Coronavirus. Covid-19, CV19 whatever you are calling it, the effects are being felt all over the world. Our schools have just moved to pupil free days until after the school holidays at least. This in turn means that Hubby and I have to rearrange our work schedules and try and figure out how to work from home, with 3-4 kids. Thankfully day care is still open and our youngest is loving it. While it’s open, he will be going.
The kids are understandably feeling anxious and nervous. There is so much mixed communication and unknown factors right now how can anyone be feeling settled? Our oldest is having live classes online so is spending the day in his bedroom with the Chromebook, coming out for recess and lunch. It’s a bit trickier with the girls as online schooling isn’t the norm in primary school, especially for year one children. The school did send home some paper based work to do and hopefully more is coming via email. It is such a different dynamic to be doing normal school work at home versus regular school versus home schooling where you have more control over the content.
Our basic plan is to do the assigned school work in the morning, take a break and then see what projects the girls want to focus on. Our oldest will just continue with live lessons until they tell us it has changed or school holidays kick in. I explained to the kids last night that this isn’t an extended holiday, but time to be productive. So they will be getting up at the normal time, getting ready as usual and starting work at the normal time. They then get to use the extra time to focus on ‘passion projects’ which may take a week or may only take an hour.
Home school projects could be:
Photography. Using the ipads to learn how to take photos in different light settings, of different subjects and how to frame your photo. Take photos and use them to create a photo book, a collage to print, write a story and take photos for the illustrations, enter any photo competitions we find online. (Maths, Art, Science, Technology)
Massive box construction. We seem to have an abundance of boxes right now, including some larger one so a possibility is creating a castle in the carport. A major engineering feat to make it big enough for all to play in, add details, paint it, create furniture etc. (Maths, Art, Science, Technology)
Restaurant Time. One of our girls loves to cook so now is a great time to have her menu plan and cook more. It may be just our regular menu planning with me or there is talk of creating a special event restaurant complete with menus, table decorations and fancy dressing. (Maths, English, Science, Health)
Hollywood. One year for Mother’s Day I was presented with a music video the family had created just for me. Now is a great time to undertake another Hollywood moment and write and film our own movie, or more music videos. We have the green screen sheet, the ipad have video recording and editing software, and my kids have experience to create a masterpiece. (English, HASS, Technology)
New business start-up. My kids love money, and are more interested in saving it than spending it so now would be a good time for them to look into ways to make money from home as kids. They have already been running a successful Etsy store for a few years now and whether they decide to look into expanding their range or changing tact or taking on a whole new venture it will be a great educational experience on so many levels. (Maths, HASS, Technology, English, Art)
Each of these projects can be linked to various strands in the Australian Curriculum and can be adapted to each year level as necessary.
However homeschooling goes we are going be flexible and make the transition and new arrangement as easily and anxiety free for the kids as possible.