S2E1 Back to School (In A Pandemic)

by | 7, Sep 2020 | Podcast | 0 comments

For what you can do to help yourself and your children return to school during these unprecedented times, tune in!!

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For the fantastic resource offered by Karen Cruise of Flourished Minds and for her contact details, please click here:  https://flourishedminds.co.uk/circleofcontrol/

Transcript

Xina 0:00
Welcome to Episode One of season two of the Mother of Abundance podcast. Today I’m bringing you a special, back to school, “back to school in a pandemic”, yeah, back to school. Given all of the changes that we’re having to make, there’s going to be a little bit of advice in there with regards to dealing with the covid 19 situation and how some schools have chosen to deal with that. Okay, let’s get to it.

Some of you may have children who have already returned back to school. My son doesn’t return until next week. And then I’ve also got a son who’s going to go back to university towards the end of this month. But I wanted to talk quickly about how you might want to prepare for that. So first things first, lets talk about how we help our children to return.

Now I don’t know about your children, but, certainly in this household for a long time, we were going to bed whatever time we wanted, we were getting up whatever time we want to because I mean, my son has been off school for like six months or something like that. So part of that time was just spent chilling out hanging out. We did do homeschooling though I’m not gonna lie. But there were a couple of things that were very different for us during this summer holiday. So every year, my son normally takes part in playscheme. He’s not done that. He’s not had, any friends over. We’ve seen my grandchildren a couple of times, but not that much really either. So luckily for me, my son is actually really he’s had a fantastic time at home. He’s loved it at home, but he is looking forward to going back to school. He’s not got any anxieties. He’s just looking forward to playing with his friends again. He understands about the pandemic.

He knows that he’s had COVID-19 as have I, as has his father as well. His Auntie Gay, his uncle Matthew, I think two or three of their children have had it. So, because his symptoms were really mild, he has no anxiety about it whatsoever, although he does understand the importance of hand washing, and all of the rest of it. But fortunately for me, I know he’s not he’s not really anxious about going back school. He’s really looking forward to it. So for me in my household, one of the things that I’ve had to do is reset his body clock help him to come down from the tonnes of screen time that he’s had since he’s been off.

I mean, due to being off through COVID. He’s really had way, way, way more screen time than he normally would do. So in order in order to do that, I have been reducing his dopamine levels and no, I don’t give him dopamine tablets normally, and then have decided not to. It’s all about not exposing him to as much exciting stimulus.

So TV, it’s completely gone. He’s not watching TV throughout the day. He’s not playing games on his tablet during the day. And you guys are probably thinking “The poor child! What is he doing then?” Well, I’ll tell you, he’s been having a great time listening to free audio books. I don’t know if you guys are aware but Audible throughout the pandemic, certainly while the children have not been at school, they’ve offered free books and I’ll put a link click and check it out. I think it’s probably not going to be on for much longer while when the children go back to school, but we’ve really been enjoying listening to lots of audiobooks. He’s been reading regular books and ebooks on Kindle. I know it sounds like “Well he’s doing screentime still!” yeah, but it’s a different type of stimulation than from playing online games and watching TV.

So and he hasn’t actually been reading too many ebooks he’s been mainly listening to audiobooks whilst playing with his toys. And that’s another thing, playing with toys that are age appropriate going out for walks. My son Elijah has been cycling a lot more, has been doing more art drawing. We’re not big on painting in this house. But he’s also been building, we’re going to be doing more board games. So yeah, lowering the dopamine levels, and that’s to prepare him for being in a classroom situation again, after not being in a class for so very, very long. makes him more relaxed, less excitable, and really just ready to pay, sit down and pay attention.

Guess what happens if you wake up a child early and give them breakfast early, and then give them lunch early in the lunchtime? And give them dinner earlier? They want to go to bed earlier. So rather than trying to make your child go to bed really early, if they’ve been going to bed quite late, my son’s been going to bed beyond his regular bedtime. Just get them up earlier instead and give them breakfast earlier so their stomach and digestive system is starting to work for you as well as for them because it’s starting to reset their body clock.

So earlier breakfasts, earlier lunch within the lunchtime window, earlier evening meals and a hot milky drink in our household we do sleepy tea, wind down have the lights lower in the evenings and just make them sleepier earlier by getting them up and feeding them earlier. I find works way, way better than trying to send them to bed early because let’s face it certainly in this household all my son would do is to say he can’t sleep and bother us all night. So yeah, get them up earlier, feed them earlier. And that really helps to reset their body clock.

I really advise you to speak to your children about any anxieties they might have with regards to going back to school. And we’ve got Karen Cruise of Flourished Minds. She is a gifted young people’s champion. She’s an outstanding coach. And she’s actually given some resources for us and for her wider audience, to be able to share with young people, how they can help manage their own emotions, not just through going back to school right now, but generally.

Karen so let’s hear it. What are your top tips for parents and children on returning to school?

Karen Cruise 6:54
Tip number one which is really, really important is that we make sure we are not projecting our anxieties and fears onto our children, “Our” being mums and dads and carers. So really think about the words that are coming out of our mouth. And the things the things that we’re saying to our young people.

If we – I can guarantee this – if we are anxious and worried and fearful, and show that, then our children will be anxious and worried and fearful. If we can be calmer, our children will be calmer too. So try to be calm and reassuring, even if inside you are crumbling, and just show your child some reassurance and some calm, and they’re more likely to be calm, if you are. So that’s tip number one. Be careful about our anxieties and fears that we are projecting to our children.

So just to specifically add to number one, Xina: So if we’re saying to our children, for example, “Yeah, it’s gonna be awful at school. Oh God, everyone’s wearing masks, there’s a chance that you might, you might get covid, because you’re gonna be with all these kids, it’s going to be awful. Oh, you are going to be stressed and your teachers are all going to be worried and oh dear, I just don’t know how we’re gonna cope.”… That’s going to make your kids really, really nervous.

If you say to the children, “Do you know what, everyone’s struggling a little bit. Everyone’s a little bit anxious, but what we’re going to do is just take a bit at a time, you just got to go to school, see how it goes. What the teachers have done is try to put everything in place to help you to be safe and comfortable. And everybody’s in this together. It’s not just you that might be feeling a little bit worried. It’s normal, how you’re feeling is absolutely normal. Everyone’s a little bit anxious about this, but we’re just going to take it a little bit at time.”

So there’s two very different ways that they can talk to their children. And they will have two very different outcomes.

So that was just to add to tip number one to make it a little bit more specific. Hope that’s helpful.

Tip number two, I’m going to suggest you encourage people to use my Circle of Control technique. So first of all, get the child to write out everything that they’re worried about in terms of going back to school, everything doesn’t matter how small it is, just get them to write it out. And just the act of writing it out, gets it out of their head, and stops it going round and round in their heads. So that straightaway is going to start to make them feel a little bit better.

Then we’re going to ask them to draw two circles and you can get them to be creative doing this using different colours, Sharpies, pencils, crayons, whatever they want to do, whatever they want to use. So get them to draw two circles, and you’re going to help them to take things from that list that they can count control. So the things that they can’t control go in one circle. With a with a title of “List of Things We Can’t Control”, and the things that they can control will go in circle number two.

So all the things they can’t control – like, we can’t really control what’s happening with COVID. Nobody really has the answers to it. But what we can control is following the rules of school. So wearing a mask, or making sure that you wash your hands, because that is something that you can do. You might not be able to control the fact that you can’t play with your friends in the playground. But you can control giving them a ring at the end of school to see how they’ve got on and to share ideas with them. So just get them to list things that they can’t control. Put them in one circle. And then actually, if we absolutely can’t control those, just scrunch that piece of paper up and throw it away. And then we focus on the things in the second column in the second circle that we can control. But this is all in my downloadable PDF.

So that is tip number two, to manage the things that we can and can’t control.

Tip number three is to on the morning when they wake up for school the first few mornings and for as long as you think they need it, get them to say a positive affirmation or help them with that with depending on how old they are. So, for example, today we’re going to have a good day at school. Okay, today I am going to do my absolute best of school. Today, I’m going to enjoy school and look forward to coming home and telling you all about it. So start their day off well. And again, that will help them to manage the day and going to school positively. And then do share with them or get them to share what happened at school each day. Get them to tell you about some good things that happened. And if there are some things that didn’t go too well have a conversation with them about how you might be able to help them be better the next day.

The other thing to do Xina, if anybody wants to talk to me, they can drop me an email, you’ve got my email. I’m more than happy to do that. But those three tips will definitely help children to feel a little bit more reassured and a little bit more calmer when they start back to school next week.

Xina 12:36
Thanks for that, Karen.

Karen Cruise 12:38
Thanks, Chuck.

Xina 12:39
I have left a link for you guys so that you’ll be able to check out Karen and her fantastic resources for young people.

For yourself in terms of going back to school, make sure you have got access to your child’s academic calendar. Put all of the dates, the holiday dates, and whatever, into your own calendar. If you’ve got an online calendar, this will take you no more than 15 minutes. And I’m telling you, it helps lay out your whole academic year around your children. Instead of, I don’t know, deciding that you’ve got a real huge major project that you’ve got to finish. And then realising that you’ve put it slap bang in the middle of a school holiday. Don’t do that. Just make sure that you have all of the dates in your diary when it suits you. So you work around your child’s school dates, not the other way around.

Read all the new rules that your school has set up for COVID. So figure out before your child goes back to school, where do you need to drop them off? Where do you need to collect them? Are they doing pack lunches the way they normally do if you’re sending your child to school with pack lunches, or has that changed?

If your child is going to university, like one of my older children is going back to university – find out are they going to be doing their classes online? In situ, in the classroom situation? A mixture?

Unfortunately, some universities haven’t been able to advise their students that they’re going to be doing everything online until after those students have already sorted out accommodation. Some students are really pleased about that and want to be in the city or town that they’re studying in. Some are a little bit miffed, because they could have saved themselves a tonne of money and stayed at home. Is this the same for you if you have a child of university age or young person of university age. Speak to them about it, find out and see if or how it affects them.

There’s another thing to do with schools – find out if your after school club is running on the same days as the day that they go back to school. So in my son’s school, they’re not some strange reason. They’re starting after school club the following week, which is going to impact on me and my family and the way that we work. It’s not, it’s not a big deal for me, but it might be really tricky for you.

So these are some things that you can think of. Maybe you have thought of some more. I would love to hear from you how you have planned to return to school, either with your children or grandchildren, if you’re looking after grandchildren as well. How this may have affected you. Things that your school is doing really well. Things that you think your schools should do a little bit better. I would love to hear from you. And for now, have a fantastic day and a fantastic week.

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How has your return to school/college/university gone, so far?  How did you manage your expectations?  Did you use any of these tips?  Do you have other tips that you’d like to recommend?  I’d love to read your tips, comments and feedback below!

Over to you, Love. What do you think?