2020 Week 12

🎢 this week has been wild
đź’ť what a simply wonderful time to work with people that care at a company that wants to do good
🤳 seems ridulously self-interested to waffle about how hard or not I've found this week when folk are losing their income

Schools are closing. We used to homeschool. I wondered if it would be useful to share what we learned.

I wrote hundreds of words on homeschooling. My wife laughed at me. Told me to stop waffling and said “write this down”

Obvs this was our experience, with our kids, in our context but…

  • Let them play. Play is learning.
  • You’re not a teacher. That’s ok. Teaching is hard (kudos teachers đź‘‘).
  • You’re not teaching 30 kids so don’t act like you are. A couple of hours of "teaching" a day will likely be plenty (and plenty exhausting).
  • Put stuff out they’ve not played with recently e.g. things to count with, puzzles, a book they hardly ever look at. Just leave it out for them to notice.
  • Use their interests. Talk to them about the topic you want to teach while they’re playing. Baking, shopping, accounting, planning an imaginary business.
  • Don’t get sucked in to the overwhelming amount of resources. twinkl is free right now. TES has resources for older kids. There’s so much online you can get sucked in to just comparing them. We had the most success when we just spent some time with them doing something at whatever level they’re at.
  • There are amazing homeschoolers that look like they’ve got it sorted. Social media will make it look like you’re not doing a good job cos others share at their best. But their house is messy and full of fighting kids too. They just don’t take photos while that’s happening
  • What worked for us was making sure we went outside every day. Even if it was wet

I made these:

Or rather they are the ones I kept. I’d see how quickly I could make something that helped them or held their attention. #3 loved being allowed to hold my phone and shouting at readerer The other two loved getting cat gifs as rewards

🎨I’d love to see what the digital community all make as learning resources.
👩‍❤️‍👩It's such a strange time in the world. Remember to be kind to others and to yourself.