homeschool dad Archives

The Burnout Remedy For Parents

Burnout isn’t exclusive to office workers. It’s widespread among parents too. While not as talked about, parents are struggling now more than ever before, which is something that we need to talk about. Unfortunately, many parents (with dads being at the top of that list) don’t seek the help they need when they’re feeling burnt out. Instead, they dismiss their feelings and continue trying to get through it independently. Which has us wondering, what is the burnout remedy for parents?

The burnout remedy for parents that we all need.

Dr. Ben and Dr. Ashley from The Burnout Blueprint have 14 years of combined experience helping parents with burnout. Their vast focus is on quality of life; how do you feel? How are you sleeping? They always found that burnout was gradual; it didn’t happen quickly. However, they have seen burnout in parents become much more prevalent over the past five years and now much worse since the pandemic.

Homeschooling parents are lacking that community which might be aiding in that burnout.

Lindsey Casselman, a co-founder of Schoolio, shares that since the beginning of the pandemic, she has seen a rise in homeschooling parents feeling immensely stressed. She believes that it is due to the lack of community that homeschooling parents are dealing with now. Before the pandemic, parents had access to homeschooling communities and a way to get a break. Now they are essentially cut off while trying to manage their mental health.

Zoey, CEO of Daddy’s Digest, shared that she once was a teacher and yet found it very difficult to try to homeschool her child during the pandemic and believes that parents are feeling very guilty for what their children are facing right now.

Immediately overnight our homes became our workplace.

Dr. Ben shared that immediately overnight, your home became your workplace. We often focus on burnout in the workplace, but we don’t usually look at the home environment, the working from home, and the homeschooling environment. To get well again, we must identify where on the burnout spectrum you are. Are you just starting to feel burnt out? Or are you deep in it? Recognizing this is the first step in the burnout blueprint to get the burnout remedy in full motion.

Pillars of good health are hugely important.

Good food, good sleep, exercise, and surprisingly doing less. These are all very important for parents to emphasize. Are you finding that you are working more and more hours but getting less and less done? Then it’s time to understand that your might be dealing with burnout, and it’s time to get help!

Learn more about The Burnout Blueprint by Daddy’s Digest on the Schoolio Live Q & A, Episode 4.

Click here to watch Episode 4!

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Random Acts of Kindness Ideas

Imagine what the world would be like if everyone prioritized being kind to others. Our society praises students for being innovative, getting good grades, and succeeding. But kindness goes widely unappreciated. Could you imagine if parents and educators emphasized the importance of being kind to others? Imagine how cool it would be if kindness were as valued as intelligence. You can start teaching your child about the benefits of being kind today! With 21 random acts of kindness ideas, plus you can download the ‘My Kindness Goal’ for your child!

5 benefits of being kind to others:

Being kind is beneficial for both the giver and the receiver. When you give kindness to someone, you usually receive kindness back. There are many excellent benefits of being kind to others; you should utilize them while teaching your children. Some seem somewhat predictable, while others are a little shocking! Nonetheless, Science continues to find more ways that our mental and physical health are impacted by each other. So, teaching your child about random acts of kindness and the benefits of bringing others joy is essential.

1. Kindness can boost your immune system.

Our brain’s feel-good hormone, Oxytocin, reduces inflammation. You are probably familiar with the fact that inflammation is linked to many diseases in the body. These are diabetes, chronic pain, obesity, cancer, and migraines. Being kind can boost your body’s oxytocin levels, which then helps to decrease inflammation. You don’t have to wait for someone else to promote your oxytocin; you can do it today! By spreading kindness like confetti!

2. Kindness creates a sense of belonging.

Being kind and helping others is considered a way to help people create, maintain and strengthen social connections. Face-to-face activities like volunteering to help someone can reduce isolation and loneliness.

3. Kindness helps you feel in control.

It’s easy to resent someone always trying to push our buttons. When this happens, we often feel like we don’t have control or stability around those people. You know that no one should be able to control your mood, yet you find it extremely difficult to stay calm when they push your buttons. When you choose to instead act with kindness, you will gain the self-respect of not letting other people push your buttons.

Remember, if someone never seems to change and is always aiming to make you upset, it’s best to avoid these people.

4. Kindness helps you find your people.

People are genuinely attracted to kind people. If you’re at the grocery store and someone kindly holds the door open for you, you will feel more attracted to that person—Vs. The person that slammed the door in your face. We were born with kindness in our hearts, so we tend to gravitate toward the people that demonstrate empathy. A kind mom at a playgroup or homeschool co-op is much easier to be around than someone constantly making you second-guess yourself.

5. Kindness can give you a mental break.

Stress doesn’t give your brain a break. Because when you’re feeling chronically stressed, all you can do is focus on the things you’re concerned about. When you focus on the joy you are bringing to someone else through the random acts of kindness you do, you also give your brain a much-needed break from figuring out all your problems.

The mental break is similar to the brain break you get from a cardio session, healthy sleep, or meditation. You are giving the analytical, thinking part of your brain a rest and, simultaneously, awakening the creative and feeling side of your brain! When you focus on someone else’s happiness, you forget your problems for a little while. That in itself is enough to give you a boost.

You should teach your kids about the power of random acts of kindness.

We all want our children to live their very best life. As you read through the five benefits of being kind, I’m sure you would also want each one of those benefits for your child. Being kind isn’t something you have to wait until your child is older to learn. You can start teaching your children about bringing others joy by spreading love with random acts of kindness. And, of course, the ultimate way to teach your children is to model it.

21 Random Acts of Kindness Ideas that your children can be involved in:

Compliment others.
Pick up litter at the park.
Let someone take your spot in line.
Insert money into someone’s parking meter.
Buy flowers to hand to people on the street.
Write and leave letters of encouragement on people’s cars.
Pay for the person behind you in the drive-thru.
Use allowance to donate to a charity of your child’s choice.
Hold open the door for someone.
Write letters to the elderly.
Shovel snow from a neighbour’s driveway.
Do someone a favour without expecting anything in return.
Bake cookies for the neighbours.
Encourage your child to show the ‘new kid’ around their school.
In the summer, hand out water to people at a park.
Send a letter to a loved one instead of a text.
Tip your waitress generously.
Make breakfast in bed for a family member.
Write a kind letter to a parent.
Leave kind comments on people’s social media posts.
Be kind to yourself.

Random acts of kindness are what the world needs.

Every single person that you meet needs kindness. Your child needs kindness; your spouse needs kindness; your family members need kindness; the clerk at the bank needs kindness; the debt collector needs kindness, the customer service rep from the company you purchased a product from needs kindness. Every single person that you come in contact with needs kindness. Including the person that is looking back at you in the mirror.

All of us need extended grace for our shortcomings and thoughtfulness when needed. You have the power and ability to give kindness to others while also teaching your children how important it is to spread kindness to the world around us.

Download the Free My Kindness Goal Sheet

Download the ‘My Kindness Goal’ sheet for your child to complete. You can choose from either the colouring sheet or the written word sheet.

Learn more about Random Acts of Kindness Day:

Random Acts of Kindness Foundation

Check out this FREE, fun task list for kids by Schoolio.

That Homeschool Stress Though!

When you first thought of the idea to homeschool your children you probably imagined yourself being the next Elizabeth Thatcher, cultivating a great relationship with your kids. Helping them learn in a fun way with a big smile painted across your face at all times. Patience abounding from every corner of your heart, as you teach with deep understanding and constant kindness. But, two months into it you find yourself wearing your pyjamas for the entire day. You don’t remember when the last time you brushed your hair was, shower? Let’s not even talk about a shower. And, that patience and happiness that you thought you’d portray? Ya, you’ve currently placed your children in their room prisons because their attitudes have caused great irritation in your mind. All those activities and art projects you saw on Pinterest and thought ‘We’re going to do these!!’ Are now crumples of paper and popsicle sticks and one is currently glued to your first grader’s math while the other art disaster is stuck to the table. Your house hasn’t been properly cleaned since ….September? And, your favourite meal is cereal.

You sit down for a break and open up your phone to see another homeschooler on Instagram. Her hair’s done, she has make-up on, she’s posting pictures of her clean house, her perfectly set-up classroom, and her perfectly dressed children. Suddenly, you think ‘What am I doing wrong?’ Suddenly that stress that you were feeling has been impacted and now you feel not just the horrible stress but the feeling of inadequacy. The thoughts ‘Why can’t I do a good job like her?’ ‘Should I even be homeschooling?’ ‘What am I doing wrong?’ Are all flashing through your head. This stress just adds another layer of tension to your already tense shoulders and you feel much more snappy than you did this morning when you woke up.

Before you get to that point, I want to stop you right there. I want you to remember -before you look through the series of perfection Homeschooling parents on Instagram- that you are doing an incredible job. Parenting is hard, parenting during a pandemic is hard, taking care of a house is hard, working is hard, working from home is especially hard. But, you’re more than likely doing most of -if not- all of these things. You are incredible! You have to stop looking at all the things you ‘aren’t’ getting done and start looking at all the things you are accomplishing! Most people would look at your daily life and just curl up in a ball and say ‘NOPE.’ But not you. You’re tackling it all.

But stress, stress is the hardest part of all of our lives. So, what are some tips that we could use to calm down the Homeschooling/parenting stress and instead give us a small dose of peace?

If you haven’t already, listen to The Schoolio Podcast -Episode 5- ‘Tips to Help you Navigate the Stress’ on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/show/1tnFc9JUnzHQ4C7zWtRHbB

or find The Schoolio Podcast on your favourite podcast streaming app.

P.S Don’t forget to subscribe!

Welcome: Schoolio Planning Freebies

What do you need to accomplish in each day when homeschooling? How can you keep your homeschool on track and set realistic goals that can be easily obtained without throwing you into a frenzy? We love our Schoolio Community, and we care deeply about how you are feeling as a homeschool parent. We don’t want you to feel stressed or worried that you are missing something, or spending the entire day trying to reach unrealistic goals.

So what is the best way to have a successful school day? Planning is the best strategy to begin with. So we had our expert planner, Lindsey, create some awesome free schedule planning tools to help you stay on track and not get overwhelmed.

One Month Calendar

Starting out by planning your month is a step in the right direction. You can include field trips, school days and days off on your monthly planner. Pro tip: Use pencil to fill out your monthly calendar, so you can easily erase and update.

Sometimes the plan has to change, that’s totally normal with homeschooling, so be sure to use pencil or erasable pen.

Now let’s break it down to a one week plan, Lindsey created an excellent template for planning out the week. In this planner template, every day is slotted to include Math, Science, Language, Art and so on. Be sure to write down what lessons in which subjects on what days they should be accomplishing them. Remember the Pro Tip, changing up the plan is totally normal.

Weekly Planner

The weekly planner comes in 1 student or 2 students form. If you have more than one child learning from home, you can take advantage of the Weekly Planner for 2 students. If you have more than 2 students, print out more than one page to match the number of students.

It’s beyond important to us that you are happy with your homeschool journey. Because we believe that homeschool should be enjoyable for you and your child, it doesn’t have to be ‘another stressful thing’ added to your already full plate. It can be such an enjoyable ride, that you and your child will never forget.

Take advantage of our free weekly planner and monthly planner downloads. Made free, because we care about your success, time and happiness.

Download our FREE Weekly Planner and One Month Calendar:

Weekly Planner – 1 Student

Weekly Planner – 2 Student

One Month Planner