The holidays are magical, right? It starts in October, really September, planning for Halloween. And then the weeks get shorter and shorter and shorter until it’s a new year and you have a new number to try to remember when you date anything (are we really dating anything anymore though?). Anyway… HOLIDAYS! They're loud, chaotic, over-scheduled, sugar-fueled, and occasionally held together by an unreasonable amount of HOPE and CAFFEINE.
And if you're homeschooling, there's that added pressure of somehow keeping your children educated (AND SOCIALIZED!) between decorating cookies, shopping, traveling, and trying to remember which day of the week it is.
Because nothing says holiday cheer quite like explaining long division to a child who's thinking about gingerbread houses (not going to lie this gave me an idea for something with gumdrops and math).
And it's not just homeschoolers. As a former public school teacher, I can assure you that teachers in brick-and-mortar schools feel this pressure, too. They're trying to finish lessons, meet standards, and keep 30+ increasingly excited and red-40 injected children focused on something other than winter break. Except they're doing it without the comforts of home, a flexible schedule, or the option to declare everyday pajama day.
So, what's a homeschooling parent to do?
My suggestion? Make the holidays part of the learning instead of trying to squeeze learning into the holidays.
Your Holiday Plans Might Already Be Educational
One of my favorite approaches to education is place-based learning, which is really just a fancy way of saying that the world around us makes a pretty great classroom.
And the holidays are full of opportunities.
Visiting a holiday light display? Talk about electricity, color, or patterns. We’re in Orlando so we frequently talk about crowds, capacity, and business strategies in overselling “special moment” tickets (eh-hem).
Baking cookies? That’s a talk about fractions and lots of chemistry happening in that oven
Exploring a historic downtown? Research how people celebrated the holidays there 100 years ago.
Heading to EPCOT's Festival of the Holidays? You're surrounded by opportunities to explore geography, history, and cultural traditions.
The best part? You don't necessarily need a lesson plan, a worksheet, or even a pencil.
Sometimes a good conversation is plenty, as evidenced by my history of learning, er, History. My high school History teacher would outline the chapter from the book on the board. We would read the chapter, outline the chapter, then every Friday was TEST DAY. How much of that history do I remember? 0%. BUT flash forward to my undergrad days and I had the MOST INCREDIBLE History teacher who shared historical drama like TEA. I started partnering my History classes with my literature and philosophy classes to get a better idea of what was happening during the time books were being written to fully understand the dynamic of the past… BY CHOICE. My point is this: presentation and sincerity matter.
It's Okay Not to Know the Answer
Here's something I've learned from teaching and homeschooling: we don't always need to have the answers.
In fact, sometimes the questions are more interesting.
There's a big difference between asking, "What country does this tradition come from?" and "Why do you think different cultures have developed different ways of celebrating the same ideas?"
One asks for a fact. The other invites a conversation.
And during the holidays, when everyone's schedules are already stretched thin, those little conversations can be a wonderful way to keep kids thinking without adding another activity to the calendar.
A Little Wonder Goes a Long Way
This is actually why I created Wonder Cards™ through my other business, Wander Learning Co.
I wanted something that would encourage kids to ask questions, think critically, and have interesting conversations without always needing a formal lesson. This is how we are doing the holidays this year.
If you're interested, you can explore the Wonder Cards collections at Wander Learning Co.
And Sometimes, Cookies Are Just Cookies
Of course, not everything needs to be educational.
You don't have to turn every batch of cookies into a fractions lesson, every holiday movie into a literary analysis, or every family outing into a scavenger hunt.
Sometimes it's perfectly fine to just enjoy the holidays.
But when an interesting question comes up, follow it. Look something up together. Have a conversation. See where it goes. There is joy in discovering with your family.
And if your math curriculum sits untouched for a few afternoons while you're out making memories, the world will PROBABLY keep spinning.
Homeschooling gives us flexibility. We might as well enjoy it.
Here's to a holiday season with a little less pressure and a little more curiosity :)
Happy holidays, and happy wanderings!
