I have been stressed out this whole school year due to the COVID-adjusted academic year. I felt like I could handle and put up with all of the the distancing, hand-washing, tele-health adjustments at work, masking and PPE donning/doffing, loneliness and not socializing, lack of travel and vacation, and missed time, holidays, and gatherings with family. While these are true losses and inconveniences, I knew they wouldn't last forever. While a rude wake-up, they were necessary and doable, and transient, forgettable. I still had a well-paying job. I was healthy. I worried a lot about my kids' losses, but both of my boys have proven to be far more positive and resilient than us adults (well, me).
"Iver, do you think you've missed out on anything this year? As in, are there things that, due to COVID-19, you've wanted to do, but have not been allowed to do and missed out on? Like attending kindergarten school?"
Iver (age 6): "No. I do everything I want to do. Just with a mask."
The lack of in-person elementary school was just about the hardest pill I had to swallow, and it sent me over the edge, in part because I felt that Iver, a lover of learning, would somehow disengage, "fall behind," and miss out crucial education in this formative year, especially with respects to (Spanish) language, among other skills. So many kids have. I felt like this was time he wouldn't ever get back/make up, and that most other parents had the time, emotional energy, and skills to supplement what their kids were missing from in-person school, whereas my tank was empty, my daylight hours limited, and my energy and motivation severely lacking. I know that this all was somewhat irrational, that it's "just kindergarten," and things could be way worse for our and for so many other families. I needn't have put so much pressure on ourselves or our family. And I know I should have been thankful that my child has still had the opportunity and privilege to play and socialize with his buddies at childcare, which is so much of what the year of Kindergarten is about. Nevertheless, I still deeply resented the after-hours burden on working parents to fight with our kids about the required worksheets and schoolwork and, the longer it went on, the more angry I became. For many months, I did it, because I am a rule-follower, not a rebel, I wanted to be a "good" and "compliant" and "supportive" parent, and I wanted to try to make the schoolteachers happy, or at least their [and their future--GOOD LUCK to the first grade teachers!] jobs as easy as they could be (as we know they've had a rough year, too!). I want to support public education and educators, even as I feel they gravely and unnecessarily disappointed and abandoned our children. However, I am not a natural-born teacher. I have never wanted to, and did not enjoy formally (attempting) homeschooling my very strong-willed kid. I am low on patience in a good year, and even lower in COVID times. It was way too much and way too hard on top of managing "regular life."
I started to let a lot of it go a couple of months ago. I was still grouchy about our local school's reluctance in opening (which, thankfully, they have now done, albeit part-day and part-time for eight total hours per week) but I stopped fighting the un-winnable battle of trying to "do it all." I just let go of the micromanaging of the task-completion of random Spanish videos and online math and reading "assignments" that sometimes weren't happening during day childcare. I just made it a priority to read, read, read to our kids. Every. Single. Day. Morning and night.
Iver wasn't enjoying "Freckle," the digital reading program that the school had for his school-mandated time that was to be spent reading, and couldn't easily do this program while at childcare because it didn't read it to him (an adult had to read the articles and books out loud as many were too advanced for his age, and the childcare teachers have been asked to do a lot this year for their young charges, and their attention is too divided and in great demand). However, he loves to learn, and is passionate about a range of topics-- ranging from magical creatures like unicorns and Bigfoot, to wild animals like marsupials, reptiles, as well as all natural wonders. He learned about a program called EPIC from one of his childcare school friends (as this is what that friend's school uses for his school literary arts), a digital library with thousands of kids' books, which can read aloud to the child while the child follows the highlighted words along (think: similar to the bouncing ball). Even though we read a ton directly to Iver at home, he begged for a subscription so that he could use this at childcare instead of Freckle to get those minutes in in a satisfying way. We agreed to the 30-day free trial and then, when I was deciding whether the cheapskate in me (because library books are FREE!) could rationalize spending $8 a month such a service, I just heard God or a small voice in my head whispering,
"If it makes your child excited to read, it's worth it."
We can afford it, and I realized that, if Iver learned nothing else in Kinder including zero Spanish words, but acquired the skill and desire to love to read, then we would consider it a successful year and a "big win" in a year of so many great losses. We don't have to keep EPIC forever, and I far prefer paper to digital books for kids, but I think we'll keep subscribing for now. Technology is not disappearing anytime soon, and it makes him happy.
We have been doing curbside check-out from our local library for almost nine months now (I believe the library was closed for about three months in 2020 when the lockdown started, but I have lost all track of time). As the library limits four hold requests per library account per time, my friend Kellie gave me the "ah-ha!" realization about six months ago that I could request library cards for the kids (and the librarian reminded me that I could reserve books under Kelvin, too), which multiplied our check-out possibilities! I tend to visit the library about weekly for curbside check-out and then, immediately after checking out the four books, request four more per card so they'll be ready the following week (and the librarian now recognizes my car when I pull up)! Kellie also told me that the library has started doing "grab-bags" ("Librarian's choice," if you will, of up to ten hand-selected library books that are tailored to your child's interests which you list in an on-line form when making the request), which can be checked out in addition to the four-items-per-card-hold-requests described above.
This offering has been so amazing for our family, as both boys absolutely love books and being read to. Iver, who now can also read very well himself and above grade level, devours books like I probably did as a kid, and often only wants to read a book once and then get more/newer ones as he feels he's mastered the content or he's bored...
The picture below shows what our living room couch often looks like, with ten to thirty library books stacked in piles or in a basket that I have attempted to use to separate library books from our own supply (however, I obviously need a bigger basket... maybe a tub).
With the constantly rotating weekly supply and influx of library books to our house, and the delay in "clearing" books from our accounts (as, after returning them to the library drop slot, they usually sit in the returned bin for a few days to a week for "airing out"/decontamination purposes during COVID), I have had a somewhat hard time staying on top of (not losing track of) our borrowed books; however, the library has not really been enforcing late fees, and I haven't actually lost any books... yet.
Even if I do, and I have to fork over some money to our local libraries, it will be worth it. Anything that promotes reading, literacy, and a love of reading in my kids is worth it. I don't know how communities (or we as people) would survive without the services of public libraries, books, and the escape of reading. Our mental health and, truly, the survival of our civilization depends on it.
So even though "COVID Kindergarten" has pretty much been a bust (although I'm really trying to be optimistic about these last couple of months. Even part-time something is better than nothing!) and this has felt like a lost academic year for my child and so many children across the country and world, my boys love to read. While my soul has often felt empty, my lap has been full.
Thank God.
Through this all (and through all of my abject failures as a teacher-parent), I think the kids will be all right.
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