A 9-Day School Break, No Hakwon
Here's What We Built
Chuseok fell on a Thursday and Friday this year. For the public schools around us, that was the whole holiday — two days, then back to the usual bell schedule.
Our kids’ international school closed for nine.
September 21st to the 28th, calendar-blank. No homeroom. No bell. No plan, either — not at first.
Nine Days, No Plan
I stared at that stretch of empty days the way you stare at a blank page you’re supposed to fill. Two kids, nine days, no academy booked, no camp signed up. Just us, and all that time.
I could feel the old reflex rising — should I enroll them in something? Should I find a program? But I didn’t reach for the phone. I reached for two sheets of paper instead.
Ninja BlendBOSS Personal Blender
(As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.)
2026 Upgraded Ultrasonic Indoor Pest Repeller, 3-Mode Mouse Traps, 6 Pack
Three Goals, One Board
On the first morning, each child wrote down three goals. Not chores. Not worksheets. Things they wanted to finish by the end of the break.
Then we built a board for each of them — a simple daily routine, just enough structure to turn a wish into a habit. Mornings were for the goals. Afternoons were for everything else.
The Caterpillar Book We Had to Return
My six-year-old’s first goal was about a library book.
The Very Hungry Caterpillar — her favorite, borrowed from the school library, due back in a week. She didn’t want to let it go. So she decided to keep it anyway, in the only way a six-year-old can: she would make her own.
One page a day. Read it, copy a line, draw the picture in her own hand. By the time the real book went back to the shelf, hers sat finished on hers — a little warped, a little crooked, entirely her own.
One Song, Finished
My oldest picked the piano.
One song, start to finish, no lessons scheduled, no recital on the calendar. Just ten minutes most mornings, the same four bars over and over until they stopped sounding like four bars and started sounding like music.
On the last day of the break, the song was done. No one clapped in an auditorium. But I watched something settle in her — the particular pride of a kid who finished something because she decided to, not because someone made her.
Mornings for the Goals, Afternoons for the Sea and the Forest
The rhythm held for all nine days, almost without us trying.
Morning: the board, the book, the piano, the quiet work of small goals. Lunch: together, unhurried, the only fixed point in the day. Afternoon: out the door — the sea some days, the forest on others, whichever one the weather and the mood pointed us toward.
No two afternoons looked the same. Every morning looked almost identical. That repetition was the point.
Filling a Long School Break Without an Academy
- Let the goal come from them, not you. A caterpillar book and a piano song weren’t my ideas — they were the kids’. Ownership is what carries a six-year-old through nine straight mornings.
- One small goal beats three big ones. A single page a day, a single song, repeated — small and finishable builds more confidence than an ambitious goal abandoned by day three.
- Fix the morning, free the afternoon. A short, predictable routine in the morning makes the rest of the day feel open instead of empty.
- Check international school calendars early. If your child attends an international school in Korea, their breaks often run far longer than the public holiday — plan around nine days, not two.
- A finished small thing is still a finished thing. A handmade copy of a library book won’t win any prizes, but it taught my daughter that she can start something and see it through. That’s the whole lesson.
