Queen's Grandson-in-Law Mike Tindall Gets Real About 'Really Frustrating' Home School Moments

Queen Elizabeth’s grandson-in-law Mike Tindall is opening up about adapting from dad to home-school teacher during the coronavirus lockdown.

Like millions of parents around the world, the former rugby star — who’s married to Queen Elizabeth's granddaughter Zara — has found teaching eldest daughter Mia, 6, to be something of an emotional roller coaster.

“I get to be a teacher in the mornings — which is sometimes really nice, sometimes really frustrating,” Tindall, who is also dad to nearly 2-year-old Lena, told the Daily Telegraph about life inside the couple's home on mother-in-law Princess Anne's Gatcombe Park Estate.

“[Mia] can be brilliant one minute, and then something you’ve seen her do a thousand times she’ll just go, ‘I don’t know how to do that.' And then you go, ‘Well, I know you do.' "

Tindall, 41, also admits to finding classroom discipline particularly challenging.

Mia "enjoyed it the first week because it was different being around Mum and Dad all the time,” he told the Telegraph. “But then, ultimately, it’s the same people who are telling her off or telling her what to do and I think then she gets bored of that.”

Like Prince William, who recently opened up about the possible longterm effects of lockdown on the younger generation, the ex-England international player is acutely aware of the toll on children — and the independent streak "you want them to keep developing,” he adds.

Away from parenting duties, Mike and Zara have embarked on charity work that has seen them wear rainbow tees in support of Britain's National Health Service (NHS), complete a 5K run in aid of Run for Heroes and contribute a painting to a charity auction for fundraiser Equestrian Relief.

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Most recently, Mike launched an online auction in aid of a collection of charities including The Cure Parkinson's Trust, a cause particularly close to his heart because his father, Phil, has lived with the disease for the past 17 years.

While he's an avid online gamer in his downtime — Zara recently joked about his obsession with playing "golf on his phone” — Mike says he has yet to become as expert in using video call apps, which the Queen reportedly used to speak to Prince Harry, Meghan Markle and 1-year-old Archie on her 94th birthday.

Cousins-in-law Prince William and Kate Middleton, meanwhile, have used the apps to host everything from global discussions with nurses to calling a game of bingo with nursing home residents.

As for the ultra-exclusive royal Whatsapp group — where Tindall first learned of Archie's birth — he told the Telegraph, “It hasn’t been that active," adding that like him, “everyone is just getting on with it.”