NoFun Quarantine School - bad mom?

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I keep seeing how much fun all the other kids are having at home with their parents but feel like all I do is make mine work.

DH goes "to work" at 9, we go phonics. We both hate phonics, his handwriting is awful so I feel we really can't let it slide but it takes ages. Then there might be a phonics activity to do or some maths, spellings to practise or some art. We also have a morning break. Lunch time is obv free then there will be another activity in tbe afternoon - a leaflet in hand washing or a poster on Spring etc. Finishes with a song or book on YouTube. All set by the teacher half a day at a time and marked instantly.

But it leaves little time for cake baking or den building or painting or everything everyone else does.

I'm normally trying to feed the babies whilst he's doing his phonics, then again just before we have lunch which DH makes and then again at the end of the school day just before DH "comes home" aka downstairs. Babies are not in sync with his breaks really. He finishes about 4.
Then it's tidying up, dinner, more bottles, bed.

I just feel like he's missing out on all the other kids lovely experiences because I can't juggle enough. And I don't work so I know before I'm slated I have it easy.

He's coming 5 so only in reception. Has some speech delay and started Sept behind virtually every one. He's worked hard to get midstream and I'm scared of him regressing

Do something daring....one afternoon substitute the school activity for one of your own. Tell the teacher - we made cakes today...or whatever. I'm sure there will be no criticism at all. You say babies....are they twins? If so you are doing great just getting dressed in the morning. Don't be too hard on yourself. There will be other parents who are working and can't do all the school set activities so you won't be the only one.

Oh gosh I absolutely wouldnt be forcing it at 5.

And not if you're not both enjoying it. Im not infant trained but I know others onchere are. There must be so much more fun phonics related activities you could doif youre worried about being behind. I wouldnt see it like school personally and move more to a home ed view and educate your own way. He should still be learnjng through play anyway at 5, and with his world turned upside down the main thing is to retain your connection with him. Do the fun stuff, choose your own books and songs when you feel like it like you did before school. Do "art" as in colouring/playdough whatever when it suits you.

Maybe visualise it as a week ratger than a day so as the mood yakes you have a list of things you want to do thay week. Maybe tick of "art" one afternoon when arranging pebbles in the garden or colouring a poster.

There is no point being as disciplined unless it suits you and your child

Do the cake baking (food tech) and den building (design tech) and lots of stories .

There are no rules about how to do lockdown well as it isnt part of our normal. You really do need to work out what works for you.

If it helps Im an ex teacher and one of my kid is in pjs all day as it suits her....

Are you saying you think he has a learning disability and you don't want him to slip backwards?
Has he been tested there are some online testing schemes some initial screens are free.
To be honest all day every day won't be helping if he has a learning disability. Can you email school and see what the SENCo suggests
I do feel for you it must be so stressful trying to make sure he doesn't loose out in any direction

SENCO is calling us weekly, and tomorrow actually. Initially we were told he categorically would have a learning disability / delay based on his medical history form birth / brain scans at 9 weeks. However the biggest issue we had was his lack of speech until gone 3. He started nursery at 3 none verbal after operations at 1 (we assume trauma from the ventilator as he came round as just refused to make sounds) so he now has speech therapy and his 121 (as he's on o2 so needs help physically) does a lot of work on his speech on school.

As his spech has progressed, I don't think he does have aearnimg disability, I think he had a learning delay due to his speech impairment and his social issues 'target of nursery was tolerating children in his vicinity!!). School are happy he's now midstream and coping but I do think it's cos he's had and has a lot of input. So yes I worry he'll slip behind. I will speak to his SENCO tomorrow

The only bit we both dislike is writing (the reading and phonics he can do easily) but that's the one thing I feel he has to keep practising. Even if scho set no work, I'd still know he needs to practise as he still has athe wrong pencil grip, writes letters and imbers backwards, can't follow the line when writing etc.
The other stuff he likes and he makes music to dance to on the school ap, he dances to his favourite TV shows songs as his exercise, he plays with his toys (basically reenacting episodes off TV with his figures) in between work / after class but I'm just struggling with the rest.

The babies don't nap well in the day as they were used to getting their big naps on the school run / DS isn't quiet and likes to hold their hands when they're bloody finally asleep and putting them in their cots with DH working in the bedroom isn't practicable. Between feeds which aren't always synced (to whomever asked, yes just twins thankfully), nappy changes for all 3 (were also meant to be trying AGAIN to toilet train DS before he turns 5) I don't know where to begin with anything else. And yet all these wfh parents or parents owth more kids seem to be making their kids lives so rich and full and happy.

The school prescribed books are find, he doesn't care as long as he's being read to really

Can you do with a funny story?

One of my employees has a 5 yo daughter that she and her husband are trying to homeschool. Here’s the problem, neither of them are native English speakers. She speaks, native Russian, French, and then English. Dad speaks native French, English, and a little Russian. 5yo speaks native French, English (in school), and is learning Russian.

Got all that?

So my employee is trying to keep up on the school work assignments for the 5yo. Somehow, this has become a topic in our 1:1s. So I’m trying to help the other day with rules for the short ‘e’ sound. I explained the best I could and sent a few links with some worksheets.

Today we were talking and I asked how the short ‘e’ lessons were coming and she laughed and said...”ummm I sent her out to the deck to catch flies with a little net...we’re improvising on the lessons these days.”

So the moral of this little tale is...don’t worry about drilling information... you are all doing the best you can with what you can.

With writing about focusing on other fine motor skills and tkaing the pressure off?

If you google you will find tons of fun activities that will secretly strengthen his fine mtoor skills.

Mine loved "dough disco" at school, there's examples on you tube. Lego, fiddly things. Sewing with a bug needle theough holes? All these you could do which would help.

Forcing will cause resentment. What about writing in sand/cornflour/flour/the garden. Drawing pictures with elements of writingn in them. Wriggly lines...

Pencil grip comes in lots of ways draw colour play dough exercises there are lots of fun exercises for pencil grip that don't involve writing.
My DS was sent to handwriting club at school. He knew he was supposed to be at handwriting club but he was having such a lovely time with games and play dough that he didn't dare mention he was in the wrong place
He wasn't in the wrong place, handwriting came along nicely they just weren't doing traditional handwriting practice

And give yourself a break. Really. You sound amazing and obviously care. Im not typing coherently at 1.30 am but please do remember in many cultures he wouldnt be at school yet and I believe in Wales still learning through play, as he would in England a few years ago.

If structure works for you thats great! But dont feel you "have " to or "ought" to at all. Education is a marathon not a sprint and all that.

I still hold reading to your children is one of the best things and e joying stories together (or audio books together if more practical!)

If writing is the issue, and it sounds like fine motor skills need work, have fun doing lots of activities that promote muscle development and fine motor skills.

Playdough, using tweezers mark making with various implements. Make it fun for you both and do a little writing every second or third day.

blog.brainbalancecenters.com/2015/05/signs-of-fine-motor-delay-and-how-to-improve-fine-motor-skills

Don't worry about him being behind- you says he's coming up on five so a summer born boy? He should be expected to be a little behind- he's 20% younger than many others in his cohort. If he's mid stream he's doing fairly well for his age.

It's interesting what you say about him not actually having a learning disability- more a delay. Look for a Facebook group- I believe it's called summer borns in school but that might not be the exact title. Research the issue. Summerborns are so much more likely to be labelled as having SEND, when in reality they're just struggling with being expected to do too much, too young. Even without his early medical issues you may well have found him struggling with his writing. It's fairly textbook. What you want to do is build up his motor control and grip/strength- get him to manipulate playdough, bake biscuits etc so he can roll and cut the dough, get him to build things that require fine motor control. Google activities for fine motor control- there's something called dough gym that's quite good too.

Oh my word, he’s only 5?! Play with him! Do some play dough and Lego for fine motor skills and strength. Let him use tweezers to develop a pincer grip. Play board games. Draw.

But don’t put you or him through this any more. He has so much time to ‘catch up’ but only one chance for the two of you to enjoy his time as a little boy. There’s so much more to life than academics.

Let him look back and remember this fun time with mum and siblings where you baked cakes, did lego, played funny games with tweezers, coloured, etc.

There is a Facebook group called ‘flexible school admission for summer born children’ if that is what a pp is referring to.

If it helps, dd was 5 in October and doesn’t write on the line either! Her teachers are very happy with how she’s doing. I forget what else you said he couldn’t do but none of it sounds serious at 5. Letters and numbers backwards...perfectly normal. Just let him be a tiny boy.

There is a Facebook group called ‘flexible school admission for summer born children’ if that is what a pp is referring to.

No, that's for people who want to admit outside of year group. There's another group for people who don't defer entry that offers support and guidance for parents of summer borns in school.

Make a cake/pizza/pancakes/fruit salad. Build a den. Play with lego. Go for a walk round the block. Watch telly. Do some Gardening. Read him a story. And repeat.

It sounds to me like you're doing great and you should congratulate yourself! The speech delay must have been the problem
Like you said and so over time everything else will come. My dd, just turned 7, wasnt a very good reader at 5 3/4 when she started school (had been living abroad so she was only at kinder garten before that). She was bottom of the class for almost the whole year when she started but she finally got it and phonics. Her teacher did say its normally the worse talkers who are less good at reading so at first she was a bit confused why articulate dd couldn't really read until we explained that she had only just started school. Dd was also slow with writing. My ds 9 still doesn't have a great grip but those hand strengthening exercises were good. He did one called funky fingers, dont know if its something his teachers made up or a YouTube thing or what not.
If I were u I'd probably really limit the sitting on a chair doing writing... at the mo I'm helping dd with her letters as some of them she still does wrong. You could try that, ideal for the one on one of homeschool. Do songs and poems that you can sing and read to him to make it easy for you as he will still learn from that. And do basic maths like numbers that make 10 (I mean 4 and 6, 7 and 3 etc.)
Personally I haven't done anything from the teacher but maybe it depends on your school what you can get away with.
With your babies, u mentioned you were just getting them used to a long nap I think, could u all 3 go out for a 2 hour walk to some woods or something?
Good luck! It's way tougher with babies, I don't suppose those wfh parents creating beautiful fb memories also have twin babies to look after!

Am those suggesting dinner stuff, ill take a look thanks. He hasn't drawn as much this lady two weeks of Mom school as he usually does so I'll try and ease him back to that and look at the other activities too.

The kid def gets plenty of books read to him at bedtime and I've bright some early reader books as his school book is very much "Tim is sad. Tim is mad. Jim is bad. Jim is sad" and he actually reads well and has been doing good on the level 2 books that have more story.

A 2 hour walk in the middle of our estate wouldn't work Tbh, if have to catch a bus anywhere like that and as he's on o2 and I don't drive... We've been going to the field by the house but I struggle alone as he wants to be chased / played with and I then have a double buggy and the 3 month olds are disinterested. By the time DH finishes work it's gone 4 before we get out so that isn't even every day. Will be more over the weekend and Easter when he's off and ds will only go in the small garden alone for short bursts. I did threaten to put the twins in their buddies in the back garden but weather's been a bit crap

Re words can I just qualify it's only 4, like "thick thin this that " and he writes it 2-3.times per word. It's arduous but it isn't technically lengthy

I really wouldnt do anything that feels arduous. For you or him! It really isnt necessary. It sounds like you're providing him with a rich learning environment. Do give yourself permission to loosen up,and have a look at some of the other fine motor skill suggestions as that would do him in good stead for writing in the future

School breaks up Friday so 8 words to go, with me being more chill and none over Easter, which I had planned to do so he could practise. I'll Dec Google the ideas, and anything in YouTube is a winner. Let's see if I can find a combo woth the hungry caterpillar for buy in as we're currnetly obsessed

If you have outdoor space (it would work on pieces of paper and a word sound treasure hunt), I wrote phonic and letter sounds like Th, ch etc over our driveway in chalk then call out a sound that DD had jump on and say a word with that sound.

She was driving me bonkers and it was a way to tire her and her sister out.

I used all of the word sounds from her homework folder. (Dd is 6)

At 5, kids learn through play. Make it as fun as possible. Are there apps you can download to help with his writing? Honestly, I wouldn't worry about it too much at his age and certainly wouldn't be forcing anything. He could practice his writing in the dirt, in the sand or use chalk in the garden! I used to let my DC draw/write on the fence etc.

Did you say he makes music to dance to? And he's only 4. Let him work on that. What app is he using? There are lots of free apps and some good paid ones for making music. Let him make TikTok videos. Doesn't sound like he has any fine motor skill issues. My ds could touchtype at 4, assemble his own computer at 10....didn't learn how to tie his shoelaces until 16 and at 19 still can't handwrite so that anyone can read it.