We have been blessed with some amazing teenagers. I honestly couldn't even complain about them or their behavior once. I don't say that to brag, well maybe I do. Everyone deserves being bragged on a time or two, right?
Our quarantine started the week of spring break (mid March) and initially was only supposed to be two weeks past that. Our district didn't provide us with any sort of guidelines on schooling and education, so for those first couple of weeks I only required the kids to practice their multiplication facts daily and watch an ASL video on YouTube to learn a little sign language daily. I gave them no schedule for this other than before they did anything else (ie watch a movie, go outside, FaceTime a friend) those two things must be done. I told them several times as long as they kept themselves busy and helping around the house, I would be lenient with them.
They did okay with this, but there was zero structure in their day which led to a lot of laying around, a lot of screen time, a lot of teenage moodiness, and a lot of me having to ask them to help out. I don't blame them. They reacted just as I should have expected. Where little is required little is done. This is human nature pretty much across the board and that doesn't fall on their character. But I knew it had to change if they were expected to be doing this for another month. By the time August rolls around and school starts back they will have been out of school for 5 months!
My husband and I sat down and created a daily schedule for them including a wake up time, exercise, meals, school work, chores, and plenty of personal time. We decided to give them a different schedule of Tuesdays and Thursdays just to switch things up a bit for them.
Your days may look a little different than ours, but hopefully the below schedule will give you an idea of how configured our teens' daily schedules and help you create your own.
If you'd like to create your own schedule, I've included a free printable. Click here to access the free printable and fill in however you'd like.
If you need some ideas on weekly and monthly chores for your kiddos of all ages, I have a blog coming this week to help! Stay tuned for that.
