Working parent learners

Working around surprises

We all know that children and family life is full of surprises: the late night trips to A & E, the constant calls from school or nursery, the partner who has to travel last-minute for work leaving you to hold the fort, the late night food tech ingredient dash, the dentist appointments, the sickness bugs at the precise time in your course when you needed to write your assignment and that spread through the entire family one by one eating up months of your life……and that is on top of working endless hours with work based deadlines and situations to take care of, colleagues to cover for, demanding managers, clients or customers to handle. It’s extremely difficult to find enough time to study in the first place but when that time is unexpectedly taken, achieving your qualification can seem like an impossible task.

In my research with working parent learners, the common themes from those who were managing to balance everything fairly well and these are highlighted below.

Tips on balancing working, parenting and learning from other working parent learners:

• Let your family know what you are doing – don’t bore them to death with every single detail of each class and each assignment (unless they ask!), but do share your journey with your family and children. Many parents mentioned the importance of setting an example or a good role model to their children about taking part in education – this will only work if you talk to them about what it is you are doing and why.
• Share the experience – if you have older children who are also at school or college, study with them. Doing homework together, having a study space and set times to work at the same time really worked for some. Although of course, if you are fighting over one laptop like we are in my house, you may have to vary the activities so that isn’t an issue.
• Remember why you are doing this HE course – you decided to do this for a reason and that was a powerful enough motivator to get you to seek out the course, apply and get started – that’s the hardest part done. The motivation is there so now you need to work on perseverance and determination, which every parent has in abundance, its just a case of reminding yourself and channelling it.
• Think about the end goal – imagine yourself completing your Access course and being accepted at university, imagine yourself completing your degree and walking across that graduation stage with your family cheering you on. Imagine the new job or career you know you will excel at once you get this piece of paper.
• Use the tutor and university or training provider support available – assignment extensions and mitigating circumstances exist for a reason – if you genuinely need more time for unforeseen reasons, let your tutor know. We can only help if you keep communicating and we want you to do well, that’s why we’re in this job.
• Reach out to your fellow classmates – they may not be in exactly the same position as you but you are all in this together and many of the learners I speak to find their fellow learners to be a brilliant source of support and motivation. I’ve seen this work both well and terribly though so you know best if this might help and it completely depends on who is in your class. It’s just one option so if the dreaded group WhatsApp isn’t for you then trust your instincts!
• Look for pockets of time that you could use and be creative! It doesn’t have to always be when the children are asleep, and besides, how can they see your hard work if you always hide it?
• Commuting or on the school run? – Listen to podcasts or audiobooks related to your subject
• Waiting outside school for the gates to open? – Watch a video on your phone or login and scan through learning materials on your VLE
• On a long journey in the car? – If you’re the passenger (and you don’t get travel sick) you can use this time to read or make notes in preparation for an assignment
• Long plane journey going on holiday? – Once everyone is settled with their inflight entertainment see if you can get some reading or note making done
• Stuck in another boring meeting that could have been an email – think about your assignment instead and if you can get away with it you can also jot down notes – it looks like you are listening even if you aren’t!
• Accept that your best is good enough – let go of perfection, no doubt you know this already as a parent – your house will never be perfect, the washing will never be done, the kitchen will never stay tidy – embrace the chaos and imperfection of family life and extend this to your studies. Do your best and let that be enough, clinging to perfection will stop you ever submitting any academic work because there is always more that could have been done, that is the nature of studying in Higher Education.
• It’s not forever – Remember that this period of working whilst parenting and studying is intense, but it is only for a relatively short time. Nobody would expect you to sacrifice so much for the rest of your life, it’s a short term conscious choice you are making right now.
• Take care of yourself – If the idea of self-care seems like wishful thinking and you haven’t had a relaxing bath or even a minute’s peace for what seems like eternity, then reframe what self-care means to you. Taking a short break to walk the dog, doom scroll social media, watch Netflix, play with the children, chat to a friend, bake something, mow the lawn, or just stare out of the window is better than sitting forcing yourself to stare at a screen when you are just not feeling it.