Welcome to the Lockdown diaries of Tanya and Tanmay.
It has been long into the pandemic. Every family bearing young children would have witnessed loss of social interaction due to closure of schools. The pandemic has also largely disrupted the daily schedules for young children. And Tanya and Tanmay’s family was no different.
The family largely experienced stress and anxiety just like you did. As days passed by, impatient grew among them like a wild fire. Managing children was becoming a great challenge at this point. But both Tanya and Tanmay knew that they needed to bring a sense of order and normalcy back into their house. So they settled down with a pen and a paper and began preparing their day schedule. After much efforts and discussion, they came up with a plan that brought back brilliant balance between their work and children.
We invite you to follow 3 brilliant tips inspired from Tanya and Tanmay. These would help you develop a schedule for your lockdown period:
Make sure to have breaks:
Incorporating breaks between the schedules is utterly important. Breaks can help children get ready for the next task. If your children are too young to understand the schedule and follow on their own, you can include simple activities like breathing in and out, exercising, brain gym exercises and so on. If your children are grown up, you can let them choose their break time activities like listening to music or doodling.
Socialising is must:
We are all facing the pandemic realities, however it is still important for children to socialise. If your children are attending preschool virtually then they may get a chance to interact with their peers and teachers. However if they are not, you should incorporate spending some quality time with your children. Talk to them about their day and what they loved the most. Alternatively have them join over a video call everyday with their elderly family members or cousins.
Plan age appropriate activities:
To keep your children engaged, it is extremely essential to plan the activities that suits their needs as well as age. If the activities are too easy or too difficult for children to accomplish, it can simply defunct your day schedule. You can design different set of activities that targets various domains of development.
Once your schedule is ready, it will also be important that the family is able to follow the created schedule religiously. Tanya and Tanmay did take time to accomplish regularity, but they were determined. Follow these tips that can make it easy for you and your family to adapt to the ‘NEW NORMAL’
Share your plan:
Invite your children and explain them about the new schedule you have created for them. You should be able to justify every activity for them. Take your children’s consent and welcome their suggestions if any. It will be important to incorporate their suggestions if you think they are valid. Do not push their suggestions away without proper reasoning. They should be happy to follow this schedule with you rather than accepting is forcibly.
Practice what you preach:
It is extremely essential for us to be role models for our children especially in these unprecedented times. Setting a new structured schedule for them will also give you an opportunity to preach them about the importance of time. Make an habit for them to rise up on time, fix up meal times and so on. And with children, it will be important even for you to follow these timelines.
Build self-reliance among children:
With schools shut, it is important for us to help children learn and grow independently. With many of you working from home, it becomes even more essential to help children be self reliant and independent in their tasks. Involve your children into household chores and take a step back for them to accomplish tasks on their own. Another way is to let the children pack up their toys after play time or dress themselves up without your help.
Create a healthy and safe environment:
In order for your schedule to succeed, everything should be in order. The play area, other rooms, resources for crafts or play time and much more. You know and understand your schedule better hence keeping everything ready a night before will ensure smooth transitions next day.
Quality time at the end of day:
One of the common areas of problem today are overuse of screen time. To avoid your children getting into screen time, you will need to encourage them to participate in hands on activities. And at the end of day, sit with them and allow self expression. This will not just boost their creativity but also allow them to develop linguistically. Also follow a habit of reading at least one story or book when you sit with them.
Tanya and Tanmay has succeeded by and large through these techniques. We hope that these tips also helps you to create a new strong routine for your family to follow. You can also simply use these tips to redo your existing schedules if you wish to.
Stay tune for more pages from Lockdown diaries of Tanya and Tanmay. Meanwhile, let us know your best practices for daily schedules you may have designed for your young children in the comment section below.