This is NOT what homeschooling looks like!

Alright everyone! I want you to take a long deep breath in and then hold it...Now exhale.

What we are all going through currently is nothing like homeschooling. I have to say this as a teacher, homeschooling parent, work-from-home parent, and suddenly stay-at-home parent!

We are getting so many messages regarding what is being expected from parents who have been thrown into having to teach their kids from home and I am feeling for them. The mere idea that homeschoolers are trapped inside for 7 hours a day is absurd at any level of homeschooling to be quite frank. Most homeschoolers I know call this "school at home"; a method of schooling that can be very inflexible, unforgiving, and incredible difficult to do with multiple children.

A few tips I can give you from a teacher/homeschooling perspective.

1. You are your child's first educator. You taught them to walk, talk, sit, and much more. You are very capable of teaching them things; it may not be standards based, but more than likely the life skills they can gain from this time will take them through adulthood.

2. Schools are trying to figure this all out right now as well. This is such an unprecedented situation. I am hoping we don't add too much pressure to anyone and just chill on all the emails and assignments.

3. Doing school from home online for hours with a child under 3rd grade while trying to work would take super hero capabilities. Please don't stress yourself out with trying to do both perfectly! We have awesome ideas and some wonderful hands on activities our blog that can be a part of learning. Legos, baking, science experiments, crafting, playdoh, and drawing are all great ideas. We would suggest a deschooling period anyway if we pulled our kids out in the middle of the school year. Please give yourself grace as we all try to survive this global pandemic.

I hate that we are asking parents to do 3 hours of work at home plus other busy work. Add to the fact that most of us are now working from home and trying to juggle life in quarantine, please take a minute and don't fall into the idea that you must get all of this stuff done! I mean, who really needs the added pressure of doing public school at home during this time?

One thing I have seen on the web is this; if it comes down to you having to choose between parenting, working from home, and doing school at home; please choose connecting with your children. Especially now, even if that means trying to involve them in cooking, doing household chores, and even some of your work load instead of fighting with them about assignments.

Showing my kids the conference calls I have been on makes them feel like they are a part of something and they get almost as bored as I am and find something more interesting to do (just kidding). So really, please try to relax. We are all in this together and need to be our least stressed selves as we can, especially for our children's sake. Let's make that our first priority. Use this time to make memories with them that will last a lifetime. Have pillow fights, bake, play, and build Minecraft worlds beside them; they will learn a so much more than you realize from those activities.