I believe we are on week 5 of this distance learning journey. Whew, it feels like longer. Now that the dust has settled a bit and we’ve had some time to get into a groove, I’ve had some time to think about what has worked well for us and what hasn’t.
Here we are on day 1. Full of hope and anticipation. Hahahaha.
I’ve learned a few things along the way that have definitely helped save our sanity.
First, a quiet space for each kid to do their work is a MUST. The harder part for me is keeping their three year old little brother preoccupied so he doesn’t distract them. Sound machines have become our friends!
Presley’s (3rd) work load has been manageable. Jackson is in 5th and his has been a little more intense. He has multiple teachers/classes and it took us awhile to get his work organized in a way that he could understand and not get totally overwhelmed and just give up. After some missing assignments and lots of tears I knew I needed a different plan of attack.
This is where my angel of a friend, Andrea steps in. She is not only the craftiest person I know…she also teaches middle school. So she’s basically my hero. She put together this task board for her middle son, Mason who was also getting overwhelmed. Total game changer y’all.
Each post-it note is color-coded to represent a class. Every assignment is written out so he can clearly see what he needs to work on.
I’ve been sitting with him on Mondays to go over assignments for the week. We write each one on a post–it and it looks a little something like this…
He finished his school work in less time and was A LOT less frustrated. Definitely go check out Andrea’s post because she makes it look way cuter than I ever could, but this gets the job done.
Another trial and error moment was our daily school “time.” I have one early riser and one that LOVES sleep. I let go of the expectation that school should start and end at a certain time. Things just aren’t normal right now and if one of my kids wants to start school at 10 am, I’m ok with that as long as the work gets done.
I also needed something to easily put the kids books and supplies in to transport from our house to their dads. These crates work perfectly help and keep everything together and organized.
White boards have also been a big hit. Math problems seem a little more bearable when its not on notebook paper with a pencil. By the way I totally had to google how to divide improper fractions the other day. This homeschool gig is not for the faint of heart.
Grace has been the word I keep repeating. Grace for my kids, grace for the teachers, and Lord knows I need alllllll the grace as well.
What has been the one thing that has helped you or your kiddo the most during distant learning? I’ll take any help/advice I can get.
