There are those whose health or livelihood is literally on the line at the moment. Those who are stuck at home (or perhaps away from home) without proper food or supplies, or without the ability to provide financially for themselves or their families while things are so uncertain.
Those are real problems.
First responders, medical professionals, political and health figures carrying the weight of decision-making regarding how we move forward.
Those are individuals under real pressure.
Anything to a lesser degree that we’re dealing with in our tiny cocoon here at home is nothing compared to that.
But.
On this here blog, I always share what’s happening in our lives, and our current focus in these strange times is navigating our “new normal,” and figuring out what that routine looks like for the near future.
So here’s the latest on our situation.
Like most, we have now shifted from the We Are On Spring Break While The World Is Unraveling mode to the We Should Be In School But Cannot Be For Public Health mode, and that’s a bit tricky.
Especially when those two modes happen back-to-back, in consecutive weeks.
(Pause for a hilarious/adorable pic of my bunnies this afternoon so you don’t get bored with all this text.)
Now, as much as the kiddos might like to enjoy the forced at-home time like its wild and free summertime, that just ain’t gonna happen.
Chica’s teacher sent a brief touch point email last night, and I loved how she signed off:
Stay Healthy
Stay Educated
Stay In Routine
Amen. (That’s me talking.)
I have no doubt that parents the world over don’t want their kiddos to backslide in their education due to these difficult times.
But how do we prevent that?
Especially when so many parents the world over are now working from home, but are now being tasked with continuing their children’s education simultaneously?
In so many cases, there is just not going to be the parental capacity for that.
Now.
I recognize my vast blessings in this difficult world situation. My husband is gainfully employed and not in danger of losing a steady income as the country shuts down in so many ways (again, I go back to the start of this blog, and the real problems that exist right now.)
And I’m also fortunate that I’m a stay-at-home mom, who can bob and weave and do as I’m tasked, if our school rallies and disseminates an official lesson plan, to be tackled each day.
Thus far, our school is only officially closed this week (though I expect that time frame to extend), and the teachers are set to meet on Wednesday to establish some guidelines for us parents and our kiddos moving forward.
I fully expect at that point, we’ll have daily homework and mandatory tasks.
And, boy, do I fear the workload. And I’m saying that as someone who technically has the capacity to deal with it.
Bottom line: it’s a lot to restructure a day as if it’s a school environment. And it’s a lot lot when you might be tasked with doing that for multiple children. If I’m assigned multiple hours of homework that requires my “teaching” and involvement so we can emulate a real school day, I’ll be multiplying that times two (and a half, as Little Man still needs some tasks, too).
Deep breath.
We’ll tackle it all as it comes, but I have to admit to hoping whatever mandates we receive will be reasonable. And leave some room for parental capacity and discernment.
In the meantime...here’s what we did today, and plan on doing until we’re told to change tactics.
We enjoyed a relatively lazy morning and breakfast. Then we began our self-assigned school work. I busted out workbooks I had on hand, made up some of my own math problems for Chica and spelling assignments, as well. And I worked with the kiddos one at a time, while I forced the other two upstairs.
Overall, they were pretty pumped about the focused time with me and their school work, and I feel like if we continued this way, we could at least attempt to retain current learning levels—if not push them forward.
We followed with lunch and some family board games. Quiet time. And then I got them outdoors for an activity in the backyard (an early egg hunt...hence the bunny ears pic from above), and topped it off with my hilarious version of a PE class that they actually loved.
I think we could follow this very loose, and with-room-for-plenty-of-play schedule pretty well, in an attempt to maintain our sanity.
But I’m not even going to pretend that Day 1 (a really good day), will be representative of the rest of our homebound time, ha.
So...we’ll take it one day at a time. Tomorrow, I’m going to throw in some fun online activities that I’ve read about, around midday. And we’ll just hope for the best!
Praying for everybody’s mental, physical and financial well-being tonight.
Wash your hands, peeps.
Over and out.
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