Well, I have't done ECC specifically, but I am handling our year-long planning a bit differently this year. Maybe something in here will help you. I did as you did - planned our breaks, holidays, etc, and came up with a "Last Day of School" date. This year, for the first time, that date is FIRM. We will not go past that date - I want something to look forward to as a, "Yay, we did it!" sort of celebration.ArkArmyWife wrote:This is our first year to use MFW, and we're doing ECC with our two DDs (6th and 4th grades). We started the year later than we usually do, and I can see after scheduling our regular breaks that it will be the end of June before we finish our 36th week. I'm concerned that this leaves us very little "wiggle" room. I'm sure we'll have sickness, house guests and other "interruptions" throughout the year. We take Wednesday afternoons off for a homeschool PE group, so that adds a little more stress, too. Here are the possibilities I am trying to choose between if we get behind on the schedule:
1. At the end of the week, whatever isn't finished on that week's list just doesn't get done. Just go on to the next week, as long as the majority of the work got done.
2. Carry over unfinished work from one week to the next. If we only finish 4 days of work, then on Monday start with the 5th day of the schedule and go from there. Whatever isn't done at the end of the year doesn't get done.
3. Carry over unfinished work from one week to the next, as above, but whatever is left undone at the end of the year would be continued when school starts back after summer. We would stop schooling at the end of June no matter what. My concern with this is the impact on oldest starting high school program in 9th grade.
4. Don't take a summer break. School year-round. Children go crazy, but Mom is happy because all the boxes are checked!This one is not really an option, since my husband insists (wisely) that our children need summer, and so do I.
I look forward to all your words of wisdom on this subject, which has hounded me throughout of six years of homeschooling, no matter what curriculum we've used!
So, I broke down our weekly work. I haven't done the whole year in all subjects, but many of them. I put most stuff into weekly file folders - math pages, any work sheets, narration pages, notebook pages, etc that can get filed are filed by week. As we complete work, I file it into a "Completed" file. (At the end of each quarter or so, I will file what we want to keep into the proper notebooks or whatever.) At the end of the week, I take a look at what's left unfinished in the file. I then evaluate - how important is this? Must we do it? If so, must we do it this way? Is it something we can quickly go over orally, rather than do a written narration or worksheet? Can it just get skipped? Etc., etc. Then, anything that MUST be done gets filed into the next week's file and we just work extra hard to get the extra assignments done and stay on track. But I'm making peace with a) skipping a few assignments here and there, knowing that the material is going to be covered again later and b) "making do" on some assignments - doing a grammar lesson quickly and orally, only doing half the math problems, whatever. Also, it's helping me adjust my expectations and be more realistic - my poor oldest child - I have SUCH a tendency to push her to do too much. This is helping me see what she's REALLY capable of getting done in a week's time. I can see she's working hard but there's still a bunch of stuff not done, so that must be my...erm...eagerness.

HTH,
Melissa