Home for Corona - Lets Come Up with Non-Screen Activities for Kids

Like quite a few folks, our kids (9 and 5) will be home from school for at least the next 3 weeks (and we'd guess longer) as local schools are closed.  SWMBO and I will both be working from home for the forseeable.  The "remote learning" setup from the schools will only keep the kids busy for so long.  We're both excited about more family time,  but are also focused on how to keep them active and engaged while we're working.  The emphasis is trying to *minimize* screen time.

They're not quite old enough to fully entertain themselves if they cant play outside with their friends - If you leave my son to his own devices, he'll read or play Lego all day.  We're trying to come up with more interesting stuff.

The together stuff is much easier to figure out than the "independent" activities.

What are you guys doing?

So far, next we have agreed to:

1. Have Daily family exercise/outdoor time. 

2. Two projects: popsicle stick bridge, and duct tape boat. 

3. My son will also be working on lots of activies in his Cub Scout book. 

4. Each kid teaching us all something every day. (Daughter is insisting she will teach her Dad ballet, lets see how that goes.)

5. Kids helping with around the house activities like cooking, cleaning the garage and storage spaces.

Teach them how to build models!

My minions and I will also be learning the 3d printer, replacing our carpet with LVP flooring together (they are weirdly excited about helping do that), and chop down a bunch of weeds and trees in the yard.

FYI - As much as I rail on them, Amazon does a stem toy subscription service that's been fantastic for our four kids. We've gotten some really cool learning activities including a make your own slime kit, roller coaster engineering, and a botany kit.

cardboard , markers , paint if old enough and build a fort or a castle.......or a doll house 

and add some rooms the next day........

Order a 3D print and print whatever is out of stock at Walmart !

But Hugs are free and read with them......

Are the librarys going to be Open ?

Great thread!!! 
 

Our plan was lots of fun outside stuff. Unfortunately Georgia is the new Seattle with no end to the rain in sight.

Girls (8 and 5) have "take-home" work.

They have a HILARIOUS, AWESOME Mo Willems activity book.

We're busting out board games, and getting them involved with preparing all meals.

But yeah. Looking for more ideas.

The rain (and general corona mayhem) have thrown me into a pretty rough depression. I JUST WANNA GO OUTSIDE, GAT DAMMIT!

Tempted to throw "snow pants" on the kids and just go play in the mud. We have a new rock tumbler and I'm excited to find some cool rocks!!!

Kids are great free labor for Challenge cars. 

wash my car.

Water color set and lots of paper, a brush selection, and a block or 2 of modeling clay.

You didn't mention ages.

Make hot wheel track and race the cars

Make r/c track and race rc cars

Kids like to paint pictures.

Learn to sew or knit

I have a high energy, 5 year old girl. 

I consider yesterday as Day 1.

It was a long day!

I'm here to absorb all recommendations (and maybe give a few.) 

Not perfect but have you heard that today, the Disney+ steaming service is offering Frozen2. Three weeks earlier than planned. 

Bike rides. 

Learn a musical instrument. 

If they learn to sew , you can get some new seat covers :)

and make your own masks !

thanks for the ideas!!

I just got back from the local Dollar Store, where I spent $100 on cheap and cheerful duct tape, masking tape, and assorted art goodies including a kid size hot glue gun which my son is beyond psyched about.  I also brought back another load of cardboard boxes for projects.  We  already go through I don't know how many sq. feet of cardboard per week, our basement is probably a firetrap becaue of it.)  The garden store at local Home Depot was PACKED, apparently had the same idea as me in terms of getting going on Spring yard work

We're in Southern Westchester County NY, about 5 miles up I-95 from from the New Rochelle epicenter, and its interesting to see that while there are fewer people on the road and in stores, the local parks are full and peeps are in good moods.

Really wanna go buy some plinkin ammo, but I'm gonna go ahead and assume there's been a run on that too :/

Build a fort or a treehouse. Like a legit one. Outside. Scavenge hunt for supplies!

David S. Wallens said:

Learn a musical instrument. 

This is a good one! We got all the instruments out. Time to form a band! 

Trampoline for the girls. Girls for the boy.

I'm a mandatory reporter for the "State". Blizzards, Hurricanes, Corona's... I still have to go to work.

Perhaps a home project

dreading this too with our  7yo.

• sidewalk chalk on the driveway, make a bike/razor scooter racetrack
• make a "spudmarine" (you've probably bought taters as part of your long-term sustenance to wait the virus out anyway)
• make bristlebots
• never too early to come up with a good idea for this year's Christmas ornament.  make 'em out of clothespins or other household stuff.
• animals are coming out of hiding now, at least here in the SE.  see if they can catch anoles, peepers, toads, salamanders etc in the back yard.
• make a birdhouse.  there are multiple DIY's out there where you can put a decent one together with scraps and leftover nails/glue/screws.  you'll be right on time for nesting season.

love this guy's channel.  he comes up with some amazing experiments, you might find some good ones in there:

https://www.youtube.com/user/Nighthawkinlight/videos

some good "more kid do-able" ones are his storm glass, fog horn, and pendulum wave.

In reply to L5wolvesf :

You can now make a living selling black market "white stuff" and not be a drug dealer.

Introduced them to all the weird rectangular block shaped things on our shelf. That you can open and they have text you can read. Scrolling is done manually by moving/turning the ultra thin screens over top of each other. There were even some with pictures.  I then told them about this thing called your imagination and you can build pictures in your mind of the things you read about in these rectangular objects.

I even offered to read to them so they could focus on the imagination part. Trying to keep the multitasking to a minimum with new users of this technology. 
 

We will see how this goes. 

Take 'em up in the attic and teach them about 16" centers.  Show them how to walk around on the 2x8's and not fall through the ceiling.   

Well I'm a grandfather of eight grandkids from 12 to 21 years old. Just got back from a week of watching five of them while our son and daughter-in-law had to attend a business function. These are all good kids, smart, considerate, good grades however addicted to phones and other electronic devises. Probably not much different from other kids there age.

when I could get them them to set phones aside I enjoyed just talking, asking questions, their opinions even telling them about things when I was their age. Might I suggest teaching table manners, eating manners, social manners, etc. Families today are often busy, heading in different direction, eating on the fly. Sitting everyone down to a family meal with teaching of good table manners, conversation without distractions would seem like a great idea. Maybe old fashion on my part but useful lessons for their adulthood.

i enjoy cooking and engaged them in preparing a meal. Talked to them about reading not because they have to but for enjoyment. Taking a walk and pointing out things in the environment that they take for granted. Make them feel important in your eyes.

Our kids are now 49 and 46, girl and boy, both successful and get along very well.

I'm going to teach my girls some card games.  Perfect all purpose diversion up to and including building a house of cards and throwing them across the room into a hat!

In reply to TVR Scott :

Maybe some magic tricks too would be fun !

Kid car art with a message board "car show" right here. Let's see some drawings, models, etc. 

If there's enough interest, we can start a dedicated thread for that.