With the ongoing situation due to Coronavirus many people are worried about the arrangements for their children and them spending time with the wider family.
Grandparents offer many families invaluable support not only emotionally but practically, particularly for those working parents who require childcare and respite as a matter of course. The COVID-19 outbreak and government advice has now prohibited that support for many, firstly by limiting the contact with the elderly but then further so by the current lockdown. The consequence of this has a wide ranging impact upon the arrangements for the children.
Families should encourage their children to use technology to keep in touch with their grandparents, many of whom will be feeling particularly isolated and lonely at the moment. Use FaceTime, Skype, video technology or even just picking up the phone, to communicate and ensure that children (and their grandparents) can enjoy indirect contact with one another. Grandparents do not have an automatic legal responsibility for their grandchildren but most will be hard pressed to diminish the enormously positive role played by grandparents who must not be forgotten at this time. Equally, grandparents – many of whom are just as tech savvy as the younger generation – have a role to play in providing their grandchildren with an important outlet, especially at this time whilst everyone struggles to adjust to being restricted to the confines of their home.