Looking for things to do during the school holidays with the kids.
Doesn't look like anything outdoors is an option because the forecast shows rain all day, every day.
Trying to get the kids off there electronics (PS5, iPads, iPhones, MacBooks, etc…)
They are primary school kids
What Are Some Things to Do Indoors during The Kids Holidays in NSW?
Hugh G Rection on 19/01/2022 - 09:31
Comments
- Get them back into the school routine, our 2 kids does about 2 hours of math and reading exercises a day..
- Cooking and baking, get really hands on, and do thing from scratch, like making bread and pizza dough
- Cardboard box fortress
- Re-decorate their rooms, Paint,
- Purge their toys and stuff (cant buy new stuff unless you get rid of old stuff)
- Put the kids to work and scrub windows, (our 2 kids just scrubbed the back timber deck the other day) Gerni was fun for my 6 yr old
- Rainy weather is good to re-pot plants and start some seedlings. ( i have way too much lettuce and herbs now)
Why stop there? Make them do everything.
not to worry. still have 2 weeks to go
That reminds me: I have to put lawn fertiliser out
Wait till grass is dry.
It’s not raining much at all where I am and there’s barely any run off (sand) - and no stormwater system so should be right
Why? You want to water fertiliser in very well
@Suspect420: yes but it will burn the grass if applied to wet grass. apply to dry and water in heavily
yeah, take them to the library and get them to pick books that they would want to read. My kid likes to read comics and magazines and also fact books.
mission control, ready for take off.
decorated the rooms as a space theme from lots of cardboard cut outs that the kids painted. last holiday was under the sea
Board games.
Kingdomino is good.
Monopoly deal is also good.Construction toys.
Drawing things. There are loads of instructions online on 'how to draw a car/horse/plane' or whatever they are into. Print some of them out.
Kingdomino is awesome. And for younger kids, Dragonimo is a fantastic gateway.
My six year old loves hama beads. Has made a whole family of characters from Among Us.
"forecast shows rain all day, every day"
Children are actually waterproof
mudpies, splashing in puddles etc, even the beach if it is warm enough, crowds should be down a bit
got any steep grassy hills nearby, toboggan or at least a piece of plastic
.
Primary school age kids have PS5, iPads, iPhones, MacBooks, etc?
I really like the suggestions from Archi above. If you need to, I would lock up those devices while an activity is underway and give them back for a short period between activities.lol. i buy a new iPhone every year, and pass it down to the kids when i buy a new one. MacBooks are for school, I got them the air since its lighter and they don't need to do any heavy processing. iPads i buy almost every other year, and that also get passed down to the kids.
the deal with their electronics is that they can use it during the holidays, and friday night - sunday when school is in session. i should have emphasised that they couldn't use it 18 hours a day during the holidays, lol.
May I ask what are the rules for electronics during the week (Mon-Thurs) during a school term?
none. they can only use it for school.
they go to a private school not near the house so they get home just before 5pm. Usually when they get home they get their snack and start on their homework. they can't watch anything because it will distract them from there homework, but they can listen to music.
By the time they finish it will be time for dinner, then shower, change into pj, prepare for school the next day, and they can play for like 30 minutes before they go to bed.
rinse and repeat.ours are…
generally
- youtube has been removed from their tablets
- they don't have phones
- you tube is only available on the TV in the family room
- laptop is for researching school work and doing school workmonday to thursday
- no tablets
- TV is ok aound 2 hours a day ABC ME or netflix Kids only after all school work is completedfriday - sunday
- tablets and nintendo switch is allowed,@Archi: How did you remove youtube? I have time restricted it to 1 minute on our ipads but I feel like its only a matter of time until they discover they can open chrome and go to youtube.com …
@admira: You could put a DNS in the WiFi connection that blocks youtube. They will probably eventually learn to go into the settings and set it to default but until they do you can research a new method
@admira: just remove the app…
my kids know not to use chrome or safari to get to yotube,
they have enough content on the other stuff for what they want..
we can then monitor youtube use on the laptop as they use it in front of us as well as the TV
@Archi: yeah monitoring is really the key, we don't let them go away into a corner and do whatever they want without us being able to walk past and see whats happening from time to time.
If you decide to go to an indoor recreation facility such as a bowling alley, on a rainy day. Call ahead as you'll probably need to book in. Rainy days those places can get FULL.
Sign up to Gracie university online and learn some jiu jitsu with them.
We have 2 primary school kids as well, the struggle is real. We make access to ipads etc time limited, and also conditional on them either sitting and doing times tables repetition, or I ask them 5 questions in a row and they have to get them all right - get the last one wrong and we start again… I alternate from spelling to maths questions and get progressively harder (but not unattainable). Or write a story about what they have done in the holidays, something like that. We also take them to the library, they love it there, get new treehouse or weirdo books, sadly they've read all the tintin and asterix ones there are (which both they and I loved reading).
Board games are good, though our kids are highly competitive. They quite like the 5 second rule game.
During holidays, they can play games etc on the ipad every day before dinner, for about 1 hour. When school is on its Fri, Sat and Sun as long as homework is done. Will admit homework for my kids last year was incredibly easy and we were making up new things the "teachers emailed us" so it wasn't just 5 minutes for them to complete.
Our kids (almost 4 and 6) are a bit younger but principle applies.
You need to set up infrastructure/system long term; it's hard to change things in short term.
We have a play based and outdoors approach with our kids. They walk 2-4 km just about everyday - lots of bush walks, to shops, they will walk >1km later today in the rain to pick up some free party items from a marketplace seller nearby with my wife.
Inside (and outside) there is a lot of imaginative play; they don't have access to electronics devices except one or two 5 minute video clips a day (music, monster jam, area of interest, etc.). They do a lot of art and craft. We read to them a few times a day; the older one reads a lot herself; they ask lots of questions, explore many different things such as bridge structures (we'll build some shortly), cook with Mum, Lego imaginative play, build MOC's with Dad.
They also do physical things inside - climb and swing on indoor monkey bar; wrestle Dad, catch balls, copy some yoga poses.