Alison Smith: The lockdown learning battle and why I'll never be a home-schooling mother

A homemade level 4 slam dunk basketball hoop is some of the creative learning going on in my home. Photo / Alison Smith

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Teachers are like magicians.

They can take a child, like my 12-year-old, and hold his attention for up to six hours a day in a classroom with 30 other students and still get him to learn something.

I see little point in poking about too much at what happens in those six hours of learning.

But it's different now I'm the one in charge.

I have always considered myself to be one of those hands-off school parents - but something had to change after a week of level 4 lockdown.

Working from home comes easy to me after years as a freelance writer, It's been intriguing to observe how students and teachers are coping with working from home during the lockdown.

I'm comparing, for the first time, the education experience of my children with that of my nephews, nieces and friends in other schools/homes.

My nephew starts his day promptly via Zoom at 8.50am and his teacher - who apparently has returned from an overseas country where online learning has become the norm - seems to have the working from home gig dialled in. She is face to face with the class for three hours before tasks are provided and checked upon, and school ends at 1.30pm.

My children are usually snoozing at 8.50am. Sadly, because of their hands-off school mother, the youngest one's day loosely starts when he decides it will start.

On the English front, the 12-year-old is picking up new vocab from his 15-year-old brother. Not the kind of vocab you would want him repeating, of course.

As for technology, our lack of fibre and the increase in people working from home on the Coromandel has left many struggling with poor internet connections.

Unfortunately, it provides an excuse for my son as to why he couldn't get onto the 15-minute daily Zoom class he should have attended.

At least he's getting an education in IT problem-solving.

Other mum friends say they're not too worried about the lack of schoolwork that their kids are doing, advising that homeschooling is about keeping it real and light, following their child's interests, and 'being in the flowing', not 'in the flow' of school.

Apparently, there's even a 'detox' process that happens for those that officially take their child out of school to begin homeschooling.

I would never have the patience or skill to homeschool. One major problem is that I don't know the answers to the questions I am testing my child over. I'm a words person, so here's an example:

Me: "12 X 11."
Son: "108."
Me: "Sure."

Physical education has been an easy one, and I love the creativity that's come from my basketball-mad son in level 4, who made a hoop with a ladder and a bucket.

For those of us who are essential workers, working from home and juggling homeschool mothering with our work is not easy, and I turned - as I often do - to my friends for support.

The most helpful suggestion has been: "Just lower the bar."

I also like the advice of my counsellor (well, this is how I interpreted what she said): "You are not a bad mother if you feel guilty about being a bad mother. Bad mothers wouldn't even feel guilty."

All I can say is ... we've done it before and if we keep doing the right thing collectively, it'll all be over soon.

We may not be homeschooling geniuses but at least we're role-modelling resilience - perhaps the most important skill of the 21st century.