If 15+ years of homeschooling have taught me anything, it’s that ruts happen! To get out of a rut sometimes you just have to shake up your homeschool.
This doesn’t mean buying all new curriculum and starting over. It doesn’t mean trying to reinvent the wheel.
Usually, ruts just mean you need to take a break for a week or two to breathe new life into your homeschool.
Warning: unproductive breaks seem to breed discontent and boredom. The key is to continue some form of learning and structure.
Here are my top 5 ways to shake up your homeschool.
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1. Field Trips
Shake up your homeschool by taking your learning on the road. Field trips can be as simple or elaborate as you want to make them.
Also, instead of just one field trip day, it is fun to schedule a full week of field trips to really help break up a homeschooling rut.
Field trip ideas:
Go for a hike in the woods and have your children collect different leaves. When you get home, identify and research the leaves. Your child can then write a paper about the different types of trees, or – for the crafty kid – they can glue the leaves to a poster board and write some facts under each one.
Go to the zoo or game ranch. After observing all the animals, your child can pick one animal they want to learn more about. When you get home, have them research that animal.
Make a routine trip to the grocery store into a field trip. Your child can plan a meal, make a list of ingredients, plan a budget, and shop for what they need.
2. Unit Studies
Ditch the textbooks and use a unit study for a week or two. Unit studies take a topic or theme and approach it from all academic subjects.
For example, a unit study on South Korea would include map work and history (Social Studies), writing reports and studying Korean authors (Language Arts), learning about art and culture (Humanities), and researching Korean scientists and their discoveries (Science).
You can create your own unit studies with library books, Youtube videos, and other online resources you find with a quick Google search.
Or, you can purchase unit studies online. My favorites are unitstudy.com with units by Amanda Bennett, and Layers of Learning (a complete unit study curriculum, but you can just use one of their books here and there if you choose).
Ideas for unit study topics
Diansaurs
Tornadoes
The Renaissance
Ocean Travel
Your favorite foods
Ancient Greece
3. Change Locations
Perhaps you don’t feel comfortable putting the curriculum aside for a week or two. That’s okay, too. Sometimes just a simple change of scenery can do wonders for your mental and educational health.
Just grab the books, a loaded picnic basket, and a frisbee and head to the park.
Do school at the library or at Starbuck’s. You will be amazed at the level of new life this can breathe into your homeschool!
Ideas for a change of location
A local public garden
The beach (if it’s convenient) or a local lake
A bookstore like Barnes and Noble
A tent in the backyard
On the trampoline outside
If you always do school at desks or the kitchen table, have a school day sprawled out on the living room floor.
4. Home Economics Week
Put the books away and teach homemaking, home management, and basic home repair.
These are skills your child will need to know in the future, anyway, so why not incorporate it into their schoolwork?
You can choose to keep this concept simple by just covering the basics of housework, or you can make the lessons more advanced to include money management and more.
Ideas for home ec week lessons
Laundry
Paying bills and budgeting
Cooking
Basic sewing
Grocery shopping
Organizing closets and drawers
Simple home crafts like candlemaking or soap making
Drywall repair or leaky faucet repair
Also be sure to check out these posts in “Homeschooling”:
How to Homeschool for Free (or on the cheap!)
The Best Homeschool Curriculum for Elementary School
5. Work on a Special Project
Ask your child for ideas of something they have always wanted to learn or something they’ve wanted to explore.
Unlike unit studies, special projects do not attempt to cover all academic disciplines within one theme or topic. Instead, allow your child to hyper-focus on just that one point of interest for a week or so.
Special project ideas
Learn computer coding (free lessons on Khan Academy)
Plant a garden from scratch
Build a piece of furniture
Build a roller coaster in the backyard (Seriously, this is a thing… search “backyard roller coasters” on Youtube!)
Write a novella
Focus on planning and implementing a science experiment or two… or three.
Final Thoughts
Homeschool ruts happen, so don’t beat yourself up if your homeschooling routine has left you all a bit bored and out of sorts. Try one or more of these simple rut-busters to shake up your homeschool!
What are some of your tips to beat homeschool ruts? Share in the comment below.
