Lockdown is hard. Home schooling is hard. Let’s be honest about it.
Yes, there are loads of resources available out there but it can be quite an overwhelming task to sift through everything and find what works for your little angels. Plus, if you’re anything like me, my brain is too taken up with work / food / cleaning to think up imaginative add-on things to make the activity last more than 6 minutes.
The Undercover Hippy Bus resource packs are brilliant for this. They are individually themed packs with both structured activities and prompts for extended tasks. Also, they’re family oriented, so the activities can be done together with younger ones and older children by themselves.
We tried out the Animal Nature Study pack, which starts out with creating a fact file on a chosen animal. It has questions to answer so it guides the responses, but the questions are more than most people would know so an element of research is required.
My daughter (4) chose to create her fact file about guinea pigs (as you do) and we had a great time looking up facts on my laptop. It was a great opportunity to practice her writing and talk about the differences between other types of pets that we are not getting.
I was able to give my son (7) the same sheet and ask him to research his chosen animal himself, using books and (supervised) internet research. He enjoyed explaining his fact file to his sister. What was completely unexpected was he enjoyed the research so much that he started another fact file independently!
Guinea pig fact file 
Writing about snakes 
Discussion activities
Also within the pack were other sheets which prompted us to research and have discussions – such as why wild animals and domesticated animals need different things in order to thrive.
There are other similar packs available, including crafts, relationships, emotions and plenty of nature. There is a great focus on family mental health running through the packs, which is much needed at the moment,
We also tried out the Self Care for Families pack, as it’s something we’re adapting to in these weird times. As a family we’re so used to being out of the house and going to the cinema / soft play or the kids doing various sports clubs, so being inside with only each other for company has been a bit of a shock.
This pack has great ideas for self care activities that can be done as a family; we especially liked the cut out activity ‘tickets’ that we could take turns choosing from. Again this led on to lots of extra discussion; about what else we’d like tickets for and making up our own yoga poses!
Yoga poses for releasing emotions 
Cutting out self care tickets
I also found the yoga pose pictures and descriptions very beneficial. It didn’t need much time or effort, and we could all take part.
I really like the resources from Undercover Hippy Bus; they feel like they have been designed with family in mind and with a lot of thought and care.
Undercover Hippy Bus is run by Rachel and Ali, along with their two children and dog Luna. They travel around Europe in their campervan, home schooling as they go. They’re passionate about travel and being as budget friendly and environmentally responsible as possible. You can read more about their adventures and shop for resource packs on their website.
Undercover Hippy Bus are offering an exclusive 25% discount if you use code mummyswaisted25.
*We were sent these resource packs by Undercover Hippy Bus in exchange for an unbiased review