Help! My Kids are holding me Hostage!

In a handle elearning how many wanna say no and stuff? You don't want to be learning surely unforeseen elements. Melina man, yeah, he level for them. Well, Linda doesn't want me to bleed further heavier. Why should I learn ilaha illallah wa sallahu eyeshadow No, Mohammed Abdullah, he was a solo solo lahardee who either early or Safi or Selim. I always remind myself and you have talked a lot as though Jen and I pray that Allah subhanaw taala increases us in our awareness, our consciousness of dealing with him, that Allah Subhana Allah blesses our home and our families and our private life with the love of Allah, the fear of Allah and a greater hope in the mercy of Allah

subhana wa Tada. Today is the 27th of March and we're just getting into the serious end of the Coronavirus. Kind of ramifications here in Perth. I'm coming to you from my office here at the length that Islamic college and our Salah was empty today. And our masala was empty today and the wonderful buzz and noise of my students who at times would annoy me so panela as we're getting ready for a slump that is something I dearly Miss. I dearly Miss saying to some of our wonderful children. Okay, everybody give me your attention. Now we're going to hear that then some kind of law how,

how amazing it is to have the life that we have with the noise in it. We pray that Allah subhana wa Taala returns us to, you know the noise and the busyness of our wonderful students here at the link for the summit college. Before we begin, I want to say two important things. So this isn't Salatu Juma. This is a virtual Juma virtual HTML virtual gathering of people. And therefore if you haven't prayed, so lots of book make sure that you pray so lots of over in sha Allah. And the reason I delayed this till 230 I didn't want you to confuse it with the times of our normal Salatu Juma prayers, there is no Salatu Juma virtually in the correct opinion or Allahu Tana Adam, and therefore

I deleted so that, you know, people can wake up in the United Kingdom like our sister there from Manchester, but also that people in other places can have an opportunity to tune in. So this does not take the hoekman the ruling of Duma number two that's important for you to consider

is that whenever we contemplate and gather around the word of alarm, the discussions that relate to our interview, Mohammed's I said to him, that it is a mutual understanding and of mutual benefit. And I pray that although the topic doesn't have an Islamic sounding name to it, you know, I'm always trying to be, I guess, humorous, you have to laugh in moments of stress and difficulty. The topic of course, is help.

My kids have me hostage. And at home while we're self isolating, and SubhanAllah. That's a reality that many of you are going to face. And you're going to appreciate me, the little humble teacher who held your kids hostage not having them holding us hostage. Because as professionals as educators, it's a privilege to be able to mold and share our years of study and experience with a future generation. So I did want to help you out as parents surround a lot, I'm going to be a parent at home, it's very difficult to be the teacher in my own household with my children, I have the same struggles as you. So a lot of what I'm sharing with you, I want you to reflect back to me and ask me

if I'm doing the same thing. So I do want to speak to you a little bit about how to manage how to manage at home, your children for the next extended period of time and somehow Allah Allah knows how long it's going to last. So key pointers from a seasoned professional Mashallah I've been an educator for the majority of my life. And ever since,

you know, and a younger age, I've always known that this is what I wanted to do. I always did want to mentor to teach to counsel and to preach to people not just about a law but about happiness and goodness. And this stems from the Hadith of the prophets. I seldom that more I live in Nashville, Ohio, the one who teaches people goodness, your stellar funeral home Memphis, San Mateo Memphis. They are blessed that they have that which inhabits the heavens in the earth, invoke God on their behalf to ask for their expiation and forgiveness Allahumma Gianni which El Camino jambalaya al Ameen. All right. So let's take it back to basics. All right, in sha Allah,

how can you get get some self help for yourself, your home your children during these periods of self isolation? So I'm going to rifle through some key points. First, most important point and something you'll see all schools have is that they have a schedule a structure a timetable. There's a

periods, there's a start time and an end time. And I want you to kind of think of what it was like when you were young, you wanted to know when you needed to be somewhere. But you also wanted to know probably more importantly, when you could leave when it comes to an end. So as important as it is, you know, just say, I have a document, I say, you know, this, you need to finish this. Well, what if my son doesn't finish it in intersection period of time, is the expectation that he sits there until it's done? Well, if that's the perspective you've already lost, there needs to be defined periods of time. So keeping a schedule is really, really important. And when does the schedule begin? Well, the

schedule begins the night before. So you need to begin with a competent, idealistic real life sleep schedule. So if you normally put your kids to sleep between 830, so that by nine o'clock they're entering into their REM sleep, so they can wake up at you know, 530 be able to pay their fair share, be functional for school, then you need to keep that schedule, you cannot on a Monday to Thursday, keep your children up late, and expect them to wake up for their eight o'clock lessons, which they should be if you don't want to be held hostage. If you want to have a functional household, during the self isolation number to limit screen time, your children don't get to watch TV, from eight

o'clock in the morning till about four o'clock in the afternoon. There should be no expectation of TV, movies, random surfing of the web, during those school or work hours. Now it's work hours. A lot of kids when you when they hear the word homework, they think it's something that's assigned, but rather the concept of homework is any work you have to do, that didn't get finished at school, or wasn't expected to be finished at school, but needs to be finished at home. And now it's not schoolwork, it's all homework. It's all work done from home. So limit your screen time with them, make sure that they have to earn it, make sure that it's something that is required for them to

understand that not because they're home, that the other things that are found around the house are open access to them. PlayStation is not open for them. You know, their mobile phone is not open for them. And very much the same rules that we enforce at our school, you need now to enforce it to mold and shape the expectations of your family. Number three, structure your school day, your home school day, we've lead your activities, there should be a recess time, there should be a lunchtime, there should be a time of in between classes, five minute breaks, there should be toilet breaks, there should be, you know, expectation to have moments of relaxation and just move from one subject to the

next. And you need to plan the schedule of events in your day. It doesn't help if you are going from dense subject to dense subject to dense subject all throughout the day. And it's one of the things that we're planning with our online teaching that's going to come online very soon. It's going to come online Monday for our year 11 and 12 students, and it's going to be pushed forward for our upper upper High School, lower high school, upper primary school and coming down and we should be very active with that at the Langford Islamic college at learn at LLC. So that's something that you're going to see coming online very soon. We want to make sure that we get it right and we want

to make sure that it's presented in the right way. And we want to make sure that it gives you the ability to schedule times, but you should certainly in the plan of your schedule. And the timetable should be something in writing. It should be something that's written and it should be something that is in front of them negotiated with them that they understand. These are the expectations. One of our sisters Mashallah sister Hasina. She said it's not easy with kids sitting at home. That's why you're held hostage, right? So that's why that's the theme. And it's something all of us are going to experience. Even myself as an educator and as a teacher. Number four, I want you to create a

physical guide that they can refer to and it could be put on the fridge on their window on the screen of the TV, so that they know the TV's not on that this is the schedule of events. These are the five classes that you're going to be doing. This is what we're starting with. This is where we're going to end with this is the 35 minute periods, 40 minute periods, and there's an expectation that you are there working from that time to that time in sha Allah.

You want to schedule in

number five you want to schedule in physical education.

Should I say probably Hi, well, I don't get physical education, well now you better so you want your children to Mashallah be able to have a sports period. So one of the five or six periods that you're going to have in their school day has to be a sports period. And I don't mean, they play, you know, Playstation tennis, I mean that they get up, get out, move around, it could be that you go out to the park, that's next door, it could be that you head down the street, that they get on a skateboard they get on a bike or you know, and if it's a, you know, an upper school teenager, that they get up, they do some push ups and sit ups, they do some calisthenics, and they get up and get their blood

moving. And that's a very important important part of their day sports, basketball that they play with kids with their friends, the handball that they play with their with their friends at recess is something that you must recreate at home, to give them a sense of normalcy. Another important tip that I'll give you is to schedule your little quizzes and little tests for them. So although the schools are going to be giving you deadlines and things for projects, you need to also assist them by saying, Okay, look, I want to test you on your quiz on your spelling list. You're going to have your test on Friday. So I'm going to test you on Thursday, Thursday night is where I'm going to test

you. And let's see how you do. So there needs to be that expectation that you're engaged and involved in their work.

You need to also schedule rewarding activities. And it could be that you're going to watch a family movie night, I am planning and I you know that you're the first to hear it, we're going to be doing the LSC family nights every Friday night in LA. So not now. But every Friday that we're going to have this kind of session, it'll be through our school website in sha Allah, and I'll put it up live on my Facebook and Instagram pages as well in sha Allah. But we will have a family night where we're going to talk about certain things. But I do want you to have a family night entertainment night. So it could be a movie that you guys watch. It could be, you know, a board game night that you guys set

up. And it's something that all of you can enjoy, make sure it's something that they see as a reward. And if it means that they want to play PlayStation with their friends for 45 minutes for an hour, maybe a little bit more. If they have earned it by working hard all throughout the week, then that is something that you might want to set up for them. Those are really important activities. So for physical activity, especially for younger children. So I'm thinking about kindy pre primary, I'm thinking about year one, year two, year three, and this is for both boys and girls.

You want to go out and buy and I know some of you you're locked up in places where you can't go no longer go out and buy an Amazon priming or eBay or whatever might might suit the trick. Get a hula hoop, get an indoor maze, or you can use a string. You can use paper streamers, you can get them to do a silly dance. You know teach teach the girls how to you know Egyptian belly dance, I guess our little kids, get them to have an egg and spoon competition around the house without dropping the egg. Make sure that you boil it first.

Get them to have a pillow fight. And I know mice, you know some of the sooner they probably sat up and looked at their mom and said, see mom. But yeah, get them to have a little bit of a pillow fight. let out some steam. Get into the pillow, fight with them. But be gentle. Be careful. Draw some hopscotch lines, get a little bit of chalk from Kmart or Walmart, wherever you are in the world. And draw some lines in your driveway that they do hopscotch, get them to skip some rope. They can even tie it on something and they can have you skip on it.

Play balloon tennis, you know, blow up some balloons and keep it up. Don't let it touch the ground. Let's see how many times we can keep it up. Another one is,

you know, for some of the older boys and girls popcorn push ups where you put a piece of popcorn in the ground, they got to go down, pick it up, go back up, right. And you know it's from a cop and they just got to go down and up and do 20 how many popcorns? Can you eat in that way? Bubble catching for really young kids, get them to take

charge of you know, enjoying themselves in a very undesirable kind of way. Certainly what I'm going to say to you is you should unplug all devices all Wi Fi connections except that which is relevant to their studies and your daughter having her mobile phone or your son having their mobile phone next to them while they're watching their online class and messaging with their friends. Even if they're saying oh I'm asking question is inappropriate. In all schools. Mobile phones are switched off kept in bags until the end of the day. That must be

that expectation that you have in your home.

Some of the activities that you might want to do are mental stimulation type of activities. And those are things like card games, learning how to play Solitaire, word searches and puzzles, getting your children to paint and enjoying that. Cooking with them. My young boy Adam, he asked me actually to say out his name, so Adam, can you if you can hear, you know, you know, I'm talking about you, buddy. You know, my boy, Mashallah, he loves to bake. So he loves making us cookies, and you know, I get the pre made, you know, stuff, and then he adds his own kind of things in it. And that's an incredible thing. He's in grade, you know, year four at the moment. And that's something you should

encourage for boys, for girls, for every get them involved. Each one of them can make one of them makes breakfast, one of them makes lunch, one of them bakes their snacks. So get a craft pack, set up for your household. And if that's something you need to ask the school for, to ask for more resources in that it is something you can communicate with us about here if you're one of our school members, and we would be happy to facilitate and assist with that, inshallah. And I know, especially for our kindy and pre primary students, that Sister hamidah, and sister Manal are very happy to hear from your parents about that, you know, they have these these stressing coloring books, where it's

like an elephant, and you know, you can color it, and it takes like a day to color it. Those are also things that can be works in progress. So all of those are really, really wonderful things. One of the most important aspects, of course, is cleaning. And you don't want your house to be destroyed. Because you have three kids at home, who are not picking up after themselves who've just always assumed that we go home, the house is a mess, we come back, it's clean, because mom or dad or whoever our nanny is there to fix it up. So very much you need your children to be do it yourself. Homemade home cleaners, not just their room, but their living space, there's got to be time for them

to vacuum. One is doing the vacuuming, the other does the dishes, the other is doing a cleanup of the car, and they switch and they go from one chore to the next. And chores are things that teach responsibility, give a good work ethic. And all of that is something that is beneficial. Just like a locker room for us. Sorry to wake you up so early. Back in Birmingham there, I'll protect you and give my son to my dear brother. Those are all important things that I believe will be of great importance in chat law.

Dealing with tension, all right, invariably, there's going to be conflict. And one of the best places for your children to learn how to fight is to fight with you and to fight with their siblings in a way that isn't rude isn't despicable and disfiguring and harsh, that they can stand up for opinion without necessarily going overboard. And that's something you need to let your children argue amongst themselves, you don't have to get involved in every way. And I know it's difficult for you as a parent that when you see that happening, you're gonna you're gonna want to intervene, stop talking to your brother that way, don't don't do this, don't do that. But you don't want that to be

an ongoing theme for the rest of the days that you are together, you need to back up a little bit, let them deal with it and let your children sort things out. Of course, you're not going to tolerate anything that is beyond what our dean and what is common sense. But what I mean is you do really need to have them self regulate, and know their own limitations. And learning to resolve conflict only comes by practicing how to resolve conflict. So don't make a drama. don't flip out every time that they're in an argument. Don't go too far, in trying to settle them and get them to, you know, just do everything the way you think it should be done. So that's tip number one for de stressing,

limiting the tension in the home. Don't get involved in everything, especially if it doesn't if it's something that can be solved amongst them. Number two is keep them busy, but also allow them to be bored. Today, children find it very difficult to just sit and do nothing. And the first thing is, well, I want to play my video game and you say no, I'm sorry, there's no video game. While I did my homework. Why can't I play my video game? say Well, listen, you know, video games are only done in a certain time. And this is when we've scheduled it. And it might be that every so often as a reward you give it to them, which makes it even more special. But the general timetable that you set as the

very first thing that we set talked about structure must be adhered to, for the most part for 90 95% of it, and don't be held hostage in that sense. Well, I did all my math, I get to play my game. Don't make those kind of negotiations because the game has

A time and other things have a time. So you want to be able to reward them with just having idle time. Well listen, no, you can't play your video game. But there's other things that you can do, you can find a book you can read, you can go paint. And if you want to cook something, you can cook something you can help out in the garden, you can do anything else. But these kind of things are off limits, these are the things that we're not going to be doing. And finally, that I will say about that is make sure that they are able to also communicate with their friends from a distance. So do not regulate their ability to contact their friends in a healthy way. So for your children to be

able to speak to their friends on the phone or through or through their game system playing online collaboratively. And having a you know, a Minecraft session are things that are healthy for them if they are restricted to what your family have set as boundaries. So don't isolate your children, not just physically but also socially from their friends and their cousins and other people. So have a balance in that. The last thing that I want to speak to you about because I don't want to go too long is about Islam, Pamela

Salatin, Jamal, I should be performed in your home, and there should be the event is being called there should be the karma. And there should be similar prayers that are offered in between, you should give them an opportunity to have a reading of the Quran in the morning. And this is something more facilitated the length of Islamic college, you'll see that we will become very, very active, to see that in, within our school systems in sha Allah very soon. And that's something and I'm delighted that I just had a meeting with all of my staff, we were online, on Microsoft team and on zoom and ironing out all the kinks and we have some really great things that we want to share with

you, I'm going to have daily lessons that are on and there'll be recorded, you can revisit them, I'm going to do the Tafseer of all of us and not for my high school students. And I'm going to do the stories of the profits for all of the primary school students. And there'll be two sessions in the day where I'll be teaching. So these are things and I'll try to put as many of them as I can on Facebook and challah so that you know, you can have that broadcast for your homes as well in other countries and other places. But these are really important initiatives. I want Islam to be a byproduct of our time together. Subhan Allah, Allah has forced us together. And for many of us, it's

not the norm that we are, you know, we're together, we're in the same place, but we're not actually together. Well, now we need not just to be in the same house, but we need to be together and reading Quran with your children, having them recite to you and prepare having them listen to a YouTube video to get their pronounciation correct. being attentive to the workbooks that they'd been sent home with, making sure that they completed time, in the right time and in the right place. All of those are really important things. But for the essence of Islam, I want three things to be done. The family that prays together is content together. So pray together, there's the mind, there's that

there's any karma, there's any mom and you can get your children to lead each other in prayer to lead you in prayer as well. Number two, there has to be a weird regular reading of the Quran and of particular of cow, especially in these times. This is something that's going to be really, really beneficial.

Number three,

in sha Allah, and something really hopeful, I hope is that the vanilla hit Allah

that you are able to maintain a closing a closing to your day with Islam. So make sure that at the end of the day, that you show thankfulness to the protection that we've been afforded to the happiness that we've inculcated and had in our lives, that the normalcy that we still have, you know, Subhanallah Yes, we have to line up and we have to buy things. You can't buy more than two things at a time at a shopping center anymore. And there's some people may Allah Subhana Allah protect our lives in our income, who've lost some of their, you know, livelihood and their centerlink payments. And people are, you know, looking for extra work and extra shifts. All of these

are things that are there, but it's a time for us to reflect. So a law may have taken your job but some kind of law you have your health because there's people who have a job but they've lost their health and they would treat it with you in a heartbeat. There's people who have their health in a job but their families are not secure. They have somebody abroad from them who they're worried about them. So Pamela your family's with you Your job is okay your your income is okay and hamdulillah but your deen is slipping and that's the worst of fitness along minetta child fitness and feeding in our lie don't make our greatest test on account of our faith and our religiosity Allahumma amin and I

prayed

Loss of data protects me protects you, honors us, elevates us, assists us and makes us from those who are virtuous Aloma mean, this are a few words that I leave you with so that we're not held hostage. There'll be a part two to this in a week's time because there'll be other strategies that you will need. I can't share them with you today because they won't be as effective but in short, like a week's time, I hope we have another virtual Juma well, suddenly lahoma wa Sallim wa barik ala Javi Vina whenever you know what say you Dina will know Lana Mohammed even Abdullah Ali have a lot of said our time with the slim was said Mr. Equal product multiply or what have you the common law

what our outcome, may Allah guard you and protect you and may Allah be your shepherd. In these times of difficulty Allahumma amin was set out on equal to law he or cat