The holidays are over and you’re struggling to get your family back into a routine. Mornings are stressful, children are grumpy and it’s getting harder to get out the door on time. This is the dreaded first days back syndrome. If you’re lucky it may last a week or two. If you’re not you can have this problem for half the school term. You’re not alone. It’s a common theme with parents and children after a long break away from the structure and schedule of school. But there are ways to help reduce this effect. Keep reading, we'll give you three tips to help ease the “first days back syndrome”.
Ditch the guilt.
Structure isn’t a punishment.
Adapt the schedule, don’t scrap it.
Monitor diet and eating schedules.
Holidays! The space that exists between school terms. Kids love it. Parents? We kinda look forward to it too. Kinda. We count the days until it starts and count the days until it’s over. But it’s the weeks between those two points that are crucial to how the next school term will start. Most kids expect to kick back and relax. They’ve just come off exams and the stress of the school term and as parents we feel for them. We want them to enjoy their time off, we want them to let loose and do all the things they couldn’t do during the term. It’s understandable. But is it right? It feels good in the moment but are we undermining the discipline and structure that they followed for weeks and months for a fleeting pleasure that then results in a laboured start to the next school term. Hindering our own child’s ability to succeed in school for a few weeks of “do what you want.”
Why do schedules matter?
Experts all over the world agree that having a structure and a schedule is better for children. It helps them to regulate themselves. It provides a clear understanding of what is going on and removes uncertainty. It gives them an opportunity to develop a sense of responsibility, improves time management skills, builds character and the list continues. Yet we often ditch the schedule when the children are home on holidays. But there are more effective ways to embrace the fun of holiday breaks that won’t wreck in a week what took months to build. We’ll take a look at these ways below.
Ditch the guilt. Structure isn’t a punishment.
Every year we send our prides and joys to be taught and guided by trained teachers. The school system offers support to the family structure but also the community in which it exists. We allow other people to help us raise our children. We understand the value but there’s a hidden side effect of this that we need to discuss. Guilt. Guilt, as a working parent, for not being able to spend enough time with our children. Guilt from the long hours of homework and assignments when your child just wanted to sleep. Guilt from restricting access to their phones and toys so they could focus on school activities. What does this guilt look like? It looks like going to bed whenever you want. It looks like eating whenever you want and going out with friends whenever you want. It looks like an unstructured eight week summer break.
We’re here to tell you we understand. We understand that feeling of guilt and we want to let you know it’s ok. Structure isn’t a punishment for your children. The first step in creating a more disciplined structured holiday break is by accepting that you’re not punishing them. If you’re used to having the structure in place this won’t be that much of a challenge, but if this is new to you, it may feel like a betrayal to your child at first. Your child probably will treat your attempt at structuring their holiday as a punishment. They will try to sway you and it could make you feel guilty, like you’re robbing them of their fun. The challenge here is to recognise that fun can have structure as well. Life doesn’t stop when you’re on holiday, no one knows this more than an adult and our journey as parents is to create functioning adults. So the room still needs to be cleaned, dishes still need to be washed. Delayed gratification is a skill that we should all learn. Chores before play, play has limits. Eating has limits. What might start out as a challenge will blossom into a habit with consistency and patience.
Adapt the schedule, don’t scrap it.
Rather than throwing your entire schedule away for holiday breaks, why not adapt your holiday schedule. Consider the times you and your family need to be up and running during the school term. Use that as a starting point for your holiday script. For the shorter holiday breaks, the two weeks at Easter for example, bedtime should not change. Maintain the same bed time and rise and shine time, as two weeks do not allow enough space to deviate from the schedule and return. A good adaptation is a camp, if available. Thankfully, several institutions create and manage camps during holiday breaks to help us juggle our schedules while keeping the children engaged and safe. It mimics the school setting but in a more relaxed and fun environment. Several children look forward to it and it provides an opportunity for seamless transitions back into school and possibly getting a head start on the next term's curriculum.
Great Kids Arête offers a great camp program to help maintain your child’s schedule, engage them in fun activities and teach them with fun, multi-sensory activities. Find out how our programs can help you and your child achieve your goals.
What about the longer holiday breaks? Summer is the highlight of the school year for all children. It’s months of leisure and fun. Because of the length of this holiday, your schedule can be a bit more relaxed and flexible with a catch. Bedtimes and morning times should mimic the school term for the last three weeks of this holiday to get their internal clock synchronised, get the grumpiness of having to wake up early out and give you the ability to address any behavioural challenges that may occur without the stress of being late for school or work.
That being said, the name of the game is adaptation. How is the school day structured? A class during the day may be twenty minutes long, some maybe thirty minutes long. Consider dividing up their time into blocks. An hour of tv, followed by a fifteen minute break to rest the eyes, calm the mind, followed by fifteen to twenty minutes of reading. Talk to your child and find out what activities they enjoy. Painting, writing, bicycle riding, use their hobbies in a structured way to lower their resistance to the schedule while also incorporating some of those things they may not necessarily enjoy.
Monitor diet and eating schedules.
So far, we’ve talked a lot about bedtime and awake time, but mealtimes are important as well. Lunch happens at a certain time during the school term. How can we incorporate this into vacation time? Having children be completely unregulated when at home can create a situation where they are hungry during school hours because their bodies have gotten used to eating whenever they want to. Now they’re not concentrating as well, at least not until they’ve settled back into their routine. Including that lunch time schedule in their day during the holiday breaks, may appear rigid, but it keeps their bodies on a consistent cycle and reduces the disruptions to their day once school restarts.
You are what you eat, but you sleep what you eat as well. Continuing from the point above, it’s not just about lunch time. Eating right before bed can impact your quality of sleep. That lethargy you sometimes experience when you wake up could be due to the last thing you ate and the time you ate it. Your body has to work to process food in your stomach even while you’re asleep. The internal effects of the digestive system, along with the type of foods you ate, can create a night of restless sleep and cause you to feel tired when you wake. While we don’t often associate eating habits with children because of perceived high metabolism and their boundless amount of energy, it’s worth noting that they’re not immune. Monitor what your child eats during the evening and try to avoid them eating right before bed. Beyond sleep habits you can be sparing them from health issues later on in life by cultivating proper eating habits early.
Enjoy the holiday breaks with your kids. Enjoy their company and their antics. Treat them to the places and things they couldn’t experience during the school term. Go wild, in a structured way. Doing so will help keep them on track, maintain their discipline and build good habits for the near and distant future. So, ditch the guilt, adapt the schedule and monitor the eating habits so you can avoid the first days back blues.
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