Are Your Kids Bored Yet? How to Stop Their Complaints.

School hasn’t even been out that long, and the kids are already started to whine and complain of boredom. I know they are spending more time than usual at home, but enough is enough. My job is not to be their full-time entertaining cruise director, but if I allow them to think I am the one responsible for preventing boredom, then they will think it is my job! No more.

Plus, experts even suggest boredom is good for our kids. Dr. Dibya Choudhuri, a professor with the counseling program at Eastern Michigan University explains, “It is a normal human emotion. To try to prevent children from ever experiencing it is probably unhealthy.”

So, from now on, I’m letting my kids be bored. All I am doing is offering the following five suggestions when kids complain of boredom.

Send Them Outside

I’ve found the best cure for boredom is to send my kids outside. We’ve got a swing set and a yard where they are free to run around and free. Whether they are pretending to be princesses or pirates, or they spend time searching for bugs, they are keeping their minds occupied and getting a healthy dose of Vitamin D. This summer, we also invested in an inflatable water slide that keeps them happy and entertained for hours.

Encourage Them to Use Their Imaginations

While my role is not to entertain my kids, I do think I have a responsibility to provide them with objects that encourage their imagination. That’s why we keep musical instruments, craft supplies, costumes, and coloring stuff in our house. When the kids say they are bored, I encourage them to find something to do that requires their imagination. They put on plays, draw beautiful pictures, and build amazing Play-Doh structures.

Have Them Help Around the House

Let’s not forget about the classic – If you’re bored, you can help out around the house! When my girls are whining about how bored they are, I like to remind me that they still haven’t completed their daily chores and that now is a good time to get started. While they don’t always rush to start their chores, they do stop complaining about boredom.

Suggest They Work on Something for School

Now, I know the idea of suggesting your kids work on something for school sounds like a joke but hear me out. They have been out of school forever because of the coronavirus! You might be surprised that they don’t mind doing a little ABC Mouse or completing something in a workbook. If that fails, there is always summer reading!

Remind Me to Think of Others

Lastly, if your kids are bored, it is the perfect opportunity to encourage them to do something nice for someone else. When my girls are bored, I often suggest they do something nice for a specific person (like Dad or the neighbor). They’ve drawn homemade cards, picked flowers, and done someone else’s chore.