Planning The School Holidays (Without Filling Them)

Not sure what to do during the December holidays? Take your kids to one of these fun-filled, family-orientated events!

Singapore’s school holidays arrive with a wave of programme advertising, and the standard mistake is to fill them.

Structure no more than half of it.

A child who comes out of a term and straight into four weeks of back-to-back camps hasn’t had a holiday. Term time here’s demanding, and rest is the actual purpose of the break, not a gap in the schedule to be optimised.

Boredom is also productive. A child with nothing to do invents something, and that’s where a good deal of creativity and self-direction is built. It takes a day or two of complaining before it happens, so most families never see it.

Shaping the long break

One week of doing very little at the start. Children come out of a term tired, and this is when they catch up on sleep.
Some structure in the middle: a camp, a course, a trip.
The last week to reset. More on that below, because it’s the part that gets skipped.
One trip or several outings, not both. Budget and energy are finite.
Keep some routine. Total collapse of mealtimes and bedtimes for six weeks is harder to recover from than it’s worth.

Choosing a holiday programme

If you’re booking one, these are the questions to ask, and most parents ask none of them:

What’s the adult-to-child ratio? The question that tells you most.
Who are the instructors, and are they trained or are they students on a holiday job? Either can be fine. You should just know.
First aid cover and emergency procedure, especially for anything sporting or outdoors.
What happens if my child hates it? Refund and withdrawal policy, in writing.
What does a day look like, hour by hour? “Enrichment” covers everything from genuine instruction to supervised worksheets.
Sun and heat management for outdoor programmes, and water breaks.
Is my child the youngest? A six-year-old in a six-to-ten group has a very different week from a ten-year-old.

If both parents work

For most families the holidays are a childcare problem, not an enrichment problem, and it’s better to say that plainly instead of pretending the question is which course best develops your child.

Split with another family. You take both children two days, they take both children two days. The most underused arrangement there is, and it costs nothing.
Half-day camps plus a grandparent or helper for the afternoon.
Stagger your leave instead of both taking the same week.
Community centres run much cheaper programmes than the commercial providers, and they book out early.
Costs add up fast. Work out the total for the whole break before booking week one.

Screen time in the holidays

Screen time expands to fill a holiday unless something stops it. The fix is to set the rule on day one rather than trying to claw it back on day ten, when it’s become the established arrangement and any change is now a punishment.

What works better than a time limit for many families: screens after something else. After they’ve been outside, or read, or finished a job. It converts the argument into a sequence.

The week before school

The most important thing in this article, and the most commonly missed.

Start shifting bedtime earlier about a week before term, by fifteen or twenty minutes every couple of nights. Going from holiday hours to school hours overnight produces a miserable first fortnight.
Move wake-up time too, which is the harder half.
Do the uniform and shoe check early enough to replace what no longer fits.
Light academic warm-up in the last week if you want one: short and low-key. Not six weeks of daily worksheets, which mostly produces resentment.
Talk about the new year if they’re anxious about it. New class, new teacher, new subjects.

The highest-value holiday activity

Reading for pleasure, by a wide margin, and it’s free. Take them to the library, let them choose whatever they want including comics and books below their level, and don’t turn it into a reading log.

After that: time outdoors, time with friends, and enough sleep to undo the term.

Frequently asked questions

How much of the school holidays should be scheduled?

No more than half. A child who moves straight from a term into back-to-back camps hasn’t had a holiday, and rest is the point of the break. Leave a week of doing very little at the start, when children catch up on the sleep they lost during term.

Is it bad for children to be bored in the holidays?

No, it helps. A child with nothing to do eventually invents something, and that’s where self-direction and creativity get built. It takes a day or two of complaining first, so most families never get to see it happen.

What should I ask before booking a holiday programme?

The adult-to-child ratio first. Then who the instructors are and what training they’ve, first aid and emergency procedures, what a day looks like hour by hour, the refund policy if your child hates it, and whether your child would be the youngest in the group.

How do I stop screen time taking over the holidays?

Set the rule on day one instead of trying to claw it back on day ten, when it’s become the norm and any change reads as punishment. Screens after something else, after going outside, or reading, or finishing a job, works better than a time limit, because it turns an argument into a sequence.

How do I get my child back on a school schedule?

Start about a week before term, shifting bedtime fifteen to twenty minutes earlier every couple of nights, and move the wake-up time too. Going from holiday hours to school hours overnight produces a miserable first fortnight.

What’s the most valuable thing to do in the holidays?

Reading for pleasure, and it’s free. Take them to the library, let them choose anything at all including comics and books below their level, and don’t attach a reading log to it.

The main points

Structure half of it at most. The rest is rest, and boredom is doing something useful even when it doesn’t look like it.

If you book a camp, ask the ratio first. If both of you work, try splitting days with another family. It’s free and almost nobody does it.

Set the screen rule on day one. And start moving bedtimes back a week before school, not the night before.