Disclaimer: This post is not sponsored, nor is the author affiliated with or connected to Canva in any way. I just use and love Canva and wanted to share how much it has helped me!
Disclaimer: The author is not a professional in child rearing, psychology, therapy, coaching, or any other field discussed. The information provided is strictly written in good faith sharing the author’s private experience, not personal advise for readers. Any use of any information provided is at your own risk with no guarantee that readers will have the same results as are shared by the author, either negative or positive. Caregiverskeeper.family.blog and affiliates will not be held responsible for any consequences of use of any information provided. You can see more on the disclaimer page from the site’s home menu.
Life in 2020 has been a challenge, but has also been a time of healing and learning like we have never had before. Problems in the family that we have never “had the time” to address have been shoved into our laps and demanded to be faced. Attitudes that needed adjusted, tasks that have been avoided, lack of motivation, a need to be grateful- just to name a few.
As the new school year approached and we wondered what life was going to look like, my family made the decision to homeschool this semester. Yet, we have always had problems just with even one sheet of homework! How on earth would we get our boy to sit down and complete a day’s school work every day?
Many adjustments have we made and tools have we discovered to help us through this new season. My personal favorites have been:
TimeTracker Timer
Essential Oil Diffusers
Spotify
Canva
Homemade Hot Chocolate or Tea
Coping Skill Sheet
Setting Realistic Time Goals Worksheet
Gum
I am in the middle of writing a Homeschool Series including each of these tools that I have stuck in my Homeschool Tool Box. If you missed the first in this series, Using Timers for Homeschooling (And Life) For Kids With Autism, be sure to go back and read it. I wrote it first because it is the one that has made the biggest impact on our homeschooling this year!
I downloaded Canva a little over a year ago to assist me in my blogging and it has been a tremendous help – not to mention a lot of fun to play with. When my boy started school at the beginning of this semester, I was having trouble keeping him interested in his work. I decided to get a little creative.
I started putting his work pages into Canva, and finding various ways to make them fun to give some variance to the otherwise bland pages of numbers and letters. I have come up with many ways to do this, and enjoy figuring out more. Using Canva allows me to mix and match where on the page he writes and where there is a point of interest. He has come to look forward to seeing them print out at the beginning of the week, as well as picking which page he does (withing reason) on a given day.
Some of the ways that I have found to use Canva to make worksheets interesting for each day are:
Pick a free coloring page online and put a faded copy behind the whole page
Take different free coloring pages of multiple characters and make a scene surrounding the work.
Make the page colorful and fun
Make a worksheet about a picture that interests him (As he is learning cursive this semester, I almost always do this on those worksheets. It keeps the work engaging and relevant, along with providing varying letter joins.)
Leave empty space on the page and an instruction to draw something relevant to the work
I will admit that this tip alone is nowhere near enough to keep my boy focused through the whole day. However, used with the other pieces of parent cleverness listed above, it has really helped channel focus back to the work page for our boy. Some days, for example, I have asked him to pick essential oils that remind him of what he is working on to diffuse during the day.
Sometimes, I will grant, I get a sudden burst of speech during his work of some intricate detail about the character that I may have placed on the page and I know that he has become distracted. However, having that pleasant little something to look at- and sometimes talk about for a sentence or two- helps him to stay interested in his work overall.
Have you used Canva to help you in your homeschool day? Share any ideas with me in the comment section below! I always love hearing new creative ways to keep my boy engaged and on track!
Caregiver’s Keeper 