Work timetable for the holidays

Usually during the major school holidays, I want the kids to do schedule some work either to revise past topics or learn a little of new ones. You may say, "What? Do work during the holidays?" but like most parents, I know that if I leave my kids to go wild and play throughout the month-long vacation, the few brain cells that have been dedicated to academic work would have perished from disuse by the time school re-opens (overpowered by the brain cells in charge of computer games).

We all know that getting kids to do work during the holidays can be a real chore (I can envision the moans and groans even before they happen). But after a few years, I've found a solution that has worked for me and minimised the pain.

What I do is let the kids come up with a holiday time-table. I will impose what I think is a reasonable workload, like for this vacation, I've asked my kids to include one heavy and one light activity every weekday. An example of a heavy activity would be a maths assessment paper or a tuition session and a light one would be reading or practising the piano. Weekends are exclusively for finishing work doled out by the Chinese tutor.

This is Andre's timetable for this holiday period:


There are some "off" days like when the kids have playdates or when there's a party. Of course no work is assigned on Christmas and they're let off the last few days before school reopens (I'm not an ogre!)

I think it's reasonable - most of the work in a day can be completed within 1½ hours, which isn't a lot to ask. The rest of the time, Lesley-Anne and Andre can do whatever they like - watch tv or play computer games, within a sensible time limit.

I've found that having a timetable is very useful, for several reasons:

1) When you don't have a timetable, it's much harder to assign work. From your kids' perspective, you will be seen as trying to "eat into" their holiday time and this inevitably causes resentment. When I tried this with Lesley-Anne in the early years, I often had to cajole or nag and the work, if done, would be done reluctantly. Whereas with a timetable, since the work has already been assigned and negotiated, it's more readily accepted.

2) When coming up with the timetable, I give my kids a certain level of leeway, eg. they can choose which day to do maths or english. If Lesley-Anne wants specific days to be free, she can opt to load up on another day instead - it's a tradeoff. Since my kids have a say in how the timetable is drawn up, they take ownership of it and also take more responsibility in ensuring the work is completed.

3) A timetable also creates structure and certainty which is sorely needed in this family of procrastinators! Eg. by noting how many sessions of maths I have with each child, I can plan beforehand what I want to cover by the end of the holidays because I don't need to negotiate for extra sessions when needed. On the part of the kids, they prefer this because they know exactly what needs to be done and won't have the dread of not knowing whether mummy will spring another test paper on them at the last minute. In fact, Lesley-Anne often looks at the schedule for the next day and asks me for the set work the night before, so that she can complete it in the morning and get it out of the way.

I normally use construction paper to draw up the timetable and let the kids use stickers or markers to dress it up. The objective is to make it look as unintimidating and as fun as possible. Afterall, it is the holiday season!