School holidays
School Holidays|Lifelong Pathways
School holidays: With the first lot of school holidays fast approaching, I wanted to share how I assist my sons to cope with the sudden absence of routine.
We are planners, I always have been one – but even more so now that we are living with children who find changes extremely difficult to adjust to. Generally I start preparing for the school holidays about half-way into the term. I start thinking about social catch-ups, booking in-home support, arranging activities and planning. Once things are relatively locked in, and this can take some time to coordinate, I start to make a chart so that my children know what is coming up. This helps to alleviate some of the oncoming anxiety that school holidays always bring.
Visual Chart
Over the years the chart has changed. Initially the school holiday chart was all visual, and only contained pictures of what was going to happen, that is, what the event was or who was coming over. Gradually, over time, words were introduced as their reading ability improved. So now it is a combination of both words and visual cues.
Changes to Plans
But I hear you ask, what happens if someone cancels or your son is sick? This happens during term time so school holidays are no exception. That’s where the “whoops” card comes in. It is critical to show children that things change, no matter how well you plan. Sometimes there are factors that just cannot be planned for – it’s just life. Whether it is school holidays or not, things happen that don’t go according to plan. So if someone isn’t well and we have to reschedule or cancel the planned event for that day, we stick the “whoops” card over the planned event on the chart.
Then I hear you ask, surely you don’t plan an activity every day? Don’t you need some rest too? You are quite right, rest is vital. Especially when your lives are busy with extra therapy appointments. My answer to this is quite straightforward – we have pajama days. My boys relish days where we don’t have to be somewhere at a certain time. We play board games, watch DVD’s together, do some baking and enjoy each other’s company. It is a day of forced rest and relaxation. It’s just planned so that they know what is coming up.
The Element of Surprise
But what about things that happen that aren’t expected? This has always been a tough one. It is critical to teach them though. I am well aware that I need to teach my sons about the element of surprise. After all, the rest of their lives will not be spent knowing exactly what is coming up. So I actually have a “surprise” visual card for the chart. One of these is used every school holidays, and there are more during the extended Christmas school holidays. This is where I plan an activity but I don’t let them know where it is or what they are going to be doing.
An example of this would be that one day we drove up to Tanunda for a family day and played mini golf, went bowling and ate wood fired pizzas. This is a big thing. This coming school holidays I am taking my eldest to an astronomy lecture and my youngest to a cooking class where he will make cupcakes. These are both things that they enjoy, but it will be a surprise that they get to do this. This is how we have introduced the element of surprise into our school holidays. One day we will do away with the chart, but for now it works and helps us to survive the school holidays.