The past few days have seen major changes within our country and more specifically, within our homes. All of us are wearing multiple hats – mum, dad, professional, cook, gardener and maybe even referee…amongst others. However, the hat that most of us may be struggling with is becoming a “work-from-home” parent.

Working from home

For some, like me, this is a completely new experience as I have never been called to work from home and not only take care of, but also school my own children. I am sure that the expectation of completing your own work and tasks and becoming your child’s teacher has raised stress levels for many parents.

Confident I could do it

On day one of the school closures, I made breakfast for everyone, made the kids brush their teeth and dress and got myself done. I then arrived at our dining room table, armed with a printed out schedule and started handing out work to both my 8 year old and 4 year old, before settling down to do my own work. Eight minutes in and after multiple chimes of “Mommy, LOOK WHAT I DID!”, getting up twice for snacks and “Can you both focus on YOUR work so I can do MINE!”, my son looked at me and proclaimed that he wished he was back at school.

Changing things up

Recovering quickly from a shattered heart, I realised that whilst we all have expectations, this is such a unique context and I couldn’t expect my kids and I to function in the same routine because too many things are so far away from our “normal”. After this, no two days in our home have looked the same so far. And, you know what? This is fine! As the concept of working from home is such a unique scenario we are all having to do what we can. Not all work needs to be completed whilst seated at a desk. Last week, my kids and I enjoyed some time outside. While my son worked on some activities on our boundary wall with chalk (yes – we wrote on the walls!), my daughter and I played her own version of x’s and o’s.

Embracing the time we have 

This time at home can be impactful – as a school, we would want it to be a positive experience above all. This is such an anxious time. Instead of getting bogged down by all we need to accomplish – take some time to rest, recuperate and spend quality time with your families, even if it means you put down tools for a few hours. We probably will not have an opportunity again to spend so much time with our families and only we can determine the level of opportunity presented to us in this case.

Our children’s schedules are so packed on a normal day – allow them this opportunity to just be. Let them get messy. Let them laugh at silly things. Watch them as they run around the house and possibly eat ALL the snacks. Let them have a little extra screen time and my favourite one, let them spend the whole day in pyjamas. Above all, stay safe and be well. We cannot wait to welcome all our families back once our situation improves!

Here’s what our other Nova Pioneer teacher-parents had to say

“As a Senior School teacher it is quite a challenge dealing with High school students, parent requests and of course with a 3 and a half year old running around and demanding my every bit of attention towards him. I downloaded a work pack for his age from a company who designs school programmes and am keeping my little one occupied. He is SUPER energetic so I needed to find a way to keep him busy. Each day has a different activity which he LOVES. So in between my online teaching and responding to emails, I’m a grade 000 teacher too. We trying to keep that #AlwaysGrowing momentum going here with yogurt, snacks and trampoline jumping in between. P. S. – Parents, please be easy on your children… This process is very new to them and to us as teachers too. THEY WILL BE ABSOLUTELY FINE WITH YOUR AND OUR SUPPORT!” – Shelley Jacobs, Senior School Teacher Ormonde 

“WELL!!! Where do I begin?! What is more traumatic than the constant flood of Corona posts? The constant flood of home schooling posts! So many parents look like they just have it nailed, and there I am, 15 years in a classroom, and not getting anything done! Working from home and managing a team remotely is so intense. Right now my children are working on their careers as professional gamers! But, I know when the dust settles, and we find a rhythm, the amazing learning packs sent home by Learning Design will make my home schooling life a dream! Then maybe I can also post some perfect parenting pics on social media, but for now, my measure of success is FED , WASHED, and CLOTHED. 😁” – Claudia Pienaar, School Leader Paulshof