How I Spend My School Holiday Essay

[Filomeno Robles]

Lastschool holiday, my family and I went back to our hometown, the eagerly-awaited holidays bring a respite from homework, lessons, extracurricular activities and exams. For me, spending a holiday at home is equally unbearable.

On the last day of school, I eagerly waited for the bell to ring at 1:30 p.m..Then, I felt like a caged bird hat has just been set free. I slang my bag over my shoulder and make my way to my dorm to pick up some bags to bring home. I waited for my mother for a couple of minutes. Finally, she came. I put my bags in the car and hoped in. In the car, my mother told me that the whole family is going to our hometown. I felt very excited because I missed my hometown very much. When we got home, I quickly packed my clothes so that I won't be rushing the next day.

We started our journey early in the morning. When we arrived, we had a quick lunch. I make a short exchange and headed for my favourite spot at my hometown. A secluded corner of my grandfather durian orchards. There under a shady spot, I sat down and enjoyed the peaceful surrounding.

Here is one of the places that made me feel relaxed, I enjoyed the solitude of nature. As I took my seat on a wooden bench, and took a glance around, I can see a flurry of activities. Birds flew and sang sweetly above me while two squirrel ran from a tree to another, colourful butterflies flapped their colourful wings and ants scurry in a single file carrying bits of food on their backs.

A cool breeze blowed. I can hear the soft rustle of leaves. The air is heavy with the scent of grasses coupled with the scent of ripe durians. I can't wait to eat durians if there's some at home. I hope so.

I lied on my back with my hand behind my head and watched streaks of sunlight filtering through the canopy of leaves. Soon I fall into short but deep slumber. When I woke up, I can see the sun slowly descending behind a row of far hills. Although I would love to linger for a little longer, I moved away reluctantly and leaved knowing that my grandparents and family would be waiting for me.

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I cringe even just thinking back on it. If you have been around my corner of the internet long, you know that this is NOT in line with my current philosophies whatsoever. In fact, in my most recent years in the classroom, I was even a HUGE proponent of not assigning homework at ALL, let alone over breaks from school.

But oftentimes, especially in my early years, I just did what everyone else was doing because I felt like, if those teachers are doing it, I probably should too. As the years went on though, I got REALLY reflective about my teaching practice and intentional about the motivation behind each choice I made in my classroom, and I want you to consider doing the same as you read this post, or really any post on my blog.

Neither of these scenarios are what I want for my students. Personally, I want my students to care more about their families than they care about their success in school. So why take over some of the limited time they may have to spend with their families?

We ALL need rest and we ALL need the people in our lives to hold us accountable to resting and actually having work/life (or school/life) boundaries. By not assigning homework over breaks (or ever) I was able to get the rest I personally needed AND model for my students how to rest and how to separate work from life.

Summertime is an opportunity for students to take a break from their school responsibilities, but also to work on themselves. There are many ways for students to spend holidays usefully, as well as to acquire new skills and have fun.

As children like to unwind and enjoy their well-earned holiday, they will probably need some help with organization and time management. With a little effort, children can spend vacation days filled with fun activities, and learn new things that could be very useful both in the new school year, and in everyday life as well.

Knowledge of foreign languages enables us to get to know different cultures and ways of life. In addition, mastering a foreign language opens up a number of possibilities, such as studying abroad, new business collaborations, or ways to improve existing collaborations. Since language learning demands a lot of time and effort, summer is an ideal period for it.

On the other hand, internships can be very useful for senior students who need work experience. Maybe someone would rather spend their summer holiday on the beach, but those who look ahead are aware that an internship in a good company can greatly help their career. First of all, they gain significant experience working in a certain industry, meet new people and acquire new skills. And finally, if they make a good impression, the intern can probably count on getting a job offer.

Some will go to summer camps, some to visit their grandparents, and others will remain at home and enjoy spending time with friends. No matter how you spend your holidays, the most important thing is to have some rest and prepare for school activities in the fall.

Association of Independent Schools of Florida;

National Council for Private School Accreditation;

Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools Commissions on Elementary and Secondary Schools;

Accreditation International;

Cognia, previously named AdvancED, a division of SACS

A couple of years before I graduated from high school in Nairobi, Kenya, my parents, my sister, and I had no plans for Thanksgiving, even though November was fast approaching. Unless we wanted to spend a sad sack holiday with just our nuclear family, we needed to find ourselves a plan, and soon. So we ended up joining a ragtag band of expats (most of them mere acquaintances) who were renting the former Mount Kenya retreat of a Saudi billionaire. It was an unlikely setting with an unlikely cast of characters, but bizarre adventures were all part of the fun of living in Kenya.

Writing an essay on your summer vacation allows you to reflect on your experiences, practice your writing skills, and share your adventures with others. It can also help you organise your thoughts and memories from the break.

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Five years ago, I had just started my first year of teaching 7th and 8th grade English Language Arts. We were working on writing middle school narrative essays and I did a blog post on how I taught it here.

I have grown SO much since that time. My students definitely learned a lot, but especially because I teach the same kids in 8th grade as I do in 7th, I knew that I had to really up what we are doing this year.

My first year teaching middle school ELA, I taught a lot of the same lessons to both seventh and eight grade. It was honestly perfect as I learned two new grade levels, but that meant I changed things up a lot in the following years.

For 8th grade, I had the same students, so I decided we would read The Outsiders. Even more so, instead of them just having to write from the point of view of a character, I actually wanted them to have to do some of that hard thinking that they might be missing out on by not doing a personal narrative.

Since I do teach middle school narrative essays differently than a lot of teachers, I thought I would give you a better overview of what the complete units looks like, plus show you some freebies you can get to use today!

With middle school narrative essays I find that students need some front loading before drafting. Because of that, we do spend the first few days doing some interactive notebook lessons on elements of narrative.

As someone who taught all three grade levels of middle school at the same time, I always needed different examples. I like to be able to use the same units, but use different content. If there is an interactive notebook lesson, I made sure to differentiate examples by grade level.

The same is done for all of the lesson plans when there are examples based on the mentor texts. I use Ghost for sixth grade, Freak the Mighty seventh grade, and The Outsiders for eighth grades, so I make sure I have different examples for each.

One of my middle school students was recently sent to me after displaying erratic behavior in class. His teachers had tried to console him and figure out the cause of his outburst. After speaking with his mom, I discovered that the family had recently lost housing and was unable to secure a bed in a shelter the night before. She told me that she had made up a reason to be sick, so that she and her son could spend the night in a local hospital.

Finding a place to sleep is an everyday battle for this mother, and yet what amazed me the most is that despite the turmoil they endured the night before, she made sure that her son got to school on time the next day. In fact, he never misses a day of school.

But for many students and their families, the holidays can also be a time of high anxiety and stress. As a school counselor in a predominantly low-income community, I have to consider that many of my students may go without the support and stability that school has come to mean. There are other stressors to consider as well.

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