Schooling At Home: Tips and Tricks
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
Thanks to Covid-19 suddenly everyone is a homeschooler, whether you want to be or not.
After homeschooling for more than a quarter of a century, I’ve learned a few things. Some the hard way, to be sure. Now, I want to share with you, who’ve been thrown into it, a few ideas that might smooth your way. At least a little.
I can’t help you with what your district loads on you. Remember, they are trying to figure out how to do this too. I keep seeing harried mothers trying to figure out emails and instructions and crazy requirements. While I can’t help with that, I can let you know a few things that have aided us through the years.
(Suggestion: divide the work your school sends you into two piles. One the mandatory and the other the busy work. Busy work isn’t bad, but when your “Have To” pile shrinks, so does the stress.)
First Things First
Let me encourage you. Schooling at home is hard.
Did that feel encouraging? Sorry, but I had to lay groundwork before I get to the encouraging part. You and your kids are establishing an entirely new pattern in your lives, and you need to give yourself and everyone else time to adjust. Don’t be too hard on yourself or them as you find your way.
When things don’t go well, remember, you can’t fix every issue, all at once. Focus on one problem at a time. When that solution is in place, tackle another. Slowly, day by day, it WILL get better. And then, just about the time you have it figured out, the semester will end! (I don’t suppose that sounds very encouraging either.)
In the meantime, don’t worry. It will be fine. You won’t ruin your kids. They will learn things. You will learn things. It will be okay.
Suggestions
To smooth the way, here are a few practical suggestions to order your days so they don’t meander without progress.
Schedule
I couldn’t function in a school year without a schedule. We needed clearly delineated times so school didn't spread through the day like melting butter. It was never rock hard, and not down to the minute. But it established start and stop times, helping Mom and kids know when it was work time and when it was break.
To juggle multiple kids, I would alternate my schedule to have one child on work they could do on their own while I was one-on-one with another. (Some of the “busy work” can keep a child occupied when you need to concentrate on the other.) Or, one student might be doing breakfast dishes while I sat with another.
The secret was repeating the schedule as close as possible every day. That way EVERYONE learns the rhythm and the question, “What do I do next?” diminishes.
Extra suggestion: Have a set Snack Time! If someone ask for snack before Snack Time, they do 10 jumping jacks. Count it as PE! Kids can misinterpret boredom for hunger. It’s our job to teach them the difference.
I saw a suggestion online. Designate a small basket for each child. Set on counter with their water bottle and their daily allotment of snacks. If they go through them quickly, they wait for the next day for more. Teaches them to “budget” their food.
And never forget, your schedule is your servant, not your master. It works for you and you can adjust as necessary.
Check lists
Kids work at different paces, which can make the schedule a challenge. It’s also easy to never feel “done.” For everyone’s mental health, a daily list of required assignments or study objectives defines when you’ve crossed the daily finish line.
Lists allow students to move through their work at their own pace, checking items off when they are complete. For students not yet reading they can still check off an item (use pictures instead of words) or put on a sticker to show they’re done.
Once you come up with a good checklist, set it up as a document you can print off every day. I always added a few blank lines where I could write either a chore or fun activity.
Timers
Timers work great and set an outside enforcer for how long to stay on task.
30 minutes on math without asking Mom a question. Circle any problems you can’t do and we will review them when we sit together.
15 minutes SSR (sustained silent reading). Adjust time longer for older students. Non-readers can still work their way through a pile of books. And there’s nothing wrong with looking through the same book twice.
30 minute break time.
20 minutes everyone go to a separate room in the house. No talking, except to yourself.
Outside and Movement
Go outside! Force them to, if they won’t go voluntarily. If they are little, go out with them. You need vitamin D and a mental health break as well. Go for a walk. Have races across the yard. Set up an obstacle course. (Better yet, have them set up an obstacle course that you will do with them.)
Collect leaves and seeds and flowers. Tape them in a journal.
Start a garden.
Time kids running five times around the yard. Make a chart and write the time down everyday and see if they can improve.
Have push-up or sit-up contests. Keep a record. (Extend to math project: make a bar graph and compare the progress.)
If you can’t go outside for physical activity, your kids still need it. When they just can’t sit still any longer, but it’s raining outside, you have to get creative. Just do something to get the blood pumping and the body moving.
They can run up and down the stairs.
Do jumping jacks and sit ups.
You can stream an exercise routine. (Even my boys enjoyed Tae Bo.)
Crank up the praise music and have a 10 minute dance session. These work best if you join in with abandon. I have great memories with Stephen Curtis Chapman rolling in the background.
Read Aloud
Best thing I’ve ever done, hands down, is read reams and reams aloud to my kids. In fact, with an eighteen-year-old and twenty-one-year-old, we’re talking about re-instituting this tradition.
I started reading aloud every day at lunch at the suggestion of an experienced mom. When the kids were young, I’d make lunch and put it on the table, then call them in and read while they ate. It kept them from getting too silly while they ate because they were distracted. (At least it lessened it.)
When my older kids were old enough to make their own lunch I’d read while they prepped and ate. (Home Economics!) I also had an older child make lunch for a younger child. They were motivated because that gave me more time to read.
My kids have the best memories of this time around the table. I suggest you throw out your stage fright and enter in with expression and all the voices you can muster. It engages young listeners who can listen to books above their reading level.
Choose chapter books that leave them hanging so they WANT to hear it the next day! If you’re having trouble interesting the kids, start with the old Hardy Boys. I defy you to stop reading at the end of the chapter.
Some of our favorite books:
All Winnie the Pooh books
Little House series
All the Redwall books (especially fun for trying out voices and accents!)
Penderwick series
Chronicles of Narnia
Stories of missionaries.
Quiet Time
My eldest son says he had to take a nap until he was twelve. As far as I know, no permanent damage occurred.
A daily quiet time after lunch was a mandatory element of sanity for me. I didn’t care if they slept. Just that everyone remained in their own space and quiet. (Use the timer and set an hour.)
Secrets to making it work:
You can either go to the bathroom BEFORE rest or AFTER. Never during.
No food or drinks. No one will starve or suffer dehydration in an hour.
If kids share a room (and our kids always did), one can take pillow, blanket and book to a sofa, as long as they didn’t talk to me or anyone else.
ADD TIME if they aren’t cooperating. Be a stickler. If everyone is quiet, it is an hour. Then you can get up quietly, so as not to wake the baby! But if they’re getting out of bed or talking, add time for everyone. Peer pressure to do as mom says makes all the difference.
Thank God For the Blessing
Even if this doesn’t feel like a blessing, we need to recognize that the Lord is giving families the opportunity to walk through the most difficult corporate experience we have had in my lifetime. It’s effecting everyone and will for years ahead.
Yet, we get to frame how our kids see this, and model for them how to respond in faith and hope. We can share with them we are scared and listen to their fears. Then we can pray together. In short, we GET to disciple our families through this crisis.
Yes, this is hard, but you might also look back on this as the more relationship-building, faith-bolstering, Jesus-seeing times in your family’s life.
May the Lord bless you greatly as you face this task. He is right by your side. You do not homeschool alone!
Have Other Questions?
Since this post is already too long, I’ll conclude. But if you have questions, put them in the comments below. I will try to shoot you a short answer, or I’ll use the questions for another post.
Here are some other blogs I’ve written on homeschooling through the years.