For parents: setting a daily learning schedule for learners ages 2-7

Subtitles section Play video

- Hi everyone, if you're already here
for the "Structuring The Day" webinar
from Khan Academy kids.
Thank you so much for joining.
We're going to get started in just a minute
when folks have had time to join, thank you.
Hi, my name is Sophie
and I'm from the Khan Academy Kids team.
Thank you so much for joining today
for our parent webinar on "Structuring The Day"
and how some of the Khan Academy Kids resources and tools
and support center can help you keep your days moving
with your little ones at home.
I wanna take this moment to say thank you so much
to our sponsors, Bank of America, Google.org,
AT&T and Nevadas for helping us provide this support
during school closures, we are so grateful.
And I wanna just acknowledge all of you parents
carers, grandparents, maybe some teachers
who have joined today.
You're taking the time to figure out ways
that you can make your days
maybe a little bit more structured
maybe meet some more of your goals
and we're so grateful that you're turning to Khan Academy
and Khan Academy Kids at this time.
I am Sophie Turnbull.
I'm from the Khan Academy Kids team
and today I'm really excited to be joined
by two of my friends and colleagues
Vicki Lang and Dan Tieu
and they are both on the Khan Academy team.
Today our big objective
is to make sure you know where to go
to find tools to help you structure your day
and achieve your goals during this school closure period.
We've got a bunch of free resources
and we've got our expert Vicky
joining to give us some tips and tricks.
I think this will be really helpful for parents
who are thinking about ways
that they can help keep their children learning
throughout school closures.
We won't cover in detail
how to get set up on Khan Academy Kids
how to download the app and set up a profile for your child.
And we won't cover specific advice for teachers.
That is all really important stuff
and if you go to the handout that is linked in this webinar
you'll see that on the learning objectives page
we have linked to the getting started guide
and to the teacher guide.
And if that's what you're looking for
then I'd encourage you to check those resources out.
What we will cover is a quick overview
of the Khan Academy Kids resources.
And then we'll spend most of our time
hearing about this idea of structuring our day.
And we'll hear from a pro on how to do this.
And then we're gonna turn it over to you.
I wanna spend at least 10 minutes of today
answering your questions
and hearing from you about what's on your mind
as you try and structure your day with the little ones.
Khan Academy Kids is a part of Khan Academy
but it's a separate app, it's a mobile app
and it was designed particularly for children
ages two through seven.
Just like Khan Academy, it's completely free.
There are no ads, there are no subscriptions in the app.
It is a really rich and educational
and also entertaining experience
for your two to seven year old.
It has a range of activities.
We built it with head start, so it has a lot of the academic
and on academic activities
that are really useful for getting your preschooler,
kindergarten, first grader, ready to go on
and succeed at school.
So it includes math and reading.
Also things like telling the time
and life skills like getting dressed.
It has a huge social emotional learning aspect to it.
Things like understanding emotions
and expressing frustration
which I think is really important during this time.
And it also encourages children to get up
and move around to draw a picture for a friend
and get creative.
It is so much more than just drilling the hot academics
and that's what we hear from parents
and that's what they really love.
During this time of school closures
we have had a think about and we've talked to parents
about what they're finding useful
and one piece of feedback has been the app is amazing.
I'm just really struggling to structure my day.
How much time should we spend on Khan Academy Kids
verses play time or doing other things that are so important
through our day?
And how on earth do I get any work done
in this mind bogglingly confusing time?
And one thing that we have come up with at Khan Academy
is a set of schedules
that just gives you a recommendation, a guide,
a starting point, that educators and parents alike
came together and helped to form
that says, "Maybe you could structure your day like this."
So on this page in your handout
you'll see a template for the daily schedules.
They're the Khan Academy schedules
and they go right from preschool
right through to the end of high school.
So if you've got a child of any age
and you're listening to this webinar
that will be helpful for you.
We've also included this more guidance link
and that is the Khan Academy Kids team
has added some very visual and fun schedules
specifically for children ages two through seven.
And if you're looking for something
where you can actually engage
and build a schedule with your child
then I'd encourage you to have have a look
at those extra examples from Khan Academy Kids.
And we put these schedules out
having heard that they were important
but we could not have prepared ourselves for the feedback
that we got from parents.
One of my favorite quotes
is a parent who says, "I just got teary eyed
"reading the Khan Academy schedules.
"These are fantastic."
Parents just saying that it has really helped them
to get some degree of normalcy back into their day.
And so I really want as many of you all
to access these schedules.
We'll be sharing the handout
and you'll be able to click on those links
and check them out.
But what I thought would be really important
was to acknowledge that they weren't just work
as is for everyone.
And I wanted to invite my friend at Khan Academy
who is an incredible parent and educator
and child development specialist.
I'll let Vicki tell her story.
But I'd love for Vicki to share with you some tips
about how you can really use these schedules
as one tool that might help you structure your day
and some other important things that you can keep in mind
as you're doing that.
So I'll hand over to Vicki.
- Yeah, thanks Sophie.
What a wonderful introduction
and just wealth of fantastic resources
you all have put together at Khan Kids.
My six year old loves it, it's so fun.
So yeah, I'm gonna talk to you a little bit about
the specific schedules that we've put together at Khan Kids.
And sort of the bigger principles
of like what are some things to think about
as you're structuring the day for a young child
especially if you are also trying to get work done
at the same time?
So we're all, I'm living that myself right now.
We're all trying to do 1700 things at once.
Before I launch into that just a little bit about
who's talking to you.
I'm a learning scientist at Khan Academy.
I help all of the teams understand how learning works
and how to design for it.
I've been doing learning design for a long time.
First as an elementary school teacher and then an ed tech
and I am the parent myself.
I'm a single parent of a six year old
and so I have a lot of practice.
She's in kindergarten
a lot of practice doing two things at once.
And living this currently
of her kindergarten being closed.
I'm trying to figure out how to structure this day for her
while also continuing to try to do my job.
So let's look at what some of these key principles are
of what we're trying to do
on restructuring the day for a kid
and why you would wanna put structure on it at all.
If we can go to our next slide.
Can we go to the next slide?
Thanks, well sometimes it freeze up.
I know that feeling, that's a terrible feeling.
So what we're trying to do
the real goal of trying to think through structure
is to create a space where kids feel safe
and secure so that they can can learn and you can work.
Safety and security are good
especially in an uncertain time like how we are right now.
And then it's also true that kids who feel safe and secure
learn better, their brains are more ready to learn
and they're also better able to play independently
when it's time to play independently
so that you can get your work done.
So it's kind of a win win all around.
And that's gonna help
you to be able to get even just a few hours
of work done or not if you're not working.
Either way, it's still good for the kids
to know what to expect throughout the day.
And then hopefully by the end of the day
we can all go to bed still liking each other
and getting along reasonably well by the end of the day
even in this stressful time.
So the big ideas to keep in mind
cause as Sophie said, "Every family is different
"and what works for one family
"isn't gonna work for another."
So I want you to be able to modify
the tools that we're providing
to work for your specific situation.
And as you do that I want you to know what are the big ideas
that I wanna keep in mind going forward as I make changes.
So first clarity and communication
is really helpful for kids.
When kids know what to expect
and what's expected of them, that helps them feel confident.
It helps them feel like they are empowered
to act independently
and they can trust that it's gonna work out
cause they know what's expected of them.
When they know what to expect
they come to trust the world as a safe and reliable place
that they can walk around
and then it's gonna be okay in general.
So having that clarity of a list
of this is what's gonna happen throughout the day
and we're gonna stick to this
and if it changes I'm gonna talk with you about that
and partner with you about that.
So that the kiddo is just aware of what's going on for them.
That really helps them to feel secure.
Connection is also really important.
Connection with any trusted adult
is an important part of security for kids.
They constantly need that connection cup refilled.
This is when you start to see attention seeking behaviors
and it can be really helpful
to reframe them as connection seeking behaviors.
That kid is wondering like,
are you not just physically present in the room
but are you really able to attend to them
really see them and hear what they need
and be available for them even just for a brief moment?
And connection can be really hard.
It's really hard
especially when we are managing so many different things
and also trying to work
and our kiddos don't understand why we're home
but not able to be with them all the time.
And so connection is something that's like lost
and reestablished many times a day in any family.
And sometimes it's taking a break to go be with them
on part of their schedule and we'll talk about that.
And sometimes it's just as we do a lot of staring contests
at my house.
Just a quick minute.
Let's re establish eye contact.
I really see you, I'm really here with you.
I'm gonna give you like not a half hug
while I look at my laptop but a turn to you like a real hug
just for a second before I go back to work.
That can really help that kid feel more secure.
And then choice is another big idea
that helps kids
develop a sense of positive self control and autonomy.
It gives them practice with planning.
It helps them understand that they can make a plan
and they can carry it out
and they can feel successful with that
if we give them just a manageable number of options
and set them up for success.
That's gonna support their development
and their executive functioning skill as they grow.
And it creates ownership
which means the kiddo is more bought in and more engaged
and more motivated to do what they need to do during the day
cause they had a little bit of choice
in when they're gonna do it
and exactly what they're gonna do.
So those are the big ideas
that I recommend trying to build into a schedule.
That said, everybody is in just chaos right now.
And so you're doing great, whatever you're doing is great.
These are just some things to try to carry forward.
So let's look at...
Sorry if you can go back for just a second.
This picture on the right, this is my daughter
and you can see choice there.
This is our schedule that she's standing on
and then she's got activity cards there
and she's thinking about where she wants to put her cards
during the day.
And so this is something that we do every morning
at breakfast but you're gonna be able to figure out
what works for you in your family.
Looking at the next slide
what might actually go in your schedule?
It depends on how much time you have
and what your school has provided for you
and it's gonna vary depending on what you're able to do.
But if you look at a typical early childhood classroom
or a preschool classroom
these are the topics they'd be trying to cover.
Reading and writing, I should say writing, some math
we have both of those in Khan Kids, it's fantastic.
Social time with other kids
even if it's on video with a play date or with adults.
Free play time where they can be creative
and get some large motor practice and small motor practice
and science and social studies.
Are you gonna be able to do all those every day?
No, I'm not able to do all those every day.
Like there's a reason teaching and parenting
are two different jobs.
And we don't have people ordinarily
that are full time parents and full time teachers.
You're not gonna be able to do that
you can give yourself some grace and patience.
But we're all doing the best that we can.
And if you can go to the next slide
we'll look just briefly at the examples
of some of the things.
This is a sneak preview of what's coming for you on Friday.
With through Khan Kids.
So there's a couple different structures.
This is the written one.
There's an option on the left
where you can write in the times that work for you,
activities, there's activity cards
and there's a space where you can write down
the name of the grown up
or you could just write independent
if it's independent time.
That might be with that kiddo
cause then the kiddo knows
it's easier for them to play by themselves for a half hour
if they know when you're coming back.
And then there's an option on the right
if you don't have the time
or space to invest in that level of connection
then there's this version that's just for your kiddo
to fill in their activities.
And you can pre fill it if you wanna be consistent every day
and limit their number of choices, whatever works for you.
If you look at the next slide
I think there's some examples here of how that might look.
We do things like read on video chat with grandpa
while I get an hour of work done every day
that's something that's helpful.
Or you can just fill in pre kind of prefilled activities.
And then on the next slide, this is my last example
is the visual schedule for younger kids who can't read yet
don't understand time yet.
We've provided these pictures where you can kind of build.
There's a blank template or there's a prefilled schedule
and you can fill in what's gonna work for you.
And even young kids can have choice
and where they put different things
to whatever extent you're comfortable with.
And with that, I will turn it back over to Dan
who's gonna say just a little bit more about
where to find these resources
and then we'll take questions.
- Hi, thank you, Vicki and thank you Sophie.
I just wanted to cover off a few things
before we get to resources and open it up to live questions.
First attached to this webinar, we have a handout section.
So please grab and download the version
of this presentation.
It contains a complete walkthrough
of what Vicki and Sophie walked you through
in terms of how to structure your schedule,
why it's important
and what content to incorporate into your schedules.
It also has links to resources like live activities
including circle time which we recently spun up
on our Khan Academy Kids YouTube channel
as well as printable.
So if you wanna do things offline
these are really important activities
that the team is working on creating for you as well.
And then as always, we have a list of other resources
available for you both on Khan Academy
as well as khanacademy.org/kids.
That's where our main Khan Academy Kids pages live.
And if you have any questions
feel free to email khankids@khanacademy.org
if you have any questions.
And the second thing we'd asked you to do
is if you have any questions
please add them to the question box.
I'll be facilitating while Vicki and Sophie do the hard work
of actually answering the questions.
Alright, so we are already have quite a few question
really good questions coming in.
I'll start off, Vicki, this one's probably for you
from Sanfil this is a funny one.
Are we sure we can have a timetable for a two year old?
- That's where the picture one comes in.
That's a great question.
So kids that young you're right don't understand time.
It's too abstract but they can understand sequence.
So we're having snack now
that means next we're gonna read a book.
And next we're gonna do nap.
So having just the order of things
can help kids to understand what's first, next, last.
- Thank you and then we have a question from Carrie.
Actually, I can chime in a little bit before I pass it off
to either of you.
So Carrie asks, I'd like to know
any tricks on how to get a six year old
to enjoy reading
either by someone else or by himself as he learns to read.
I read with my nieces and nephews
as they were growing up throughout all the ages
and the way I've done it
that worked for me is we'll take turns reading
like a little paragraph or a sentence.
And often acting out the character or just like enunciating
and just playing along with it just beyond the page
has been really helpful for me.
And so Sophia or Vicki
if either of you would like to provide your own tips there?
- Yeah, I think reading with a variety of adults
can be exciting.
My daughter is much more excited to read to her grandmother
than she is to read to me.
Another thing that can help is sometimes as parents
we are really excited for them to try to learn
or try to read and we can push them a little bit.
I know I tend to fall into that sometimes
and if we back up and just let them go at their own pace
give them room to make mistakes, give them wait time
while they're sounding something out.
Just let them take their space and slow down.
That can make it feel like a lower pressure activity
for them and they can be more excited to engage in it.
- And the little bit that I would add
is that the Khan Academy Kids app
has a whole library of thousands of books.
A lot of them are our own original characters.
So there's five really happy animal characters.
Some of them are about nature
and you should really check those out too.
- Perfect and then Sophie, this one's probably best for you.
Goal asks, is there a way to access Khan Academy Kids
through a browser?
I have two kids but only one mobile device
for them to use.
- Yeah, the short answer is no.
The Khan Academy Kids app
was built for really little fingers.
So it's designed to be on a mobile device
that can be manipulated
and so it works on a Chrome touchscreen
but not on the typical desktop browser experience.
That's something we would love to build
and I'm really glad you've asked that question.
I guess in that scenario
I would say maybe having one child
take a look at circle time which is available in browser
because it's posted on YouTube
and that's a 15 minute or so reading
and interactive activity that's supposed to really represent
that circle time that kiddos have in preschools in schools
all over the country.
And then maybe using some of our printables.
If you have a printer at home, we've also adapted them
if you don't have a printer at home
there's some offline activities that maybe your child
could get excited about.
And thanks so much for laying out that scenario
that you've got.
I definitely love to take it onto desktop someday.
- Yeah and I would just echo what Sophie just said.
It's the teams developing a tremendous amount of resources
that are off the app as well.
Sophie's one of the stars of circle time.
So you get to see Sophie repeatedly visit there as well.
And then the printables are just adorable.
So I think that's a really fun activity
that you can take offline as well.
We have a great question from Jason
and I can start with this
and then probably pass it over to you, Vicki.
So Jason ask, how do we navigate between this schedule
and what our districts are sending us?
I would just echo that we created these schedules early on
before any other public schedules
were really made available.
And so we were developing it to fill a void
that we saw that was a need.
And obviously we don't wanna conflict
with what your districts are advising for you.
So I just kinda give that background
before I hand it over to Vicki.
- Yeah, that's a great point.
I would just say that different schools
are doing different things
and you can fill in
if you're working with them on those blank templates
where your child has some choices
you can just fill in the fixed things, right?
Just write in nine o'clock circle time with class
before you even give them the sheet.
We do that here.
I fill in where I have a work meeting
and I'm not gonna be available to be with her
so she knows she can't schedule math
or something during that time.
So then you're just limiting
the number of choices that they have
based on what free time they actually have to schedule.
You can also put other constraints on it
like we need to do exercise in the morning
cause otherwise you are off the walls by the afternoon.
Or math has to happen in the morning
because your brain is tired at the end of the day.
So just pre filling, I think is what I'd say.
- Okay perfect, this next question
Sophie, perhaps you can answer this question.
So Ernesto is asking, is Khan Academy Kids
targeted more towards native English speakers?
- Khan Academy Kids is an app in English.
We have actually had a lot of great feedback
from English language learners who are using the app.
An example might be the read aloud feature in the books
is a really helpful way to onboard
to then reading independently
and there's lots of very simple guidance
and reinforcement delivered
by the narrator Kodi Bear throughout.
So I would say it is in English
and the learning will happen in English
but I think it can be well suited
to English language learners as well.
And also we'd love to hear feedback from you.
If you have it on what that is like for you
in your experience
but we've had good luck with that so far.
- Thank you for that, Sophie.
So this question is super important
cause I think many of us are facing this.
Laurie asks, any tips for a very small living environment
where a child doesn't have a dedicated school area?
So we talked about scheduling with time
it's interesting in terms of scheduling with space.
- Yeah, that's a great question.
So we didn't talk about that at all
but it is great for kids to have a space
that's a consistent workspace
just as it's great for us as adults to have a desk
that's organized where we get our work done
cause your brain kind of switches modes.
If you don't have that
I think you can still signal work time and work brain
with just a special folder
or a special area like a quarter of the room
where there's a pillow to sit on and a clipboard
or anything that is kind of dedicated
for the use of learning specifically
and not used for other purposes.
I think can serve the same function
as having a dedicated space.
- Perfect, I have a question
from Cater here and probably Sophie
you could answer this one.
Does Khan Academy also provide suggestions
on physical activity?
Physical, we have a physical development section.
So if you can kind of dive into that,
that'd be terrific, thanks Sophie.
- Yeah, I think a really big part
of the Khan Academy Kids app
is that we recommend that it's used for 15
or 20 minute session at a time
and we really don't see kids getting stuck in it
because we bring them out of the activities
to do something physical.
So an example might be, we get them to act like zoo animals
and that's always a really fun time
where they go from manipulating something
or reading something to you to actually getting up
and moving around.
I think so that's like the app
actually prompting physical activity.
I think throughout the app
there's just a great emphasis on getting outdoors
on moving around and having adventures.
And so treating Khan Academy Kids
is like a good role model for that
and using it in a really balanced way
is one way that we see kids being really physical.
We just saw these amazing tweets this week
of kids dancing around and they'd created forts
and they were talking to the characters
and there is just so much theatrics
that goes on with early learning
and I think the app really encourages that.
- Awesome, so kind of related to this one.
It's asked quite frequently right now
so I'll just kind of ask on behalf of everyone else
and actually I can chime in here as well.
There are many questions about how to regulate
or think about screen time especially in a time like this.
So Sophie or Vicki, do you wanna volunteer?
And I can chime in?
- Yeah, Sophie do you wanna start?
And I have a couple ideas.
- Yeah, happy to start.
So the number one principle
for the Khan Academy Kids creators
who are parents themselves has always been that parents
really know best and best parents and carer
is the best place to come up with a balanced
very nutritional media diet, some like to call it
for their children.
We really differ a lot to the guidelines of the experts.
WHO the World Health Organization
and the American Association of Pediatrics on screen time
and that's why we recommend that 20 minutes a day mark
for our two to seven year old learners.
It obviously can be flexed up for the older ages
and really that's what we tend to see
is working for families
is Khan Academy Kids becomes just one part
of a very balanced day
that to Vickie's point has a lot of free play
has a lot of outdoor time ideally and a lot of movement.
- Yeah and I think that there are different ways
of using screen time.
I think that there's more and less educational ways.
In this day and age there's also more and less social ways
that may be the only way that your child can get social time
with other kids their age
which is an important part of a kid's development.
So that's something to think about
as you're figuring out what feels right for your family.
One of my favorite tips
as you're trying to limit screen time
coming from having been a single parent
raising a toddler is podcasts.
Podcasts serve almost the same
sort of like a kid entertaining function
while you need to do the dishes that a screen sometimes can
without the screen.
So there are some fantastic
education podcasts around science.
There are some for the really little ones
there's some really good storytelling podcasts out there.
And if you have one of those homes speakers
that listens to your voice
the child can actually play it for themselves.
It's just like robot placed for its podcast.
And it will do that.
And has been very helpful and supportive for me
as I try to do more than one thing at the same time
and still want her brain to be growing.
- Yeah and I think you two hit the main points.
I would just echo I think part of the reason
why they Khan Academy Kids team is so thoughtful
about creating these additional resources
whether it's circle time
physical activities within the app
as well as the printables
is really to provide a mix of activities for you all.
And then to Vicki's point about screen time
being a social activity.
I think with the shelter at home mandate
many of us are using screen time
as a way to communicate with our families remotely.
So just think about screen time
also like not all screen time is created equal
and to also create a balance of a mix of activities
for you to use.
Okay, with that, I think we're almost out of time.
So I think that's all we have for questions.
I'd like to close out with a couple of things.
First, Sophie and Vicki thank you
for sharing your expertise today.
And then I wanted to thank our fabulous audience
for taking the time out of your evening to be with us.
We know you're extremely busy
and we appreciate you investing
your time with us in this session.
If you missed something or if you wanna go back and review
for those of you who registered for this webinar
you'll automatically be emailed a copy
a recording of this video.
And for those of you who may not
or you know of other people who would be interested
in watching what you just saw
and get access to those resources.
Well, this recording will be posted
and be made available online.
And additionally, we have quite a few resources
on khanacademy.org as well as khanacademy.org/kids
specifically for younger learners
and we're updating those resources daily.
So be mindful that you can come visit those pages
and you'll see the updated versions pretty much every day.
And then before we sign off
we wanna ask you to do us one more favor
and take the poll
that pops up at the very end of this webinar.
And we wanna know two things from you.
First, how can we make this future iteration
of this session even better for other parents?
And then secondly, what kind of session
would you like to see next from us?
In fact, this session was actually a product of feedback
we heard from you all.
Our first section was a very high level overview.
And many of you asked for more structure and more tips
and that's what this was meant to do.
And so we're continuing to listen to you
and we're here to support you.
So please provide us with that feedback.
And in closing, all of us recognize
that you're juggling a lot as parents here.
This is really uncharted territory for all of us.
And we here at Khan Academy
just wanna remind you to be kind to yourselves.
It's okay, we're all in this together and you've got this.
So with that, from all of us at Khan Academy
thanks again and good night.