A few days ago, I wrote about how to use Zoom to teach courses online. For most people, however, teaching online entails a lot more than just learning a new technology. For some, it also involves managing heightened anxiety and fear as the world around us crashes. For some, it requires finding a physical space to work in a crowded apartment. For some, it means temporarily setting aside increasingly urgent financial or health concerns in order to concentrate on course materials. And for some, it means figuring out what to do with young children so that they are busy and happy enough for a sufficiently long time to allow for course prep and teaching. That’s no small feat on any day, let along after days or weeks of social distancing measures that are keeping children far from their school, friends, playgrounds, libraries, and the outdoors.
I’ll be honest: I had a great ambition to write this essay, to share with all of you, earlier in the week. But my day is currently broken into five-minute chunks of time, as I’m continually interrupted by one of my children, whether to help them log onto their own Zoom classes, to prepare lunch or a snack, to break up an argument about who gets to use the hula hoop, to play mancala, to put the crayons away, to explain when their quarantine ends – in addition to my own desire to hit “refresh” on the news every few minutes, to prepare for a possible city-wide shutdown, to check in with loved ones to see how they’re managing. Even when I lock my bedroom door for a few minutes of solitude, I hear their conversations, their piano practicing, their squabbles, and their laughter. And that’s just for class prep, never mind actually teaching!
Balancing teaching from home with entertaining the little people who live at home requires flexibility, creativity, and patience. I hope that some of the ideas and resources below are helpful: for your kids to be engaged and entertained at this challenging time; for you to find meaningful ways of being with them; or for keeping the kids busy so that you have time to decompress, to cook dinner, or to prep for class. Many of the ideas below involve access to a computer and internet, but some of them can be adapted for those who don’t have access. I tried only to link to free opportunities, though some require basic supplies such as paper, crayons, yarn, or glue.
Drawing, Doodling, and Other Art Projects:
Each day this week, well-known children’s author and illustrator Mo Willems has posted a 20-30-minute video in which he shows viewers around his studio, encourages playful doodling, teaches children how to draw some of his favorite characters, explains the process of writing and publishing children’s books, and answers letters from fans. He is extremely warm, sensitive, comforting, and hilarious in each episode: it is no wonder that he writes such emotionally smart books. We have made watching his “Lunchtime Doodles” into a daily after-dinner family activity. After we’ve cleared our dishes, we bring out our sketch pads, crayons, and colored pencils and watch “Lunchtime Doodles” together as a family. The first day, we began – as Willems instructed – by drawing a creature with many legs, and then we learned to draw his famed character the Pigeon, who isn’t allowed to drive the bus. On the second day, we learned how to draw Elephant Gerald who wears glasses because he’s an anxious character who needs something behind which to hide (an autobiographical character, Willems admits), and we were encouraged to write our own adventures of “Elephant and Piggy.” Willems also showed us how to be creative with letters and numbers, turning an F into a fire truck. The kids were enthralled to watch one of their favorite authors teach them how to doodle in such a calming and compassionate way, and their parents had just as much fun. Our kids now wake up and go straight for their sketchbooks. The Lunchtime Doodles series can be found here: https://www.kennedy-center.org/education/mo-willems/. Jarret J. Krosoczka, another beloved children’s author, is also hosting a daily drawing webcast (https://m.youtube.com/studiojjk?uid=ObbZ-lkhRQ203mtX9ZmgtA)
Additional art activities include using recyclable materials from home, such as creating a loom out of a cardboard box and weaving (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWLIy-Um7_0); making coasters by cutting cardboard into squares or circles and papier mâchéing newspaper above them (a project my children invented); building a house or a car out of cardboard; transforming used jars into snow globes (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYo-d9vxNJM) or water bottles into lava lamps (https://sciencebob.com/blobs-in-a-bottle-2/). With minimal supplies, you can also learn to make an origami zoo (e.g. here’s a butterfly, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZdO2e8K29o, and here’s a dinosaur, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKOVYw9R7oI); a rainbow of pompoms (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StO7IRBP8V4); or your own set of cartoon characters (https://dragoart.com). We have also done our fair share of silly manicures, which is an art form as well.
Reading, Writing, Storytelling, and Math:
A few days ago, the Los Angeles Times reported that celebrities and others in the entertainment industry are reading children’s stories on Instagram, which is an especially exciting opportunity not only for younger children to hear beloved books, but also for their parents, to connect with celebrities they too admire. The set is already quite expansive (https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/books/story/2020-03-16/coronavirus-operation-storytime-celebrities), and includes, for example, Jennifer Garner reading Jan Brett’s The Mitten on her couch along with her dog, who is adorable. Oliver Jeffers is reading his own books, and the archive for “Stay at Home Storytime” can be found on his website (https://www.oliverjeffers.com/books#/abookaday/).
Scholastic has created many free open-access resources titled “Scholastic Learn at Home,” which has materials for Pre-K through high school, with daily activities reading and writing activities for all ages (https://classroommagazines.scholastic.com/support/learnathome.html); Khan Academy has many online resources for various different subjects (https://www.khanacademy.org), and Mystery Science is offering its most popular science lessons for free on its website (https://mysteryscience.com/school-closure-planning). We have not tried it yet, but we’re intrigued by Duolingo’s free online language learning program for kids (https://www.duolingo.com).
Older kids might also enjoy exploring online magazines, such as National Geographic Kids(https://kids.nationalgeographic.com), or reading the free e-books available from your local public library (these usually require a library card, which can now be acquired online as well). Stone Soup, a literary magazine by and for kids, is an excellent resource (https://stonesoup.com). Issues can be downloaded for free from their website (https://stonesoup.com), and kids can submit their own writing or illustration for publication (https://stonesoup.com/how-to-submit-writing-and-art-to-stone-soup).
Kids can also be encouraged to journal daily; to write Limericks, Haikus, and other poems (https://www.poetry4kids.com/lessons/how-to-write-a-limerick/ and https://www.kidzone.ws/poetry/haiku.htm); or to fill out crossword puzzles (https://www.puzzles-to-print.com/crossword-puzzles-for-kids/). Jarrett Lerner has created free comic book pages and other comic-related activities for children, including pages in which kids can complete a comic strip that is only half full to tell their own version of a story, and prompts that show kids how to draw different parts of faces and bodies, to make animals out of scribbles, and more (https://jarrettlerner.com/activities/). Children of all ages can also write letters or draw pictures for friends or relatives, snap a photo, and then text or email them.
For those who love math, or need some extra practice, there are free math and reading worksheet for grades K through 5 (https://www.k5learning.com/free-worksheets-for-kids). Those looking for more challenging puzzles can download practice tests, which can be used as worksheets, for kids particularly interested in math from both Math Kangaroo (https://www.matematica.pt/en/useful/kangaroo-questions.php) and Beast Academy (https://beastacademy.com/resources/placementtests), which also has free printable games, cards, and practice sheets (https://beastacademy.com/resources/printables). Online chess is another favorite.
Virtual Tours, Shows, Exhibits, and Exercise:
Almost no one is going out anymore. So how do we continue to foster a relationship with nature and animals? The Cincinnati Zoo is streaming live tours of different animals each day at 3pm (EST). The first day’s tour, of Fiona the Hippo, was engaging and educational, and the kids had a blast watching it (https://www.facebook.com/cincinnatizoo/videos/were-live-at-hippo-cove-for-our-first-home-safari-with-everyones-favorite-hippo-/646073945952924/?__so__=discover&__rv__=top_live). The zoo is planning to give a tour of a different animal each day. This was just as engaging for our ten-year-olds as it was for our six-year-old. The San Diego Zoo has live cams of the apes, baboons, condors, elephants, giraffes, koalas, owls, pandas, penguins, polar bears, and tigers, which are all really neat to watch from the couch (https://kids.sandiegozoo.org/videos).
The Center for Puppetry Art is streaming workshops and interactive puppet shows as well (https://puppet.org/center-for-puppetry-arts-home/). For those who love music, the Metropolitan Opera in New York is streaming performances almost every night and the recordings are available the following day, though not thereafter (https://www.metopera.org). National Yiddish Theater Folksbiene has gone live on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/folksbiene/) and YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AtITlmZNX0&feature=youtu.be), so far with a multi-part history of Yiddish theater, living room theater, and more.
Many museums are offering virtual tours. For example, the Jewish Museum in New York has audio tours for kids and families (https://tours.thejewishmuseum.org/audio-tour/kids-and-families-tour/audio-section/welcome-to-the-kids-tour?j=96889&sfmc_sub=65739525&l=1022_HTML&u=2674140&mid=100003087&jb=31&utm_source=salesforcemc&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Institutional_JM%20at%20Home_Feinstein&utm_content=) in addition to many other tours, talks, and virtual exhibits for adults. The Children’s Museum of Manhattan has a full resource page (http://cmom.org/learn/resources/), and the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History has a great webcast archive (https://naturalhistory.si.edu/education/distance-learning/smithsonian-science-how-webcast-archives). Many of these and other museums, including the National Museum of African American History and Culture (https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/collection), the Metropolitan Museum of Art (https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection), the Whitney (https://whitney.org/collection/works?q%5Bhas_image_true%5D=1), the New Museum (https://www.newmuseum.org/exhibitions), and the British Museum (https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection), also have free online galleries for older kids and adults interested in art and history.
We live in an apartment building, and so exercising can be a challenge as we try hard to respect the elderly tenants who live beneath us. Our kids have particularly enjoyed Yoga with Adrien’s free videos (https://yogawithadriene.com/free-yoga-videos/). Many gyms and community centers are offering free online classes as well, including circuit training, Zumba, pilates, and more (e.g. https://www.riverdaley.org/online/).
I imagine that this is just the tip of the iceberg, but it might give busy parents juggling work and parenting a place to start.
Sarit Kattan Gribetz (Fordham University)
Acknowledgments: Thanks to Shira Billet and the "Quarantine" WhatsApp group to which I belong, for inspiration and ideas, and to my kids for their feedback and participation.