- It’s all in the planning.
- As much as it might sound a small bit overboard it actually helps everyone to know roughly what is happening and when. Not just for you as parents but it’s good for children to have somewhat of an idea what to expect from the holiday period so that they don’t start getting bored and then cranky.
- Balance – achieve a ratio of planned activities
- It’s not realistic to have a day out every day of the holidays, but it is nice to have a couple of special trips or adventures planned! It’s a good idea to involve the kids in the planning of the days out. You could ask the child to come up with 3 ideas for a holiday activity that they would like to do and then choose one or one from each of their lists if you have more than one child.
- Don’t fear free play time
- Free play is a critical part of childhood. Nowadays kids have less free-play time than previous generations had as they have so many entertainment options nowadays. But encouraging them to just play with toys, be around the house and in the garden and make their own entertainment actually teaches them much more than any structured activity. They learn to be creative, imaginative, independent and also how to problem solve.
- Set them a challenge
- Give the children a challenge that you want them to complete over the holidays. This could be a project that can be done across a number of days. For example, an art or craft project, like making a series of greeting cards or decorations for their room. Or it could be getting them to practice their football skills. Try to ask them to do 5 ‘keepie-uppies’ by the end of the holidays.
- Or even getting them to write a story or poem. Something that they can do a little bit on every few days and have as a focus for their downtime whenever they begin to seem bored which is inevitable during a several week Easter break
- Appreciate the time
- If you look at the big picture, there are not that many periods of time that you will have with your kids to just enjoy being together in the holidays. Before long they will be older teenagers/ young adults wanting to spend their school holidays with their friends or off doing their hobbies on their own. So make the most of the time you have.
