Here is what your school day could look like

In most states, the school year has been canceled. As a result, many parents are homeschooling for the first time. I’ve seen a ton of resources and sample school schedules floating in the ether. While many of these are helpful, there is one problem with all of the schedules I have seen: They are TOO LONG!

When I started grad school studying curriculum and instruction, I became obsessed with the idea that the school day is too long! I found tons and tons of research confirming my belief that the school day is lengthy without much benefit. I found research showing that people learn best between 10 am and 2:00 pm. If that was true, why did school drag kids out of bed before the crack of dawn and keep them until around 4 pm? Of course, it is because school is sometimes a well-disguised daycare to hold kids while parents work.

All of that, however, has been thrown out with the bathwater in the wake of COVID-19 and stay-at-home orders. We are all at home, schooling and working together.

Here, we will discuss what the school day could and should look like at home and beyond.

Should the distance learning day mirror the physical school day?

NO! Here is the fact: None of us saw this coming. No one was prepared. But we can respond appropriately.

I am going to say it. School sucks. The traditional school system is failing more kids than it is serving well. So if you are looking to replicate your local, traditional school model at home, you may be making a big mistake. There is no need for you to fill 6–8 hours of academic content per day.

You should use this time to let your student do three things:

1. Find the ways in which they learn best.
2. Explore the things they love and are interested in.
3. Learn by trial and error.

None of that takes 8 hours of grueling school. So what does it look like? School in three parts: Academic Skills, Applied Learning, and Deep Dives.

Part 1: Academic Skills

I think life skills are far more important than many academic courses. But I would argue that Harvard, the University of Texas and your local community college may disagree with me. Because the educational landscape remains largely without innovation over the last 100 years, we have to check some boxes still. Academic coursework is one of those boxes that, like it or not, must be checked at each level of schooling. Here is what it could look like at home for you.

Short Bursts over long hauls. I work at a unique school that has no lectures or classrooms or academic teachers. Kids learn using adaptive learning software for at least 25 minutes per subject per day. They spend about 2 hours per day on academics. Regardless of the way you pull this off, the short burst of focused, individualized and personalized practice helps students maximize the time and effort spent on each subject.

Imagine telling your 7th grader at home, “hey you only have to do two hours of school instead of six.” Do you think they’d take you up on that offer? Of course, they would! Any kid would.

If you want to check out some adaptive learning platforms, many of them are offering either free trials or have made their app free during the COVID quarantine period.

Total Time: 2 hours

Part 2: Applied Learning

Accumulating academic knowledge isn’t very interesting unless you are actively using it. This is one of the places where schools lose student interest and excitement. When you tell a child to learn math because “…it’s good for you,” or “…because you won’t have a calculator with you at all times when you grow up,” you have not given the child anything to hold onto. You haven’t given them a way to connect the dots between what they are learning and the life they live.

Applied learning is where we must frequently engage and immerse learners in the real world. Especially now while your child is learning from home. Applied learning projects belong in your distance learning day at home.

To execute this you need to first take an inventory of what you have at home. Whether or not you have internet and a device, you’ll have to get creative about what you create and how you roll it out. The key here is to take 45 minutes to an hour each day to engage in an applied learning project. This could look like building a popsicle stick bridge or a Rube Goldberg Machine. It could also be a digital debate using Zoom, an elevator pitch or a demonstration speech.

Whatever the project may be, working on something other than pure academics during the day is great for learning but also for morale. Don’t worry about designing the perfect project from scratch either! Jump on Google and Youtube to find something that works for you and your child.

Total Time: 1 hour

Part 3: Deep Dives

As kids get older, school gets worse. They like it less. The more school they do, it becomes commonplace to hear the words, “I hate school.” Gallup calls this the “School Cliff” as they found that student engagement drops with each year of school. I believe there are two causes at the root here. 1) As kids get older, school becomes less fun. 2) As kids get older, school loses its luster because it becomes routine and stops engaging kids with their interests.

How can we remedy these root causes to engage students especially when they are learning at home?

Engage your child’s interests. Period.

Make it a part of your “school day” at home. If your child loves video games, find a way to work that into their school day and let them dive deep into that passion or interest. If your child loves art or singing or the entertainment industry or math or chess or skateboarding or acting or playing make-believe, find a way to support them in doing that as a part of your school day. This takes lots of creativity on your end as a parent/teacher. I’m not telling you to give a kid time to play video games but to take that interest and design a learning experience around it for at least an hour per day.

Total Time: 1 hour

But this is only 4 hours?

Right!

I believe that this four-hour school day is a more efficient and effective use of a student’s time. Notice that in each of these four hours the student is handling all of the cognitive lift. They are doing the thinking and execution. You are just putting things in place to help them be successful in that. School works best when kids are in charge of their learning. Be there to guide them through this process, don’t lord over it.

You’ve got this!

If you need help or ideas, please contact me on my website and let me know how I can help you!