Educational Peer Pressure

I struggle with myself on a regular basis with what I call "educational peer pressure". It is so easy for me to fall to the idea that my children need to complete such and such by the end of the school year - because that is what the curriculum says or that is what my friend's children do. The same struggle happens when I am trying to determine what activities we will partake in during the school year - which determines what our school year will look like. I have this friend who homeschools year round and that neighbor whose children have the summer off. Of course my children want what they consider the benefit of both systems - but not the work of both. It all comes down to deciding with my husband which system both of us feel is the most beneficial to our whole family. Now convincing our children of this is always an interesting challenge. This past week we had the opportunity to serve a family that was preparing to move. They needed help in their "new to them" house. We helped clean carpets and painted. It took away time from our "school" schedule but was an education in serving. We also had a light snow on Tuesday, which is unusual for our area, so I let the children play out until we left for our friends. The schools only had a late start that day. These activities meant that we were a bit behind on what I had planned for school so I decided that we would do school on Friday and today, both of which our local public schools had off. Of course my children forgot that they had a very light week of regular school work and wanted both of these days off so that they could play with the neighbors. Oh well, can't please everyone and while I do want my children to be able to have some play time with their friends, I can't fall prey to their pressure either.