To ask if anyone else is actually home schooling their kids?

[candyflossicecream]

I feel like the only one! People keep telling me "oh they'll catch up" "have some fun" i'm trying my hardest to keep them on track, entertained and keep them away from the tv, devices, etc.
Ps. We are having fun. I just keep getting made to feel like an arsehole for teaching my kids things and it's disheartening 😔

I am and I didn't stop during the 'Easter Holidays'. It has been excellent having a routine and my children's social skills and reading in particular have come on leaps and bounds.

Yep. SLT member here. I've been ringing parents of every Year 10.to.make sure they're on track. It's about 50/50.

Tech has been an issue for us too.

Personal laptop was completely dead when we went to use it a month ago (to be fair it wasnt an expensive one and it hadn't seen the light of day for over a year). We currently have my work laptop and 2 Amazon Fires to service me WFH + a Y2 and YR.

Wish I could just buy more kit, but I can't. We're skint.

Feel quite disadvantage actually but tok ashamed to actually tell the school we can't even print the worksheets they are sending us (what would they do about it anyway?)

@Crunchymum tell school you can't print stuff off (tell them your printer has broken) and they might be able to print off the worksheets for you. I know the schools I deal with are doing this.

I feel crap that I haven't spent much time 'teaching' DD2, a bit of help / feedback but just letting her get on with it. I am too busy tackling home learning for my class (same year group as she is). Her school have open ended tasks- mine expect us to cover new areas so new ways if teaching remotely required. V. Pissed off when NDN started jet washing half way through my first ever attempt at videoing myself!! (I know he was not BU... just unlucky timing).

Crunchymum they might print stuff out. I am going in tomorrow to my school to call parents of pupils who haven't been submitting work to see if they need help logging on / printing and delivering packs if required.

I have tried to order a printer (can stretch to a cheap one!) but none in stock.

I'll email school tomorrow and see if they can help.

My (local) brother has a printer but they also have 6 kids so they dont need to print off all my stuff and drop it / post it.

Missing my work printer so much

Yes, we're doing what school has set, which is about an hour in the morning and the same in the afternoon. A little bit of phonics, maths, writing and reading every day, and usually another subject such as History or Science.

DS is 5 and in Y1. I think what is actually important is having some structure and routine, and making sure that he retains whatever he has already learnt this year. That's not to say he is always compliant. Some things he is really interested in, but others (writing mainly) are difficult to motivate him.

In terms of how we do it, DH does the morning shift while I work and then we swap over. DH manages to get all his hours in, while I just do what I can, but have an understanding employer.

Shamelessly bribing my child - every half hour academic work she completes without attitude earns her half an hour of screen time. She is a bright little girl but lacks motivation which is a rubbish combo but the promise of playing a mindless computer game makes her ask me if she can do some schoolwork so win,win. I figure when we return to school she will be too busy to be playing these games and am doing what l can to get through this nightmare as pain free as possible

Yes and no.

I’m doing what I can with ds 6 but I’m also wfh!

Dd 11 is pretty much doing hers independently and extra but that’s no thanks to me!

We are. My ds is 7.
We do 1 maths task, 1 written task, 1 project type activity, 2 lots of reading and we usually do a draw with Rob on Tuesday and Thursday, other drawing tutorials on the other days, plus other activities that the school send through.
I try to do it in small pieces, we do lots of stuff outdoors, we try to keep it fun.
The huge advantage we have is that I am a midday supervisor so therefore not at work, and dh was made redundant the week before lockdown so there is 2 of us that can homeschool him to keep it interesting and it's not like we have anything else to to!!
I would find it way more stressful if dh and I had to work from home and homeschool.
Our dd on the other hand is 15 and in year 10, so in the middle of her GCSEs and she is really struggling to keep on top of things. She doesn't want our help and is finding it really hard to do her work. She really needs the structure and discipline of school. I do worry how much she will fall behind whilst she is not at school and in a crucial academic period

My poor y7 DD has more work than what she can realistically keep up with. Hours of each subject. I do hope schools are planning some kind catch up programme. As much as I'm trying to help keep her on track, we get bombarded with more and more work, do secondary school teachers actually talk to each other in order to know how much work each is setting?

@aintnothinbutagstring have you contacted school about how much she is getting?

Yes, I’m doing it and my son seems to be taking to it well. He’s in Year one, so just turned 6.

We aren’t doing any of the set school work and instead are just doing our own things based on DS’s abilities and interests.

We cover 5 topics:

Maths
English
Science
Learning about the body.
Learning about the world.

We have about 3 lessons a day on a cycle of set lessons in set days. He also reads each day.

We have to email all his work to his teacher on every Friday and by Monday she will have sent a reply to comment on the work he’s been doing.

She also rings us once a week just to verbally check on progress and ask how we are coping etc etc.

His teacher has been brilliant really, no complaints.

Mine are little so it’s more about managing the chaos and making sure the 3 year old is doing some focused things like puzzles and colours. My niece and nephew are getting a full timetable online (private secondary) and my local state primary seems to be sending out workpacks each week. I was quite interested to see our local big name prep is not doing an online timetable as they didn’t think it was good for the children’s well-being. They’ve instead focused on making sure they children are happy and activities like podcasts, baking, physical activity, connecting the children socially. I was quite interested to see that as it is renowned for being quite pushy.

My poor y7 DD has more work than what she can realistically keep up with. Hours of each subject.

I think the Y7s are suffering, they are still adjusting to secondary and now they are being given lots of work to manage themselves and they are still developing the necessary maturity. DD1 is getting stuck on the silliest things (we've had upset over typos in instructions) and just isn't getting the support her sister in Y6 is getting in the cosy environment of primary.

Our secondary had some complaints about too much work being set initially - so the principal sent out a survey to ALL the students and ALL the parents to gauge how people felt about it.

Generally, students were mostly satisfied, about 30% felt it was too much but about 20% felt it was not enough and 50% about right (roughly!). And the proportions were about reversed in the parents' cohort (15% felt too much, 30% not enough and over 50% felt about right). Where a particular issue was seen (I think it was 3rd years and 1 group of 5th years with particular subject choices), there were adjustments made and teachers coordinated more. But it also meant the students felt they were heard as the question was seen to be asked.

If you get in touch with school, they may be able to explain it to you, and possibly adjust it if there really is too much being set.

If you get in touch with school, they may be able to explain it to you, and possibly adjust it if there really is too much being set.

We are going to give some feedback to her form tutor. Although since DD1 is top set and conscientious I do keep telling her that if she is struggling everyone else will be as well. There's definitely variation from subject to subject, ironically the teachers she says are the best seem to be the ones who are setting the most work.

My yr4 and reception aged children's school sends work home. I get them doing maths / english / topic work in the morning, then give them an hour to play over lunch. In the afternoon, we tend to go off-piste and I find them fun activities to do, off twinkl / art or science experiments / animal cams etc, still with an educational twist. Then they play until dinner time. It's been great as they've not watched TV or played on tablets nearly as much.

Plus they've been following their own interests, which is nice for them.

@oncemorewithfeeling99

Thank you for your thoughtful post, it is exactly what I needed to hear today.

I’ve got a ds in year 2 and he has SEN with one to one support at school. He was already massively behind at school before all this started. He just can’t do any work at all without someone there to keep him on task.

My DH and I both really value academic work and want to do everything we can to help our son learn. We also both wfh and in stressful jobs, mine has never been busier.

I’m starting work at 7am -1pm and working 8pm-11pm. DH does maths with DS in the morning then works all afternoon and evening. I “teach” 1-5pm usually. It is taking forever to do what I’m sure is supposed to be a short activity.

Having tried to keep up with the daily work and spent the last couple of days crying sporadically, I’m going to just have to accept we can’t do it all.

I’ve been shocked at the amount of input he needs just to access the curriculum and write the answers down. Apparently he’s good as gold at school.

I’ve certainly been jumping into “teacher mode” , I just don’t have any other option if we want to cover the workload. It’s not “fun and loving” for us or whatever another poster said. It’s straining our relationship, there’s been loads of tears and tantrums and I think we’re causing more harm than good.

I’m very sad about the current situation, also now realising how little my son has been able to join in with learning at school in the past, finally I’m jealous of others and distressed about the fact he will be further disadvantaged by the time he goes back, by virtue of having working parents still lucky enough to have a job in this pandemic.

Sorry, that was long! I just wanted to say thank you and what you said has given me some comfort and perspective.

We do school work that is set every week day. I have two 7 year olds in year 2. They so all the tasks the school sets, plus Kumon and we do a craft together every day, sometimes baking. It doesn't take all day. The school work is a maximum of 2 hours so hardly painful or difficult to achieve.

I am also desperately trying to keep them in a routine, up by 8am, dressed, breakfast, hair and teeth brushed before 9am. This helps is all feel productive.

I have also swapped my wfh hours to Saturday and Sunday when dh is home (key worker). My company has agreed for me to do just two hours wfh during the week and the remainder at the weekend which has helped tremendously.

A bit. I reckon one on one is better/more intensive than 1: 30 so we definitely don't have to do a whole school's day worth - but not being a teacher dilutes that a bit. The stuff that benefits from being done in a group is impossible anyway.

I'm trying to limit screen time as much as possible but it is a constant fight. I do think that they will learn things by kicking about that they wouldn't have learned at school, too. It's just different.

The main thing is not to constantly compare myself to what others are managing because after all I don't actually KNOW what others are managing.

I'm hardly doing any with my DS (he's 7). He is dyslexic and needs lots of support and encouragement. I'm a single Mum and am still working full time. Its really hard. He has hardly done any of the work set at all.