On Wednesday, March 11, 2020, COVID-19, aka a novel coronavirus, was deemed a global pandemic by the World Health Organization. 2 days later, on Friday, March 13, our school district announced that we were shutting down for 4 weeks, tentatively reopening on Monday, April 13. The governor of Wisconsin ordered mandatory 4-week school closures to begin by Wednesday, March 18, for all districts.
To say that sent shock waves through my brain would be an understatement. I thought we might be closed for the week after spring break, which was scheduled to be March 23-27, but I never imagined an entire month (or more!) of school closure. Our district has no virtual learning in place either, so everything we’ll be doing at home is not counted as “official” educational minutes. I’m just hopeful that the district waives the educational minutes requirement for this school year, or else we’ll most likely lose our summer vacation entirely. Because I have a funny feeling that we won’t be going back to school on April 13.
Ryan’s work turned to 100% online classes beginning this week, so his office has been a nightmare. They didn’t have all-online infrastructure in place either, so he’s been scrambling like crazy with all the higher-ups to get them up and running as well as possible. Plus a bunch of their professors/deans/CI-whatevers have to self-quarantine right now because they took trips to high-risk areas, so he has to deal with that, too.
However. I’m actually kind of looking forward to this. Being at home with all 5 kids with literally nowhere to go, in fact being told to go nowhere, is kind of my thing. We’ve gotten emails from all their teachers with online resources and ideas for learning during the break, and Lana came home with writing and math packets, too. So I’ve already bookmarked a bunch of cool websites – museums and galleries offering free virtual tours; zoos streaming their animals since they’re all closed, too; authors doing virtual visits; artists sharing daily drawing tutorials; tons and tons of awesome science experiments; NASA’s live International Space Station cam; free online library subscriptions; math and reading programs the kids use at school; and a bunch of videos for dancing, singing, exercising, and learning pretty much anything. We have a very loose schedule in place for the weekdays, but my biggest priority is to have them all treat each other with respect, embrace and hopefully enjoy this change instead of shying away from it, and simply enjoy and remember fondly all this extra time we have together.
I’m going to keep this post as a daily log of what we do each weekday during the shutdown, mainly as a posterity record for myself, but if you’d like to see what we’re up to feel free to check back daily. I’ve certainly never experienced anything like this before, and as Twilight Zone-ish as this all seems, I’m expecting never to again. So here we go!
Monday, March 16, 2020
- Drove to Metro Market with the kids to pick up groceries ordered online. They finally got toilet paper back in stock! (that was probably the craziest part of all this – a toilet paper shortage!)
- Quick exercises with the kids
- Dancing raisins science experiment
- Started watching Frozen II
- Lunch break
- Boys went to nap, the girls and I finished the movie, the girls had writing time
- Lunch doodles with Mo Willems for the big 3
- Dreambox for the big 3
Tuesday, March 17, 2020
- Green pancakes for St. Patrick’s Day breakfast!
- Reading time for the big 3 while I got laundry going and ready for the day
- Long walk to count shamrocks in windows/doors and go down to Big Bay to look for sea glass. It was cold, but we found 60 shamrocks and a surprisingly big haul of sea glass, since the beach is essentially gone down there.
- Dreambox before lunch while I switched laundry loads
- Lunch break
- Experimenting with magnets – what sticks, what doesn’t, homemade magnet fishing
- Naps for the boys while the girls and I went outside to rake and bag up all the leftover leaves from last fall
- TV time while the boys finished napping
- Lunch doodles with Mo Willems
- Cincinnati Zoo live safari for the big 3 – Rico the porcupine. I’m having them each write down 3 facts they learn about that day’s animal.
- Writing time for the girls
March 18, 2020
- Dreambox and Raz Kids/reading for a good hour after breakfast while I cleaned up, vacuumed, and did my workout (I feel a million times better after exercise!)
- Cosmic Kids yoga
- Learning about osmosis and celery stalk/colored water science experiment
- Kids’ cardio exercises
- Lunch break
- Story time from space
- Naps for the boys, girls writing, shower/lunch/clean up for me
- Virtual tours of the British Museum in London and MoMA in NYC – the girls thought both were boring 🤣
- Lunch doodles with Mo Willems and drawing with Narwhal and Jelly (by Squiggles & Scribbles by Ben Clanton) for the big 3
March 19, 2020
- Cosmic Kids yoga
- Jack Hartmann phonics/sight words/letters for L and M; reading for D
- M write around the room – letter O
- P.E. outside – run up and down our side of the block 10 times
- Science – check on colored water celery stalks; Mystery Doug – what makes a rainbow?
- Lunch break
- Naps for the boys, writing and TV time for the girls
- Cincinnati Zoo home safari – Sihil the ocelot, Mo the sloth, and Fiona and Bebe the hippos
- Lunch doodles with Mo Willems
- After-dinner math lessons for each other
March 20, 2020
- Cosmic Kids yoga
- Making birthday cards for a little girl who had to cancel her celebration
- Reading/Alphablocks/Dreambox for an hour while I did my workout
- Weekly email to teachers
- Running through dining room obstacle course, sit-ups, push ups, squats, plank, jumping jacks, and limbo for P.E. class
- Lunch break
- Story time from space
- Nap time for boys, TV time for girls
- Science – last day of celery experiment
I think I’m going to break this all down by week, because this post filled up faster than I expected. So if you’re following along, please come back Monday to see how our social distancing/homeschooling adventure continues to pan out.