Hello families with kids home from school!

Welcome to the wild and wonderful world of homeschooling! With over ten years of experience homeschooling my two kids, two years working at Embark Center for Self-Directed Education, and over twenty teaching privately and part time in public school, here are some tips and ideas to keep you and your child (at least partially) sane during this time of madness.

• Your child’s school will most likely have remote and online teaching. Do not expect it to take up the same amount of time as a traditional school day. Your child will most likely finish early.
• Please be patient with teachers, schools, and administrators while they work out how to teach remotely. Many don’t have experience teaching this way and are learning as they go. They are trying their best to support their students, but still must care for themselves and their own families.
• It’s ok if your child does not want to do their school work. They are stressed, most likely scared, and trying to adjust to this new reality. Please give them space to process what they are going through. Even if we try and force them to learn right now, they won’t retain much of it because of these circumstances. They will be able to catch up on what they are missing later.
• Talk to them honestly, as best as you can within your judgement, about what is going on with COVID-19. They already know about it, but it is hard even for the experts to keep up with what is happening. Balance what you tell them with what we as citizens and the authorities are doing to help. Give them reassurance.
• Take this time to do things together as a family: play board and card games, cook together, read to your child again (seriously, there are some fantastic YA books out there), listen to podcasts, watch documentaries, TV shows, and movies together (it is really fun to share your favorite shows and movies from childhood with your kids), go hiking, biking, dog-walking, tree-climbing, picnicking, bird-watching, and anything else you can think of outside that isn’t violating CDC social isolation guidelines, do arts and crafts projects, build a treehouse, clean your home (with the right soundtrack, this can be a blast), exercising together can be a lot fun (yoga, anyone?)
• You do not have to schedule every minute of their day, and you also don’t have to be educating or entertaining them constantly. Give them time to play freely on their own.
• Free play is extremely valuable for learning and mental health. It’s ok to relax a little and let them have time to explore their interests and the world around them, even if it is limited right now.
• If your child needs ideas of what to do or play, try respectfully not to give them any at first. Boredom is a great accelerant to creativity. If you need ideas, brainstorm some together (or individually) and write them down so you don’t forget them.
• Let them play video games. Heck, play video games with them, including Roblox, Minecraft and Fortnite. You’ll be surprised about how much they can teach you.
• Encourage them to go outside. The fresh air and vitamin D are great for them. See if you can challenge them to sit outside in one spot for 15, 20, or 30 minutes and write down or draw everything they hear, smell, feel, and see.
• Have your child teach you about something they are passionate about, even if it doesn’t seem like it’s academic enough. Seeing their whole face light up with excitement is already worth it, but they will be working on valuable communication skills as well.
• There are an amazing amount of online teaching resources if your child wants to supplement their learning: Coursera, Khan Academy, YouTube, Outschool, to name a few. Many symphony orchestras and other music ensembles are live-streaming the concerts that they can no longer play for live audiences.
• Draw kind and respectful boundaries. You both will need breaks from each other. It’s ok to say “I can’t play/help/work with you right now.”, but give them a time and place when you can. Since we all may be spending a lot more time in close quarters with each other than we are used to, it’s important to communicate with each other clearly and compassionately. After all, we are a team working together to beat this virus.

With kindness and patience we will all get through this together, including the youngest members of society.