Darren & Paige talk about the big decision on where to educate the kids. Due to COVID-19 and restrictions of being in person face to face. Tough decisions had to be made on what to do with the kids education. Once the decision was made making it all happen and as painless as possible is the next trip. Find out how we navigated the uncharted waters we are traveling. 

Where to educate our kids

• After a complete disaster in schooling when COVID first hit, we quickly started looking at alternatives for the Fall.
• Options
  • Just go with the flow and keep the kids in their normal schools
  • charter schools
  • Online schools
  • Homeschools
• Decisions about the school are not made alone. Ex(s) need to be on board
• Not all of your kids have to do the same thing.

Online School 

• Orientation meetings and lots of videos
• Weeding through thousands of Emails.
  • setting up a joint email for all of the parents
• Preparing for the first day. 
  • Getting organized (Computers, printers, cords, books) color coding, cubbies, shelves
  • Testing computers and connectivity
  • Getting into class early making sure everything is working
• Patience and perseverance is key. Not everything will be perfect at first give it time.
• We are four days in and we are still working through issues
  • Classes scheduled at the same time.
  • Too much work assigned on the same day.
  • Middle School kid with no work, High Schoolers with too much.
• Everyone is going through these changes. (7000 new families joined K12 in the last 2 months)

Blended Family Online Schools

• Shared Login and Email for online school and communication.
• Transporting school stuff between the house. Roller board suitcase for school supplies
• We had to change our transitions times to be after school instead of during school like before.
• Sometimes you need to let things go and look at the big picture.
  • Why did an email only go to one parent and not both?
  • Focus on the kids.
  • The little things will work themselves out.
• Make sure you are communicating with the ex(s). CC on email, send copies that only you get etc...

Lemonade Moment of the Week

Darren gets a black market haircut.