These Tips For Getting Back Into The School Routine will help you and your family start the new school year off with a bang…a happy and healthy bang!
Late nights, lazy mornings, crazy feeding schedules, counting playing in the pool as a bath…oh summertime you are a delight! But friends, school is fast approaching and unless you want to deal with the spawn of Satan on the first day of school you better start thinking about easing those kiddos into some sort of routine again soon!
Tips For Getting Back Into The School Routine
Now that I work from home our summertime schedule is a lot less structured than it ever was when I worked in an office. That being said, the transition to having the kids actually getting out of the house into the car and dropped off at school before 7:30am is always a struggle! To be clear, it is a struggle for the whole family! Implementing these back to school routine tips have helped us in the past and I hoping it does the trick this year as well!
Tighten Up Bedtime
If your family is like ours, as the summer goes on bedtime gets later and later. When school hits it is going to be hard for kids to fall asleep and then get up early in the morning. That being said, having a test run of earlier to bed and waking times is a good idea. During the summer kids usually have more time to wake up and get going for the day but during the school season usually mornings are a bit rushed. For a week before the first day of school we like to implement school bedtime and school wake up times. This helps us all get back into a routine!
Back-To-School Shopping
School supplies and new clothes!! There is something so fun about those two shopping themes during this time of the year. Instead of being tempted to do all of the shopping with out the kids (because kids make shopping ROUGH!) bring the kids with you. Let them get excited about their new pencils, folders and lunchbox. We also let the kids pick out one new first day of school outfit. This usually gets them excited to get moving and get dressed that first day of school.
Remember that Bath time schedule
Call me a bad mom but during the summer bath time is also considered pool fun, water balloon fights and running through the sprinklers. Please tell me I am not the only one! Come school time it will be necessary to get back on that bath time schedule and routine. This is another thing to add to the schedule a week before the first day of school so the whole family can get back into a good routine.
Get Organized – What To Wear
Great a system that helps the kids (if old enough) to get themselves dressed every morning. We created this weekly outfit organizer for Teagan last year and we will be doing it for Jude this year as well. This lets us sit down with the kids and look at the schedule and weather for the week and set out what they will wear every day. When the organizer is labeled they can easily get themselves dressed while mom and dad are working on breakfast and lunches.
Planful Lunches
We all want to be lunchtime heroes but the first step to not having to pack PB&J every day for lunch is to have a plan. Create a list of what lunches will be made for the week and have all ingredients/items on hand for easy packing. We pack lunches in the morning but on crazy days it is possible to pack the night before as well. Finding some great school lunches that kids will love to have is key. Start brainstorming some ideas now and create a calendar just like you would for your dinner meal plans.
Kick Snacking To The Curb!
Get on a food routine too! How many snacks do your kids ask for during the day in the summer? Way more than they get when at school because they are bored some of the days in the summer. Boredom leads to snacking! Time to implement a breakfast, lunch, afternoon snack and dinner routine. Encourage you kids to think about how they eat while at school to help them not be starving when back in the classroom.
Discuss A Homework Routine
Come up with a plan for when the homework starts to roll in. For us, we have a pretty strict homework routine and rule. No screen time before homework is complete and the kids must read for 30 minutes every day before screen time as well. We will remind both Jude and Teagan about this homework routine and will start with these rules the first day of school. We also created a fun Homework Station for our house to help with our homework routine…I will be sharing that soon!
Limit Those Screens
Okay, let’s not judge each other because we all know that the kids watched WAY more shows, played way more games and enjoyed WAY too many video games that anyone would like to admit but hey, it’s life. So, the problem? The detox comes on the first day of school, this is a hard transition for kids to go from enjoying screen time in the middle of the day to sitting in a classroom for 7 hours! To ease this transition start pulling the cords in the next few weeks. Need some Back-To-School books to keep the kids entertained? Check out these 13 First Day of School Books that your kids will love!
Share The Family Calendar
Once school starts all of the after school activities start as well. Kids like to know what their day might look like and they deserve to know the schedule as well. Before all of the school craziness happens sit down and share what evenings they will have activities and how the schedule will look on those days. Every Sunday evening have a little family meeting about the upcoming week so everyone is on the same page. This should help keep everything running smoothly!
What back to school routine tip would you add to this list?
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