Getting Started: Learning at Home with your Family

As the panic of COVID-19 washes over us, the parents among us are facing the worst: 

school closings! But as you switch into survival mode, fear not. We've got some tips and 

resources to help you make this an exciting and engaging opportunity to spend time with your 

children and keep them learning.

First, we are not including resources about how to talk with your kids about COVID-19. 

There are plenty of great resources for that already (like this)!

What we do plan to do is offer tips and resources, share what we actually do, and use your 

comments to help us update this as we go. To get us started, here are some basic tips for 

surviving and thriving with kids at home for an extended period:

1. Keep a schedule and a basic routine: You know best what works for your family, but most 

kids do well with structure and consistency.

2. Combine learning in different formats and in different environments (kids need to move!).

3. Pick digital resources that are research-based and effective for learning: 

Common Sense Media keeps a great and up-to-date list.

4. When using digital resources, watch or play with your child, talk to them about what they 

are seeing or doing, and make connections to other experiences and learning outside of 

the digital world.

5. Play non-digital games together, like board games or word games (e.g., hangman).

6. Read and tell stories together, or even act them out! 

7. Write! Writing should be fun and meaningful, so kids can catch up on thank you notes, 

write letters to friends and family, write out the daily schedule, write about how they're 

feeling...anything that gets them excited!

8. Use what you have around your home to ask questions, make predictions, explore and 

experiment (worried about using up your toilet paper? At least the empty rolls can be used in 

a fun ramp activity!) .

9. Curiosity drives learning, so don't worry about whether you can teach your kids or answer 

all of their questions right away. See their questions as a chance to learn together.

Here are some other resources that can also get you started:

PBS KIDS has a website for parents that also has activities organized and search-able by 

age and topic, and that feature many of kids’ favorite characters.

NYC Public Schools has a website by grade level with resources for learning at home.

An article in the NYTimes by a school administrator in Philadelphia about what to do with 

kids when schools are closed.

Best of luck, and more coming soon. Thanks for reading!