Week 3 – What about me?
Most of what we have been doing in regards to remote learning up until now has been self directed revision of term 1, with very little consequence. The intention is to make this stress free for all involved.
The ability to fluff about because I am busy working has led to a sense of freedom at our place.
Suddenly there are expectations from the structure. BC9 and I begin Monday with check in and then highlighting the weekly schedule so as he can clearly see what his must does for the week are. It is a living document, so some changes need to be acklowledged seeing as it was printed last week. He sets to work independently and has Monday nailed before lunch. Of course I don’t believe him and set to ticking off his list. Whoever made religion optional had better set themselves up for my children not having a clue who God, Mary or Jesus are when they return to face to face learning.
GC11 has been cruising along. She is a strong independent mini woman just like all of her female forebears. So when I found her with head in hands sitting at the table I was totally unprepared. “What’s up?” I asked in my calmest I am your mother and a bitch, but I am always on your side voice. “nothing” she squeaked. “Don’t be silly honey, if something is wrong I need you to tell me”. When she looked up my heart shattered into tiny pieces. Something was definately up, and here I was trying so hard to keep Master Distracted on track that I had missed it.
“I haven’t done something that I must do, because I thought I knew what I was doing, but now I can’t do it” she screached at me with tiny little tears escaping her gorgeous little eyes. WTF? Like seriously WTF? I grab her some tissues and offer her some hugs and, for a change, she accepts them (hugging is not cool anymore). She admits to me she feels out of her depth. I downed tools and gave her my attention for the next hour or two, we methodically worked through it like this. “Don’t scroll so fucking fast, how in hell am I supposed to comprehend anything if you do that?” “show me where the instructions are?” and eventually it is done. I hate this she says. I hate it too.
We soldier on. BC9 keeps finishing early, but can show me his work. Thursday CG11 and I are forced to plant something in 4 seperate pots in 4 different sets of conditions for STEM, we look at each other in horror. I suggest we can use food handling gloves to touch the dirt. She agrees. I ask what are we growing. She doesn’t know what the seeds are. I suggest that school could be teaching them to grow marijuana, she doesn’t think the Mrs W would make them do that and says that I am not funny.
Today is Friday. I am wrecked. I have not had a load of work to do this week, but somehow I am more exhausted than the past two weeks put together. I listen in on grade 4 check in and hear what they are up to. I check in on grade 6 and make sure that all is well. I expect I might bludge the day away and watch some brain numbing TV.
Na. Nope. That doesn’t happen.
I am required to assist with some grade 4 word finding, while that happens I am requested to assist with grade 6 spelling words. I say in a minute love, so she says I will do this Kahoot quiz while I wait. She finishes quiz and proudly tells me that she is in the lead, but it is early, and a lot of the other children are yet to do it. I finish Anzac word find and we set to her spelling.
BC9 is finished school by 11am. This can’t be right. I make him show me his schedule and find him two unfinished tasks. I try to catch up on some professional development for myself. It’s not long before I find GC11 in same position as earlier in the week. I want to know what’s up. She says she hates this note taking, report writing stuff. She doesn’t get what she needs to do and suddenly we are back to square one. I check her notes and ask why can’t she just turn them into sentences, it looks pretty good to me. Really rational comments like “because I hate it”, “this isn’t fun”, “I don’t know why I have to do it” spew from her mouth. And then the truth. “It is due an hour ago and I didn’t know, I can’t get it in on time”. Fuck you anxiety! A quick email to teacher asking if a phone call is out of the question. Impossible, but can request another teacher responds. Email back explaining dilemma in short hand. She emails back and says said assignment was misleading, don’t stress, and as an aside our girl is the winner of the Kahoot which summed up all of this week’s learning. Champion! I tell GC11 not to stress, although I want her to finish the report, just don’t worry about the due time. Go and buy her some KFC, because I don’t care, I love her. Afternoon check in. Winner of the Kahoot announced. It is GC11. Her words “I have never felt this good”, shows me all of the comments of congratulations from fellow students.
Note to self: we all need a little TLC right now, weekend is for bludging this week.
schedule so he didn’t need to keep going back to the iPad when he changed tasks. We worked out a strategy of his “must dos” and listed what he needed to finish from his unproductive Monday. My phone doesn’t stop ringing, I cannot get anything done, I am replying to emails, but my productivity is low. I have parent forums to attend. BC9 nailed Tuesday. Check in with girl child. She is sitting in arm chair, using iPad to draw. As this is normal behaviour, I challenge whether she is doing school work. She is working on a comic about Anti Bullying. I feel like a bully. Next thing GC11 comes rushing in. There is something wrong with the cat. I am irate. I don’t need the interuption. I check the cat. Oh hell, there IS something wrong. I ring vet. They are booked out because all of us stay at home people are killing our pets with kindness taking them for walks they have never been on, and giving them love they have never had. I am invited to come and sit in the carpark until vet can see cat. He has UTI and now needs twice a day medication. I refrain from shoving a dirty plate down dear husband’s throat when I get home to find that none of them have lifted a finger since I left for my 2 hour vet visit.
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