Day in the Life of a Traveling Homeschooler

Do you ever wonder what a day looks like for children who are homeschooled while traveling (also known as roadschooling)?

Each day for a traveling homeschooled child is different. Some days are spent coloring, doing read alouds, and going on family nature walks. Other days are spent going to museums, historical monuments, ecological preserves, or petting zoos. Travel homeschooling offers a unique experience of learning firsthand. Children are able to travel with their families to historical sites, national parks, and many other educational opportunities along the way.

The truth is that every day for a traveling homeschooler is different. I could write an article for each day of the year (yes, we homeschool year-round), and no two blogs would be the same. That being said, here’s one of our recent days!

Morning

Most of our mornings start off with a little time to wake up, breakfast, songs, and a little school work. When we travel, which is often, we adapt to our surroundings. My goal is to have my son have a lifetime love for learning which usually happens when he learns organically as opposed to having set times for lessons.

Recently, we traveled to Cape Coral, Florida, and found Rotary Park. They have a butterfly garden, a reptile house, fish tanks, lots of hiking trails, an overlook area, a playground, and lots more.

Every Friday at 10:00 am, they take their turtle on a walk around the park which is why our day started off at the park on this particular day. We walked around the park while listening to the guide talk about what turtles eat, where burrowing owls nest, and the life cycle of the butterflies they raise.

After our tour around the park finished, we checked out the butterfly house, walked some of the trails and found a lizard, made a number 5 out of palm leaves and played on the playground.

Afternoon

After we left the park, we went out to a seafood restaurant. Chase ate crab legs, his favorite. The restaurant is in a marina and it’s so beautiful. We walked along the piers looking for manatees, but we didn’t see any. I think the water was too warm for them. Then we walked to the candy store. On the way home, we reviewed phonics in the car.

Next, we went back to the condo we are renovating and let Chase help because he wants to be a builder when he grows up. He can use a power tool better than I can. He helped take off light plate covers so we could paint, and he even installed a new doorknob while his dad explained how!

I had some work to do, so we ended up taking the rest of the afternoon pretty easy so I could get my work done. Chase watched his iPad and rested first. Then, he played with magnetic tiles.

Evening

In the evening, my husband cooked dinner while we played Snakes and Ladders. I love this game because it helps him learn number identification up to 100, addition by adding the dice numbers together, and it’s fun and competitive.

Next, I read aloud some of the books we are currently reading. (Stuart Little, Dinosaurs Before Dark by Magic Treehouse, and Little Kid’s First Big Book of Why.) Reading is a HUGE part of our homeschool, and I love doing it in the evenings because it helps my son settle down, and he is usually extra snuggly in the evening. If you do one thing to improve your homeschool, read out loud to your kids!

Next, we ate dinner together. Since my husband cooked dinner, Chase and I cleaned up. After we were done with that, we all snuggled up on the couch together and watched Despicable Me. Snuggles are always the best part of the day.

Day at a Glance

On this day, our homeschool included:

Science – Visiting a park to learn about butterflies, reptiles, fish, flowers, and plants.

Physical education – Hiking through the park trails, playing on the playground, and climbing a lookout tower at the park.

Phonics – Practicing letter sounds in the car on the way home.

Trade skills – Practicing using a drill to unscrew screws and install a new doorknob.

Free play – Kids learn so much from playing, especially as young as my son is. Magnetic tiles teach colors, shapes, engineering skills, patience, problem-solving skills, and more. He also watched videos on his iPad about different types of drones and how they work.

Math – We played Snakes and Ladders, which teaches number identification up to 100 and addition by moving spaces and adding the dice together.

Reading – I read part of 3 books aloud to my son which incorporated science, history, listening skills, comprehension, and reading skills. In the Big Book of Why, we read about why fingers and toes wrinkle in the bath, why some people need to wear glasses to see, and how TVs work. We finished our Stuart Little book and learned about what dinosaurs looked like and what they ate in our dinosaur book.

Life skills – It wouldn’t be a proper homeschooling day (for us) if we didn’t focus on life skills. On this day, we cleaned up after dinner, including rinsing our dishes and loading them into the dishwasher.

The only thing that we normally include in our homeschool day that we didn’t get to on this day was writing. I have to go easy on myself and realize that all days won’t cover every subject, and that’s ok. We can always color, trace letters, and use a writing tablet on another day.

Conclusion

As you can see, instead of carving out a specific time of day for “school”, I prefer to have educational snippets in our whole day. I do this for several reasons:

• I want to create a lifetime love of learning so I am adapting to my son’s learning style.
• Since my son is young, his attention span is about 15-20 minutes.
• I don’t want my son to view school as boring, so I try to make it as fun as possible. We play lots of games, cuddle while reading, and explore nature.

I have tried many different ways to teach my son, and this one seems to be working the best for us, at least for now. As an eclectic homeschooling parent, I have no issue with taking different parts of each homeschooling style and making them our own. We try one way, and if our needs or interests change, we pivot. We’ve tried unit studies, time-blocking, and front-loading our day with school so we have the afternoons free. They all work great for us!

When you’re considering how to set up your homeschool, do what works best for your family. Happy homeschooling!