Have you ever found out at the last minute that your child's homework is due today? Or worse, that it was due yesterday? I have experienced both. Having encountered it on occasion as a parent of two school-age children, I loathed that nagging feeling that some such surprise would come upon me. Between parenting, household work, chauffeuring, and career, life is stressful enough without having these worries. Even the best organized person can easily overlook something like this all it takes is a change in some schedule to set off a series of events that ends up causing a lot of stress and anxiety.

It is a considerable challenge for parents just to coordinate who's picking up whom when. The wall calendar, the perennial favorite of most families, is barely up to that task. How do you get such information as homework due dates on it? Most people end up sticking the papers containing homework schedules on the other perennial favorite family information management system the fridge. There's only so much it can hold and just sticking it on the fridge doesn't do any good in remembering when something is due, does it.

It's a shame that in this day and age, when most family households have multiple PCs, multiple cell phones, and even personal digital assistants (PDAs) such as Blackberry, PocketPC, and Palm, we must live with these paper-based implements that pollute the environment and cannot remind us when something's due.

Yes, there are many computer-based programs that could potentially help. Some school districts have implemented systems that allow parents to log in and find out about children's schedules and homework assignments. There are some well-executed systems, but what I've found is that they don't necessarily solve the problem. They are generally hard to integrate with your everyday routine - almost in the same way that a paper stuck on a fridge is.

The major portals Yahoo, Google, and AOL all have decent web-based calendars. There are also countless desktop programs available. Most of these programs excel as single-user systems, but how to address the needs of the whole family? How to beat the ease of use of the ages-old wall calendar? And how to easily stick everyone's homework schedules in there?

Remember the challenge is making all family members continually aware of the obligations and activities of all other family members. And to do that in a way that beats doing it with the old wall calendar and day planner.

Fortunately, a new breed of computer programs address the needs of the whole family - Google "family organizer" and you'll see many, some of them even free. You'll also see Mediabee Family Dashboard, made by my company.

The computer, if it were only usable for such purposes, could help you make sure the homework gets done on time and even help eliminate some of the anxiety around some of the other repetitive scheduling that's harder to manage on paper - like walking the dog or feeding the cat.

Between the web and email, you're probably spending a lot of time on the computer. And so are your kids. So, instead of sticking the paper notice on your fridge, try entering the schedule right away into the computer. Better yet, incent the children to do it. They can't play on the computer unless they empty the notices from their school bags and enter them into the computer.

Find a program that (1) can send email and cell phone reminders (2) can easily be accessed on multiple computers at home (3) can easily update any work-based calendaring programs, and (4) is easy and quick enough to use that you know you, your spouse, and your kids are going to keep using it for all your scheduling needs including homework, not just appointments. You'll soon be wondering how you put up with the paper calendar and resent all those precious hours you spent coordinating calendars instead of spending quality time with your family.

Computers were invented to help improve quality of life. Now a new generation of software turns that possibility into a reality.

2006 by Saro Saravanan.