Why Boredom is Good for Your Child
“Mom, I’m bored.”
Makes
you feel put on the spot, right? Most of us respond to our kids’
boredom by providing technological entertainment or structured
activities.
But unstructured time challenges kids to engage
with themselves and the world, to imagine and invent and create. Kids
need practice with unstructured time, or they'll never learn to manage
it.
Even more important, children need empty time to explore their inner and outer worlds, which is the beginning of creativity.
Most
kids given unstructured time rise to the occasion (after some minor complaining) and find something interesting to do with it.
Kids are always happiest in self-directed play. When kids simply can’t
find something to do, it’s usually because:
- They're so used to TV that they aren’t practiced at looking inside themselves for direction.
- Their time is always so structured that they aren’t used to finding fun things to do with their “free time.”
- They need some parental attention. All kids need to check in with their parents for refueling during the course of the day.
So how to respond when kids complain that they’re bored?
First,
stop what you’re doing and really focus on your child for five minutes. If you use this
time to connect, just chat and snuggle, your child will probably get
the refueling he needs and be on his way fairly quickly.
If he
doesn’t pull away from you, and you need to get back to work after a
few minutes of fully connecting, consider that maybe he needs a little
more time with you. Offer to involve him in what you’re doing, or take
a break from your work and go for a walk together.
Once you’re
confident that your child has a full “love tank,” you can revisit the
“what to do” question. By now, she probably has some ideas for
something she’d like to go do. If not, tell her that figuring out how
to enjoy her own time is her job, but you’d be happy to help her
brainstorm about possible activities.
Most of the time, kids
left to their own devices end up doing something interesting, but
sometimes they really do need our help, especially if she suddenly has
more time on her hands than usual, or if you’re newly limiting TV and
electronics. (Once kids get used to limitations on TV and electronics,
they become good at entertaining themselves, and more creative at play.)
Even
if you need to help your child come up with ideas for “what to do,”
shift the responsibility to him by creating a Boredom Jar stuffed with
ideas written on pieces of paper. Whenever a child says he’s bored, he
picks three pieces of paper from the jar and chooses one of the
activities. Tell him that if he doesn't like any of the activities, he can always empty the dishwasher instead!
Suggestions for the Kids' Boredom Buster Jar:
Write your Grandma a letter
Run around the yard three times
Put on some music and dance
Write down ten things you love about each person in your family
Brush the dog or give her a bath
Find shapes in the clouds
See how many times you can dribble the basketball
Paint or draw a picture
Wash the car
Plan a treasure hunt, with clues
Ride your bike
Make a scene in a cardboard box
Start a journal
Make homemade wrapping paper
Organize your room
Write a story
Create a play with costumes
Cut out pictures from magazines and make a collage
Cut
up old holiday cards and make holiday stickers for next year by coating
the back with gelatin glue, let dry (dissolve 2 tsp gelatin in 5 tsp boiling
water.)
Surprise your mom by making lunch
Make a zoo for your stuffed animals
Make & decorate a calendar of the summer, with important dates marked.
Put juice & cut-up fruit into ice cube trays to make ice cubes.
Create a family newspaper/newsletter
Make dessert
Start a collection (leaves, rocks, buttons)
Hang a clothesline in your room and clip photos to it to make an album
Create a circus performance
Make your room into a rainforest
Make a sculpture from pretzels and peanut butter
Make an obstacle course
Make a placemat (just laminate it at the local copy shop)
Write some limericks or haiku
Decorate an old teeshirt with cool buttons & fabric pens
Start a club
Use old cardboard tubes and boxes to build a marble maze.
Make "funky junk" art out of old jewelry
Read a book
Have a water balloon fight (outside!)
Memorize a poem and recite it for your parents
Make a boat using a plastic soda bottle base & popsicle sticks (use duct tape) for the top, then float it at the pond.
Draw a picture of a desert island with all the things you would want on it
Blindfold your sibling & take them on a tour of your house & yard, then trade places.
Play a board game
Create your own board game
See if you can draw a picture with your foot.
Draw on the sidewalk with chalk
Play hopscotch
Play jumprope
Play with bubbles in the sink
Weed the garden
Wash the mirror with a sponge
Make a book of jokes
Build a fort with blankets and pillows
Make puppets with old socks, buttons & markers.
Make a list of fun things you can do without a grownup
Mix liquid hand soap, cornstarch and food coloring into paint and paint the bathtub.
One
last tip: Don’t use the TV or electronic games to alleviate boredom.
Studies show that kids who regularly use electronics are more likely to
feel bored when not doing so than other kids. Even after eliminating
the habit, it can take months for them to find other activities about
which they're passionate. But don't give up -- you're doing their
creativity an enormous favor!
