Today, as I struggled to assist my kindergartener during yet another exhausting session of online learning—complete with a barrage of YouTube videos, Google Docs, classroom meetings, and educational apps—I felt my patience (and sanity) dwindling. After exclaiming, “I’m DONE! We’ll revisit this later!” my eldest child came to the rescue.
This incident is just one of many times this past year when he eagerly stepped in to help his younger siblings manage their online schoolwork. He has an uncanny ability to sense when I am about to lose it. Time and again, he has truly saved the day, and for that, I can’t thank him enough.
As he guided her through video clips, helped her sound out words, and typed out phrases for her assignments, I realized that without him, I would have struggled immensely during this challenging year, especially with the hurdles of e-learning. Although I consider myself fairly tech-savvy, I can’t compete with my son’s instinctive ability to troubleshoot the numerous issues that pop up on the devices they rely on for school. His aptitude for technology has been honed since birth, making it second nature for him.
In contrast, much of how children today learn and complete their assignments feels like an entirely foreign language to me—like hieroglyphics mixed with emojis. When I was in 3rd grade, we practiced cursive by spreading shaving cream on our desks and tracing letters with our fingers. We learned math without calculators, while he was coding computers and creating PowerPoint presentations in 3rd grade. His mathematical methods seem akin to how astronomers compute the speed of light and the space-time continuum, and they’re encouraged to explore scientific calculator features—something I wasn’t even allowed to use until high school.
This shift in education caught me off guard, especially since I was suddenly responsible for guiding lessons at home all day, every day, for an entire year. Enter my little hero. He takes pride in assisting his siblings, and more importantly, he communicates the lessons in ways they can easily grasp because he speaks their language. Having recently learned these concepts himself, he possesses the patience to help them through frustrations, along with handy tricks to overcome their mental blocks.
If it weren’t for my eldest’s familiarity with the lessons and the programs used to deliver them, my younger kids’ homeschooling experience would have been drastically different—likely filled with more meltdowns and expletives.
These older kids deserve a huge shoutout for stepping up, serving as role models by showing compassion, patience, and support, and encouraging their siblings to learn and grow. They are also little heroes to parents everywhere, who are struggling to juggle work, chores, cooking, and a million other responsibilities while ensuring their kids receive a decent education—albeit in ways no one could have anticipated.
My eldest son is the true unsung hero of our chaotic pandemic journey, and once things return to some semblance of normalcy, I plan to reward him with something special—perhaps a pony (or more likely, a new gaming system, since kids today are more interested in tech than pets) because he certainly deserves it… and so much more.
For more insights on navigating parenting during these challenging times, check out this helpful blog post. For those looking into at-home insemination options, Make a Mom is an excellent authority on this topic, while Hopkins Medicine offers valuable resources for pregnancy and home insemination.
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Summary:
Older siblings have emerged as unsung heroes during the pandemic, stepping up to support their younger siblings in navigating the challenges of online learning. Their innate understanding of technology and recent educational methods makes them invaluable to parents struggling to manage their own responsibilities while ensuring their children receive a proper education. As we adapt to these unprecedented times, it’s clear that older siblings play a crucial role in fostering resilience and learning within the family.