The stay-at-home dad Quarantine - the Opening Games
Quarantine - the
Opening
By TYLER WILSON
Coeur Voice contributor
Four kids, three school “curriculums,” two parents, one house. These are the key stats for Team Wilson Quarantine 2020. May the odds be in our favor.
Both my wife and I come from a family of teachers, and so we’ve seen firsthand just how dedicated, overworked and underpaid these professionals are under normal circumstances. The last two weeks have only emphasized just how incredible teachers are when it comes to a. Providing meaningful education experiences and b. Corralling the little monsters without exploding into Hulk Rage.
My wife is working from home full-time, though I must credit her for helping as much as possible in-between her responsibilities. Still, the first week of quarantine underlines just how challenging this will be if we’re confined for the rest of the school year.
Some highlights from the first week:
Monday
We used the whiteboard to write out a general schedule for the day. It wasn’t too specific - just blocks of time dedicated to Reading/Writing, Math, lunch and backyard/bike time. Two of the kids are school age and rotate on the laptop for math exercises, and we utilize an iPad for the kindergartner’s reading practice.
Our preschooler has a humongous case of FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) right now, so she rotates on these devices too, though her preschool teacher provided some great videos and sing-alongs she can watch on the living room TV via YouTube.
Our toddler is in speech therapy, and while in-home visits are cancelled for now, I have materials and guidance from the therapist to work with him too. However, he is two and insane.
The schedule goes well (ish), minus a few fights on transitioning between devices. There is much screaming outside over confrontations about mud and shoes. Apologies to the neighbors.
Tuesday
We write the schedule on the board, but almost immediately the two older kids push back on the order of activities. So we switch it up, try some alternative activities and reward compliance with a “Minecraft” session on the PS4 during the littles’ nap time. It works out fine, minus some screaming about “Minecraft” I don’t understand. Look, I can troubleshoot the old Minesweeper computer game, but this “Minecraft” business is not my forte.
Wednesday
No schedule written on the board. I’m tired. The toddler got up a bunch for no reason the night before, so I’m more compelled to basically “wing it.” The reading app on the iPad isn’t working, so the old LeapFrog handheld game-thingie gets swapped into the rotation. The oldest finds some coding activity online and spends much of the day on that. I used to design web sites as a side hustle, but even I don’t understand what she’s doing. I hope she’s not involved in cyberterrorism.
They play outside a bunch today, as they’ve built a contraption out of the rusty wheelbarrow and the scattered pieces of a swing set I never bothered to put together when we moved into the house four years ago. It seems sort of dangerous, but at least I’m not sending the kids over to the park to snot all over the play structure, amirite?
Side rant: I know they’ve closed most of these play structures now, but seriously, folks, the longer some of you don’t follow the CDC recommendations, the longer we’re all going to have to suffer. Social distance!
After a couple of minor injuries, I begin to think about how I’m going to deal with one of the kids breaking a bone during Pandemic 2020. I don’t want to go to the hospital right now, so everybody came in to watch several episodes of “Tangled: The Series.” It’s a pretty good show, by the way.
Thursday
(Expletive deleted). We try the white board again, and the iPad seems to be functioning okay. Still, I. Don’t. Want. To. Do. This. Anymore.
I tell myself “Minecraft” is educational and encourages creativity, so I let the kids play that for a while. The toddler takes an old XBox controller and just pretends to play, which is cute but definitely not great for that whole “speech delay” problem.
At some point, the kids turn on a different game, “LEGO CITY Undercover,” which has some puzzle solving but mostly just involves punching bad guys and crashing LEGO cars into buildings. I take a nap or two, explore dark web access to toilet paper and Clorox wipes and look into opportunities to pick up large amounts of booze for our “emergency stockpile.”
Friday
Honestly, I don’t know what happened today. We made a sorta-schedule, but I didn’t have the energy to really enforce it. At some point, I might have said, “I don’t care what you do!” and “I quit!” My wife tapped me out for a while, and I cried in the shower until the water got cold.
After the reset, we went back to the sorta-schedule and the kids did a decent job rotating on the devices and educational materials. At some point, we watched “American Idol” and ate frozen pizzas. We’ve had worse days.
Honestly, things worked better once I let some of the pressure off myself. I’m not a teacher, and I can’t replace a full school experience on my own. Other parents will, and that’s great for them and honestly inspiring. I’m not that dude. I’ll do my best while trying to avoid a nervous breakdown.
Luckily, we also got a few emails on Friday from the school about new “remote educational materials” coming soon. I doubt it will include “Minecraft,” but we’ll try to work it in anyway. Dad still needs to hunt down more hand sanitizer.