An Unexpected Turn: Covid-19 and Homeschooling

 
The Covid-19 virus has certainly turned life upside down for many of us. Efforts to #flattenthecurve have far-reaching effects including social distancing, panic buying and now school closures.

If you have never considered homeschooling, but are now wondering what your children can do during the closures. Normally, we love to talk about education but you may not have the time or energy to plan much right now. Furthermore, with mass gatherings cancelled, many activities are not available.  We hope this post gives you a quick guide to get a routine going.

ETA: This post is continually updated as our group members continue to find and recommend fantastic curriculum suggestions..tell us how else we can help! 

Logistics

Besides academics, families may be impacted by a cutoff to food programs or internet.

ETA 4/13: San Mateo County Office of Education has published its newsletter and it covers eligibility for lunches, and internet options.  Many school districts will have drive-thru or pick-up lunches for families, list from Second Harvest Food Bank.

Quick Start: Online Schooling

First, try this article by CNN about managing expectations and ideas about homeschool. Then, try the following as a familiar routine.

1) Create a sustainable schedule

• Khan Academy has suggested schedules which incorporate learning and physical activities.  
• Life As Mom has great ideas on tweaking schedules to fit your family.

2) Fill in the teaching slots with online classes

Multiple Subjects

• Kids Activities Blog has a list of educational offerings which are offering free subscriptions because of school closures. 
• Outschool is offering $200 of free classes per family.  These are online classes on a variety of topics.
• Amazing Educational Resources has both a website and a Facebook group where people are constantly (multiple times a day) adding websites and activities.
• "The Great Courses" is a series of high school level videos, several are available through our library subscription services. For example, this is a list of courses through Kanopy on Redwood City library (may require library card to login)

Language Arts

• Institute of Excellence in Writing (IEW) has three weeks of writing, grammar, vocabulary and poetry materials free, grades 3-12.

Math/Science

• Science Mom and Math Dad: Daily science/math class from 11a-1pm Pacific Time
• Beast Academy: Offering $15 off monthly or yearly subscriptions using code FlattenTheCurve. This is a great math curriculum using engaging comics and puzzles.
• High School Math Live: Middle and high school math online

3) Supplement

Here's where to get additional help if your student doesn't understand the online material.

• Brainfuse: Online tutors from 1-10pm daily (requires library card)
• Khan Academy: Comprehensive. Search by subject, grade or topic.
• Mathigon: Interactive textbooks, math concepts clearly demonstrated.
• Education.com: Free worksheets for a huge age and subject range.
• Brain Pop: Free access for 30 days (or as long as schools are closed) using this link 
• EBSCO Learning Express: Tutorials as well as exam (SAT, AP) prep

This list of educational YouTube channels is maintained by a teacher:

4)Breathe

Homeschool Garden has tips on motivating your student through the day.

Veteran homeschool parent Kathy Ceceri shares about the value of unstructured time, and other ideas to have both  kids and parents more involved in education, a win-win.

Quick Start #2: Alternative Learning

This is a great time to try learning outside the box. As a bonus, these combine well between age groups, e.g.  your children can work together on a project, and listen to you read aloud (or takes turn reading out) a thrilling book. Afterward, they can still do their school assignments - you'll be pleasantly surprised how much they learned while having fun. CNN has an article with ideas from various homeschool veterans.

Afterthoughts has a Welcome to Homeschooling post which reassures parents:  you don't have to know everything, and rather than fret, remember to nourish your child's body, mind and soul.

Everyday Education has a "What to Do When Everything Changes" post which asks important questions about how we should spend our time in creating an atmosphere of love and learning.

Living Books

•  Read-Aloud Revival: Book lists by grade and topic
• Sabbath Mood Homeschool: Books classified by field of science, e.g. Biology, Chemistry
• Charlotte Mason Institute: Charlotte Mason was an educator whose methods included living books, nature study, habit training and other whole child philosophies. They are offering a free selection of lessons for all ages, requiring little/no preparation. 
• Ambleside Online has an emergency homeschooling plan (HELP) which is free and requires little resources.

Foreign Languages

• Little Chinese Readers: Two months free access with code HOMESTUDY 
• French Experiment: Classic stories read by native French speaker, with slow audio.
• Spanish Experiment: Classic stories read by native Spanish with slow audio

Unit Studies  (similar to Project Based Learning)

• Amanda Bennet: Unit Studiest that capture a wide range of interests, e.g. International Space Station, St. Patrick's Day
• Scholastic will be posting new cross-subject lessons each day for three weeks.

Hands-on Projects

• Art/Craft
• Harrisville Designs has temporarily made some patterns for knitting, crocheting free.Tutorials for knitting and crocheting also available.
• Life Skills
• America's Test Kitchen - Kitchen Classroom will post new recipes, lesson plans every week.
• Science
• Mystery Science uses common materials.
• Home Science Tools have extensive, searchable experiments.
• Computers
• Humble Bundle: $1 or more donation unlocks eBooks on programming with Scratch, making a website.

Movies

• Learn in Color: Looking for a documentary or movie to teach? Samantha has reviewed plenty!
• California State Parks will have live streams with story telling, exploration of parks.

Michelle (from Great Educational Resources) has created a spreadsheet of livestreams (all times EASTERN).   Our group calendar will also have live stream events.

Find a Balance

Try and find a good mix of activities, e.g. we don't want our children online the whole day, though they might feel otherwise. 😆   Some ideas include:

Life Skills

Maybe it's time to learn to make a budget, cook, or fix the car? HomeschoolMom has links which you can filter by topic.

America's Test Kitchen has Kitchen Classroom with recipes for the kids to try. 

Maker Spaces

Are your kids bored? Set up a space where they can create, e.g. cardboard boxes, school supplies.

• Maker Spaces Education has eBooks with suggestions
• Rachelle Doorley's Tinkerlab gives fantastic ideas for projects with everyday items.
• Resource Area for Teachers (RAFT) in San Jose has idea sheets, also using common items.

Outdoor/Indoor Time

ETA: A shelter-in-place order is in effect for San Mateo county. Outdoor exercise still allowed, but maintain social distance.
 
San Mateo County Parks and Peninsula Open Space Trust are open. Although scheduled walks are cancelled or postponed, it's still important to get some fresh air and sunshine.

Before you go, make a bug pooter and nature book to store impressions.  John Muir Laws has an amazing (and free) resource for nature journaling - it's amazing how much more we observe when we're trying to draw and record things.  You can also do a nature scavenger hunt.

Tinkergarten has posted DIY activities - take a listening walk, play Hide and Sound or other fun games!

Weather not co-operating?

• HelloWonderful has fifty activities that can be done indoors.  
• DareBee: Exercises for overall and target muscle groups, several don't require special equipment.
• San Carlos Children's Theater will be posting videos for theater games the next three weeks.

Don't Break the Bank

Before ordering, remember to check these digital offerings:

• Kanopy (documentaries, movies) 
• Hoopla (eBooks, movies, music) 
• Freegal (download music legally)
• Internet Archive's Open Library (many in print books) 

The Internet Archive has curated helpful collections:

• Children's Literature: Includes many of the New York Times' "Top 100 Books" 
• Educational Computer Games: Great classics here like Oregon Trail,  Carmen Sandiego
• Shakespeare: Includes original text, commentaries, study guides
• Space: Books and multimedia collection about our cosmos
• #1000BlackGirlsBooks : Marley Dias's campaign to curate books featuring black protagonists

Redwood City School District will also give out books on March 16 and 17 at Hawes Elementary.

ETA: Swap groups are open again, with precautions.
You can also post on Nextdoor, Facebook, your local Buy Nothing group, or browse Trash Nothing for books, craft items and things for your budding engineers to take apart.

Find Community

Although mass gatherings are cancelled, you aren't alone. Feel free to reach out to homeschooling groups in your area, e.g.  A2Z Homeschooling Directory lists groups by county.  Our sidebar also lists groups which are close by, and which we have worked with.

For a peek into the lives of other homeschooling families, check out the 'Real Homeschool' series where you can hear from members with:

• Teaching Young Ones Through Everyday Life: three children in elementary and preschool
• A Letter from a Homeschooling Mom: two children in elementary
• A Shelter In Place Day: staying indoors with four children from toddler to upper elementary

To reach us, you can leave a comment or drop us an email - we would love to hear from you!