Schooling at Home: The Real Lessons We Should Be Teaching Our Kids

With all the educational trends over the last year pointing towards schooling at home and remote working, parents all over the world have had to fly by the seat of their pants. When they receive work from the school, they have to interpret it and do the best they can with the child. And while there’s a lot to be said about the importance of academics, while our children are at home, we might want to start thinking about the best lessons that we can teach our children that are not necessarily provided by schools. If you have thought that there are certain lessons that you need to teach your children, now is the best time. With this in mind, let’s show you a few approaches you may want to consider.

Enunciation and Pronunciation

Depending on where you live, you may find that clarity is something that is hard to come by. Sometimes we can get caught up in our own way of speaking, that others may not necessarily understand us. But the importance of enunciation and pronunciation can be embedded early on in life. Speaking clear is one of those things that can get you ahead in life. And it’s not something we would always consider. But when you start to think about the importance of being social, especially in relation to the fact that children who are taught social skills appear to be more successful in life, taking the opportunity to go over how they speak can reap dividends later in life. You can start as soon as your child is able to string a couple of words together. There are some great tips for teaching letter sounds available online, and you can make it as age-appropriate for your child as possible. Of course, it’s really cute when they mispronounce a word, but it’s about being aware of if it can potentially develop into some sort of speech issue. 

The Art of Resilience

Everybody is understanding how resilient they can be in the current climate. And as children start to know how to push your buttons, especially when you are all cooped up in tight quarters, now might be the perfect opportunity to help your child develop some resilience. It can be so beneficial to teach our children how to rely on themselves. In some respects, we have had to do this already, either because we have work to do, or we just don’t have the time to do everything. And when it comes to something like homeschooling, your child can start small. You can give them a set of tasks, and ask them to do it. They may very well play the guilt card and say they cannot do it, or expect you to do it for them, but this is, unfortunately, where things can get exhausting. But if you really want to teach your child resilience, you must give it a little bit of time. Any habit takes weeks, or sometimes months to embed. And while you feel you may not have the time to do this, the road to resilience starts small.

Time Management

Schools run on a strict schedule and when your children come home, it is the opportunity to throw schedules out of the window. But it’s one of those essential skills in life that your children need to be able to do. Children who understand how to plan and prioritize tasks can be very successful later in life. It’s never too early to teach them time management. You can start small by helping them to understand how long they have to do something. When we incorporate good time management, it gives us and our children the ability to focus. The trick is about doing something together with a set deadline. When your children are young, it’s about being aware that things can take time, but it’s about giving them a deadline that is far away. For example, if you set a deadline of lunchtime for them to do something, if they start at 9 in the morning, there is plenty of time for them to do it. And it has to be a small task. This gives them the opportunity to complete the task in their own time but also gives them the feeling of accomplishment when they have completed it.

Learning How To Be Responsible

There are many schools of thought with regard to responsibility. You may think that if you’ve got young children, there is no need in teaching them responsibility because it piles the pressure. But when our children are in school, the importance of looking after their work, and taking pride in something they have completed is part of the curriculum. And this is where being age-appropriate will help. Our children can be responsible for something little. We need to show our children how to do things and accept the outcome of the action, whether they’ve done the right thing or the wrong thing. You can start by giving them little tasks. Something as simple as tidying up can seem like a momentous task for a five-year-old, but it’s about making sure that they are responsible for putting their toys away, and by giving them a consequence if they do not tidy the toys away. And this means that after a while, it becomes a habit. You may very well have to reiterate the consequence, but responsibility starts with the things they care about.

No doubt, there are many things that you think will help your children. Now is the ideal opportunity to in bed some more these habits. While there’s a big debate as to whether our children are being negatively impacted by schools being closed, you can take the glass half full mentality and look at what skills you can teach your children right now that you’ve not had the time to do before. There are so many lessons in life that we need to teach our children, but time has got in the way. With our children being at home, let’s take it upon ourselves to give them something extra.