Homeschooling and the Holidays

There are many holidays that happen during the traditional school year, and while some homeschoolers do school year-round, we are mostly a traditional public school calendar family for our homeschool.

Because of that, I’ve accumulated several lessons for the different holidays. And now I’m going to share that immense wisdom with you.  I’m organizing it along the lines of a traditional school calendar year.

Fall Semester homeschool holiday units

Originally I had lots of pictures in here, and I’ve since figured out, that it just bogs down this page, so I’m going to transform it into a list. Enjoy.

• Columbus Day lessons– This is a mini unit part of a larger unit on the Age of Exploration.  If you want to expand past the lessons in this unit, you can go into the Life of a Sailor Unit which is also applicable.
• Halloween homeschool lessons– We love the costume and dressing up aspect of Halloween, and my kids love the many silly books you can find for this holiday.
• Thanksgiving homeschool holiday lessons– Thanksgiving was originally a uniquely American holiday, and there is much to learn about the history of Thanksgiving.
• Christmas homeschool lessons– I love Christmas, which was amply illustrated as I went through and collected all of my posts and discovered I easily had over 20 posts and about 20 books.

Spring Semester homeschool holiday units

My experience as a public school teacher, there were so many more holidays with fun activities in the fall semester, than the spring semester. I’m also realizing I did not include a few holidays that are more history-related, like President’s Day or MLK jr Day. Since I don’t tend to have lessons for those, but history lessons, I didn’t think about it when originally creating this. So let me see if I have something now (in 2024) to add it in.

• Martin Luther King jr. Day– This was a history lesson we did for a co-op group, and I need to add to this.
• Chinese New Year (Lunar New Year)– I need to hunt down my field trip post for this, this wasn’t a big thing to teach about when my kids were the right age for these lessons, so I don’t have as much
• President’s Day lesson- I guess I no longer have this post
• Valentine’s Day homeschool holiday lessons– Lots of pink, hearts, and silly fun as we celebrate Valentine’s Day.
• Saint Patrick’s Day homeschool holiday lessons– Saint Patrick’s Day is an interesting holiday to learn about especially since it’s become so closely tied with going out and getting drunk here in the United States, but it’s got a great history behind it.
• Homeschool Easter lessons– Easter is a time of new birth, and in the United States, it has both a religious significance and a cultural significance as kids go out every year on Easter egg hunts.

Summer homeschool holiday ideas

Okay, so I’m gonna admit there are pretty much nothing for this, and for my one holiday I’m going to include, I am not linking to an Independence Day post specifically, but to the American Revolution

• Homeschool 4th of July– While most people running on a traditional schedule are out of school, there are still many fun lessons to be learned and books to be read for this holiday