Busy Parents Guide to Balancing Work and Online Schooling

This lockdown has thrown a lot of challenges at busy parents. A major one being how to go about balancing work and the online schooling of kids. Depending upon your circumstances, you must be feeling how the ‘new normal’ has completely flipped your life upside down. Trying to maintain professionalism on a work call while your toddler screams in the background feels like an everyday challenge, right?

Being parents of five-years-old twins, both me and my husband initially found it extremely difficult to manage the new work from home routine while our kids attended their virtual classes. With no help around, everything seemed to create a lot of stress leaving us more haggard.

Eventually, we realised that the only way to adjust to this ‘new normal’ and have a smooth ride is by creating a healthy balance – between our work, house chores and the online schooling of kids. It required a bit of planning and organisation on our part but was totally achievable.

Here I am sharing with you a few basic tips that can help busy parents achieve that balance.

Balancing Work and Online Schooling : Tips for Parents

Plan ahead

Planning ahead helps your day run smoothly and ensures nothing is missed out. So prepare a checklist of all the major tasks-to-do a night before. Plan your meals a day in advance. Keep the clothes ready for the next day. Arrange for all the resources kids may require for their online classes. Prepare everything a night before to save yourself from the morning hustle.

Set a routine

We all had a daily routine which probably changed during the lockdown. Be open to set up a new routine based on your child’s study schedule and your work schedule. I personally prefer to wake up an hour early and finish some chores before the kids are underfoot. If you are a night owl, you might be able to manage some tasks after their bedtime routine is over.

Divide work & responsibilities with your partner

Discuss, divide and distribute work with your partner or among the family members. This really helps in getting the work done quickly without any one person feeling overburdened. You can even delegate some work to kids. Assign them some age-appropriate chores or make them in charge of arranging their own toys/books, etc

Priortize your chores

Prioritizing helps to understand which chores need immediate attention and which can be pushed towards the end of the week. For us, laundry is something we do over the weekend, whereas weekdays are mainly for cooking and cleaning.

Keep kids busy while you attend your important work calls

Talk to your kids about work calls or meetings. Explain how it’s important to you and would require peace and silence. Alternatively, look for ways to keep them busy. You can enrol them for online yoga classes, art classes, etc or even schedule their screen time as per your work routine.

Last, but not the least – don’t aim for perfection

It’s ok if certain things do not happen your way. What’s important is that the work is done. Don’t stress about perfectionism. Allow yourself some flexibility. Know that, like all other things, this is just a phase that will pass soon.

Learning to work in less-than-ideal situations helps us be more creative and resilient. All we need is a positive mindset, a bit of planning and workable strategies that can help make the work-school arrangement easier on everyone.

Hope these tips contribute in bringing a balance in your life too!!

This post of mine ‘Balancing Work and Online Schooling : Practical tips for Busy Parents’ was originally published on Times Of India’s Times Keep Learning platform.

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