Mtdrew wrote: How do you get back on track when falling behind?
I don't think that right now you are behind because the whole family was sick. You just took fall break much earlier than you otherwise would have. So if it were me in this situation, I'd just pick up one day at a time and call myself in week 5. I might do some readings in the weekend days and pick some stuff to not do to get back into working strong after illness and keep marching forward. ((hugs)) and glad you're feeling better. Doubling up on reading in some sections of year 4 is hard.
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because I feel like typing....
for the more general question of "how do you get back on track when falling behind" ......
Take from the rest of my post what works in your family. Ignore the parts that don't.
In my family we realize that public schools and private school require kids to make up stuff. So we blend that with the fact that we are tutoring our children. We don't push it to catch up to where the teacher is, or what week of school it is on a calendar. But at the same time, we make some adjustment to press forward. It is possible for homeschoolers to be behind if they aren't moving forward. Illness -- people get sick. That's different. and you are moving forward!
Yes, there is of course a measure of grace that we give ourselves especially if someone had been ill. They might need a few extra days to play catch it up
so.... Vacations and scheduled breaks might get shifted. instead of taking off all of Thanksgiving, you might have to plan to do a little bit of school that week to get "caught up" or make up work.
and we try to go more year round so that days and hours and all of that are "banked" so that when real life hits, we have time for real life.
and occasionally, we'll double up on some lessons to get a bit more done that day or have weekend lessons too.
light and independent friday might be used for a full day.
None of us are really saying that we should just blow off our responsibilities. We're just realistic that we can't always do 2 weeks worth of MFW in 1 physical week and there really isn't a need to do that.
When we got off track this last month due to having to drop stuff and deal with closing a house 500 or so miles away this is what helped us to get back on track.
1. We start early in the school calendar year. This year we knew we were moving. We started in July. boom! 2 months ahead already and that gave us the freedom to bank some days. (sorry, I borrowed that line from David Hazell in one of his workshops. The chaos one I think.....hee hee.) I knew it would be chaos during August. I didn't anticipate my mental exhaustion and inability to teach or supervise. But, we were already plugging along. So, maybe your school year might extend a few days here and there, or a holiday might become a school day.
2. My husband had to take over and help us get it done on weekends. He's the hero in this one. Go John! LMy dh really stepped up the last 2 weeks to read to the kids, check the lab reports, grade the math test, etc.
3. Dropped outside commitments for a few days to get more done. We still went to church and saw a few sites around the city. But I delegated a lot.
I don't know if you have an umbrella school that requires a certain number of days by a certain date on the calendar. If so, grab some weekends and do the minimum needed.
-crystal