Do you worry about children missing school when you are on holidays? I am not concerned at all about Noodle missing school, not one bit! Children learn far more being out in the World than in a classroom. Adults learn more too!

But it seems despite the number of times we have travelled we still get asked “What about school” which my response is always along the lines of “He will learn more from being out in the World”.

This post is based on shorter term holidays. If you are after material on schooling while travelling long term then head to bloggers that have experience in this area.

But if you want to take material…

If you want to take educational material some ideas are:

• Speak to their teachers to get some homework or activity sheets to take with you.
• General activity books with mazes, puzzles etc. Google free PDF activity sheets for ideas.
• Online programs such as Reading Eggs or Mathletics (again we don’t use these but some other travellers do).
• Free apps for devices.
• Research museums that have free tours, or tours suitable for children.

Things that are like school work, but totally fun

• Keep a journal or diary for writing and observational skills.
• Write postcards to the school or family members. Or even send them to yourself and see how long they take to arrive (we love doing this!!).
• Collect stamps – this works great if you are sending postcards home.
• Card games or other games.
• Awesome colouring books – I use these too! We also have postcards that can be coloured first, so you get to colour, post and collect the stamps – Win Win!
• Allow the child to take their own photos, this provides engagement and gets them to focus more on what they are looking at. They can add these to the journal when you get home.
• Go to interesting places like silk farms, acrobatic circus/workshop, places that make paper from elephant poo and any other random places of interest.
• ….the list is endless when you travel! I really could go on all day!

Allow the child to choose

We let Noodle choose what he wants to pack and he generally includes a maze book or general activity book but we don’t push him to pack educational based materials. If he wants to take school based stuff he can, that is totally fine.

We do get him to take a few books to read but this is because we love reading, not because we are concerned about missing school.

Small things like Noodle being in charge of watching the screen for when the flight gate will open, or counting our money at the end of the day are simple learning opportunities. If you are planning on travelling long term then find a world-schooling based group for advice.

Don’t let anyone stress you out about taking your children out of school to travel. The children will be fine!