Parent Resources
Tips for Caregivers and Parents on Schooling at Home: What Role Do Executive Skills Play?
Peg Dawson has developed a great resource for parents during this remote learning time. She has included tips and strategies to help children who have executive functioning difficulties. There are sample schedules as well as ways to help strengthen executive skills while at home. She also includes links to additional resources as well as books.
Parenting During COVID-19
A bulleted list to stick up on the fridge.
- Simultaneously, model reframing and looking on the bright side. Maybe there's a lot more family time now that both parents are working from home. Or maybe your child can finally do that epic art project he's been thinking about. Or maybe he can take on a new job or chore, now that the whole family needs to pitch in, and you can emphasize what a "big kid" he's become.
- Emphasize agency. Your family is not just sitting around at home passively waiting for forces out of your control to take shape as they will. No! Frame what you are doing, what we all need to do, as a set of actions. Your family is doing its part by helping to stop the virus, exercising agency by washing hands so thoroughly, working together as superheroes spreading health and safety around the world.
- Answer questions with factual knowledge. Then stop. If your children have questions about the virus, answer them honestly. Then stop talking. If they have follow-up questions, they'll ask. And then you can answer again.
- If your child asks the same question again and again, point that out. "But are we going to get it?" "Wait, are we going to get it?" "Are Grandma and Grandpa going to get it?" If your child continues to ask the same question, or very similar ones, then he or she is likely reassurance-seeking, which is a sign of anxiety. It's okay to acknowledge that: "Sometimes when we are worried, we ask the same question over and over. The worry fools us into thinking that will help, but it actually doesn't."
- Then provide helpful, calming strategies. What does help when we're worried is getting into our bodies ("Let's do some jumping jacks!"), or doing some deep breathing ("Smell the cookies as they come out of the oven, now blow on them since they're too hot to eat"). You know what makes worry get even bigger? Worrying about the worry! ("And then worrying about the worrying about the worry!" your child may say, and suddenly you're in a playful interaction and things don't feel quite as bad anymore.)
- Be the grown-ups. It's on us to start conversations with our kids. Continue to ask them what new things they've heard about the virus, to correct misinformation, and to answer their questions honestly and using short sentences. Kids get bogged down in words.
- Point out things that are different. Birthday parties are being canceled. Mommy is working from home. (Maybe) there's no school. People aren't traveling for spring break.
- Point out things that are the same. You're still having Honey Nut Cheerios for breakfast. You're still watching your favorite shows. We still have to brush our teeth.
- Play, play, play. Kids work things out with stuffed animals, dolls, action figures, costumes. Let your little ones be mad at the virus, attempt to control it. Maybe Elsa casts a spell so that it freezes in its tracks. Maybe Ryder and the pups go on a rescue mission to help those who are sick. Maybe you mix a COVID-19 cure potion involving food coloring, glitter, and whatever else.
- Put your phone away for set periods of time. Our kids sense, and feel uneasy, when we are distracted. Mumbling "Mmmmhmmm" as your child tells a story, while you simultaneously scroll and swipe, is not helpful. Being intentional and clear about your phone use is. "I am going to play with you right now, so I'm putting my phone on the shelf"; and "I am going to take a few minutes to check my phone right now, so I won't be able to play for a bit."
- Structure and routines are your friends. Even more than usual, and particularly as daily life looks less and less familiar. The world may feel chaotic and unpredictable, but your home doesn't have to. Consider making a daily schedule and hanging it up for all to see (use pictures if your kids can't read yet).
- Validate feelings of anger and disappointment. It stinks that you had to cancel your spring break travel plans. Or your sleepover party. Or your school play. It's OK to cry, hit the couch, even yell for a bit. Spending time at your local park as opposed to Disney World is not, in fact, a "super fun adventure." Your kids are little, not stupid.