What To Do with Kids All Day | Online Learning Resources
Okay friends, seems like we better get used to this new way of living for the foreseeable future. Like you, I’m still absorbing the shock of this and trying to wrap my head around it all. It seems every hour there is more scary news and more to be concerned about. It’s uncharted territory with everything closing down and all of us quarantining inside our homes and social distancing when we need to go out.
And the really wild thing is that IT’S HAPPENING TO THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD. No one is immune. It’s not like a flood in Houston or a hurricane overseas. It’s affecting every single one of us, worldwide, and we’re all in it together, so we can all relate to how each other is feeling.
I must say I’m so thankful right now that we can meet here, from the safety of our own personal space, online. I’ve never been more grateful for social media because it means I get to stay connected to you, when I’m started to feel extra isolated.
There’s lots of uncertainty, but I know we will get through this. We’ve been through lots of hard times in our lives, but we are resourceful and we are survivors!
One day in the (hopefully) near future, this will be behind us and normal life will resume with work and weddings and parties and vacations and restaurants and school!
Dear Lord, school! What in the world are we going to do with our kids all day, especially when it’s not summer and dangit, WE DID NOT PLAN FOR THIS! This was not in the schedule, Coronavirus!
WHAT TO DO WITH KIDS ALL DAY | ONLINE LEARNING RESOURCES
Well, now we have to deal with it, find help, make arrangements, be home when we were supposed to be working or work from home, or however the heck we’re doing to get through the next several weeks or months. We are supposed to learn today what is happening with our school, but nearby schools are currently closed until April 10th and it could be longer. What’s happening with your school?
At this early point, we might still be figuring out how we’re going to arrange our day, but sometime soon, you might start thinking about activities the kids can do at home.
I’m hearing that we might be responsible for homeschooling our kids while school is out. We may get online tutorials to help, but everything is still so up in the air.
If your school isn’t sending curriculum home, or you just want some additional resources, I have that for you today. A mom in my community that homeschools her kids sent over a list of online learning sites and I thought it was genius!
I was happy to link up all the sites and provide brief descriptions for you. I really hope this is helpful, maybe you can bookmark it for future use or pass it along to a friend!
ONLINE LEARNING RESOURCES
ABCya! • Learning games for all ages
All in One Home School • Free online Christian homeschool curriculum, from preschool activities to 12th grade
Beast Academy • Math for ages 8-13
BrainPop • All subjects & free access during school closures
Creative Bug • Thousand’s of award winning arts and crafts classes
Cool Math for Kids • Math and games for parents, teachers and kids
Curiosity Stream • Paid access to all documentaries
Discovery Education • Free access to Discovery Education Experience through the remainder of the school year
Fun Brain • PK – 8th Grade
Highlights Kids • Activities, jokes and games
iReady • Assess kids’ levels, then provides teaching resources
Khan Academy • Ages 4-18
Kids National Geographic • Explore the farthest reaches of the Earth and beyond
Literactive • Literacy for PK – First Grade
Math Game Time • PreK – 7th Grade maht
Outschool • Live online classes for ages 3-18
PBS Kids • Daily activities to help kids play and learn
Scholastic • Free learn-from-home site with 20+ days of learning and activities
Science Kids • Science and technology for kids
Suessville • Play, watch, explore Dr. Suess’ world
Splash Learn • Kinder – 5th Grade Math
Starfall Education • PreK – 3rd Grade
Switch Zoo • Animal games
Tynker • Coding for kids ages 5+
Travel & Leisure • Pretend to travel the world, go on a virtual tour of these 12 famous museums.
Turtle Diary • PK4 – 5th Grade learning games
Udemy • Over 100,000 online video courses
Unite for Literacy • Narrated books in several languages
SCIENCE & GEOGRAPHY YOUTUBE CHANNELS
Crash Course Kids • This series is beginning with 5th grade science: Earth Science, Physical Science, Biology, Geography, Engineering, and Astronomy
Free School • safe and friendly place to expose children to famous art, classical music, children’s literature, and natural science in an age-appropriate and kid-accessible way
Geek Gurl Diaries • Like Raspberry Pi, Arduino, Python, Programming, Computer Science, Logic, Electronics, and being geeky and awesome? I do, so I started to make videos for people like me! Welcome to the Geek Gurl Diaries, where us gurl’s discuss, create, demo and interview all things geek.
Geography Focus • All about geography, maps, flags, culture, languages, and travel.
Kids Learning Tube • Educates kids through music and animation in a fun and unique approach to learning
Mike Likes Science • Science inspired music videos
National Geographic Kids • Exploring your world with weird, wild, and wacky videos. Videos featuring awesome animals, cool science, funny pets, and moreScience Channel • Learn about outer space, leading scientific exploration, new technology, earth science basics, & more
Science Max • Cool science experiments
Sci Show • Learning about the world around us and beyond
SciShow Kids • Explores all those curious topics that make us ask “why?”
Soul Pancake • Explores what it means to be human. Created for the joy spreaders, deep thinkers, and change makers of the internet
The Brain Scoop • Created in 2013 to share the work and research of natural history museums with the world
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Of course, there are also lots of creative things kids can do at home like play cards, board games, read, build things, solve puzzles, tinker with toys, draw, paint, put on a show. Or how about helping clean up, declutter, learn to do laundry?! 😉
I hope you find these websites useful, and if you think it would be helpful to another parent or child, please feel free to pass it along! If you have a great resource to share, please let all of us know in the comments below!
Have a fantastic day friends!
I don’t have kids myself, but have shared your blog and this post on Facebook for my friends who are in the same situation as you.
Thank you – these look like wonderful ideas! Please take care of yourself and your kids.
Our school has set up online learning and we will add chores and outdoors time to that to create a routine. During the youngest*s naptime will be electronics time for the others and my downtime.
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Thank you!!!! And I’m so glad to see the variety of ages you included. I have older kids, but all the sites I’ve been seeing on FB are only for the younger kids. As of right now, my kids’ school is closed thru March 30 (I’m guessing this will change). The preschool I teach at is closed thru April 10th. This week is our scheduled Spring Break, so I’m being nice & not making them do much of anything 🙂 I also want to Thank You for still posting & keeping some normalcy to my mornings.
This is a really great list. Thanks for sharing!
It certainly is crazy times. Especially as you pointed out the whole world is experiencing this at the same time. We don’t have schools closed here yet in Australia but many are pushing for it. We have two weeks holiday coming up at the end of next week so I think that has something to do with it. At the moment the government thinks it is counterproductive to keep kids home when their parents whom may be Health workers will have to stay home. Good luck and take care (and wash your hands)
Thank you very helpful! Thank you also for continuing to post during this time it’s helpful! Blessings!
I am a fourth grade teacher and this is a great list! We are closed for 3 weeks but expect that to be extended. I’m checking in with my class digitally but I’m worried about the long term effects of this crisis on everyone. You’re right-we are all in this together!
Thank you!! My husband and I are both still expected to work from home, so I have put together a “schedule” (more like a guideline) of what the kids can do each day, and educational electronics is on there but I only had a couple things I knew to offer. This is SO SO helpful!!! We are all in this together, we’ll get through, especially if we just all focus on taking care of each other and love as Jesus taught us!!
Thank you so much for posting this and acknowledging the Coronavirus impact early on in such a positive way. Will send this on to my grandkids.
We are very fortunate that our district (we live in Northwest Indiana) moved to e-learning a few years ago – the whole state has it now. Typically it is for when we have so much snow that we can’t get out and the buses can’t run but for our kids, it is business as usual except instead of of being in a classroom, it is through the Canvas platform. We are trying to just have a sense of normalcy so instead of letting my daughter stay home, I bring her into work with me and she does her school work and is able to socialize from a distance with my co-workers who all love her. She brought in board games and coloring books in case other kids came to work with their parents or if any of the staff want a break. I think trying to keep everything as normal as possible is the best thing to do, at least for our family. I know I’m missing out on my workouts at the YMCA but thankfully they are going to send out emails with exercises we can do at home. My daughter’s swim coach is sending out dryland workouts for all the kids on her team so they can burn off their energy. We are also trying to support our locally owned restaurants by ordering to-go and shopping locally (but not hoarding).
My daughter is on a year round swim team and it was just canceled too, but her team is really, really small. Would you mind sending the dry land workouts to us? I would be so grateful! My email address is amyjim2003@bellsouth.net
Thank you so much for sharing this! You have no idea how helpful this is for my family.
I’m so glad to hear that Kristin! Thanks for letting me know!
Great resources! Emily Lex (www.emilylex.com) has a great online art course for kids. Evelyn Henson (www.evelynhenson.com) has some cool colouring books you can download for free. Check them out!
I saw a doormat on Amazon with a bee on a hive that said “Honey we’re home”
I need that!!
Thank you so much! This is so helpful! I’ll share on FB!