By Jessica Wedemeyer
8:24am PDT, May 14, 2020
Even celebs are struggling with parenting amid the coronavirus pandemic. Keep reading to see what some of Hollywood's biggest stars have said about child-rearing and homeschooling during these difficult times, starting with this hot mama… During an April interview with People magazine, Eva Longoria said she's become like a "tiger mom" to her nearly 2-year-old son, Santiago, with husband José "Pepe" Bastón. "I have like his whole day planned, like we're going to paint in the morning for an hour and then we're going to do flashcards and we're going to do the alphabet. Then [my son will] find a box and play with that for five hours, and I'm like, OK, all my planning goes out the door," she said. Added the actress, "I'm lucky cause my son is so little, he's not in school yet and he's not quite a baby so he's just in the sweet spot of 'has no idea what's going on' and just loves that Mom and Dad are home all day long."
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During a mid-April interview with "Entertainment Tonight," Chris Hemsworth dished on homeschooling his three kids with wife Elsa Pataky: 7-year-old daughter India and 6-year-old twin boys Sasha and Tristan. "I wish I had a positive attitude about that," he joked, adding that his "negotiation tactics are improving." Explained the actor, "It's like, three hours of that and then 20 minutes of actual schoolwork." He also told "Extra" that homeschooling is more stressful than shooting a major action movie: "My mom is a teacher and I have a huge appreciation — even more so now," he said. "Teaching my kids is like trying to choreograph a fight scene. Someone's throwing pens and crayons at me, so it's real fun."
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On the April 12 episode of the "Today" show, Drew Barrymore opened up about how much she's struggled to homeschool her two daughters with ex-husband Will Kopelman — Frankie, 6, and Olive, 7 — amid the coronavirus pandemic. "School started, and it all went out the window," she said of trying to "find routine" and "be inventive" with activities for her kids. "The minute I thought, 'Oh, I'm three weeks in, I've got this,' I cried every day all day long. … It was the messiest plate I've ever held in my life — to be the teacher, the parent, the disciplinarian, the caretaker. And I thought, 'Oh my God, and teachers have children [of their own]. Do they survive it because they get to go away and work with other kids? Have they had their children in their classroom? How did this all work?' I didn't think I needed to respect and appreciate teachers any more than I did." Fortunately, she eventually got "some systems" in place to help her manage. "You find your way. We're resilient," she said.
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During a mid-April interview with SheKnows, Hilary Duff joked that she's "become a second-grade teacher" to her 8-year-old son, Luca, with ex-husband Mike Comrie. "It is so hard," she said. "The patience I'm exercising is insane." The singer-actress added that second husband Matthew Koma — with whom she shares 1-year-old daughter Banks — told her that "Drew Barrymore cried on TV about being a homeschool teacher." Joked the former child star, "So at least it's not just me! I just cry in my bedroom." Continued the "Lizzie McGuire" alum of homeschooling, "It's 8:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. every single day. Luca has only been doing real school for two years; kindergarten is a joke. It's like, I have to be there with him through everything, and it's not just like we're doing homework; we're teaching curriculum, and I've never done this before so it's just wild."
It's even tough for royals! During an April 16 interview with the BBC, Duchess Kate called homeschooling her three kids with Prince William — Prince George, 6, Princess Charlotte, 5, and Prince Louis, 2 — "challenging." Chimed in the father of three (sarcastically), "Yeah, homeschooling's fun." Kate then revealed that they stuck with homeschooling during spring break: "Don't tell the children — we've actually kept it going through the holidays. I feel very mean." She later said of keeping her kiddos entertained, "It's amazing how much they can cram into a day, that's for sure."
During a March interview with People magazine, John Legend acknowledged that homeschooling his two kids with wife Chrissy Teigen — 4-year-old daughter Luna and son Miles, who's nearly 2 — is "not easy." Said the singer, "I think every parent is realizing how hard it is to be a teacher." Fortunately, the power couple has some help: "The school that they go to is helping by sending little activities and things and the music teacher sends songs for us to do with them," said the chart-topper. "We're fortunate enough to have a pool and a beach right behind the house so occasionally [we have outdoor activities]. But just keeping them entertained and engaged all day, it's a lot!"
On the March 30 episode of "The Tonight Show," Kim Kardashian West called parenting amid the coronavirus pandemic "insane." Said the reality star, who shares four children — daughters North and Chicago and sons Saint and Psalm — with husband Kanye West, "It's spring break now, but we have school, usually. So to be the teacher to four young kids — well, two are in school, so two — is like insanity. I'm, like, hiding from them." She conducted the interview with host Jimmy Fallon from mom Kris Jenner's house: "I had to get away from my kids," she said.
On the April 29 episode of Kristen Bell's EllenTube series "Momsplaining," the actress called homeschooling "the two worst words in the human language." Said the "Veronica Mars" star, who shares daughters Lincoln, 7, and Delta, 5, with husband Dax Shepard, "Doing schoolwork with them, it is absolutely miserable. When we started this quarantine, the first math worksheet I gave my daughter, in all the answer lines, she wrote, 'No. No. No. No. No.'"
On the May 5 episode of "The Tonight Show," Ryan Reynolds joked about quarantining with wife Blake Lively and their three daughters: "Frankly, I think it sets a dangerous precedent," he deadpanned. "I think when we look back at this thing years from now, they're gonna think about me and how I used to be a present dad — and I worry about that. I worry about the: 'Remember when dad was just home all the time and always up in our grill?'" After a brief moment of sincerity — during which he acknowledged that he's "trying to let myself appreciate the actual face time with the family and spending as much time [together] as possible" — he went back to joking about the situation: "It really does, like, vacillate between deep, beautiful connection and then suddenly it's like the third act of 'Aliens,'" he said. "I'm having a totally normal conversation with a 3-year-old — then she's spitting acid in my face and I'm running for my life in the belly of a ship and wearing nothing but a tank top, sweaty as hell. … It changes on a dime, right? You're just like, 'What do you want for dinner, sweet, sweet angel?' And she's just like [in a demon voice], 'I want Cheerios!' It's … the beast."
During an April 29 interview with "Entertainment Tonight," Halle Berry called homeschooling her two kids — 12-year-old daughter Nahla with ex-boyfriend Gabriel Aubry and 6-year-old son Maceo with ex-husband Olivier Martinez — a "nightmare." Said the actress, "This is like a wash of a semester. They're really just not learning anything — and it's hard. I have a 6-year-old, and what I learned is that when 6-year-olds see other 6-year-olds do things, then they do things. Like, they sit and they eat because there's 25 other ones doing it. They stay at their desks and color because there's 25 other ones doing it. At home, there's not 25 other ones doing it. So to get them to focus and realize they're at home but yet they're at school, it's really been a challenge. … But I have enjoyed having all this extra time with them. We have been making good use of the time when they're not in school. When I'm not cracking the whip for school, we do have a lot of family time, story time and bonding time that we don't often get to have, so there is the silver lining."
On the April 7 episode of "The Ellen DeGeneres Show," Jennifer Lopez dished on homeschooling her 12-year-old twins with ex-husband Marc Anthony — son Max and daughter Emme — along with fiancé Alex Rodriguez's two daughters with ex-wife Cynthia Scurtis: Natasha, 15, and Ella, 12. "I help with the homework," she said. "All four kids are doing virtual school right now and so I stay more on top of Emme and Max about that." Added the singer-actress of schoolwork, "I think we're all like, 'What is this?' I'm not a teacher. And also, have you seen the math that they make the kids do now? It's a new math! … It's crazy. And so half the time I'm like, 'OK, yeah, let's look up that word. What does that mean?' It's been an experience, for sure."
On the April 22 episode of "The Ellen DeGeneres Show," Kate Hudson opened up about homeschooling her three kids: 16-year-old son Ryder with ex-husband Chris Robinson, 8-year-old son Bingham with ex-fiancé Matt Bellamy and 19-month-old daughter Rani Rose with boyfriend Danny Fujikawa. "The schooling thing is an adjustment," she said. "Ryder is 16, so he's in 10th grade — a little more independent. But Bing is 8 and in second grade, so it's hands-on. It's just a juggling act — an adjustment and a juggling act. … I have one area for Bing because it's more hands-on, and I have to sit with him — so he's got his area. And then Ryder does his work in his area, and we do more like check-ins because he's doing lectures and it's Zoom but he doesn't have that one-on-one. So we kind of just started going back and forth on like, say he has to read an article, we'll read it together [and] we'll talk about it. But I'm definitely doing more reading than I've ever done in my life. And then I try to just squeeze in calls and the Zoom work-life that I have to do."
On the May 4 episode of "The Tonight Show," Mila Kunis joked that her two kids with husband Ashton Kutcher — daughter Wyatt, 5, and son Dimitri, 3 — are "great" because they have an iPad and pretzels. "Boy, do I appreciate teachers," said the actress. "I've realized I'm a fantastic TA [teacher's assistant]. I'm like a professional TA," she continued, adding that her hubby has done the bulk of the homeschooling. "I like me some teaching," Ashton chimed in. "We set up a curriculum for the week, and we plan it out and figure out what the kids are going to learn throughout the week. So we've done various weeks. The first was, like, energy and electricity. Then we did how to build things, architecture and building." Mila then shared their "big hack" for homeschooling: "We enlisted our friends to do 20-minute Zoom sessions with our kids [to] teach our kids anything — from making flower arrangements to architecture. That gives us 20 minutes of not parenting and also allows our kids to have another type of interaction." She also acknowledged that they "piggyback off of our kids' curriculum." Said Mila, "I don't want to take away [from that]. Their schools are amazing at helping the parents throughout the week."
On the May 6 episode of "The Tonight Show," Gabrielle Union said that "homeschool is happening" with husband Dwyane Wade's daughter from a previous relationship, Zaya, but the 12 year old "does not trust us to even look" at her schoolwork. "She's like, 'I'll wait for my tutors,'" joked the actress. "Somebody said, 'How are you on the new math?' I'm like, 'I wasn't solid on the old math.'" Gabrielle and Dwyane also share 18-month-old daughter Kaavia.
On the April 15 episode of "The Ellen DeGeneres Show," Jason Momoa joked that he's the PE teacher for his kids with his wife, Lisa Bonet: daughter Lola, 12, and son Nakoa-Wolf, 11. "The kids are doing really well. Everyone's kind of in virtual school," he said. "My son, Wolf, he was already being homeschooled anyway, so it kind of was easy for him. And then they have time to check in with their friends. But I think they're really loving it. They're loving having me home, and we're having a great time and we're just getting around like everybody else is. But thank God they have their teachers — and much respect [to them] because they don't go to me for any [school questions]. … I'm like the PE coach: 'Get your [butt] outside! Want to go rock climb? Skateboard?' But that's about it."
Sienna Miller told Vogue for the magazine's mid-April feature "Postcards From Home: Creativity in a Time of Crisis" that "having to homeschool is a challenge." Said the actress, who shares 7-year-old daughter Marlowe with ex-boyfriend Tom Sturridge, "It makes you greatly appreciate the people who teach for a living. They are making this system work in such an unpredictable and scary time. … This experience is overwhelming, but I'm trying to bring in as much optimism as possible and make the most of the time I get to spend with my daughter. There's been lots of baking, lots of makeup, lots of swings."
On the March 30 episode of "On Air with Ryan Seacrest," James Corden called homeschooling his three children with wife Julia Carey — son Max, 9, and daughters Carey, 5, and Charlotte, 2 — "horrific." Said the actor and "The Late Late Show" host, "It's an up-at-dawn, pride-swallowing siege. … I've never had greater respect for teachers everywhere, and also, I will never come home from work ever again and say that I am exhausted." Joked the "Into the Woods" star, "If somebody came down from a different planet and observed me and my son and then were asked 'Which of these is the teacher?' they would never choose me."
On the May 5 episode of "The Ellen DeGeneres Show," Linda Cardellini said that homeschooling her 8-year-old daughter with long-term partner Steven Rodriguez, Lilah-Rose, has been "maybe my most challenging role." The actress added that she's been using "Wheel of Fortune" as a homeschooling device: "I love 'Wheel of Fortune.' I'm like a huge game-show person," she said. "So sometimes I just convince her that that's time for spelling and we do some 'Wheel of Fortune' playing."
Padma Lakshmi took to Instagram on May 1 to share a three-minute video demonstrating how to make her version of a margarita. "Just found out #littlehands won't be going back to school until September," she wrote in the caption of her 10-year-old daughter with off-and-on love Adam Dell, Krishna, whom she calls "Little Hands." After mixing the cocktail, the "Top Chef" host did a taste test. "I think it needs a little more tequila though," she said. She then went to top off her drink. "Actually, f— it," she said as she began chugging directly from the bottle of tequila. Enough said!
Sherri Shepherd took to Instagram on March 25 to share a (joke) video depicting her emotional reaction to the news that the Los Angeles Unified School District pushed back its return date to May 1. (Since then, the return date has been pushed back even further to August.) Through tears, the actress tells her followers that her 15-year-old son, Jeffrey, is going to be home for the rest of March. "And he's going to be doing online schooling for all of May," she sobs. "He's going to be doing online schooling for all of April. And we're gonna be together 24/7." She then looks over her shoulder, where Jeffrey can be seen throwing up his hands in frustration. "I gotta cook breakfast, lunch and dinner for you like, for the next two months," she concludes before reminding her followers to wash their hands. "The Pain is just too Much to Bear – School has been Pushed Back!" she wrote in the caption, adding hashtags for "love my son," "Jesus take the wheel," "laughter is the best medicine" and "it's a joke, folks" to indicate she wasn't being entirely serious.
