The Stead family at the Rivers of Laos. Photo / Old Mate Media
Ever considered taking the kids out of school for a term and schooling them with world knowledge? Family travel writer Chris Stead reveals exactly what it’s like.
Pencils down, books closed; school is out, and it’s time to head outside. Not just to the park or the beach, or a quick family holiday across the ditch. But outside your comfort zone. Beyond the wop-wops and well over yonder. To places with different languages, cultures, religions, animals and food. With histories alien to our own.
In 2023, my wife and I took a punt. We pulled my three rugrats – aged 12, 10 and 7 at the time – out of school for an entire term and bought one-way tickets to Indonesia. Then, we spent two months backpacking through seven countries together.
The goal? To blow our kids’ minds and feed their malleable young brains something they can’t get from a familiar neighbourhood or school textbook. Perspective. Understanding. True world knowledge.
Taking the travel term isn’t for the faint of heart, but I encourage you to be brave, give it a crack, and do the same.
Every parent wants their child to have a good education and we certainly tossed and turned over whether missing a term of academia was the right decision. However, when we first sounded out the idea with each child’s teacher, the support was unanimous. As public school educators, they knew how much life experience and knowledge our kids would get from these trips.
Each teacher provided insight on how to keep the kids’ education moving forward while travelling. A daily diary was a big one, as reflecting on what they experienced each day worked their literacy, critical thinking and interpretation skills.
In Southeast Asia, we’d often find ourselves on trains, vehicle transfers or even boats between towns and hotels and we’d push the kids to use the down time to write and collect their thoughts.
There were also ample opportunities to practice classroom subjects in a real-world setting. Whether it’s currency conversions, working out transport timetables, converting speed signs or simply shopping at markets to barter for goods, travel is naturally full of mathematical equations. By encouraging the kids to take the lead in these moments, maths was brought to life in an engaging way.
One of our favourites was a problem such as, “It’s 120km to our hotel and we’re travelling at 70km/h, so how long ‘til we get there?” Or, “If 100,000 Vietnamese Dong is equal to $5, then how much is this 180,000 Dong fried rice?”
Geography is also a part of the day-to-day. Navigating around towns, deciding which place to head to next and working out things to do on a map quickly broadens your child’s understanding of the subject. Meanwhile, the arts are well and truly covered by so many of the activities you engage in, such as local dances, cooking, galleries and shows.
It should come as little surprise that history and culture are the subjects most richly explored. When I think back to just a snippet of what we did, it blows my mind.
We took the kids to Angkor Wat in Cambodia. Crawled the Cu Chi Tunnels of the Mekong Delta. Into Buddhist caves along the rivers of Laos. Ancient temples in Indonesia. We gifted alms to the monks and heard the Islamic call to prayer. Filled our noses with a bouquet of incense and exotic spices sizzling in street-side foods. Came across elephants, monkeys, squirrels and water buffalo. Flagged down utes and jumped in the back, letting the dust and wind orbit our hair in pursuit of the next adventure: the kids thanking the driver in their local tongue.
By this point, you’re no doubt wondering how we can afford all this. Travelling isn’t cheap at the best of times, especially when you’ve got kids and require such significant time off work. There’s no doubt that taking the travel term is a serious investment; a financial risk. But it is one worth taking.
Perhaps for you, it means taking a mix of annual and unpaid leave. Or even solo-parenting a portion of the trip while your partner stays back at work. In preparation for our trip, we switched out our fulltime roles for contract work. It untethered us from the office chair and allowed us to pick and choose work we could do remotely along the way, in hotels at night or while in transit.
Ideally, you’ll find someone to rent or sublet your home to supplement the reduced income. We’ve always found someone in the local community who could benefit from a couple of months of residence, often because they are renovating or living with parents.
Choosing relatively inexpensive countries, such as Southeast Asia, Eastern Europe, or South America, also helps if you’re on a budget. Plus, using points towards flights, booking last-minute hotel deals and investing time in cost-comparison to find the best deal helps keep costs down.
Just remember, you don’t need luxury. With kids, I recommend a hotel with a pool and breakfast; that’s all you need. Then eat in local markets and not at restaurants.
Finally, try talking with local grassroots tour operators. Not only are they significantly cheaper, but they will take you to unique places you’d never find otherwise, if you’re happy to go with the flow. We did one very memorable five-day trip with one such operator, heading up the Mekong River from Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam to Siem Reap in Cambodia, staying on farms, visiting coconut factories and finding hidden temples.
The idea of taking a travel term can feel impossible at first. It did for me. In truth, we started with smaller trips to get our jandals in the dirt, so to speak. Two weeks here. Three weeks there. So, when a window appeared in the calendar that didn’t clash with family and sport commitments, or key school milestones like the start of a new year or exams, we had the confidence to pounce. And if I can do it with young kids on a budget, then you can too.
Indeed, so successful was our experience that we’re doing another. For our 2025 travel term, we are backpacking and cruising our way around the Mediterranean and Europe.
The textbooks will still be there when you return, after all.