5 Screen-Free Activities to Explore with Your Child

Tech is a vital part of our world today and our children are spending more and more time in front of screens. Both at school and at home, much of their time is spent learning or playing on screens.

It’s vital for children’s development that they experience other activities. Children who have a good balance of screen time and non-screen based activities have better physical strength and better eyesight. Not only that but children who regularly get exercise outdoors also have better emotional responses and are less inclined to temper tantrums, depression and anxiety.

This upper school in Hampstead ensures that children receive a balanced education with a good mixture of tech-based activities and outdoor as well as artistic activities.

Here are 5 fabulous screen-free activities for you to explore with your child – there’s sure to be something here that will catch their imagination!

5 Screen-Free Activities to Explore with Your Child

1. Board games – we’re not talking about snakes and ladders either. There are so many amazing board games around today and many of them have multiple players as well as fun pieces and 3D aspects to them. If your child has an interest in fantasy, why not look at Dungeons and Dragons for instance? Set a table up and make an evening of it. Experiment with different games till you find your favourite. 

2. Mudlarking or bottle digging – for the history buffs out there this is an amazing hobby to get interested in. Not only does it involve outdoor exercise, it’s also highly educational and fulfilling. The idea is to locate older streams and brooks, specifically ones closer to old settlements or villages and search the banks for evidence of days gone by. You can find old bottles, interesting pieces of china, coins and even roman artifacts and fossils! Take your finds home and then research them, Your child can even set up a museum!

3. Gardening – educational and fulfilling, your child might like to have their own section of garden or join in with yours! Try growing vegetables with them. You can even make a small nature pond if they have an interest in pond life. If you’re short on space, container gardening is fun and manageable – you can even grow potatoes in a tub!

4. Kite flying – simple but addictive and tonnes of fun, flying kites is a great way to get children outdoors. You can choose a small, affordable kite and graduate to bigger more complex kites later if the interest is there. There are also some great kite making tutorials online – what could be better than flying the kite you made yourself?

5. Treasure hunts – no need to write complicated clues for this – simply make a list of things your child must find. You can keep it simple and work only around your own home and garden or branch out into your neighbouring streets. Extra fun is a treasure hunt in the city!

Spending time outdoors is valuable for growing children and healthy for adults too. Learning from the environment around us is one of the best ways to gain a deeper understanding of the world.

This is a collaborative post.