Like most of you, I find myself quarantined with my children. While everyone is already stressed about the COVID-19 virus, having our kids with us all day everyday adds another layer to the stress. I believe our children will be home with us for the foreseeable future. I know for many this will mean making difficult decisions about leaving their child at home while they continue to go out to work. For others, it means figuring out how to balance our child's need with our work.
I have seen people go crazy and post tons of homeschool ideas and curriculum strategies; and read this article in the NYT which offered a healthy dose of screen time reality.
I am a teacher - so I am figuring out how to deliver content to my university students and like most of you am navigating more virtual contact.
As parent spend more time with their kids, I'm also seeing countless tweets and memes praising and offering sainthood and million dollar pay raises to teachers. While I agree that teachers deserve a raise (Of course I think everyone deserves a living wage but I'm crazy like that), your child's teacher has two assets that you lack.
One - she has training. Let me say that again, She has training. Your child's teacher is a professional. She went to college to learn how to teach your child. Second, she isn't worried that your child will never move out of your house. It may seem like she has more patience or she just loves children, but the truth is most likely she has taught a kid just like yours before. She has seen a kid weirder, more behind, more socially awkward who picks his nose more than your child. She has also seen a child smarter, more proficient, with neater handwriting and more perfectly fung-shui-ed lunches than your kid. So relax. We teachers know how valuable we are, obviously we don't do it for your praise, we really like your kids. Second, we teacher know how important and valuable you parents are. No one loves your kid and knows your kid like you. While we may have put more band-aids on boo-boos, we have not kissed those wounds like you.
So I'd like to help you figure out how to best meet your child's needs in this crazy new world in which we are living. Hopefully you will also find a new normal for yourself.
First off, take a deep breath and relax. You have time to figure this out. I have spent the last ten years teaching people how to be teachers. The first lesson new teachers must learn is that they are going to make a lot of mistakes. The good news is that kids make mistakes too - so what is the first lesson we can teach our kids? Making mistakes is a normal part of human life. Your kid barges in to your conference call with a single shoe and nothing else on their body - take a deep breath, relax. Step out of your meeting for one minute and help your kid get dressed. There you have - homeschool lesson #1.
Second, spend the first two weeks of homeschool establishing routines and procedures. How do we do this? Watch how people you like are doing it and see what works for you. At the end of the day evaluate how the day went and try again tomorrow. Focus on what worked well and try to do more of that. Take a moment to think about what you didn't like about today and see how you might figure out something different for tomorrow. Maybe tomorrow help your kids get dressed and give them a pop-tart before your meeting.
Here is what is working for us, less than one week into our quarantine. We have stopped using alarm clocks, we are waking up more slowly and spending a few more minutes at the breakfast table. Here is our first rule: No screens before lunch (you cannot eat lunch at 10:00am - believe me, this kid can find every loophole). Does this mean I have been asked, can I watch a video too many times to count? YES, but she has colored, played in the sand, built blanket forts and I have let her. When she tells me she is bored, I take a deep breath and say, "oh, what are you going to do?" She is currently playing with rubber bands and singing to the dog.
For our fifteen year old: I am making him read one chapter of Stamped, highlight one sentence and talk to me about why he picked this one sentence. he also has to take the dog for a walk and get some other exercise. The other day I was feeling ambitious so I downloaded the Geometry TEKS and made him highlight the skills he already had. I feel confident that his teachers are going to figure out a plan for how he will learn French in the meantime, he is doing chores, cooking, playing games and reading.
I am trying to spend a bit of time "present" with each person who lives here and limit how much time I spend scanning Facebook and reading news sights.
Here's my PhD approved professional opinion: talk to your kids, listen to them, ask them about their passions (I have learned quite a bit about DND), write a letter, make them write a letter, sit down and do nothing. Read a book. Read another book. Stop making up "activities" to keep your kids occupied and let them get bored. She what happens with those three cardboard boxes that once housed your new home office set up.
Finally, and this is super important - Buy yourself some really nice school supplies. If you are going to have to be a teacher - get yourself a new box of crayons and some smelly markers.