So it’s been almost a month of school and the girls are still so positive about their experience. I don’t remember being that excited about school when I was their age. But every day, they’ve been so compliant with getting their homework done on schedule.
Establish Time
One of the best investments on your first child is setting up a consistent schedule for their school day. From the time they wake to the time they go to bed, as much as possible, set up a reliable routine and verbalize it every day so they become very conscious of what they’re doing and the times they are doing them. Since Emma hit school, I’ve communicated that she has an hour to decompress and rest, eat, watch tv, then at 4:30, she starts her homework and then her violin. Now that she’s older, I don’t even have to tell her; and the best thing is that when Zienne wasn’t in school, she’d see her older sister do this every day. So now that she has homework, she gets excited that she has similar responsibilities as her older sister and she follows the same schedule when she sees her sister go to do her homework.
Talk About Time
I often have long talks with the girls about who they want to be. When we discuss their goals, I tell them what it takes to get there and to maximize their every day, which compile into a huge amount of time. So then we get into the problem of time and management. I want them to understand that their decisions on what they spend their time doing is important in who they become. So we go further into the rabbit hole and talk about what 20-30 mins of violin practice means years from now, what 20 mins of reading every day adds up to, the benefits of writing and practicing a skill, the importance of building their relationship with God through moments of prayer and reading their Bible. Then we discuss the pitfalls of time- like the mins of tv time building up to hours and hours of wasted time, the mins. of gadgets time cutting into the time they could be doing something more productive. Because of these important frequent talks of time and potential, the girls have come to me with a resolve to not use any gadgets during school days. I’m so proud of them because they’ve come to that conclusion themselves and they don’t even complain about it. I don’t have to remind them, and the tiny fights over the iphone/ipad are now only on weekends…hahaha.
Be Consistent
Being a stay at home mom has its perks. One is the advantages of having the opportunity to be consistent when wanting to establish a goal. For example, when Zi wants to read a book or multiple books during the day, I push through the chore and help her every day so her memory kicks in from the previous day’s lessons. With Emma, it’s the same thing; we affirm yesterday’s lessons. This can apply to everything and it only takes a couple minutes- like learning memory verses. We recite a little of a verse every day, adding just a little more until we know the whole verse. But it has to be every day. It’s a conscious commitment that works.
