS for those).  She is a talented musician and we spend one full day a week with her music co-op (morning) and dance and drama co-op (afternoon) so do core subjects four days a week.  We are about to add Rosetta Stone to our school day.  We save all our electives for the one day.  She does, however, start her day with a half hour piano practice and a half hour flute practice, plus whatever she needs to do for choir.  We're usually done by the end of May.  I find she does better if she's "free" in the summer with her friends, though she takes classes at our local community college and also cooking classes at our local Central Market. 

Do any of you have older kids?  Mine is in 7th grade this year and has never been in public school, but tests well ahead of her public-schooled peers in spite of the fact she's a little dyslexic (could be much worse!)  That's why we use a separate spelling curriculum.  I did not homeschool my oldest three but sure wish I had.

My husband also travels a great deal for his job.  We use SOS so that we can pack up her laptop and go with him - she's been more places at age 12 than I had been by the time I was forty.  That's an education in itself!

Cindy

Our official school year runs from July 1 to June 30.  The reason I run this way is because our umbrella school (which we have to be part of in order for me to teach my high schooler at home because neither my husband nor I have a batchelor's degree) has their reporting schedule in January and June.  Then we also have tuition due in June as well.

Dawn

Edited for Grammar (duh, moment there).