Surviving with the Kids at Home
- by Lou Bernard
- April 14, 2020
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Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, everyone is encouraged to stay at home right now. Many of you are off work, and if you have kids, they’re off school, and that turns this into a whole new sort of survival situation. (If I hear the theme song to “Tayo The Little Bus” one more time….)
But there are a few ways to keep your children busy at this time. Personally I’ve been teaching my son Paul, age 5, basic survival skills. We’re averaging two a day here in my yard, learning simple skills that we can use for camping in the future. And because freelance writing is a job that I can do from home, I thought I’d like to share a few of these with you, in the hopes they might keep your kids busy, too. If your kids are like my son, you may want to try this. Paul interrupted me seventeen times during the writing of this paragraph alone.
LEARN MORSE CODE
Up until recently, Paul would not have known Morse Code from a loose windowpane. But we’ve been picking up the basics. We began by writing it down, a couple of letters at a time. A good beginning point is “SOS,” which is how to signal for help and is easy to learn. Three dots, three dashes, three dots. We used chalk to write on the sidewalk in front of our neighbor’s house. I hope nobody thinks she needs help.
Once we got good at the chalk, we began practicing “SOS” using flashlights and knocking on walls. Three short, three long, three short. Paul desperately wants to need help so he can use this skill. We have since moved on to other letters. Paul can now spell his own name in Morse Code, and his sister’s. He was just writing them in marker this morning.
I got my guide for Morse code out of my old Boy Scout Fieldbook. You can find a guide here or with a Google search.
SIGNAL FOR HELP
Once you have a handle on the Morse Code, you can learn how to signal planes. (This is all considered practice. Do not actually signal planes.) With a signal mirror, you can reflect the sun’s rays in a way that will signal you need help if you’re ever lost. If you don’t have an actual signal mirror, anything reflective will do.
Practice reflecting the rays against the side of your home or another building. You can even practice making the light flash “SOS” in Morse Code.
By holding up two fingers in a Nixon-like peace sign, you can learn to use the notch in your fingers to aim your light beam, much the way a rifle sight works. This is useful when you want to make certain your imaginary plane sees your signal.
BASIC FIRST AID
In the past couple of days, we have had a few simulated injuries to stuffed animals.
First, Paul’s gorilla broke his leg, and I showed him how to splint it. Now, don’t get me wrong, an ambulance is still your best bet there. But if you happen to be hiking out where an ambulance can’t get to you, you’re going to want something temporary. We used bandannas to tie a stick tightly around the gorilla’s leg, holding it in place.
Then we made a stretcher out of two mop handles and several jackets. You slide two strong, long sticks or poles through the sleeves of the jackets and zip them up, and you have an instant stretcher. We carefully rolled the gorilla onto it, and then we carried him to safety.
The next day, because I still had a few shreds of dignity left in front of my neighbors, Paul’s stuffed duck injured his arm on the sidewalk. We used an old shirt to make a sling, holding it in place. Then when the duck stopped breathing, I taught Paul how to perform CPR on it. If you’re certified in CPR and know what you’re doing, you can teach it to your kids using any number of stuffed animals.
I am pleased to report that both the gorilla and the duck are going to pull through.
FIND DIRECTIONS
Paul has been learning to use a compass since he was 2. He’s still a little fuzzy on what the directions mean, other than Grandpa lives east of us. If you don’t have a compass handy, you have the sun, sticks, and rocks. Send your kids out to find some — my kid can somehow find sticks and rocks in the living room.
Put the stick into the ground, standing up. Place one rock on the tip of the shadow. Now wait about fifteen minutes, which is hard for kids, I know. Practice your Morse Code while you’re waiting. The shadow will move, so place another rock on the tip.
The two rocks will now be due west and east. (The chalk lines I made on my demonstration are for your benefit, so you can visualize this.) If you stand with the tips of your feet pointing at the rocks and the sun at your back, you are now facing north.
Have a kid who can’t sleep? Take them out and find the Big Dipper. It’s the most identifiable constellation in the sky; it literally looks like a giant dipper. Note the two stars on the end of the spoon part (the two stars farthest from the handle) and draw a mental line from the lower star to the upper star. Then continue the line, and the first star it leads to will be the North Star.
COLLECT WATER
If you’re in hot weather, you’re going to need water. One way of getting it is to build a solar still. It’s a good way to kill an hour with your kids, too. You start by digging a hole, a couple of feet wide, a couple of feet deep. We used the sand pit my son plays in, because why dig a hole if you already have one? Make sure you remove any Peppa Pig and Moana toys from your hole. (This may be a problem specific only to my family.)
Place a container to catch the water dead center in the hole. If you really need to maximize your water collection, tear up some grass and leaves and put them into the hole, surrounding the container. Then take a piece of plastic — a garbage bag works — and place it over the hole, covering it completely and weighing it down with rocks. Gently put one small stone in the center, right over the container underneath.
Once it gets hot, water from the ground will evaporate, collect on the underside of the plastic, roll down, and drip into the container. It doesn’t get you a whole lot of water, but in a survival situation it could make the difference. And, again, it’s useful for keeping your kids busy.
I’m not going to deny that this situation has been difficult for everyone. Workplaces are closed, schools are closed, and we have to stay home. But with a little imagination, we can turn a negative into a good experience for our kids. We’ll get through this together — me, you, our kids, and Tayo The Little Bus.
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