Traveling and working is a fantastic experience that more and more professionals crave with each passing year. It can be effortless, fun, and quite liberating. But what happens when you decide to take the road with a family and kids? Digital nomad and parenting can be a daring, sometimes daunting, new experience because, as a digital nomad with kids, you must make major short- and long-term calls for your family.
How do you make sure you stay caught up here?
Is achieving a functional slow-travel family even possible?
Is joining the digital nomad family community likely a worthwhile adventure?
I have spoken to some nomadic friends with kids, and I’m going to share with you some of my findings in this article! Find out all you need to make the best decisions right here!
- Understanding Digital Nomad And Parenting – What You Should Know
- Why More Professionals Are Joining The Digital Nomad Family Community
- What Life As A Slow Travel Family Looks Like On The Inside And Outside
- Challenges Of Digital Nomad Parenting
- Benefits Of Digital Nomad Parenting
- What To Consider When Preparing For Life On The Road As A Digital Nomad Family
- Best Strategies For Successful Digital Nomad Parenting
- Digital Nomad Families Who Led By Example
- Digital Nomad Parenting – The Way To Go
- Popular Questions About Digital Nomad and Parenting
Understanding Digital Nomad And Parenting – What You Should Know
Digital nomadism and parenting happen when two parents work remotely and travel with their kids (and perhaps a pet?).
On the surface, traveling with your family appears like a manageable exercise. And it doesn’t have to be, either!
The nitty-gritty, from securing a digital nomad visa with family to facilitating the ideal homeschool life for your kids while on the road, is not easy but possible! You just need to know the right moves to make and when.
Before moving further, let’s understand why the digital nomad family community keeps growing and why you might want to join that trend.
Why More Professionals Are Joining The Digital Nomad Family Community
There are many reasons why more digital nomads travel with their partners and kids.
In the past, it was the convention for most digital nomads to leave their families to explore the world and pursue their interests. However, thanks to the introduction of more viable ways of traveling as a group, professionals who want their family to go sightseeing with them can make that stuff happen without stress now!
The best part of being a knowledgeable digital nomad with kids is that you get to see the world without hurting the growth of your kid(s) in any way!
What Life As A Slow Travel Family Looks Like On The Inside And Outside
Digital nomads and parenting, like peanut butter and jelly, can go hand in hand. However, that’s usually only possible through careful and extensive planning.
Every member of the global digital nomad family community will be sure to tell you that this lifestyle has its fair share of ups and downs.
Let’s take a quick look at what it means to be a slow-travel family in this day and age.
Challenges Of Digital Nomad Parenting
While it might seem like it at the time, your biggest challenge down this road isn’t securing a digital nomad visa with family.
First, you must understand that traveling with your family is nothing like solo nomad traveling. And even though there are benefits to experiencing digital nomadism this way, there are also challenges peculiar to this particular lifestyle.
A few of these include:
1. Your Travel Plans Become That Much More Volatile
Digital nomads will readily attest to how quickly even the best-laid plans can turn on their heads, even when only looking after themselves. The volatility and unpredictability of your travel plans increase exponentially when you introduce kids into the equation.
These individuals are their own bosses and run on their own time!
So, you must be prepared to do something drastic, like miss a flight if your child suddenly throws up and needs to take a thorough shower!
2. The Education Factor Becomes Problematic
The fact that your kids will be on the road doesn’t mean they have to do away with their studies. Because, sooner or later, you will have to put down roots somewhere. And, when you do, you want them to stay caught up to their peers academically.
As such, you must strike the perfect balance between keeping on the road and leveraging the best learning apps for nomad kids.
Under certain circumstances, this feat can be remarkably tough to achieve. And there’s also the fact that you would need to find an efficient way of introducing them to the local community for socialization. Doing so is necessary in the path of their education.
3. Your Budget Goes Up Significantly
More people on a trip has one direct implication: you have more mouths to feed and more expenses to sort through. And, spoiler alert, kids aren’t the cheapest travel companions on any day!
In addition to the fact that you can’t expect any financial input from them, you must also be very particular about certain things.
Traveling alone is typically possible (and maybe even easier) to settle in a cheap hostel when strapped for cash. However, this plan would be next to impossible when you have kids hanging on your coattails. At the minimum, you’d need to get a proper house. You may need to find a daycare center, too!
As you would expect, all these bills will add up.
Benefits Of Digital Nomad Parenting
If the potential challenges of living as a digital nomad with family have got you sweating bullets, relax! The merits of this lifestyle far outweigh any of these possible issues.
Some benefits of digital nomad and parenting include:
1. You Get Maximum Latitude On The Road
As a digital nomad parent, you won’t have to choose between your lifestyle and building a close relationship with your kids because you’ll have both! You’ll be able to check out the Pyramids of Giza or see the Eiffel Tower, all while keeping up with everything happening in your kids’ daily lives!
Also, remember that you’ll have a lot of flexibility regarding your working hours. This you can channel into fostering deeper, lasting bonds with your children in their formative years.
2. You Can Make Lasting Memories With Your Family
Most families must wait for a vacation (around once a year, at best) before making priceless memories with their loved ones. As a digital nomad wandering the world with your family, you make daily memories with your kids!
Because they’ll be with you throughout your adventure, they’ll be spared the tedium of conventional homeschool life. Instead, your kids will be able to learn and grow in an even more imaginative environment.
3. It Offers Exposure To A Rich Culture And Unique World Experiences
The average digital nomad child has one overwhelming advantage over the traditional school child. The former’s learning experience isn’t restricted to online school and printed worksheets like the latter.
The level of world schooling your kids will get with you while you travel will be significantly more hands-on. Because of this, they’ll have a considerably easier time assimilating, whether they’re learning about science or life.
What’s more, life on the road can do much to satisfy your kids’ natural curiosity by helping them amass unique world experiences as they go.
What To Consider When Preparing For Life On The Road As A Digital Nomad Family
As I’ve said before, life on the road as a slow-travel family can be a simple and stress-free matter. You must ensure you put the right amount of thought and effort into preparing for this activity.
Along these lines, there are three (3) important considerations you must consider when making a decision. These are:
Your Current Financial Situation
I’ll be straightforward: joining the digital nomad family community will cost you. To be clear, you need less than a hundred grand to make things happen. However, you must be positive that you’re financially stable enough to embark on such an endeavor.
I recommend that anyone intending to combine being a digital nomad and parenting have at least a $ 10,000 to $ 15,000 financial buffer first. This is more so the case if your income could be more reasonably regular.
You need to ensure that you always have enough to tide you and the kids over at any given point in time.
The Childcare Options Available To You
Yet another critical element to remember here is the childcare options you’ll likely have access to while on the road.
Remember that you will be traveling AND working. Kids have a way of making the latter exercise an unbelievably tedious affair. They don’t know or care what you’re up to, and it’s your job to keep adequately entertained whenever they demand it.
When choosing travel destinations, you may favor locations with well-equipped enrichment classes or daycare centers. Having daycare options will ensure that your kids are happy while you work and present the perfect segue for them to enter the local community for socialization.
Your Kid(s) Socialization Needs
Also critical to the success of your travel plans here is the socialization needs of your child. As a digital nomad with kids, you’ll likely hear stuff like digital nomad children are poorer at making social interactions.
Well, the exact opposite is the truth.
World schooling trumps the conventional classroom environment for teaching kids how to master social cues. The unique atmosphere that world schooling puts them in naturally helps them embrace new people and things.
Having established this, you should know that you must make a conscious effort to help your kids mix around with their peers on the road. Here, you can let them join ad hoc playgroups and mingle with the kids in the local community for socialization.
Best Strategies For Successful Digital Nomad Parenting
Different digital nomad families will naturally have different needs while on the road, that’s for sure. You can use some universal tricks to ensure that you completely cover your bases.
Some of these include:
Education And Schooling Solutions
Your online school and homeschool life game must be tight to get things right here. In addition to elementary world schooling, you need to be positive that your wards have access to the right learning resources, no matter where they might be.
Thankfully, there are tons of resources where you can find the right learning apps for nomad kids. There are online sites and apps you can leverage to your advantage of homeschooling. A few that immediately spring to mind are:
Other great learning apps for nomad kids include World School Academy and Khan Academy Kids.
Consider Slow Travel
The slow travel family is undoubtedly one of the best models to follow for the modern-day digital nomad family. Traveling and working simultaneously comes with a certain measure of stress, even for you. Jetting non-stop from one place to the other might also take a toll on the kids.
As a digital nomad with kids, it may be best to draw out your trips some. Consider spending a month or two in one location before packing up shop. This type of travel, better known as slow travel, will be more suitable for digital nomad parents with kids instead of living a life that’s always on the move.
But it will ensure enough time to recover between trips for your kids and yourself. Moreover, it’ll give them more opportunities to soak in the world and culture around them.
Have A Plan For Every Step Of The Journey
Leave nothing to chance! Remember, you’re out and about with another human being. You can’t afford to just “wing it” at any point.
Think about it; what exactly do you plan to do if you don’t have a structure for your trips and ultimately find yourself out in the cold with a 6-month-old baby?
Playing things by ear could be better advised, even for solo digital nomads. So, that goes double for you!
Ensure that you think ten steps ahead and let your contingency plans have contingency plans. You’ll need it!
See the basics of how to plan a long-term trip here.
Leverage The Coworking Space Option
Subscribing to a coworking space is attractive if you’re on the road with your partner. It’s as simple as having one person stay home with the kids while the other can head out to the coworking space and finish some quality work.
– Some platforms you can leverage to find great coworking spaces no matter where you are on the place include:
Connect With Other Digital Nomad Family Community
Digital nomad and parenting is a relatively recent development. However, that path is quickly becoming well-trodden. Several people have been where you are, and you can benefit from their experience.
Platforms like Kidigital Nomads offer some decent resources you can count on to make time on the road with your kids reasonably enjoyable.
Other digital nomad family communities you can check out include:
Digital Nomad Families Who Led By Example
Before taking that plunge, taking your kids to tour the world while you work might sound fantastical. However, it is, in fact, possible. Moreover, many people are doing it right now and getting great results!
Here are some success stories:
#1 – Jenna and Joel Young
The Youngs are a couple who decided they wanted the digital nomad life for themselves and their kids and haven’t looked back since.
“Jenna and I grew up in farming communities in rural Ohio. I only went on an airplane when I was 17. We wish we had seen and lived more before making critical life choices. We want our kids to benefit from seeing the world. This lifestyle will inevitably open their minds and lead to an overall better judgment and decision-making.”
#2 – Julia Jerg and Claudio Delgado
These two digital nomads had a child together and became determined to find that sweet spot between travel, work, and an entire family.
It became apparent that we wouldn’t stop our nomadic lifestyle after having kids. We took Vincent, our eldest son, to Italy on a road trip at three months of age. Then, we looked at each other, saying that traveling with kids is possible! Vincent was born in 2017 and has been to Italy, (Fuerteventura) Spain, England, the Czech Republic, Croatia, Portugal, 2x Thailand, and (La Palma) Spain since.
Niklas was born in 2019 in La Palma, one of Spain’s Canary Islands. Even at his young age, he adjusts quickly to new situations and loves interacting with others. We took him to Germany and Thailand, where we are stuck by choice due to the worldwide Coronavirus pandemic.
Digital Nomad Parenting – The Way To Go
Now, you know that digital nomad and parenting CAN mix!
It won’t exactly be a walk down Easy Street. But, as long as you have your financial situation under control, properly leverage the suitable childcare options, and afford your kids the ideal opportunities to enter the local community for socialization, you’re closer than you know to your goal!
Of course, you must ensure your kids have the best education possible on the road, meaning giving them an excellent online school and homeschool life and the right learning apps for nomad kids is non-negotiable.
Remember to consider the slow travel family route. And, where possible, leverage coworking spaces and reach out to other digital nomad family community members.
With this, you’re sure to have a blast on the road!
See more helpful digital nomad resources here.
Popular Questions About Digital Nomad and Parenting
Can Digital Nomad Families Live Anywhere?
Yes, digital nomad families can live anywhere, technically speaking. However, certain elements may make some destinations more attractive options compared to others.
For example, countries like Germany, Mexico, Thailand, and Croatia offer digital nomad visas to families, which are considerably easier to enter and operate in these countries.
Are There Any Disadvantages To Being A Digital Nomad Family?
Yes, there are disadvantages to being a digital nomad family. Not properly combining digital nomad and parenting may compromise the kids’ education, increase travel and living expenses, and make traveling far more volatile.
How Can A Digital Nomad Family Make Education Work On The Road?
A digital nomad family can make education work on the road by providing their kids with the right learning apps for nomad kids. Tools like World School Academy and Khan Academy Kids can help parents get the best out of online school and homeschool life while they travel.
What’s The Biggest Challenge Of Getting A Digital Nomad Visa With Family?
The biggest challenge of getting a digital nomad visa with a family is restructuring your travel and living plans to adequately accommodate the unique needs of the children.
Regardless of the age group, it is a fact that traveling from one place to another can be traumatic for kids to handle. The pressure of making new friends all over and having to socialize in different cultures may be a plus point, but it’s also pressuring. As such, awareness and consideration must be considered for their comfort and well-being at every step.
Can Digital Nomad And Parenting Be Successful?
Yes, digital nomads and parenting can be successful. However, you must put several things in place to ensure success, including confirming your finances are in order, seeing to the childcare needs of your kids, and leaving ample opportunity for socialization and world schooling.
