Ideas & Resources for being at home with the kids

I am a planner and an organiser. It’s who I am and so the thought of having the kids at home with me for an indeterminable amount of time with no plan, scares me, er, quite a lot. My pair are 5 and 7, by the way, in Reception and Year 3.

I don’t want to go mad and plan every second of the day but I know my kids and if they aren’t busy, they are bickering out of boredom. Being bored every now and then does them no harm but too much of it will stress me out. So I’m coming up with a loose plan for each day. I’ve made it changeable because I don’t know the kind of things school will send for them to learn from home, and there are online tutorials and online classes we may join so things will move around a bit. But this is my vague plan for Monday.

As for what we will do during each of these segments, some will be stuff the school sends, but here are some of the ideas I have , with links to resources where relevant.

Maths

  • Workbooks, sent from school and shop bought ones.
  • Playing shops, using change from around the house
  • Board games
  • TimesTables Rockstars. (Our school uses this so we have a log in from them, not sure if you can access without that)
  • Activity Sheets from Twinkl – you can get these for free using CVDTWINKLHELPS
  • Top Marks
  • Baking – good for measuring and weighing
  • Measuring themselves, each other, and things around the house
  • Orchard toys Activity Sheets they have Maths, English and just colouring and all sorts that you can print out

PE

  • Go Noodle Zumba
  • Joe Wicks PE at 9.30 every morning
  • Cosmic Kids Yoga
  • Walks
  • Bike Rides
  • Running laps of the garden (they run laps of the playground at school for The Golden Mile so hoping they will find this more fun than it sounds lol)
  • Ball Games in the garden
  • Other online videos on social media. I think Leo’s Karate club are doing some for members and I’ve seen a ballet teacher on Instagram doing short ballet classes. @theballetcoach

English, Phonics & Reading

  • Workbooks from school
  • Oxford Reading Owl free ebooks of colour band books
  • Phonics Play username March20 password, home – good for younger ones
  • English with Holly live tutorials all week for various ages covering
  • Activity Sheets from Twinkl – you can get these for free using CVDTWINKLHELPS they have various story writing sheets and sheets for all ages with writing, phonics and more complicated activities for older children.
  • Writing letters to friends (even if we just take photos and emailing them or messaging them if you can’t get to the post)
  • Orchard toys Activity Sheets they have Maths, English and just colouring and all sorts that you can print out
  • Scholastic has some free resources too

Art

  • Drawing
  • Painting
  • Chalking outside
  • Water painting outside
  • Making pictures for friends and family
  • Junk modelling
  • Virtual tours of galleries
  • Look up a famous painting and make your own version of it
  • Make mosaics
  • Sticker pictures
  • Orchard toys Activity Sheets they have Maths, English and just colouring and all sorts that you can print out

Science/Geography

  • Making Slime
  • Baking
  • Home experiments using activity sets we have in the cupboards
  • Explorify
  • Watching animals on Zoos that live stream
  • Watch some documentaries

Coding

  • Purple Mash we have a school login so again not sure if you can use without that
  • Scratch
  • BeeBot App – not sure if only Apple

This list is by no means exhaustive, I’m sure I will add things to it. there are so many groups on facebook sharing tips and ideas and resources too. Please also feel free to let know of any you find.

We are all different and for some people a much less planned approach to this situation will work best, but for me I need a plan and some ideas for what to do, and if this helps anyone else out there than that is great. I’m not going to focus on educating them all the time, I am no teacher and I want to have fun with them at home. But I do want to keep them occupied as well.

Good luck everyone!

Thanks for taking the time to write something. I love comments and read every one xx

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