7 Self-Care Activities for Online School Students

December 15, 2022 byMelanie Hess

6 min to read

A teenage student is writing what she is greatful for in her notebook

Self-care teaches children to identify and address their emotional and physical needs, which is one of the first steps toward independence. Routines are a great place to start when you want to teach kids about self-care. With this in mind, we’ve compiled a list of seven routines we recommend parents use to equip their online students with self-care skills.

1. Reduce Unproductive Screen Time

Screens offer students many positive opportunities, from connecting with distant loved ones to receiving an outstanding education as an online student. However, when the use of electronic devices becomes unproductive—such as mindlessly scrolling through social media or excessively playing videogames— students can become vulnerable to the negative effects of excessive screen time. One of the kindest things parents can do for children is limit unproductive screen time and establish healthy screen routines.

Imposing restrictions on unproductive screen time may be challenging at first, but it will ultimately be worth it. In fact, studies show that limiting screen time can improve children's physical, social, and psychological health as well as academic achievement, making it one of the most beneficial self-care activities for elementary school students.

A parent teaching a child about self-care with yoga.

2. Exercise

Exercise is important for a student’s physical and mental well-being. Your student may already have a passion for physical fitness and participate in competitive or team sports that fulfill both social and physical needs. If your student isn’t too fond of group athletics, they have many fitness options such as rollerblading, skateboarding, golfing, paddle boarding, yoga, rock climbing, mountain biking, kickboxing, or horseback riding.

3. Find a Creative Outlet

Creative expression can help students in many ways, from discovering more about themselves to improving mental health. In addition, creativity enables children to have a safe environment to explore new ideas.

Whether your student is 7 or 17, creativity is a terrific way for them to explore their emotions. Help your child select a creative outlet using the following list of recommended creative activities:

Journaling
Visual Arts (painting, drawing, sculpting, etc.)
Music Composition
Gardening
Photography
Acting
Video Creation
Cooking and Baking
Spoken Word
Sewing/Crocheting/Knitting

4. Get Up and Get Dressed

While spending all day in PJs is fun for adults and kids alike, it’s important for online students to differentiate between school days and more relaxed or lazy days like weekends. One of the best ways they can do this is by getting up and getting dressed every morning. In fact, scientists believe clothing choices can impact our mental health and overall productivity. For example, when kids ditch their dirty PJs for a clean set of clothing explicitly meant for the daytime, it symbolizes the start of their day and helps put them in a more productive mindset. Reassure your child that they can still wear comfortable outfits; just choose something they usually wear only during the times when they need to be productive.

5. Get Your Daily Fiction Fix

Whether you’re reading a bedtime story to an elementary school student or encouraging your tween or teen to read on their own, kids can benefit tremendously from getting their daily fiction fix. Reading aloud or following along with an audiobook can improve information processing, vocabulary, comprehension, and fluency for new readers or students learning English as a second language. By placing the student in the figurative shoes of another, reading also serves as an exceptional means for teaching empathy. This simple form of self-care for kids has also been proven to reduce stress and build self-esteem. Who knew bedtime stories and sci-fi novels could have so much impact?

An online student doing some self-care for kids by reading.

6. Make Your Bed Daily

Teach your student to start their day with a tiny victory and keep their room looking nice (bonus!) by making their bed every day. U.S. Navy Admiral William McRaven, famous for his University of Texas commencement speech and related book is a big proponent of making the bed every morning. “If you make your bed every morning, you will have accomplished the first task of the day. It will give you a small sense of pride, and it will encourage you to do another task and then another,” Admiral McRaven explained in his speech. “By the end of the day, that one task completed will have turned into many tasks completed.”

7. Schedule Your Self-Care

Encourage your student to fit self-care into their week by scheduling it. If your student hasn’t already purchased their academic planner for the year, ask them to select one that already incorporates self-care with features like weekly self-care checklists, daily highs and lows, or daily mood trackers. Alternatively, help your student add similar self-care features to their current planner. You can even find self-care stickers to help.

Using their planner, have your student write specific self-care for kids exercises their planner’s monthly calendars, including at least one or two weekly. Some fun ideas include doing an art project or engaging in a sports game. Urge your student to commit to complete a couple self-care activities for kids each week, explaining that these routines don’t have to be elaborate or time-consuming. They can be as quick and easy as enjoying their favorite healthy snack or spending 10 minutes with a good book. Once they schedule their self-care for the month, have them transfer the monthly plans to their respective weekly calendars. By doing so, you ensure your student will get a reminder to take part in self-care no matter which calendar they look at.

Discover more ways to support your online student’s well-being by visiting Connections Academy’s article “5 Activities to Support Your Student’s Mental Health.”