The situation with the pandemic changed the lives of everyone. Unfortunately, not only for adults but also for children. Most adults tend to work from home and schools and kindergartens are closed, so children are also at home. It is a challenging situation, especially for parents.
So how do we cope with this? How do we stay productive while working from home with kids in the other room? How to occupy children while they are at home? What are the most important things children need to learn by the end of this school year (depending on which grade they attend)?
Yes, most of us are bothered with these questions daily and we feel like we are the only ones in the world facing these challenges. But, that is actually not the case. In the manner of supporting working from home parents, opening a discussion, sharing experiences and sharing some advice we decided to host an online workshop for parents with a professional teacher. She gave us tips and tricks on how to handle kids and how to occupy them while we are at home. In addition, read what were the main conclusions of the workshop:
- The world is your home so make it as comfortable as possible for you and the kids. Create a working corner where you will be able to perform your daily tasks. The first few weeks are really hard but it is ok, because as you know Rome wasn’t built in a day. As days pass things will fall in their place.
- Create a daily routine for you and your children and make sure you practice and respect it.
- Leave children to do what they want. They are at home more so if you want to work in peace and quiet don’t stress if you find the kitchen or living room a mess an hour later ? They are just kids and you will arrange things later, you have all the time in the world now.
- If your kids go to school make sure you talk to their teachers and define major things children need to learn by the end of the school year. For example, your child might need to learn how to write or needs to know how to calculate numbers up to 100 or differ all the letters in the alphabet. Don’t be too ambitious and have in mind that this is not a regular situation, so the learning process can’t be done the regular way as well.
- If you live with a toddler try coloring, building things, driving cars, playing with dolls, read stories, play audio stories on YouTube… They have a shorter attention span so you will need more activities to keep them busy.
- Download interesting applications to engage children. We have three proposals for you:
1. Homer (it costs $8 a month but you can share it with 4 other children) an application for reading and learning English for kids from 2-8 years.
2. Khan Academy – an educational application in various areas, very useful for math for all ages. It offers learning videos, tasks, and tests. And it is free!
3. IW ColorMe – a coloring application for children over the age of 2. Children can learn colors and learn how to color and it is also free!
- Establish a schedule for learning and playing computer games. For instance, two hours of learning in exchange for one-hour playing computer games. ? This can be hard but if you endure the first week it will be worth your while.
- Try exercising with your children during breaks or in the afternoon. Find some family training sessions and play them on YouTube. This can turn into an amazing family ritual that will be great for you and the kids as well. We started our own family workout series so feel free to check them out.
If you want to learn more tips or want to hear the whole recording of the workshop feel free to contact us at marketing@iwconnect.com. If you have some proposals or tips that work for you feel free to share them as well. We are all in this together!
