Tosan Okotie: Ways You Can Maximize This Lockdown Period with Your Children
The arrival of children in a home is something everybody looks forward to. At the arrival of a child, the mentoring, building and molding begins. It is an experience everyone builds with time no matter how many children you have cared for before having yours.
It can be an uphill task to manage children especially during this period of world-wide lock down which is to curb or slow down the spread of the current pandemic.
Why is this necessary?
This is because we have become familiar with occupying our kids with extra-curricular activities which eases the workload from us till we get back from work and then the next day we are off to our various workplaces. This has become a routine.
With this lock down, we have had an unwilling default reset to spend more time with our children. Here are some ways you can maximize this lockdown period:
Learn to Bond With Them
Due to our quest to provide the very best for our children, we are always on the go. This leaves you sometimes with little knowledge about them. You will be surprised as parents, you sometimes forget their birthdays and other things that are important to them. Now, you have been given a chance to make up for lost times.
- Ask them questions about themselves; we have age related questions we can ask each of our kids. Some of such questions could range from knowing how their academics are going, their area of strength, who their friends are and the list can go on. It’s also the time you have been looking for to teach them the sex education you have been postponing.
- Tell them stories or teach them songs which you learnt while growing up. All those cool moves you had while growing up, you could teach them. Tell them the good stories of your growing up days. You will be surprised how fascinated and connected you would be with your child (ren).
- Do regular exercises with them at home. Create space in your living room and jog, do push-ups and other aerobics together.
- Watch TV with them. Sometimes ask what interests them in those programs and give them the chance to tell you how the plot goes.
- Do house chores together. Cook and bake together, it can be quite fun. The chores don’t have to be gender based. Make it centralized that both genders enjoy doing any chore.
Create time to rest and refuel
being home with your child(ren) can be draining and this can lead you to becoming grumpy with them. In order not to spoil the connection you want to build, you would need to create time to rest and relax. This is very key. A refreshed parent is a happy parent.
Give them the chance to learn to be by themselves
It may help to build their sense of Independence which will help them do things by themselves. Worthy of note is that you can check in on them from time to time but not overly monitoring them.
It has been said that our perspective about a situation makes it easier to go through those situations.
Life has afforded us the needed time to be with our family. Let’s make the most of it before we resume our busy lives again.
Written by: Tosan Okotie
Tosan Okotie is a public servant whose unnerving interest in improving the lives of people constantly drags her into teaching and speaking on various subjects in this regard. She has organized several couples programs and a few teenage activities with her husband to enlighten people.
Photo Credit: Jeniffer Araújo on Unsplash
