Kids staying at home can cause stress and anxiety among parents. The pandemic has made us realise that schools will stay shut for some time. It is up to us to decide whether to make the best time at home or stay idle. You can consider this time as a blessing to sharpen their brains with useful activities. But, where to start with? A brainstorming session is a good step to engage children. It will help you understand their interests.
It is well-known that schools are operating online with the pandemic. Few schools in Chennai like Babaji Vidhyashram School organise online activities to help kids. Yet, the biggest challenge befalls on the parent to keep them engaged. They have to develop useful yet interesting activities to engage their kids. Doing so will help them stay active physically and mentally. But, are you wondering how? This article has consolidated the easy and best strategies to keep your kids busy.
Effective & Simple Pastime Activities for Kids
Make an Effective Plan
You can come up with a daily schedule or plan. Make kids stick to it and perform their daily chores and activities. Ensure that they wake up and eat their meals as a routine at a definite time. Doing so will make the kids feel like they are not out of normalcy. This is the best way to maintain discipline. Also, following a routine will reduce their screen time. A structured day is the best option to make time move faster.
Offer Choices
Create a choice board. It will help your child focus on one area at a time. You can make it interesting by fixing a time frame. As children learn to complete their choices on time, they learn time managing skills. You can find many choice boards on the internet. Pick ones that will interest your kid and take a printout of them. Remember to recreate one if they do not fit your child’s needs.
Story Creation
Creating a story with pictures will help build their narrative skills. This will be fun when your child does a presentation in front of family and friends. It will let them bond well with kids of all age groups. You can either fine-tune their final narration or let them share it as such. Doing so will help you know how creative they are and what fascinates them.
Math Puzzles
Maths is in our everyday life in everything. You can organise math activities with available things at home. One simple example would be to measure things of the same length. The next day you can choose a different length. Ask them to go around the house hunting for objects that belong to that measure. Being a parent, you can encourage counting money or things. In this way, kids will become strong with addition and subtraction. If you have bigger kids, you can ask them to solve a word problem. Make it more interesting for them by quoting real-life examples.
Learn Facts
Create a day for something. For example, you can tag a day as “World War Day” and make them collect information about it. You can also contribute facts, which will let your child learn a new subject and gain more knowledge. Keep swapping the subjects between history, geography, trade, horticulture and astronomy. You will see them show much curiosity on unknown subjects. Inculcate the quality to inquire and learn with excitement. This will help them perceive the world in a different manner. For instance, one of the top international schools in Chennai, International Village School, is making this a routine to help children gain vast knowledge.
Internet to the Rescue
With everything revolving around the online platform, various learning activities are gaining popularity. There are a few free online quests involving math. You can encourage your kids to do it and assess their results. The internet provides anything you name. But, remember to track your child’s activity as the internet has too much information. Researching inappropriate things without guidance might cause severe damage to their mental health.
Family Time
Bonding is the best way to create memories. Remember that you can never regain lost time. Involve in simple team work like baking desserts, dancing or playing board games. Let out the child in you. Finally, all these small things in life will matter the most to your kid.
Useful Activities to Engage Kids
Art & Crafts
Most parents complain that there isn’t time for art during the standard routine. You can use the pandemic to make children focus on their creativity to learn hands-on crafts. YouTube tutorials are an excellent way to make kids draw and develop a passion for it.
Making them draw their favourite character is the best way to kill time. But, if you are particular not to make them watch screens, there are handbooks on making art. Buy them and make your kid follow the step-by-step process. In this era, you can make kids learn almost anything staying at home. Music learning apps will help them hone their skills towards a particular instrument.
Science Project
If you have a microscope at home, you can let your young mind explore various things under it. Or you can take them for a stroll in the garden or backyard to witness different insects and their life cycles. Start a butterfly garden, and this will be the easiest science experiment. Butterflies stay indoors during their chrysalis stage. You can chart their various stages and visualise how they transform with time.
Seed germination is another interesting scientific activity. You can encourage your child to check their daily growth and record them for analysis. Science experiments are possible in the comfort of our kitchen space. You can help kids mix food ingredients to see their reactions. If weather permits, take them outdoors to explore different leaves or underground animals.
Jig-saw Puzzles
Introduce your child to a puzzle challenge. You can provide a puzzle that is beyond their difficulty level. It will be more challenging and help them develop focus. They will learn perseverance and problem-solving skills. This is the best way to handle their boredom and also make their brains work.
The Takeaway
The pandemic has taught us the value of spending time with family. Encourage children to ask questions and let them express their feelings. You must understand that kids also get stressed by staying indoors. Hence, use the time to teach them simple yet basic hygiene or good manners. Give them full attention and make them feel your unconditional love.
