I don’t know about you but this summer flew by! In the suburbs of Philadelphia, we have about two weeks before school starts. I am both nervous and excited for my oldest as she enters first grade and for my son’s last year of pre-school. As always, I like to deal with any type of anxiety-provoking situation by planning as much as possible and controlling any variables I can.
I am only familiar with pre-school and the lower elementary school grades, but hopefully some of my hacks translate to other ages as well. If anyone has advice that is different from mine for older kids, please share – I would love to have a guest blog post!
Last year, I learned that having the kids in two different schools was extremely challenging. It was hard to keep schedules straight and remember who was in school when, who had a teacher planning day, and what fundraiser we were supposed to be helping/contributing to any given week. If this sounds like you, please keep reading for some back-to-school hacks I decided to do this year in order to simplify things!
- Divide and conquer. I know this may not be realistic for everybody, especially if you have more than two kids or are in a single parent household but I would recommend as much as you can to divide responsibilities with your partner if you can. For this year, I will be in charge of my daughter’s school responsibilities and my husband will be in charge of my son’s. It was hard for me to let go but it became clear after sending my son to school when there was none and forgetting to do half the fundraisers that it was just too much for me to keep up with. Even if you can’t evenly divide things, you can always ask for help from your partner (or other family members or close friends) if you feel like you can’t keep up.
- Take advantage of pre-packaged supplies. I love this one. My daughter’s elementary school HSA packaged all the supplies needed for each grade and these are being sold as bundles at the local Staples (with a discount). Check to see if your school does the same! If that is not available, I highly recommend doing the shopping online in order to avoid wasting time and buying extra things. Who doesn’t love office supplies? Last year, I ordered everything from Target and picked it up as a drive-up order, which likely saved me a ton of money. As they say….you don’t go to Target because you need something. You go to Target and let Target tell you what you need. Best to just shop for the exact supplies on your list online.
- Start the routine 1-2 weeks prior to the start of school. Summer is filled with late nights and fun weekend trips. This is awesome but less compatible with busy school and work schedules. It is nice to start mimicking what the school routine will be a little before, so there is less of a shock once they have to wake up at a certain time. Even though both my kids were in camp, the three weeks between camp and school somehow completely negate any schedule they had throughout the summer.
- Plan lunches and snacks ahead of time. I like to meal plan my breakfast, lunch, and family dinners. My kids eat the same breakfast and lunch every day when they are home but it is more tricky once school starts. We tried to send the same thing for lunch during camp this summer but towards the end, we were getting the full peanut butter sandwich back. For this year, I will add planning my daughter’s lunch to my Sunday night meal planning schedule and make the meal either the night before or have the nanny or my husband prep it in the morning. If your child is old enough, you can ask him or her to do it! They can be involved in the meal planning as well.
- Calendars. This is basically how I run my life in general. Wall calendars, dry-erase board calendars, shared calendars on the Internet… Find what works best for your family and stick with it. I use all of the above but the wall calendar has worked best since it is easy to use and visualize (we keep it in the kitchen). Once you get the school’s schedule, I highly recommend filling in all the holidays, half-days, teacher planning days, etc. This helps me think ahead of time of any gaps in babysitting that may occur and can also help plan vacations.
Bonus tip: I definitely plan on keeping a spreadsheet with all of the passwords for the different sites: school lunches, class assignments, parent teacher conference sign-ups, etc.
Hope this helps! Let me know what other back-to-school hacks you have that have made your life easier!