At this point, most parents could use some new energy in the home school routine.
Studio 5 Home & Family Life Contributor Maria Eckersley shares 3 ways to pump up your online school efforts.
Get more great advice from Maria on Instagram, @meckmomlife, or at www.meckmom.com.
How to Add New Energy to Your Home School Routine
On-Task Bonuses
This one is all about planting surprises into your kids homework routine (similar to what we talked about in the fun mom segment last summer). For example, I might set a few random mid-morning alarms on the alexa for later in the week. If the alarm goes off and you’re doing homework or reading you earn a reward (like no chores that day or something from the fun-mom arsenal). For older kids, I might leave an invisible ink message inside their laptop or add a post-it promising a favorite take out treat to the inside of their calculator.
Randomized Locations
Sitting inside the house all day can be so lame. I think it’s fun to mix up their homework locations (similar to what we do for couch potato book club). We tend to put things on a clipboard so their work is more portable. Since reading can be done anywhere I think it’s fun to get those minutes elsewhere – like on the tramp, out in a hammock, or on a mini road trip through the canyon.
Movie Night Learning
We love a good family movie night at our house. Lately, we try to pick a movie based on the stuff the kids are learning. When Jack finished Pride and Prejudice for his senior English class, we popped popcorn and piled into my room to watch it. We’ve done similar things with some of the cool nature shows on Disney Plus and the crazy Science and History shows on Netflix. We love it because the person who has been learning gets to feel like the expert for that night while the rest of us get to relax and get some downtime together.
Maria Eckersley is the Studio 5 Home & Family Life Contributor. She is a graphic designer, shop owner, and sleep-deprived mom of six. She studied communications at BYU and Ohio State before jumping into design full time on her site, MeckMom.com.
Add comment