How to Work from Home AND Home School During Lockdown
Last night the UK Prime Minister announced that the country was going into yet another total lockdown, leaving many working parents wondering how to work from home and home school during lockdown. We had a similar situation in March 2020, and I learned a few tips to make life easier. For background, I work from home as a Pinterest Manager and have an eight year old daughter. My husband works from home but the majority of the childcare and home school responsibilities have fallen to me as he works full time office hours. As my role is flexible, I can adjust my routine to take into account the extra responsibilities of home school. Here are my top 5 tips on how to work from home and home school during lockdown.
Be flexible.
Be prepared to work in short bursts as you will definitely be interrupted. Turn off your phone (or put it on aeroplane mode). I wait until my little girl is on with a task then I crack on with some work, helping her out as she needs. We both work at the dining table so I’m on hand to help if she needs it.
Change your working hours if possible, so you can work when your children are asleep or your partner can help out.
Only do the essentials.
We’d all like to organise our inbox or create a new background for our laptop, but these can wait. Only focus on the tasks that NEED doing, not the ones that you’d like to do.
Get up early.
I’m a huge fan of an early morning as it means I can get a cup of coffee in peace before the before school rush starts. I get up at 6am most mornings and go through my emails with my cup of coffee. I’ll also do some social media engagement and post on my personal account if I’ve got a decent picture. I feel like I’ve ticked a few things off the To Do list, and am actually feeling awake before the rest of the family get up.
Plan your meals.
Meal planning really helped us, as did batch cooking. A big batch of chilli will make a quick, easy and healthy lunch and save you having to think about what to make. If you have a freezer, batch cook and portion up things like chilli, lasagne, stews, casseroles. I have a Pinterest board full of free planners – use one of these to plan your meals.
Don’t feel guilty about extra screen time.
We tend to work and home school in the mornings, leaving us afternoons free to read, watch a film or play Xbox. It’s important to have some downtime! It also helps to keep a bit of normality in what is a very strange situation. My little girl has gone from being in a classroom with 34 other children all day to being at home with just her parents. It’s a huge adjustment, and anything we can do to make the situation better for her is a bonus. We’ve definitely had our money’s worth out of our Disney+ subscription over the various lockdowns!
If you have found yourself in the situation where you have to work and home school during lockdown, be kind to yourself as well. Don’t put too much pressure on yourself to do all the school work, all your work, bake banana bread, learn a new language or take up painting. There is only so much you can do. Make sure you schedule in time for yourself, even if it’s just half an hour after the kids are in bed. You might like to read this post on The Myth about Self Care I wrote.
I hope this is helpful. Do you have any other tips on how to work from home and home school?
I’m stuck in this very situation! My kids are in kindergarten and 1st grade, and I can’t say it’s been easy to work from home and ensure they do their homeworks! Thanks for these tips. You’re right, getting up earlier might actually help me instead of waking up at the very last minute. I would sure enjoy having time to enjoy my morning coffee before working!
It is so hard! I found that even just having that cup of coffee and those five minutes to myself made the world of difference. Remember to take time for yourself as well x
I don’t have kids, but even without, I find myself distracted. There are so many things to do on top of work, and so many shows to binge watch 🙂
I have to be really disciplined when it comes to getting my work done – the temptation of the TV is too great!
This article is really helpful…
Working from home on itself is already difficult, but homeschooling at the same time… it’s a logistical nightmare. 🙂
Thanks a lot for sharing this article, i’m going to try to wake up earlier, that will definitely help!
It’s so hard when you are busy with work but now have to find time to fit in a full day of teaching as well (especially when you’re not a teacher!). I find early mornings really help me. Hope you manage OK!
I’ve long worked from home so that aspect of the pandemic isn’t new. But previously, I could ‘leave the office’ if I wanted – take a break from typing away on my computer and go to the store or to a park. Even though we’re not in total lockdown in the US (yet) the options for ‘going out’ are severely limited and that complicates matters. Previously, even ‘work from home’ had flexibility (I wrote the majority of one of my novels in a Starbucks), but that’s no longer possible either. And yes, the TV – for all the faults of reruns – has become a principal break from work.
It’s so difficult when you can’t get out for that break any more – taking breaks is so important for your mental health, but also to be productive. Hopefully this pandemic will be over soon and things can return to some form of normality!
I struggle the most with wwaking up early. I plan my day before and is a game-changer for sure…
That’s a great idea to plan out your day! I’m a big one for planning so always have my week scheduled out in advance.