How To Keep Your Kids Entertained On A Rainy Day
With the Easter holidays quickly approaching (and the weather showing little signs of improvement), finding ways to keep your kids entertained on a rainy day has never been more crucial. After all, failing to do so means that you’ll have to hear the phrase “I’m bored” at least 10 times a day (or an hour).
With that in mind, here are some effective ways to keep your kids entertained on a rainy day!
Learn karate online. Whether you’re hoping to burn through some of their energy or want to help them develop a new skill, making use of resources that can help them learn karate online is a great way to spend a rainy day. Be sure to move all of your furniture out of the way ahead of time, and supervise them to ensure that they are playing/learning safely.
Plan a family game night. Planning a family game night (or day) is an incredibly effective way to keep your children entertained when they cannot play outside. This is because it taps into their competitive spirit, while also allowing you to spend some much-needed quality time together. One way in which you can make sure that everyone has fun is by letting each family member pick an age-appropriate game they’d like to play. This can help you to avoid tantrums, as everybody gets in their way!
If you don’t have a lot of board games to hand, consider visiting a local charity or thrift shop. Here, you can find a wide range of games and puzzles for an incredibly cheap price while also supporting a good cause.
Turn your home into a cinema. Turning your home into a cinema is another great way to keep your children entertained. It’s also a little more fun than simply watching a film, as you can turn it into an experience the whole family will enjoy. For example, you could start with an arts and crafts session, each creating “cinema tickets” that you can use later.
You could then spend a bit of time in the kitchen preparing fun snacks to enjoy during the movie. If possible, try to match the theme of whatever films you will be watching. For example, if you’re about to participate in a Harry Potter marathon, you could make your own butterbeer and chocolate frogs!
Help them discover the joy of reading. Reading can provide your children with endless hours of entertainment. However, in a world where they’d likely prefer to look at their iPad than pick up a book, it can be hard to instill a love of reading within them. Fortunately, there are many ways in which you can work around this.
For the most part, this simply means helping them to find a book that they genuinely like or enjoy, of which there are thousands to choose from. Make sure you sign up for your local library in order to ensure that they have plenty of FREE options to choose from. Alternatively, you may find that your children prefer listening to audiobooks, which often allow for a more immersive experience! If they are struggling to develop their reading skills, they may find it useful to read a book while also listening to the audiobook, which can help them to sharpen their reading comprehension skills and learn the proper pronunciation of new words.
Set up an arts and crafts session. Whether that’s painting or modeling, setting up an arts and crafts session in your home and allowing your children’s imagination to run wild is a great way to pass the time during the Easter holidays. Not only that, but studies have found that this kind of hobby can help children sharpen their fine motor skills and embrace their creativity. Of course, this does mean that you should prepare for things to get a little messy in the process.
Visit a local museum. Visiting a local museum or gallery is another great way to pass the time when the sun isn’t shining, while also serving as an educational experience that will teach your child more about the world around them. Not only that, but the majority of museums are free to enter, which is great news for those who are on a budget!
Ideally, you should keep an eye out for museums with interactive exhibits, as children tend to find them much more engaging. Furthermore, many museums will run events throughout school holidays.
If you’re finding it hard to choose a museum, ask your children what they are interested in learning more about. In some cases, they may want to go to an exhibit that can help them to complete their homework or consolidate any knowledge they picked up on in a recent history class.
Build a fort. Building a fort is another great way to entertain your children on a rainy day, while also encouraging them to develop useful skills. For example, while it may not seem that way to begin with, fort-building requires your children to use their problem-solving and logical reasoning skills, as they work to build a structure that will not collapse (whether it is made from furniture and blankets or even pillows).
This can also be a lot of fun for the whole family to get involved in. For example, you may want to divide into teams and compete to see who can build the best fort (or who can build their fort the quickest). You could even let the winners choose a prize, such as getting to be in charge of what you watch on TV or eat for dinner that night.
Final thoughts. Finding ways to keep your children entertained during the holidays can be difficult enough without having to contend with bad weather, too. After all, this often limits their options quite considerably, as it means that they cannot play in your backyard or visit the park.
Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to have fun indoors – from learning a new skill online to building a fort. Of course, if you’re running out of options or ideas you could always ask your children what they would like to do, too.
