A mother creative solution for helping her girls with their homework

Agile@Home :

“ I do believe in Kanban, it did help my daughter in school big time!

" 2 years ago, she used to bring her homework, put her agenda on her desk and start crying :) she didn’t know where and how to start. At school, they give them lot of tasks to perform every Thursday. They write them in their agenda, and they have to perform all of them by the next Friday (they have one week).

Schools and teachers expects kids to manage their tasks by their own, but in reality,  I see all parents around me managing the homework tasks for their kids. Some parents and kids are great working with the traditional agenda, but for my daughter, it was a big a challenge.  One day she forgets her agenda at school, the other day she starts multiple tasks same day, another time she forgets that she didn’t finish a task etc.

The agenda was not working for her, I tried to help her with it, but couldn’t, it was simply not for her! I had to find  another way, a better way. I wanted a solution that will help her structure her homework tasks by her own, without me asking, did you start your task, did you finish it, how many tasks left etc…

Both my husband and I are software engineers, my husband is a scrum master, he knew about agile mythologies and Kanban. My husband suggested to use Kanban as an alternative for her task management, because he knew that she was very visual, and Kanban will be perfect for her.  I loved the idea; we started using Kanban as a physical board with stickers.

 It was great for the last 2 years, until my other daughter needed the same thing. They didn’t want to share the physical board J  Instead of having 2 separate boards (eventually I will have 3 because I have a son who is in Grade 1 and will certainly use Kanban as well), I wanted to build something reusable, fun, easy and made specifically for young kids, so as an agile developer, decided to make a fun app for my kids. Android was the first step because tablets are less expensive and we could have one tablet for each of our 3 kids :) 

 

I started developing the app , kids enjoyed the experience, because they participated, they asked for features (task becomes red when it is due next day,  earn points when they finish a task etc…), they have chosen colors, pictures etc… They have been using it since March 2012, and they just love it! Even my 6 years old son is using it for his homework which I didn’t expect, thought he was too young. I realized that kids nowadays are born in a modern era, with Ipads, tablets, smartphones etc. They naturally love using devices, so why don’t get even my son a tablet for his homework and teach him managing as well!  He loves earning points and practicing maths on   KanPlan .

It’s not just the tablet and the board, it’s the way they own their task that makes this whole deal worth a try. The Kanban is a minded approach, it teaches them visualize what they need to do , moving tasks around the board , making decision  and getting things done.

The app, was designed for them, it had to be easy and fun. It holds a neat look and feel and an easy way for the kids to add tasks drag them around the board and see the completion. I also added predefined tasks, that are quick to add and run on   KanPlan . Something like practicing times table. Instead of my daughter entering manually a task for practicing her times table, she browses a selection of tasks (KanQuiz), picks the one she wants, and running it directly in KanPlan. It avoids me of writing some multiplications on paper to practice. It is integrated, and gives her a report at the end how fast she was and her score.  I see KanQuiz as reusable tasks, that can be done several times by one kid, and are there for my next kid once they reach the KanQuiz grade level.   I am also adding KanWord to the selection (tablet will speek to kids), to practice spelling and grammar soon. 

Anyway, my kids are 100% self-managed now, I am so proud of them, they come at home after school, they go directly to their desk where their tablets are, and enter their tasks and manage their work. My daughter went from being an average student who was unable to focus, was lost in her tasks to do, to an efficient and  very organized student, now she always finishes a task before starting a new one and never forget a task to do. She was able to manage her tasks to practice exams for entering  private schools. She did that using   KanPlan by her own.  She applied for 4 private schools, we were hoping to get 1, and she succeeded all of them! We were so proud of her!

My daughters wish to bring their tablet  at school and avoid the “agenda” step. Instead of writing their tasks in the agenda and enter them back again in KanPlan once at home, why not entering them directly to KanPlan in the class?  Schools are too strict right now, they don’t want electronics in their classes. I am positive that it will change one day.  I just hope that they will allow students to use different solutions for their task management, because the traditional agenda is not a solution that fits all students.  I definitely see KanPlan as a solution for teachers/tutors who want to teach kids how to manage their tasks.  I have few comments from some teachers who are waiting for the admin tool (we are working on it) that allows them to create KanTasks and assign them to their students. Students will automatically see their tasks in the TODO list!  I would love to talk to more teachers/tutors to get more comments about how we can use KanPlan in a class environment that fits and embrace how teachers/tutors work.

My challenge now is to continue improving   KanPlan and keep it interesting and fun for all kids. Don’t hesitate to contact me for any comment, any feature request or change request !

Houda Hamdane the owner and developer of  KanPlan .

 For more about KanPlan

More about kid’s empowerment in Kanban

Balancing the task list & Creating a task board for 10 and 12 years old kids

1. Presenting the idea: 

What’s the biggest problem with kids? That they always forgot to do their chores, and we parents find that we have to act as their memory, and constantly remind them to perform their tasks.

When we keep on reminding the kids of what they need to do, we also become the task  owner. Want proof? Well, If we aren’t around, are the tasks completed?

It’s not easy, by the way, to come home from work every day and immediately start talking about what hasn’t been done today. ‘Why is your bag in the middle of the room?’, ‘Why haven’t you had a bath yet?’, and so on.

And along comes Agile for Kids.

When we introduced Agile for Kids, this family children didn’t want to go along with the sticky notes, but they immediately understood the problems we were talking about. So we went along with them. After all they are the ones that are going to own the tasks and perform them later on this week.

2. Cleaning the old white board – just for fun

 

3. Balancing the task list:

After the board was cleaned, we asked the kids to write down all their weekly tasks.

Each kid read out one task, and the other balanced his list accordingly. Of course there were tasks they missed, tasks they didn’t agree on, or tasks that their father wanted to add (such as, ‘Don’t forget to take your house key with you’). This is a real discussion, and it is the heart of the Agile Kids method.

Finally, they agreed on one task list. This will be our backlog.

The real purpose of this exercise is, of course, to have them write down and own their tasks, and remember what they have to do.

4. Gathering ideas to build the board:

As they didn’t want to use sticky notes, we made sure they plan the board as they saw fit. Of course we insisted that they do it together.

Always keep in mind that our real goal is discussion, and to make sure they know what they are supposed to do. It is their board, which means that they are accountable to create it as they see fit. Yes, as parents we can recommend some changes, and we will review the board during the daily meetings and encourage them to improve it.

But we must remember: The board belongs to our kids.

 

5. Building the board:

Remember, the kids do this, this is their board, their responsibility and they are the ones who are accountable for completing the tasks. This is exactly why they are the ones who need to build it as they see fit.

Above you can see the discussion over placing the tasks on the board and the best place to place the task board.

'Homeschooling' - making it easier with kanban

Sometimes Scrum and your task board can be the easiest way to handle your daily homeschool activities.

Take, for instance, one of the families I worked with developed a home schooling curriculum in using Agile and Scrum.

How did they accomplish that?

Well, it went like this:

First, they put up a task board in the learning area, a flet covered board - the notes had scotch on the back.

The task board held the entire home schooling tasks for the next week. For example, addition and subtraction for Ben, and learning Gensis for Liz.

Each child wrote their name on the back of the relevant tasks for that week.

Each child knew what his tasks where, and both knew, after the tasks were divided into smaller tasks, how to take the task himself, and move it around on the board, according to its status, of course.

For example, they had a task to learn about the creation of the world, which was divided into each Day of Creation (in the Biblical sense). Each Day they learned about, they took the relevant note and moved it across the board. They even added an extra column for a drawing :), which was the definition for ‘Done’. Once the child drew in the Day of Creation they studied that day, the task was considered to be complete.

Each morning, the family had a daily meeting, which made sure everyone was up to scratch about the material they were learning. Yes, including the parents, but the meeting was mainly about the children. The meeting created the daily agenda, with goals and tasks that the children needed to complete by the end of that day.

 During the day, the children would move their tasks across the board according to their lessons, and the daily chores when they started or completed them.

This way, the children can see for themselves how their studies are progressing, and they even take part in planning how, and how fast, their studies will advance.

The daily planning sessions enabled the family to plan their home-school schedule ahead one or two weeks, and of course the retrospective session that they had weekly helped the family continually improve.

This is EXACTLY how Scrum works. Scrum/Kanban is a powerful tool, that develops empowerment and goal achievement, with a healthy dialog on the way.

So start using Agile to manage your homeschooling today - Get the Agile Kids book!

By the way, if you want to learn more about homeschooling, here’s an excellent resource.