Am I Doing This Right??!

Am I doing this right? It used to be a question I asked myself every so often both as a parent and as a teacher. And now that we are all in this dual role together and alone, it is a question I ask with significantly more frequency...

How much time should my kids be spending in front of screens? How hard should I push them to do "school" work and sit in front of Zoom classes if they don't want to? How should I be scheduling the days or should I not be scheduling at all? How many "easy to do at home creative family fun activities" should I be incorporating into the day? How much time should I be spending on my own work and creative endeavors? How often should I be cleaning my house and tidying clutter? How much of a threshold do I need to give for behavior issues right now? How many snacks does my toddler really need in an hour? Are my children going to fall behind their peers if we don't do Khan Kids Academy/Virtual Museum Tours/Lunchtime Drawing Sessions With Their Favorite Author and Illustrator/YouTube PE and Yoga every day?

I cannot speak for what every parent, family and teacher is thinking and feeling right now, but I can imagine that if I am asking myself some of these questions on a daily hourly basis (sometimes even more frequently than that), so are many others. I have been a teacher in a classroom. I have been a stay at home parent. I have never before done both at the same time while also trying to prevent my family and others from getting sick, running a household, office, school and entertainment industry, preparing for Pesach and never leaving or seeing people beyond a walking distance away. Uncharted territory is the understatement of the century. And I can't speak for what other schools may require of students in this time or what works for each household within that framework, but I can give my unsolicited opinion:

First off, if you're healthy and your basic needs are met by the end of the day right now, you're doing great. We need to reset the bar. We need to decide how much exposure to social media is helpful and when it is not helpful. We need to trust that the beautifully filtered photos of happy children and creative family activities that we see (including my own) are literally a snapshot of one moment in one day that was full of plenty less photogenic ones. I didn't get a picture of me ugly crying in my kitchen last Friday. I didn't get a shot of us losing our patience with the kids last night while we tried to fold laundry right before their bedtime and they were literally jumping off the walls. I didn't capture the moment one or two or all three completely melted down because their banana broke, because they were put on the rug to play for five minutes and I left the room, because the toy vacuum he was trying to carry up the stairs was "not listening!" Survival mode is a real thing. Those pictures we see are there because they are imperative to our survival right now. We need to see the one thing in a day we know we did right because there are too many others we are unsure of.

But what should we be doing for our early learners right now as parent-teachers who never expected or planned to be thrust into this role overnight? (I should note here I am not touching on the topic of older children and learning because it is above my pay-grade.) Let me give you a tiny glimpse into the secret world of early childhood...

You Do Not Need New Activities Every Single Day: This may be shocking to you, but teachers repeat activities. Often. Sure, there are billions of ideas on Pinterest and Instagram. But we don't have a new craft, sensory table, writing activity, dramatic play scene, science experiment, storytime, game, fill-in-the-blank every day or even every week. And repetition is good for children. An activity that may require a lot of assistance at first can be done more autonomously with repetition. Feelings of confidence arise from opportunities to develop competence and mastery over a task. Deeper understanding and engagement happen when something is familiar. And familiarity is comforting--especially in times of crisis.

You Do Not Need to Fill Every Moment of Every Hour of Every Day: Even in classrooms, there are open spaces of time. Time when children have "free play" and not structured activities. Recess. Have recess! Call it that or whatever you want and "schedule" it into your day. And, if possible, schedule your own "recess" as well. This is time to play for everyone. If you can, get outside. If you can, find enjoyable ways of moving your body. And if you can, let this be a time for your own enjoyment and not a time to clean, tidy toys, prep food or other activities...

You Don't Need to Spend Every Waking Moment with Your Children: In fact, I would even argue that you shouldn't. It's OK (albeit challenging and even right now I am challenged by this) to say that you are taking some time for yourself and you need some space. It's a great way to model this to your children as well--and helpful for siblings who are spending every waking hour together as well in close quarters. And I would also argue that spending a chunk (in fact, several chunks) of time for yourself where you are not also engaged with tending to the many desires of everyone else and the many household tasks will help you to be more engaged in times that you do need to tend to the many desires and tasks at hand. Of course, this doesn't mean ignoring an urgent need. It also doesn't take into consideration that in many households, one or more parents/caregivers are working. There are times that working adults will need to be working and are not available.

They Can Be Bored and they will and it's OK.  Good even. This is the space where creative thinking, planning, discovery and deep play begins.

You Don't Have to Fix It All: There are going to be fights. Meltdowns. Disappointments. Temper tantrums. Frustrations. And also fears, worries, anxieties, grief... You can't and you don't have to fix it all. Be there. Be patient (with yourself as well). Know that this just will have to be enough. You don't have to intervene at every sibling squabble. You don't have to fill the minutes of boredom. You don't have to direct every activity or please every person at every time. It's OK to say "I can't" or "No" or "I don't know right now." And it's also OK to ask "What do you think we should do about this?" or "How can we solve this?" or "What would help you in this moment?"

About Activities... You don't need novel activities and projects every hour or every day. It's great if you have an interest in planning one or two. It's also OK if you don't or you can't. It's fabulous if an activity spans over the course of several days or weeks. Consider some longer term projects (like learning a new craft or hobby, planting a garden, or, as shown in the photo at the top, a child-led project like digging the deepest hole possible and finding out what is underground). And also note that teachers do not always prep every single step of every single activity. It's OK to just set out some paper and rolls of tape. It's OK for your kids to cut and glue and find their own materials and clean them up afterward... And you don't have to have every single item on that extensive blog supply list complete with Amazon affiliate links. We are all having to get creative with using what we have on hand and this is also a reality for many classrooms and teachers on a regular basis. What can you use instead? And this is a great question to pose to your children--you may be impressed with what they come up with. Activities can also be participation in natural routines of your day--cooking together, cleaning together, folding laundry together, reading together...

Time... Do you need a color coded schedule? Do you need to have timers set and follow a strict routine? No. And truthfully, many of the best classrooms don't follow a strictly timed schedule either aside from out of necessity (like pick up times or scheduled extracurricular activities). Having some semblance of a repeated flow of activities can be helpful. Even having a visual representation of this can be helpful for young children (and this can be as simple as stick figures drawn onto paper) so they are able to see that after breakfast they will get to play and after that there will be a Zoom class and after that there will be a time to go outside and then Mommy will be "at work" and at this time Daddy will be able to play with you... And it's OK to go off schedule. If your kids are content playing outside and really engaged in a game together, you don't need to rush inside for a craft project or science experiment.

Emergent "Curriculum" in the Home: Theme based learning is something that does happen in many classrooms, but it's not the only way and it's not the way that you must run things in your home (unless you happen to like that). One thing I have really enjoyed gaining out of this is an opportunity for emergent "curriculum" to happen in my home. Y wanted to have a pillow for the Seders next week, so we all sewed pillows. S wondered if we could grow an apple tree from the seeds of his apple, so the boys collected their seeds and we planted them and they sprouted and then S wanted to plant it outside, so they dug a hole and we put in the plant and we are making a label to stick beside it with a wooden paint stick we have at home. C was very interested in how the doors on the dollhouse open and close, so we got out some other toys that open and close and showed her to the toy kitchen cabinets that open and close and observed how things "appear" and "disappear" when doors open and close.

The If You Can/When You Can Category: If you can/when you can, have a list (either physical or in your head) of things to do when you need to fill a space of time or change a mood or moment. You can even engage the whole family in coming up with that list. Take a walk. Blow bubbles. Dance party. Read together. Read aloud. Family Movie Night. Board games. If you can/when you can set a chunk of time (does not need to be a long time or even only one, you can do "snacks" instead of a "meal" here), and have that be time with your family and kids. Where you can put the phone aside and turn the computers off. Be silly together. Share hopes and plans for the future together. Just be.

When to Zoom In and When to Zoom Out: No one versed in even the most basic components of early childhood development will tell you that screen learning is developmentally appropriate for this age group. In fact, I don't think it's really developmentally appropriate for any age group. But this is what we have now. There are many benefits to this technology and it allows us to be together while we are alone. But it is also very hard on children and their adults! If your kid is done with it for the day, my *opinion* is that you can shut it down. I know some schools and teachers have certain requirements now, but my two cents is that if it's not working for your child on one day or on many or on any at all, shut it down. If it's not working for you on one day, on many or on any at all, shut it down. Math can happen by counting grapes, splitting the last cookie in half, measuring how deep the hole is in the backyard... This is not a normal school scenario. This is not even a normal home school scenario. We are all in this together and alone. The bigger picture is not clear right now, but it's also not what we need to worry about/focus on at the moment. Getting through this with health, safety and some semblance of sanity is. I feel that the benefits that do potentially come from Zoom classes or similar setups right now are the opportunity for "socialization" and for familiarity/routine. There may be some learning happening as well, but right now that is not the most urgent need we have. So if virtual schooling is giving your child a way to connect that works for him/her and works for you--that is a great tool. If it is not, you can make use of other tools here. As a teacher, I would want to have feedback from my parents and families right now to know what is working and what is not and to brainstorm together--I do think it's OK and encouraged to reach out to your teachers and discuss this with kindness and empathy on both sides. We all need a lot of that right now.

And with that said, be well, be patient, be kind to yourself, and when you can, be playful.