Coronatimes: The schedule

My toddler's teacher called today as part of the weekly check-in on her brood. My little one was of course excited to hear from her "Ma'am" but soon became phone-shy and left me to chit-chat with the kind lady on the line. 

Since my daughter is 'graduating' to formal school in August, this was the last week of with her pre-school. During the lock-down the pre-school set up weekend catch up classes with the teachers and other kids from her class. It was a very brave attempt by the  school to try and engage these 2 and 3 year olds on a google hangouts session. They did try and the parents pitched in. But there is only this much that a three year old can grasp in a virtual class.

The teacher, today asked me what my little one does through the day. I think it may be useful to pen down our experiences.   

The lock-down, needless to say, was unprecedented. My daughter and I played by ear. In the first few days, I tried to wake up early and finish office work before she was up. Once she was up, I did the more un-productive tasks of cooking and cleaning while keeping the news broadcast playing on television. Once my zoom meetings and other office commitments piled up, I would plant the ipad in my daughter's hands. Post lunch, more of the ipad and then siesta. During this time, I tried to again engage in the more challenging tasks for office. I would wrap up around 7 PM with an online exercise session. This is the bit that my daughter loved. She would roll up her mat alongside mine and tried her best to follow the moves. She enjoyed zumba and salsa sessions and even had preferences on the videos that I picked for the evening. Then dinner, more television for me and then to bed.

It took me two weeks to realise that the lockdown would not end anytime soon and I had to get more structure into our days. I also wanted to reduce the screen time. My daughter's pre-school helpfully sent parents daily #lockdownparenting activities modeled on the montessori method. 

I read them and added a few of my own. The activities that we tried:

• Sorting pulses in different bowls

• A dear friend had me hooked on the microgreens bandwagon. Since then, my daughter and I have been getting our hands dirty on coco peat lined trays of greens. 

• Again, the same friend inspired us and my daughter and I have been pottering around with the pots and plants at home that we took to nourishing with the ground coffee from my morning cuppa, egg shells, onion and banana peels (Read more here and here). 

• I made her a (rather clumsy) board to practice lacing and knots. (Inspiration here)

• Using chopsticks to move material from one bowl to another. What you see in the photo are beads from a broken necklace and a few clips and other junk. This one kept her occupied for ages!

• Indoor tennis (!!)

• Whisking. She loves to whisk - eggs for her pancakes, coffee for dalgona, curd, cake batter...

As days progressed, I made an attempt to introduce work and play times into my daughter's schedule. Now when she wakes up, we go through the task of watering the plants, raking the soil up, followed by breakfast. Then I spend an hour supervising her 'work time' - essentially getting her to trace letters or colour or read. 

Then I settle her with a bowl of fruits and the ipad before getting down to office work. Post lunch, we spend more time doing water colours or jabbing at piano keys (basically anything that does not involve the screen). Soon after that we settle in for a nap. Once she wakes up, I take her for a walk or if it is too hot (as is the case these days) we walk over to my in-laws where she plays, while I do a quick run. Once home we have dinner and settle in bed with her books (she loves the Gruffalo series and the No David series). 

This sense of structure and dividing up the day into work and play times has worked really well for us. Even my daughter, after the initial histrionics on being denied her screen on demand, settled into this routine rather well. I am now wondering how to build a routine in the coming days as we inch our way into 'normal' life and the usual office-school routine.