Family Learning Hub

• Reach out to the school to ask how your child is doing. There are at least 3 people who can help you: Your child’s teacher, principal, or community liaison. 

• Look on your own! 

  • PK - 3: Most students use Seesaw.  Learn how here. 

  • 4th & 5th: Most students use Schoology. Learn how here.

  • Sit with your child to play “Rose Thorn” with Seesaw or Schoology. Ask them to show you the best thing they worked on (rose) and the assignment that was hardest for them (thorn). Look together for missing work and make a plan to complete it. 

• You probably don’t need to check-in daily; a weekly check in should work well. Younger students may need more frequent check-ins.

The learning environment has changed for all students, and your child is not alone. Teachers will continue to identify your child’s needs in the coming months and years and support them to catch up as needed. 

• Encourage your child to tell their teacher what is feeling hard in class and ask for suggestions and support.

• Ask the teacher what skills practice and activities would best meet the individual needs of your child. Then create a routine for practice time and celebrate your child’s effort each week. 

• Read read read, to and with your child! Creating time and space for cozy reading will always help your child across all content areas.

• Create a visual list with your child that they can cross off or check off throughout the day.

With children spending a significant amount of school time on the screen, many families are looking for ways to limit screen time during other times of day. Here are a few ideas: 

• Use the screen time settings on tablets and phones to monitor screen time

  • How to for Apple and Android products 

• Set limits, explaining why it is important for your brain and body to have non screen time

• Activity Menus (combination of screen and off screen)  

• Outdoor Activities 

• Stuck at Home Science (science activities using household materials)

• Playing With Your Child 

• Experiments to try at home 

• 25 Screen Free Ideas for Home

• 100 Ideas for Kids in Quarantine

• Preschool Activities for Home

• Project Based Learning (PBL) is a way of teaching and learning in which students work on a project that requires creativity, critical thinking, problem solving, communication, and collaboration. Check out these Teachable Moment Projects by the leading PBL experts, PBLWorks, designed specifically for families to do at home!

• Real World learning opportunities are everywhere. Whether it’s sorting laundry, changing the kitty litter, raking leaves, changing a lightbulb, or any other chore - remember that you are your child’s first teacher and they have so many important life skills to learn from you. 

Check out these family friendly Bedtime Math activities and Family Writing ideas

If there are gaps in your kid's school day, remember that your child’s passions -animals, Minecraft, magic- can be used for learning. Read books, create science experiments, and do math related to favorite topics. Wide Open School has great easy to use choices, too!

• PK-5 Reading Resources :

  • Listen to Reading - 

    • Storyline Online    

    • Raz Kids (English and Spanish available- contact teacher for login)

    • Unite For Literacy (several languages)

    • Ms. Menji’s library (Digital read alouds in Spanish) 

    • Maestra Kathy YouTube channel (pre-K Spanish), 

    • Todos a leer YouTube Channel (Spanish read alouds)

  • Read to Self - Sora (English and Spanish available)

  • Reading Rockets for Families

  • Colorincolorado: Spanish    English 

  • Phonics: education.com word patterns; Heggerty (scroll down)

  • Practice Reading Skills via my.bvsd.org: iReady or Istation (bilingual schools)

  • Newsela (3rd -5th) (English and Spanish available)

• K-5 Math:  

  • Many family friendly math links

• K-5 Science & Social Studies: 

  • Mystery Science Videos & Activities

  • ScienceFlix Videos & Experiments 

  • Digital History Explorations

  • KidNuz - Current events for kids in five minute podcasts 

  • Rocky Mountain PBS

  • Brainpop (students log in from my.bvsd.org)

• Art, Music & Movement:

  • Chrome Music Lab 

  • Go Noodle 

  • Go Noodle Español

  • Draw with Mo Willems

  • Art for Kids Hub

• Try a first/ then approach to the day. First, complete the assigned task. Then, spend a few minutes in a preferred or choice activity. Sprinkle the preferred/chosen activities throughout the day to help with motivation to get school work done.

• Expect your child to turn his or her camera on during live teaching! This lets the teacher know that your child is ready to learn and helps connect them to the other students. Reach out to the teacher if there is a reason turning on the camera is problematic.

• When school feels hard and overwhelming, students are more likely to give up. Sometimes support with Executive Function skills (planning, focus, memory, etc.) can help. To learn more, explore this Executive Function Resource  Kit. 

• Check out this article from The Seattle Child: “My Child Hates Remote Learning”

Children respond to stress in many different ways. Remind your child that this is hard, that we will get through it, and that the adults in their lives at home and school care deeply for them. 

• Five Helpful Responses for Families

• Helping Children Cope with COVID

Social Emotional Menu of Ideas for adults to do with children

BVSD IT continues to run the IT Prime Delivery Service to ensure your children have access to working Chromebooks. A typical turn around is 24 hours for a broken device swap. If your student is having issues with their Chromebook, please call the IT Service Desk at 720-561-HELP for troubleshooting assistance or to schedule an IT Prime device swap.

For emotional/counseling support, reach out to your School Counselor

For immediate crisis support help, Colorado Crisis Services is available to anyone 24 hours a day, seven days a week and provides free, confidential support.  See resource information below:

• Check grades, attendance, and assignment completion in the following ways:

1. Infinite Campus (IC) has both the grades and attendance records for your tween/teen. Use the IC Parent Portal to check these things.

2. Check Schoology weekly (or daily if needed): Schoology is the Learning Management System (LMS) for most secondary students in BVSD. Sit with your child and ask them to show you the courses, assignments, and projects they are working on in Schoology or Google. Consider asking, What was most interesting this week? What was hardest for you? Let’s look for missing work together and make a plan to complete it. You can also check yourself via the Parent Login and Account Overview.

3. Focus on positive progress no matter how small. Consider noticing, “You turned in _____. Your grade improved in ____ this week.”

• If you don’t see your child during the day due to work or other circumstances, here are some ideas for checking in with them:

  • Set up a paper planner or an electronic version such as Google Keep

  • Ask your teen/tween to snap pictures of their work and text them to you as they move through each part of their day. 

• If you want more detail or are worried your student is falling behind, you might:

  • Reach out to the school to ask how your tween/teen is doing. There are at least 3 people who can help you: your child’s teachers, principal, counselor or community liaison (if your school has one). 

  • Encourage your child to advocate for themself by emailing or talking with their teacher. Practice with your child what they might say “I am confused about___. Can you help me understand______? I need______” 

  • Ask the teacher (or have your student ask the teacher) for practice sites and other suggestions to help them catch up in their learning. Help your teen/tween schedule time to do the suggested work. 

  • Remember that the learning environment has changed for all students, and your child is not alone. Teachers will continue to identify your child’s needs in the coming months and years, and will do all they can to catch them up as needed. 

• Try a first/ then approach to the day. First, complete the assigned task. Then, spend a few minutes in a preferred or choice activity. Sprinkle the preferred/chosen activities throughout the day to help with motivation to get school work done.

• Expect your child to turn their camera on during live teaching! This lets the teacher know that your child is ready to learn and helps connect them to the other students. Reach out to the teacher if there is a reason turning on the camera is problematic.

• When school feels hard and overwhelming, students are more likely to give up. Sometimes support with Executive Function skills (planning, focus, memory, etc.) can help. To learn more, explore this Executive Function Resource Kit. 

• Talk to the teacher - ask for flexibility or extra credit for a family and/or independent project (PBL resources to reference).

• Children respond to stress in many different ways. Remind your child that this is hard, that we will get through it, and that the adults in their lives at home and school care deeply for them. Explore these resources for ideas:

  • Helping Teens Cope with COVID

Social Emotional Menu of Ideas for adults to do with children

• Start with what they love. Tweens and teens have been asked to adjust to extraordinary circumstances, and it can be helpful to remember that the activities they care about are not lost, but they may look different for awhile. Make a list with your child of 3-5 things that light them up inside!

• Check out these Smithsonian links for teens with a wide range of content:

• • Examples:

    • Hip Hop Rap  page

    • Strong Female Athletes

    • Make Your Own Time Capsule

    • Digital Puzzles 

    • Hands On Art Projects

• Ideas for your history buff, budding political scientist, or world explorer

  • Digital History Explorations

  • KidNuz - daily current events for kids in five minute podcasts

  • Hogiesgifted.org - provides games, links and activities in Geography, Economics, Social Studies, and much more

• Ideas for your inspired Artist, Musician, or Athlete

  • Chrome Music Lab 

  • Draw with Mo Willems (yes, big kids love this too!) 

  • Art for Kids Hub

• Ideas for your science or math minded teen or tween

  • Stuck at Home Science - science activities using household materials 

  • Experiments to try at home 

  • Brain Teasers

  • Engineering & Physics Challenges  

  • Life Sciences

  • Astronomy Links: Hoagies links  

• Ideas to spark getting lost in a book

  • Epic books (log in to BVSD SSO)

  • SORA (log in to BVSD SSO)

  • Download Audible (audio books for purchase through Amazon) 

• Get them outside...even if you have to make a deal! 

  • Use the screen time settings on tablets and phones to monitor screen time

  • Set limits and explain why it is important for your brain and body to have non screen time. 

  • Challenge older children to do one of these activities each week with a sibling or younger neighbor/friend:

    • Outdoor Family Activities

    • 25 Screen Free Ideas for Home  

• Ask your school counselor for a list of clubs and activities still happening at your school 

• Feeling bored? Helping others is a wonderful way to beat boredom:

  • Getboulder.com has multiple volunteer opportunities

  • Get involved with Intercambio: Watch the video on intercambio.com to learn about the many ways they unite immigrant communities 

  • Live in Lafayette? Check out the Youth Advisory Group

  • Live in Broomfield?  Check out the Broomfield Teen Council

  • Live in Louisville? Check here for teen program updates

  • Live in Boulder? Check out the Boulder Youth Advisory Board

• Love & Care & Nature Volunteer Opportunities

  • Her Campus - Volunteer Opportunities for animal lovers:

    • Horse Rescue

    • Luvin Arms - neglected animals

    • Wildlife Rehabilitation

    • Colorado Therapeutic Riding Center - volunteer opportunities

  • Operation Gratitude (Write letters to military and first responder heroes)

  • United Way - Volunteer Virtually

  • A Precious Child

  • Sister Carmen

  • Broomfield Fish (Fellowship in Serving Humanity)

• Safely get involved with community partners

  • Boulder Museum - Addie@museumofboulder.org

    • Work in the Boulder Experience Gallery

    • Interact with visitors

    • Help change out exhibits

  • CU Partners

• Project Based Learning (PBL) is a way of teaching and learning in which students work on a project that requires creativity, critical thinking, problem solving, communication, and collaboration. Check out this resource for ideas for doing PBL at your house: Teachable Moment Projects. 

• Check out these Family Writing ideas

• Real World learning opportunities are everywhere. Whether it’s sorting laundry, changing the kitty litter, raking leaves, changing a lightbulb, or any other chore - remember that you are your child’s first teacher, and they have so many important life skills to learn from you.

BVSD IT continues to run the IT Prime Delivery Service to ensure your children have access to working Chromebooks. A typical turn around is 24 hours for a broken device swap. If your student is having issues with their Chromebook, please call the IT Service Desk at 720-561-HELP for troubleshooting assistance or to schedule an IT Prime device swap.

For emotional/counseling support, reach out to your School Counselor

For immediate crisis support help, Colorado Crisis Services is available to anyone 24 hours a day, seven days a week and provides free, confidential support.  See resource information below: