Making home-schooling easier

Like a lot of children your child may have also realised that they won’t be going back to school in fall and instead will be doing distance learning by computer and home instruction. And, if they don’t seem happy by it because they did not enjoy the last months of their last school term, here’s what you can do to make transition easier.

According to parent reports, children’s reactions to the closing of schools have ranged from apathy to making the best of it. No doubt about it, significant numbers of children are experiencing mental health issues including depression, anxiety, and various forms of acting out.

That is understandable given that for many children, no school combined with no after-school sports means virtual isolation at home. Unfortunately, that often translates into over-exposure to screen-based devices that have been shown to have negative effects on both mood and behaviour.

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Please take note: Do not allow your child to fill his time with video games, unsupervised time on the computer, and the like. Help him connect face-to-face with other children and free play activities.

Let’s begin this problem-solving exercise by asking: Does the shuttering of schools extend to all forms of private education as well? If not, and since your income is discretionary, then consider sending your son to a private school.

As for you not being suited to homeschooling, consider that the public-school curricula in question were not designed for that purpose. Public schools are attempting to shoehorn a classroom-based education model into homeschooling. That is not a valid means of assessing one’s “suitability” — whether parent or child — for homeschooling.

Get in touch with your local homeschool coordinator. Ask her to recommend a curriculum and find out what sorts of homeschool options are available in your area. There well may be one that fits both you and your child. The “university model,” for example, combines group instruction and home-based instruction. That might allow you to work part-time while providing your child with a good amount of needed socialising.

Finally, see if you can find a retired teacher in your area whom you can hire to homeschool in your stead. You might even be able to form a small homeschool group with children of other parents who are in the same boat.

This will pass, but just as COVID-19 is permanently altering the way people work, it is going to alter the “look” of education in the world. It may well be time to shake things up a bit anyway.

Tribune News Service