Lockdown homeschool activity ideas

So… I never imagined I’d be writing this blog post! As the girls slept in their indoor tent last night and watched movies until midnight they are still asleep giving me the time to write this blog…

It has been 6 weeks since lockdown began and we have been all doing our best at home with our children trying to stay sane and also teach them too.

I know this is a difficult time especially for those who are trying to work from home or juggle shifts whilst also keeping their little ones busy. I thought I’d share the way we are managing our time and I would love to hear your experiences of homeschooling too.

The girls school has been fantastic at keeping in touch and providing us with work to complete. Initially I wrote out a timetable with subjects and times… this went out the window within the first week as this just caused me stress trying to hurry them along for the next subject.

I thought I’d share some websites and programmes that we are enjoying too as some  ideas for those who are not so well supported by their schools. 6 weeks in and our day looks a bit like this:

Breakfast: Reading over breakfast and following this the girls take an online test for comprehension that the school provide if they have finished their book.

English tasks: These are provided by school with a focus for the week.

Maths tasks: We use Hamilton Maths sheets, White rose maths sheets and their favourite  The Maths Factor which includes videos, tests and games which the girls are loving!

Science, History, Geography, Language: Both girls have activity ideas set by the school and we try to do one for each subject each week.

Music: The girls are both learning to play the guitar and usually have lessons at school, we have been learning from Youtube videos as and when they fancy it (not very often! I think I want to learn more than they do).

PE: We started off with Joe Wickes’ daily youtube workout however the girls got bored quite quickly. We have been mixing it up with doing something every day : basketball, cycling, long walks with the dogs and playing Just Dance on the Nintendo switch. Katie has also been learning some Ballet from Youtube. Both girls like to practice their gymnastics moves and create dances to their favourite tracks, which certainly gets their blood pumping! We have been sent log in details for a PE lessons from school but at the moment we have just been doing our own thing.

Lunchtime: We love David Walliams and have been listening to his audiobooks each day whilst we eat our lunch they are free and he posts them daily on his website: The World Of David Walliams . We are also using Audible to listen to Harry Potter at the moment and listened to Fantastic Mr Fox last week.

We try to get most of our work done by lunch time as we are early birds we are often sat eating breakfast and ready to start English by 8am although as the weeks go by our sleep pattern is shifting slightly later!

Afternoon:  We try to have some fun in the afternoon, there are so many people sharing ideas on facebook, pintrest, blogs etc.

Some of our favourites include:

• Painting, junk modeling, craft etc.
• Playing board games
• Reading books or online magazines at Readly which is great for children’s magazines and adult magazines too ( if you sign up with my link we both get a month for free! – Ready – Sign up )
• Electronic time
• Playing in the garden.
• Watch nature documentaries or a movie on Disney Plus
• Making dens
• Gardening – We are useless but we are trying!
• Pampering – Soaking feet, face masks and painting nails.

Cooking: We have also found a new love of cooking, both girls have been learning to cook simple meals. It has been a real bonding experience and lovely to see them helping out in the kitchen and being excited and interested in baking too. We don’t usually have much time to spend in the kitchen with after school clubs and work etc. but we have really enjoyed baking yummy food and meals.

Mental Health: We are very aware that we need to protect all of our minds at this difficult time and that we should be  putting too much pressure on ourselves to succeed right now! We talk daily about how we are feeling, Coronavirus, identify things that we miss and our talk about possible plans for when we are able to see friends again. We find this a good way to keep us uplifted and motivated to enjoy our time together. We enjoy getting out for fresh air on our daily  walk with the dogs and recognise this as being very important for our wellbeing.

 Connecting: We have found it really important to try and stay connected with family and friends during this time. Each day we try to Facetime, message or write a letter to someone we care about. We have started doing family group calls once a week, where we have played bingo and created our own family quiz.

Reality: Whilst this all sounds great….. we do have ups and downs like any family. The situation in our country changed so fast and suddenly we found ourselves trying to adjust to teaching children at home. On the whole we doing okay and having good days, trying to make the most of our time together. However one day last week it just wasn’t working so we binned off homeschool by mid morning and just vegged around the house. It is a massive change in everyone’s lives to be at home all day together for weeks on end.

Websites we recommend:

Twinkl – Lots of free printables to support learning

Mrs Mactivity – More free printables

BBC Bitesize online lessons Lessons and activities completable online

The Wellbeeings – Wellbeing Diary – Free printable

The Shows Must Go On – West end performances to watch

Duolingo – Learn a language online, which is fun for children too.

Stop Motion App – My friend told me about this app, it is great you can create your own movies using animation techniques.

Look at Zoo facebook pages many are doing watch online feeding times or meet the x animal videos.

For grown ups there are lots of online quizzes also advertised by individual businesses on Facebook.

I hope this post provides you with a few ideas or if nothing else it killed 5 minutes of your day!

Take care and stay safe!

Bex and The Allum Family.