A critical look at the rising culture of holiday lessons in schools
By Ngoni P Jemwa
Introduction
When did “holiday” quietly become another word for “school day” and why are we accepting it as normal?
Vacation lessons used to be a last-resort boost for exam classes or a voluntary catch-up option. Now, in many communities, schools and colleges appear to run almost continuously, pausing only for public holidays and sometimes even turning weekends into teaching time. That raises an uncomfortable tension: are we offering genuine academic support, or building a dependable revenue stream around anxiety?
The growing culture of vacation lessons
The whole thing did not just happen overnight, ah no. What started as a small thing, meant to help learners who really needed a bit of extra support, has now grown into something much bigger. These days, vacation lessons are being advertised early, priced with confidence, and made to look like the must-have option for any learner who is serious about passing. In some places, it now feels like school never really ends: term time, weekend lessons, vacation lessons, then back again. It is almost like the academic calendar has been turned into a service schedule.
And that is where the red flag starts showing. Because yes, extra lessons can help, no doubt about that, but when they become the normal thing, then the message changes. Instead of saying, “do them when necessary,” the system quietly starts saying, “if you want to keep up, you must pay.” That kind of setup pushes learners and parents into a corner, where success starts looking less about good teaching and more about who can afford to keep buying extra time. In short, education begins to feel like a product you must keep paying for, not a right you are supported to enjoy.
The bigger worry is that this mindset can normalise pressure, stress, and endless grinding for students. If children are told that real success means sacrificing most of their breaks, then we are slowly building a culture that rewards endurance, money, and survival, instead of proper learning and thoughtful planning. A learner should be given space to rest, reset, and come back ready, not be made to feel like every break must be sold off in the name of performance. So yes, extra learning time can be useful, but when it becomes the default, it starts turning schooling into an always-on hustle, and that is where the problem is.
Is the school calendar failing learners?
Supporters of vacation classes often point to a familiar argument: “There isn’t enough time.” But is the term calendar truly too short to complete the syllabus, or is time being lost inside the term itself?
It is worth separating two possibilities. The first is structural: a packed curriculum, frequent interruptions, and competing demands may genuinely squeeze teaching time. The second is managerial: uneven pacing, late starts, weak follow-through on schemes of work, and assessment practices that eat up weeks without improving understanding.
If the calendar is the problem, then the remedy belongs with policy: curriculum load, realistic time allocations, and clear priorities. But if poor pacing is the culprit, then vacation lessons become a convenient escape hatch: instead of fixing term-time discipline, we extend the school year by stealth. The uncomfortable implication is that learners may be paying financially and emotionally for what should have been addressed through better planning, monitoring, and instructional support during normal weeks.
What exactly is being taught during vacation?
Another question deserves to be asked plainly: what content is so impossible to cover during the term that it must be taught during holidays?
Is it core instruction, new topics delivered for the first time, or is it revision, past-paper practice, and targeted remediation for learners who are behind? The distinction matters. Teaching brand-new material in vacation time can signal that the term was not used effectively, or that the timetable is overloaded. Meanwhile, structured revision can be valuable,e especially for exam classes, es if it is limited, purposeful, and accessible.
Yet vacation lessons are often marketed broadly, not narrowly: whole cohorts invited, fees standardised, and attendance treated as “expected.” If every learner is urged to attend, then “remediation” starts to look less like support and more like a parallel paid term.
And if weekend lessons are already running, what is left for the holiday to solve gaps in understanding, or gaps in a school’s income plan?
Problems caused by excessive vacation lessons
Excessive vacation lessons, even when introduced with good intentions, often undermine the very purpose of school breaks. Learners need time to rest and recover, because education is not just about absorbing information but also about processing and reflecting on it. When students are constantly in class, fatigue sets in, leaving them able to memorize facts but struggling to think critically or creatively. Over time, this lack of rest erodes their ability to sustain effort, making learning feel more like a burden than an opportunity.
Beyond fatigue, the pressure of continuous lessons creates stress and anxiety. Breaks are meant to provide relief from the demands of school, but when they disappear, learners experience education as an endless treadmill with no pause button. This constant pressure can harm mental health, leaving children feeling overwhelmed and disengaged. At the same time, families lose valuable opportunities to reconnect, share responsibilities, and provide emotional support things that cannot be outsourced to a classroom. Holidays are not just leisure; they are a vital part of a child’s social and emotional development.
There are also broader social and financial consequences. Parents often face unplanned expenses when “optional” lessons are framed as essential for success, creating financial strain and inequity. Learners from poorer households may be excluded, not because of lack of effort, but because the system quietly prices them out of opportunities others can afford. This commercialisation of education risks shifting schooling from a public good into a paid add-on service, where business interests overshadow student well-being. The deeper cultural problem is that once continuous schooling is normalized, rest is treated as irresponsibility. Yet rest is not a luxury; it is what makes sustained learning and genuine achievement possible.
Possible solutions
It is not enough to simply criticise the growing dependence on vacation lessons; if such lessons are responding to genuine gaps in teaching and learning, then the real task is to reduce those gaps so that holiday instruction becomes an exception rather than a normal expectation. A more effective approach begins with stronger term-time planning and pacing. Schools should ensure that schemes of work are well prepared, syllabi are started on time, and instructional time is protected from unnecessary disruptions. When learning is properly organised during the term, the pressure to “catch up” during holidays is greatly reduced.
In addition, schools should put in place regular monitoring of syllabus coverage so that delays are identified early and corrected before holiday lessons become the only solution. This can be supported through internal checks, clear reporting systems, and timely feedback to teachers and school leadership. At the same time, teachers need more support to manage large classes, heavy workloads, and limited teaching resources, all of which affect the pace of syllabus delivery. Such support may include shared teaching materials, professional coaching, and realistic assessment schedules. Schools can also provide structured remediation during the term through targeted clinics, peer tutoring, and small-group support for struggling learners, rather than relying on entire holiday periods for catch-up.
There is also a need for clear policy guidance on holiday teaching. The Ministry should define when vacation lessons are appropriate, who they are meant for, the limits that should apply, and how transparency will be ensured. Holiday lessons should remain voluntary, time-bound, and linked to clear learning outcomes, rather than becoming compulsory for all learners. Where such lessons are frequently used, schools should be required to explain why, show what is being taught, and demonstrate how term-time teaching will improve. Ultimately, the best solution is not simply adding more teaching time, but making better use of the teaching time already provided for in the school calendar.
Vacation lessons can help especially for exam classes that need focused revision, confidence-building, and targeted support. No reasonable observer denies that extra practice can make a difference when it is well designed and genuinely optional. But a system that runs almost continuously, breaks only on public holidays, and recruits weekends into the timetable should make us pause. Are we strengthening learning or normalising exhaustion? Are we rescuing learners or covering for weak term-time delivery? And if “success” increasingly comes with a holiday fee, what happens to students whose families simply cannot pay? The fair position is not to ban all vacation lessons. It is to insist that they remain what they were meant to be: a limited support tool, not a substitute for effective teaching during the term and not a profit-making habit disguised as academic urgency.
NP Jemwa writes in his own capacity.
