Stay-At-Home Homeschool Helpouts
Remember when homeschoolers were weird, introverted oddballs that were easy to make fun of? Well, welcome to the team!
Due to the Covid-19 situation the vast majority of families are being forced to school from home. Some of this, I’m told, is being conducted via online classes that teachers are still conducting. But some public districts are entirely on extended breaks leaving parents saddled with the task of educating their children.
I’ve had a few people asking for tips and tricks for homeschooling. Before I get into those, here is my curriculum vitae as it relates to homeschooling: I was homeschooled until high school, have a secondary education teaching certification (that I’ve never used), and I homeschool my kids. Note: by I, I mean my wife. She is a guru of curriculum curation, lesson planning, and juggling five boys. Which is the only way I think this stuff could ever get done.
So, based on my experiences, here are some thoughts and tips for the new, temporary, and coerced homeschooling parents of kids under 10.
You are always teaching your kids. The young ones in particular learn from what you do and what you don’t do every single day. So, if you think, “I'm not a teacher and I can’t do this” remember you are already a teacher and are doing this every day.
You’re not a school teacher (unless you are, in which case reading this doesn’t change that). That’s ok, and if you’re just trying to get through a few weeks or even the end of the semester, especially if you're working from home as well, don’t set the bar high. I’m not saying turn over school time to TV/tablet time. I’m actively saying don’t do that. But if you can just keep some basic math review and practice going, encourage and/or up the amount of reading going on in the house (kids to themselves or older kids and parents to kids), and facilitate good playtime (i.e, not in front of the screens) you’ll be doing just fine.
Read, read, read. If you did nothing else but facilitate a love of reading and expose your kids to classic literature and good reading material you will have achieved a large part of many years’ worth of pedagogical goals.
Don’t obsess over time. The truth is there is a lot of wasted time in school. It’s not always unnecessary in a setting with hundreds of students. Forming lines, pseudo tasks, busy work, and roll calling are needed for a structured day with 30, 50, or 100s of students. But the advantage of scaling down is you may only have one or two kids to help through a lesson. No line standing required. A school day may be 6-8hrs but I don’t know any typical homeschool day that intense. Sure, there may be unstructured free reading time for two hours throughout a day but if you’re overwhelmed by the idea of keeping a kid at a table or desk 8-3, take a breath and realize that just isn’t necessary.
Get into a rhythm as soon as you can. Kids need structure. That doesn't mean everything is exactly the same each day, but if breakfast time is followed by diving into school and that flow works stick with it.
At the same time, strike while the iron’s hot. If a kid is motivated to dive into math problems in the middle of the afternoon, you’ve got the flexibility to do that.
Think about the motivations. This is going to be very different depending on the age of the kid(s) and the length of time you think you’ll be homeschooling. Of course, the best motivation would be learning for the sake of learning. But you’re probably going to need some assistance with pointing them in the right direction.
My wife has found the reward of a short TV show is a great motivator for having a good attitude in school. Bad attitude, no show at the end of school time. Also, breaking up the day with screen time in the middle does NOT seem to work well, especially with screen time sensitive kids. You know the ones. They’re an emotional hurricane when the show needs to get turned off and you immediately regret ever having turned it on.
Outdoor time and play are vital. I know we’re in a pandemic, but if at all possible get the kids outside. It really makes a difference. If you’re not used to being home all day with the kids, I repeat, this really makes a difference. This is like the “wash your hands” saying for homeschooling. It sounds trite, but is true, and very effective.