Tips for Supporting Parents in Managing Distance Learning

As supporting parents, it is your responsibility to guide your child to learn. But how will you do it? Find out in this article!

In terms of education amid the COVID-19 pandemic, students aren’t the only ones affected. Parents are directly affected too since what used to be a teacher’s work becomes theirs instantly. 

As a parent with no formal training, experience, or degree in teaching, you’ll surely find it hard to adjust. In the first place, how will you teach your child when you aren’t prepared for this?

Prepared or not, you are left with no choice but to become your child’s teacher as you both embrace distance learning. Yes, it’s challenging, but it’s also a learning process for you and bonding time to your child. 

Best Tips for Supporting Parents in Managing Distance Learning

Suddenly shifting into distance learning is both challenging to you and your child. It’s a big adjustment for you, most especially if you are working from home too. 

Here are some of the best tips for supporting parents in managing distance learning.

Create a schedule or routine. 

It’s very important that your children will still have a schedule or a routine that is similar to what they have in school. Continuity is needed for them not to get lost when everything goes back to normal. 

Creating a schedule or routine doesn’t mean that it should be exactly like what they have in school. You can always revise it to fit your circumstances at home, especially when you are working home. 

It’s also not expected that what you’ll come up with is perfect. In fact, you can experiment first to figure out which one works. Once you find the best schedule or routine for you and your child, stick to it. 

Provide an environment conducive for learning. 

Having a place where you can study without any distractions is a great thing. Providing your child with an environment where he can learn at it’s best will help him become more productive. It also makes learning more effective.

In as much as possible, allot a room or space only for studying. In that space, there should be no other activities involved so that your child can solely focus on his lessons. 

A conducive learning environment is free from distractions such as noise, devices, television, and the like. If your child learns more with music, playing soft music in the background is okay.

But creating a conducive environment for learning is extra challenging at home. More so, if everyone is at home.

So how will you create a conducive environment? As supporting parents, you can choose a spot you least use and convert it as a study area.

You can also ask everyone’s support and cooperation to make things work.

Don’t teach, but help them understand. 

Helping your children understand their lesson is one of the best and most important things that you can do for them. How you can accomplish this is a little complicated since this is subjective.

For example, you have three children. One is in elementary, one in junior high school, and the other is in senior high school. Their needs are different from one another, so are their year levels. 

Imagine teaching elementary, jump into junior high school, then finally, senior high school. This means that you have three preparations to do. What if they all have a few subjects in a day? How will you survive?

It’s hard and complicated, isn’t it? But regardless of how complex it is, helping them understand their topics are very important. 

This is because your other children might be older already, but they still need you. They still need you to help them understand the lesson that isn’t explained to them in the first place. 

This way, you can guide them as well and correct them immediately.

But this doesn’t mean that you should spoon-feed them. Instead, let them do their thing and check out afterwards if they are doing it right. 

Don’t let them be totally independent while learning. Be of help to them in getting what the lesson is for more effective classes.

It’s about your child, not the amount of work. 

To be supporting parents can be quite difficult since the pressure is high. Specifically, there is so much pressure that you’ll do it better and get things done on time. 

In such cases, supporting parents tend to forget their child. They start prioritizing the workload instead of helping their child to learn. 

There are even times that the supporting parents are already the ones doing the work. Things shouldn’t be this way. You should always prioritize your child at all costs. 

On the other hand, do not force your child to complete everything so soon. Do not expect that he’ll have everything ready when you like it, especially when he is still in the transition period. 

The bottom line here is, regardless of the amount of work that remote learning has, always put your child first. Do not let your child be a follower of the jobs. 

In simpler terms, works should serve your child, not the other way round.

Related Article: 9 Common Mistakes Parents Make In Homeschooling Toddlers

Know the barriers. 

There’s one thing that teachers have in common – they can know exactly what will happen or what will go wrong. This is called Diagnostic Teaching. 

Diagnostic teaching is the process of finding out the what’s and the whys of learners. 

Why are the learners acting this way?

What’s wrong with the lesson? Why can’t they get it? 

What can I do to help them?

These are only some of the questions asked by a teacher. These questions are directed towards one thing – figuring out where your child is struggling and helping them cope with it. 

As supporting parents, it’s your responsibility to figure out the strengths and weaknesses of your child. This way, you’ll be able to address it as soon as possible. 

Knowing what hinders your child from learning is of equal importance too. All your efforts will be useless if, in the end, your child won’t be learning since something is stopping him.

Take care of yourself. 

You might often hear this out, but taking care of yourself is of utmost importance. If you are not taking care of yourself in all aspects – physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual – you will find it hard to connect with your child.

Taking care of yourself doesn’t mean you have to spend a few days out or relaxing. It doesn’t also mean going to the mall or spa. 

A 15-minute break from everything is enough. Having at least 15 minutes of “me” time can help you relax and calm down. 

It will also help if you connect with others—Check-in with your local community about the activities they have and join them. 

Regardless of how busy your day has been, do not forget to check in with your support network. This includes your family, friends, and colleagues.

Talking to them is a good meditation. You can share with them your worries, problems, share pieces of advice, and the like. 

These activities bring out the best in you. And when you are at your best, you can help and support your child more in adjusting and keeping up with distance learning.

Conclusion 

As supporting parents, you play a big and pivotal role in how your child will do well with distance learning. We understand that this isn’t easy for you. It wouldn’t be as hard as you think when you do your best to learn how it goes. 

Remember, in times like this, the closest person who can teach your child is you. So, give it your all, and your child will surely excel. 

Check out this article to know more about distance learning.

Related Questions

What can I do to help my child with distance learning?

The best thing that you can do for your child is to give him all the support that he needs and be there if he needs you. No matter how busy you are, find time to be with your child. Ask him if he needs help, if he needs something, or if everything is okay. 

Give him the assurance that everything will be alright. In addition, do not pressure him. Let him learn at his own pace. Give him the time to adjust. 

Is distance learning necessary?

Knowing that the global pandemic won’t end soon, yes, distance learning is necessary. Your child shouldn’t stop learning no matter how slow the progress is. What matters is that it is continuous. 

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